He was born on 11 December 1879, the third son of Walter F Adeney, congregational minister at Acton, and Mary J Hampton his wife. W F Adeney was subsequently Chairman of the Congregational Union of England and Wales; he was a distinguished theologian and Bible critic. Cuthbert Adeney was educated at Merchant Taylors' School and St Thomas's Hospital, where he was house physician and clinical assistant in the throat department. During the war of 1914-18 he served in the RAMC with the rank of Major. He then practised for a time at Broad Chalk, Salisbury, but came to Upper Berkeley Street, London about 1928, on appointment as a medical officer of the Ministry of Health. He was subsequently regional medical officer of the Ministry at Norwich, where he lived at 20 The Close. He was a member of the Medical Society for Individual (Adlerian) Psychology. After retirement he lived at Ditchling, Sussex from about 1945, and died there on 19 March 1958 aged 78. Adeney married twice: (1) his second cousin Hilda Caroline Adeney, who was survived by her daughter and an adopted daughter; (2) about 1930 Rosita Hodges, who died before her husband, leaving three daughters.