Alan Bell Tawse was born on 18 March 1915 in Nottingham, the only child of Herbert Bell Tawse FRCS, a consultant otolaryngologist, and Gertrude Mary, née Goodall, daughter of a hosiery manufacturer. He was educated at Neville Holt Preparatory School, Uppingham School and Trinity College Cambridge, and went on to the Middlesex Hospital, where he was much influenced by Blundell Bankart and Guy Pulvertaft. He qualified in 1939 and held Junior appointments at Mount Vernon Hospital and the Radcliffe Infirmary, Oxford. In 1941 he joined the RAF Volunteer Reserve, in which he served until 1946. He was senior medical officer to the Mediterranean Allied Air Force at their headquarters in Caserta, Italy, reaching the rank of Squadron-Leader and being mentioned in despatches. After the war he trained as an orthopaedic surgeon at the Derbyshire Royal Infirmary, and became a consultant in Pontefract, where he set up a unit for the management of road traffic casualties. He was an active Fellow of the British Orthopaedic Association, was President of the Holdsworth Orthopaedic Club, and medical adviser to the Yorkshire Association for the Disabled. Upon retirement he moved back to Scotland, and took up a post as lecturer in anatomy at the medical school in Aberdeen. In his leisure time, Bell Tawse was an enthusiastic gardener, and particularly enjoyed cultivating carnations. He was a keen fly-fisherman, and enjoyed pigeon, grouse and pheasant shooting. In 1941 he married Margaret Irene, née Cousins, a nurse. They had three daughters - Mary, a nurse, Rosemary, a hospital manager, and Susan who became a consultant dermatologist at Dundee - and seven grandchildren, including one about to go to medical school. He died in Alford, Aberdeenshire, on 31 May 1995, survived by his wife and family.