Leslie Peter Clark was born in New Zealand in 1909 and after early education entered Otago Medical School. He qualified in 1914 and two years later came to England where he undertook house officer appointments at All Saints' Hospital and the West London Hospital. At the outbreak of war he was on the junior staff at Queen Mary's Hospital, Sidcup, and was appointed surgeon to the Emergency Medical Service hospital there in 1942. He remained at the hospital after the war and passed the FRCS in 1947. In the following year he was appointed consultant surgeon to the hospital and remained there until his retirement in 1974. In addition to his clinical work he was a Fellow of the Royal Society of Medicine and served on many hospital committees. He worked hard to promote the rebuilding of his hospital and finally achieved this ambition in the year of his retirement. He had been a considerable athlete in his younger days in New Zealand and remained a vociferous supporter of the All-Blacks all his life. He was a bluff, hearty, character with a good sense of humour. He remained in south east London and died on 20 August 1984, aged 74. He was survived by his wife, Ida, a son and a daughter.