Richard Derek Richards was born on 26 February 1917 and was educated at Canton High School, Cardiff, and the Welsh National School of Medicine. He had a brilliant student career, winning all the available prizes, and graduating MB BCh with honours in 1942, having taken a BSc also during the course of study. He became house surgeon to the Professorial Unit at the Royal Infirmary Cardiff and then joined the RAMC, serving from 1943-47 under Sir Lionel Whitby in the Emergency Blood Transfusion Service at Bristol where he joined in some valuable research into oligaemic shock. He took the FRCS in 1944. On demobilization Richards became registrar and then assistant surgeon at Morriston Hospital, Swansea, and in 1950 was appointed the first consultant surgeon to the Merthyr and Aberdare Hospitals and did much to improve their scope and reputation. In 1953 he was made consultant surgeon to the Royal Gwent Hospital in Newport and the East and North Monmouthshire hospital groups, an appointment which he held till the time of his death. He was chairman of the Monmouthshire division of the British Medical Association in 1966-7. Having had such an outstanding record as a student, it was natural for Richards to become a brilliant teacher, and his friendly nature and his interest in the training of the young men who served with him caused the posts of house surgeon and registrar under him to be keenly sought after. His sudden death after a heart attack at the age of 51 was thus a loss keenly felt by great numbers of patients and by numerous colleagues of all ages. His keenness on his work left Richards little time for recreation, but he delighted in spending his leisure at home with his family and in the garden which he tended with great care, filling it with shrubs and exquisite flowers. He was a founder member of the Welsh Surgical Society, and he and his wife Megan, whom he had met when they were students together in the medical school, were always welcome attenders at its meetings. When he died suddenly on 21 September 1968 his wife and children survived him.