Ernest Edward Dunlop, widely known as 'Weary', was a quite exceptional man whose stamina, sheer tenacity and bravery whilst a prisoner of war in the Far East gave him a unique position in Australia and in the College. He must be one of the few surgeons whose likeness was printed on an Australian stamp as well as on the 1995 Australian 50 cent piece, with the head of the monarch on the obverse. No account such as this can encompass such a legend, and the reader is urged to study *The War Diaries of Weary Dunlop*, a remarkable illustrated record of his period in captivity which was published forty years after the end of the second world war. He was born in Australia at Wangaratta, Victoria, on 12 July 1907, the younger of the two sons of James Henry Dunlop, a farmer at Sheep Wash Creek, and Alice Emily Maud, a teacher. His great-grandfather, Henry Nagle Walpole, had served as a surgeon with the East India Company during the Indian mutiny. After education at Stewarton State School and Benalla High School, Victoria, where he won a number of prizes, he studied at the Victorian College of Pharmacy, winning the Gold Medal in 1927 and 1928. Then, like Sir Thomas Dunhill before him, who had also been a pharmacist before becoming a surgeon, Dunlop determined to study medicine. He secured an exhibition to Melbourne University and a resident scholarship to Ormond College, where he was president of the students' club. He won prizes in physiology, obstetrics and gynaecology, and graduated with first class honours. He was house surgeon and registrar at the Royal Melbourne Hospital in 1935 and 1936, and was registrar at the Royal Children's Hospital, Melbourne, in 1937. In the pattern of those times he then came to the United Kingdom to study for the final Fellowship at St Bartholomew's Hospital, having passed the primary in Australia. He was house surgeon at Hammersmith Hospital to Grey Turner and A K Henry, and later on was to list with gratitude Sir Alan Newton, Sir Victor Hurley, Sir William Upjohn, Professor Edgar King, Sir Gordon Gordon-Taylor and, most notably of all, Sir Thomas Dunhill, as his surgical mentors. Throughout his early years Weary was an outstanding sportsman: he won Blues at Melbourne University for Australian Rugby Union Football and heavyweight boxing, and won Australian Rugby Union caps between 1932 and 1934. Shortly before the war he was in the memorable St Mary's XV for 1939, won a Barbarian cap, and was selected for the Commonwealth XV. Throughout his life he continued to enjoy tennis, golf and cricket. He stood 6'4", and was described by Robert Marshall as being 'a huge, slow, affable, shambling bear of a man who spoke slowly, courteously and calmly. He seemed the very personification of his undergraduate nickname but, in the true Australian tradition, the label 'Weary' was no more accurate than 'Tiny' would have been. His apparent slowness concealed a mind like a steel trap'. Then came the war. He had just been appointed an EMS specialist surgeon in the St Mary's sector in 1939 when he volunteered for the medical branch of the Australian Imperial Forces in London, and was posted to Palestine, which he recorded as 'the most unholy land'. He served in Tobruk, Greece and Crete, where he narrowly escaped capture. Early in 1942 he landed in Java, three weeks before the Dutch surrender. A fellow prisoner, Maurice Kinmonth FRCS, described the drama of the handover of the Allied Hospital. A tiny Japanese General was received by the towering Colonel Dunlop, who stood rigidly to attention. The General, by way of showing his displeasure, drew his sword and flashed it repeatedly on either side of Weary's head. Weary never blinked. Australians were not easily intimidated. Although Weary was neither a combatant nor the most senior officer of the combined forces, he was, by general consent, appointed Officer-in-Charge. He commanded the camp at Bandoeng until January 1943, when several thousands of prisoners were transported via Singapore up the Malaysian peninsula to an unknown destination. Many camp sites were prepared to build the notorious Burma-Thailand Railway. It was at this time that Weary's outstanding stoicism and courage were tested to the full. 'Part hero, part saint' said one of his colleagues. His surgery in the most primitive conditions saved many lives and brought relief to innumerable sick and wounded. No less important was his leadership and inspiration for his fellow prisoners. 'Weary Dunlop was a lighthouse of sanity in a universe of madness and suffering'. By surreptitious means he established a relationship with Mr Boon Pong, a courageous Burmese river trader, who bravely agreed to supply essential foods and medicines which significantly relieved the suffering of the sick and starving. After the war, Weary returned to Melbourne to marry his fiancée Helen Raeburn Ferguson, from whom he had been separated since 1939. He became honorary surgeon to the Royal Melbourne Hospital from 1946 to 1967. He was also consultant surgeon to the Peter MacCallum Cancer Clinic, the Royal Victoria Eye and Ear Hospital, and the Heidelberg Repatriation Hospital. For the rest of his working life he was a very general surgeon who was known for 'working on and on at all hours, day and night', a pioneer in laryngectomy, thoraco-abdominal surgery, oesophagectomy and surgery of the aorta. In 1969, when he was 62, he led the Australian surgical team to South Vietnam. He was absolutely dedicated to the cause of war veterans, former prisoners-of-war and war widows. He embraced innumerable other good works. He was President of the Australian Anti-Cancer Council, the Victorian Council on Alcoholism and Drug Dependency, and the Victorian-Asian Medical Association. He was Patron of the Dunlop/Boon Pong/Thailand/Australia Medical Exchange, and the Sir Edward Dunlop Medical Foundation for Ageing Ex-Servicemen. He was named Australian of the Year in 1977, and starred in a BBC 'This is your Life' programme in 1979. With his old friend Robert Casey, Weary Dunlop was actively involved in the Colombo Plan for a number of Asian countries. He was honoured by the surgical and medical associations of many countries. He was an untiring surgical traveller, notably with the International Society of Surgery, of which he was a Vice-President. The last few years of Weary's domestic life were marred by his wife's Alzheimer's disease. She died in 1988. They had two sons, Richard and Alexander, one of whom became a medical practitioner in Melbourne. Weary himself remained remarkably fit and vigorous until he developed pneumonia and died on 2 July 1993. His State funeral on 12 July was attended by 1500 people in the Cathedral, together with representatives of the Prime Minister and Leader of the Opposition, the Governor-General, the Governor of Victoria, members of the judiciary and of many associations and national institutions. The eulogy was given by the Rt Hon Sir Ninian Stephen, former Governor-General of Australia (1982-1989) who movingly said that 'he was loved and respected at a distance by millions, and intimately by his family and those fortunate enough to be his close friends at home and overseas'. More than twenty thousand people lined the streets of Melbourne. Some of Weary's ashes were scattered in Melbourne. The rest were take by his sons to the River Kwai, where they launched them in a bamboo boat decorated with orchids to the strains of a piper playing 'Flowers of the Forest'. There are statues of Weary Dunlop in Melbourne and Benalla, Victoria, near the family farm. The inscription on the base of the latter reads: *When despair and death reached out to us Weary Dunlop stood fast, a lighthouse of sanity in a universe of madness and suffering*.