Born on 3 June 1876, grandson of Edmund Bevers, dental surgeon of Oxford, and son of Edmund A Bevers, who practised as a surgeon in Oxford in 1873 but later specialised in dental surgery and was elected the first dental surgeon to the Radcliffe Infirmary in 1886, Edmund Cecil Bevers was educated at St Edwar's School and St John's College, Oxford. For his clinical training he went like his father to Guy's Hospital. His appointment as house surgeon in 1902 and then house physician at the Radcliffe Infirmary, Oxford marked the beginning of over forty years of devoted service there. He was a demonstrator of anatomy in the University, and in 1904 was appointed assistant surgeon to the Infirmary and elected surgeon in 1915. During the 1914-18 war he served as a surgical specialist with the rank of Major in the RAMC. After the war he returned to Oxford and was Litchfield lecturer in surgery in the University on several occasions. During the twenties and thirties Cecil Bevers took an active part in the affairs of the Infirmary, and was chairman of the Oxford Division of the BMA from 1931 to 1933, and president of the Berks, Bucks and Oxford branch in 1932-33. On account of trouble with his eyesight Bevers resigned from the Infirmary in 1933 at the age of 57 and retired to Devonshire with his wife, Tryphaena Letathea, daughter of the Rev Edward Seymour, of Bratton Clovelly, whom he had married in 1910. He looked forward to fishing and sailing, but they missed Oxford and so in 1939 returned there and Bevers started one of the most active periods of his life. He became chairman of the committee of management of the Radcliffe in 1940. Owing to shortage of staff during the war years he resumed active surgical work and teaching. Bevers guided the Radcliffe through this most difficult period, and when the National Health Service started in 1948 he was elected the first Chairman of the Board of Governors of the United Oxford Hospitals. He resigned the chairmanship in 1951, but continued to live close to the Radcliffe. He was appointed CBE in 1951. Bevers was a good-natured man of sound judgment, an excellent host and a witty conversationalist. His wife died in 1954; there were no children. He died on 13 December 1961.