Alan Jardine Watson was born on 2 December 1905. He received his medical education at the Middlesex Hospital and qualified with the conjoint diploma in 1927. He graduated MB BS two years later. He served in the RAMC from 1942 to 1946 in North Africa, Italy and Britain. After the second world war he worked at the Middlesex Hospital and the British Postgraduate Medical School, before being appointed director of accident services in Coventry and consultant orthopaedic surgeon in Coventry and South Warwickshire from 1939 to 1966. An obituary in the *British Medical Journal* by J H Penrose says: 'Within two years of being appointed director of accident services and consultant orthopaedic surgeon at Coventry and Warwickshire Hospital in 1939, Alan Jardine saw the hospital almost completely destroyed in the air raids on the city. After his demobilisation from the army he returned to Coventry and set about rebuilding an accident service in hastily reconstructed buildings in the bombed out hospital. 'With the advent of the NHS he was appointed a member of Birmingham Regional Hospital Board and served on this for nine years, during which time he helped to plan Coventry's new hospital at Walsgrave. The accident and orthopaedic departments remained at the old hospital and, under his guidance and with the gradual opening of new facilities, had grown into a highly efficient unit by the time he retired. 'A bachelor, Alan had a keen sense of humour and was a charming and genial host who enjoyed entertaining friends at his home. He also enjoyed music and foreign travel, but in recent years a slowly progressive illness gradually deprived him of all his main interests.' He died on 17 January 1993, survived by his sister Margaret.