Sir Nicholas was educated at
Eton College and
Sandhurst, and took a commission in the
Royal Horse Guards in 1953. He played
polo, and was an amateur
jockey. On his own horse, Stalbridge Park, he won the
Grand Military Gold Cup at
Sandown Park in 1958, came second in 1959, then third in 1960, won again in 1961, and came second another time in 1962. He served in
Cyprus during the
Cyprus Emergency. By 1966, he was a major, in command of the
Guards Independent Parachute Regiment. He resigned his commission in 1968, on the death of his mother, to take over the family firm. He held a party at Lowesby Hall in 1959, to celebrate the restoration of a painted ceiling by
Antonio Verrio, and held a dance in tents at Lowesby in 1976, shortly before it was sold, emulating a party held by the
Shah of Iran in the desert in 1972. Nuttall supported the
Labour government's
Channel Tunnel project in the 1970s. The company was later involved in the construction of
High Speed 1. The company was bought by
Hollandsche Beton Groep (later HBG), a Dutch group, in 1978, and he emigrated shortly afterwards with his third wife, Miranda, moving to
Lyford Cay, near
Nassau, Bahamas, on
New Providence there, although he kept a house in
Chelsea. He became involved in
marine conservation and founded the
Bahamas Reef Environmental Educational Foundation (BREEF), almost single-handedly transforming local attitudes to maritime conservation. The
Nassau Guardian lauded him after his death as a "prominent local environmentalist... at the forefront of a number of important marine conservation initiatives and environmental causes". ==Family life==