George Bush Junior said his father was ‘a man of the highest character and the best dad a son or daughter could ask for’.

Obit George HW BushGeorge HW Bush enlisted into the navy in his 18th birthday and is pictured here pinning a lieutenant bar on his son, George W. Bush, after the younger Bush was made an officer in the Texas Air National Guard in Ellington Field, Texas.(AP Photo, File)
Obit George HW BushMr Bush entered politics in 1963 and was made Ambassador to the United Nations in 1971 (AP Photo/John Duricka, File)
Obit George HW BushMr Bush decided to run for president in 1980 but the Republican party would endorse Ronald Reagan (AP Photo, File)
Obit George HW BushFormer president Gerald Ford lent his support to Republican presidential candidate Ronald Reagan and his running mate George HW Bush (AP Photo/File)
Obit George HW BushMr Bush was sworn in as president in 1989 by Chief Justice William Rehnquist outside the west front of the Capitol as first lady Barbara Bush holds the bible for her husband (AP Photo/Bob Daugherty, File)
Obit George HW BushHe was president as the Soviet Union fell and is pictured here at a conference with President Mikhail Gorbachev, at the Soviet Embassy in Madrid (AP Photo/Jerome Delay, File)
Obit George HW BushMr Bush condemned the Chinese crackdown on pro-democracy demonstrators in Beijing’s Tiananmen Square in 1989 (AP Photo/Marcy Nighswander, File)
Obit George HW BushPresident George HW Bush is greeted by Saudi troops and others as he arrives in Dhahran, Saudi Arabia, for a Thanksgiving visit (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite, File)
Obit George HW BushMr Bush ran again in 1992 and is pictured here talking with independent candidate Ross Perot as Democratic candidate Bill Clinton stands aside at the end of their second presidential debate in Richmond (AP Photo/Marcy Nighswander, File)
Obit George HW BushGeorge HW Bush, then candidate for the Republican nomination for the US Senate, is pictured getting returns by phone at his headquarters in Houston, as his wife Barbara, smiles at the news. (AP Photo/Ed Kolenovsky, File)
Obit George HW BushGeorge HW Bush, left, walks with his wife, Barbara Bush, followed by their son, President George W. Bush, and first lady Laura Bush to a reception in honour of the Points of Light Institute in the East Room at the White House in Washington (AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta, File)
Obit George HW BushMr Bush made a dramatic entrance to his presidential museum during a rededication ceremony in College Station, Texas (Sgt. 1st Class Kevin McDaniel/U.S. Army via AP, File)
Obit George HW BushGeorge and Barbara Bush are pictured here as they arrived for the premiere of HBO’s documentary on his life near the family compound in Kennebunkport, Maine (AP Photo/Charles Krupa, File)
Obit George HW BushBarbara Bush died in April this year (AP Photo/David J. Phillip, File)