Candler was born in 1884 and studied medicine at St Bartholomew's Hospital, qualifying with honours in 1908. After numerous house appointments at Bart's he passed his Fellowship in 1912 and was appointed to the staff of the Royal Devon and Exeter Hospital in 1914. During the first world war he served in the RAMC, mainly in the Salonica campaign, and was mentioned in dispatches. After the war he returned to Exeter and remained there until his retirement in 1946. During the second world war he supervised the arrangements for increasing the bed capacity of his hospital for the admission of air-raid casualties and convoys of injured from the Forces. After retirement he championed the hospital side of the National Health Service and strongly advocated preparations for the take-over of the Hospital by the Ministry of Health. He was soon elected a founder member of the South-West Regional Hospital Board and later succeeded to the post of vice-chairman. When the Devon and Cornwall Committee was formed he became its first chairman, retiring before the end of his term of office to make room for a younger man. Candler was a skilful and conscientious operator and an admirable teacher of house surgeons and nurses alike. He was also a man of decided views, but to his friends a much-loved figure. His chief interests outside his profession were, first, fishing and second observing nature, with special concern for wild bird life. In later life he took up painting both in watercolours and oils, but of all the arts Candler loved music most and both he and his wife were pianists well above the average. He was an active Freemason, and also became vice-president of the Exeter Boy Scouts. He died at the age of 83 on 4 April 1965 and was survived by his widow, a daughter who married a doctor, and two sons, both of whom are surgeons.