Robert Peter Silverton was a surgeon in Sydney, Australia. He was born in Sydney, the son of Robert Joseph Silverton, a consultant urologist, and Dulcie Myee Silverton née Huxtable. He attended Cranbrook School and the University of Sydney. He held residencies at the Royal Prince Alfred Hospital, Sydney from 1954 to 1957. He then went to the UK, where he gained his FRCS in 1958. On his return to Australia, he became an honorary surgeon at Hornsby and District Hospital, also in Sydney, and a visiting surgeon (teaching) at the Repatriation General Hospital, Sydney. He became a fellow of the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons in 1961. In Sydney, he was influenced by Eric Vernon Barling and Norman Wyndham, and in London by Harold Cochrane and Peter Philip. Outside medicine, he enjoyed books, wine, gardening, fishing, music and art. In 1958, he married Beverley (née Warburton) and they had three children, Julia, Ralph (who predeceased him) and Rowena, and a granddaughter, Miranda. Robert Peter Silverton died on 24 January 2016. He was 85.