Born at Blythe Court, Newnham-on-Severn, Gloucestershire on 30 April 1855, the sixth child and fifth son of William Barling, MRCVS, veterinary surgeon and farmer, by his wife Eliza Sharpe. He was educated privately until he matriculated at the University of London in 1875 from Queen's College, Birmingham. In October 1875 he entered the medical school attached to St Bartholomew's Hospital and there made a life-long friendship with (Sir) Anthony Bowlby. He won the scholarship in anatomy and physiology, the Kirkes gold medal in clinical medicine, and the Brackenbury surgical scholarship, and was a house surgeon from 1 October 1879 to 30 September 1880. On the advice of Oliver Pemberton, FRCS he then applied for and was elected to the post of pathologist to the Birmingham General Hospital, where he was successively resident surgical officer, assistant surgeon (1885), surgeon from 1891 to 1915, consulting surgeon (1915-40) and president of the hospital board from 1925. On his resignation as surgeon, on reaching the retiring age, he was presented with the portrait which now hangs in the hospital and Mrs Barling received a pendant of opals, diamonds, and pearls in recognition of the encouragement and sympathy given to her husband during his long and devoted work at the hospital. For many years Barling was chairman of the Birmingham Committee of the Hospital Sunday Fund, of the Birmingham Hospitals Council, of the Hospitals Guild of the Amalgamated Orthopaedic Hospital and Cripples Union. He taught almost continuously throughout his professional life at the Birmingham Medical School, first as demonstrator of anatomy (1885), then as professor of pathology at Queen's College (1886) and at Mason College. He was co-professor of surgery and dean of the faculty of medicine in the university 1905-06 and 1911-12, and Ingleby lecturer (1895). Whilst at the university he acted as vice-chancellor (1913-14 and 1926-27), pro-chancellor (1927-28 and 1932-33). On his resignation of the last office he was made emeritus professor of surgery and was again presented with his portrait. In 1937 he received from the university the honorary degree of Doctor of Laws. At the Royal College of Surgeons of England he served as a member of the Council from 1904 to 1912, and on the General Medical Council he represented Birmingham University. He joined the territorial force on 3 July 1908 with a commission as lieutenant-colonel, RAMC, *à la suite*, and was called up for service in August 1914 when he was posted as consulting surgeon to the southern command. On 18 June 1917 he was promoted colonel, AMS and in November went to France as consulting surgeon to the British forces on the western front. For his military services he was decorated with the CB in 1917 and the CBE in 1919, and in recognition of his civil work at Birmingham he was created a baronet in 1919. On 21 October 1885 he married Katherine Jaffray, daughter of Henry Edmunds. She died in 1920, leaving him with two daughters: the elder unmarried; the younger, Mrs E L Chaloner, whose husband was editor of the Journal of Commerce and Shipping Telegraph and afterwards of the Public Ledger. Sir Gilbert died suddenly whilst walking in his garden at 6 Manor Park, Edgbaston on 27 April 1940, three days before his eighty- fifth birthday. Gilbert Barling attained to a position which is only possible in a large provincial town possessed of a strong ésprit de corps both in civic and professional life. Starting in Birmingham without any advantages he made his way to a large practice by the excellence of his surgery. He availed himself of the successive changes in surgical practice and kept himself abreast of them by his ability to teach students. He was foremost in improving and advancing the medical faculty of the newly established university and in consolidating the clinical side of surgery. He was endowed by nature with great powers of administration which, with his transparent honesty of purpose and friendliness of manner, brought him to a very prominent position in his adopted city. Portraits: No 1. By E Harper, three-quarter length, in vice-chancellor's robes, hangs in the boardroom of the General Hospital, Birmingham. No 2. By Fiddes Watt, three-quarter length, in pro-chancellor's robes, hangs in the Great Hall of Birmingham University.