Norman Murdoch Matheson was born in Stanway and was educated at Wellington College, New Zealand, and despite a serious rugger injury which necessitated six months in hospital he joined the New Zealand Expeditionary Force and served in an infantry battalion in France in 1918. He was demobilised in 1919 and returned to New Zealand to the University of Otago. He was a contemporary and friend of Sir Archibald Mclndoe and Lord Porritt. He graduated MB ChB NZ in 1924 and gained the University Medal for clinical medicine. After a house appointment at the Wanganui Hospital he came to England and qualified MRCS LRCP London 1928, FRCS 1929, MRCP London 1931 and FACS 1939. Among resident appointments he served at the Birmingham Maternity Hospital where he met his wife Louise Johnson, a fellow resident. He became surgeon to the Central Middlesex Hospital and thence to the Ashford Hospital, Middlesex. He was especially interested in urology and was an assistant editor of the *British journal of urology* for many years. He edited the seventh edition of Hamilton Bailey's *Emergency surgery*, 1958. He was Chairman of the Middlesex County Medical Society in 1946. In 1961 at the invitation of the British Council he acted as Professor of Urology at the University of Shiraz for several months. He was a keen philatelist and wrote a *History of medicine in stamps*. He had an unassuming manner but his astute clinical acumen was matched by a fine surgical technique. His wife was Medical Officer of Health to Staines. They had two daughters and a son who is a biologist in Canada. He died on 27 July 1977, in his 80th year.