Born 31 July 1877, fourth son of John Needham of Eccles, Lancashire. He was educated at Owens College, Manchester, where he graduated in science and served as demonstrator of anatomy. He took his medical training at the Manchester Royal Infirmary, where he served as house physician. He was commissioned in the Indian Medical Service in January 1903 and served in North China from 1905 to 1908, being promoted captain in 1906. He became interested in public health problems and took the DPH at Manchester in 1910. He was posted on special duty in 1912 for the repatriation of Chinese troops from Tibet. When war broke out in August 1914 he had just been promoted major, and was sent to France as Deputy Assistant Director of Medical Services for hygiene at Marseilles, the port of landing for the Indian troops; he was awarded the DSO in 1916. He was recalled to India in 1916 to superintend the medical supplies for Mesopotamia, after the breakdown there. He was made Deputy Director General of the Indian Medical Service in 1918, was promoted lieutenant-colonel in 1922 and brevet colonel in 1924 when he retired, having been created CIE in 1919. Needham's six years' tenure of the Deputy Directorship gave him opportunity of getting to know nearly every officer of the Indian Medical Service, and his robust and likeable character won him universal respect and popularity. Dick Needham was a stimulating and hospitable friend to all with whom he came in contact, while his shrewd and diplomatic advice was of great value to his Service. He represented India at the conferences of the Office internationale d'Hygiène publique in Paris in 1923 and 1927, and in the intermediate years 1925-26 he carried through the reorganization of the medical services of the Indian State Railways. From 1923 to 1930 he acted as the General Medical Council's visitor of Indian medical colleges, a task which he performed with his accustomed genial ability. He did similar service from 1932 to 1939 in Burma, Ceylon, and Hong Kong, and the Colonial Office sent him on a like mission to Nigeria and Uganda in 1939-40. He had been knighted in 1932. Needham served on the Council of the British Medical Association from 1932 to 1938, and was particularly active in the naval and military committee, where he made himself the effective advocate of his brother Indian Medical Service officers, and secured the support of the Association for their claims, at the time of reorganization and imminent disbandment. During the war of 1939-45 Needham represented the British Red Cross and St John War Organization as their commissioner in the Middle East and later in Italy, and was also for a time the commissioner of the Indian Red Cross in Egypt. He was created a Knight of the Order of St John for his services. Needham married in 1925 Harriet Ellen, daughter of Lieutenant-Colonel R Dewar, RA, who survived him. He died in his flat at Grosvenor House, Park Lane, London on 24 October 1949, aged 72. He left £1,000 to the University of Manchester for a library at Needham Hall, and three-quarters of the residue of his large fortune to the university, one-quarter being for a John Stopford fellowship in applied anatomy, and two-quarters for scholarships for students of Needham Hall.