Henry Ralph Johnson, generally known as Harry, was born on 18 October 1930, the son of a senior officer in the Victoria Public Service, and was educated at Melbourne Grammar School and Trinity College, obtaining the degrees of BSc in 1951 and MB BS of Melbourne University in 1954. He then held a series of appointments in Melbourne, RMO at Prince Henry's Hospital in 1955, at the Royal Children's Hospital in 1956, and at the Fairfield Hospital in 1957, after which he came to England to obtain the FRCS in 1960. He stayed in London as senior registrar at St Paul's Hospital in 1960, and at the Bolingbroke Hospital in 1961, and then returned to Melbourne to become assistant surgeon at the Alfred Hospital from 1962-1964, after which he was appointed surgeon to the Austin Hospital and Prince Henry's Hospital and continued as such for the rest of his life. Henry Johnson served in the Vietnam war with the surgical unit from Prince Henry's Hospital. In 1970 he published an article on operative cholangiography in the *Australian and New Zealand journal of surgery*. His favourite recreation was yacht racing. He was engaged to be married and was preparing for his wedding when he met with a freak motor accident on his way to operate at the Austin Hospital on 19 May 1972. He was comatose in hospital for several weeks, but seemed to be recovering when he died on 16 January 1973. He is to be commemorated by a scholarship to be awarded by the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons, financed from his estate.