Mary Fredericka Richardson was born in Portland, Dorset on 10 April 1917, the daughter of Surgeon Captain Arthur Henry Sims Richardson, DOMS, RN, who after retirement from the Navy became an ophthalmic surgeon in Hereford in 1927. Her mother was Emma Fredericka, née Barker. She came from a medical family, having an uncle and a cousin who were both surgeons, and another cousin who was a radiologist. She spent much of her childhood travelling the world with her parents. She was educated at Hereford High School for Girls, the Godolphin School in Salisbury and St Hugh's College Oxford, where she gained a rowing blue and was president of the Oxford Women's Boat Club in 1939. She did her clinical studies at Oxford University Medical School and qualified in 1942. After junior posts in surgery and obstetrics and gynaecology at the Radcliffe Infirmary, Oxford and Ronkswood Hospital, Worcester, she joined the RAMC for three years from 1944 to 1947. She spent a year in Anti-Aircraft Command, and then two years in India doing orthopaedic and maxillo-facial surgery. She was then repatriated after developing tuberculosis, but after further training passed the FRCS in 1956. She was subsequently appointed surgical registrar at Crewe General Hospital and later senior registrar at the Mid-Ulster Hospital in Magherafelt, County Derry. In 1959 she returned to India, taking a post as surgical officer at Johar General Hospital, Assam, and from 1963 to 1970 she worked as company medical officer to the Jorehaut Tea Company in Assam, with responsibility for a 120-bedded hospital serving a population of 50,000. She returned to England finally in 1970 and worked mainly as a clinical assistant in the casualty department at Hereford General Hospital until 1983 when she retired. In 1972 she married Richard (Dick) Clifford whom she had met in Assam. She died of cancer on 25 April 1993 aged 76, survived by her husband and step-children.