Hugh Hedley Skeoch was born on 18 December 1895 in Sydney, the second son of Hugh Skeoch, a mechanical engineer and Mabel, née Hedley, who came originally from Liverpool. Hugh was educated at Grafton Public and Hay High Schools in New South Wales, and then qualified in medicine from Sydney University. He served as a Captain in the Australian Navy and with the Middle East Force in New Guinea from 1919 to 1921, but later continued his post-graduate training at the London Hospital and the Royal London Ophthalmic Hospital. He served in the RAMC as a Major from 1940 to 1945 in North Africa and Italy. He returned to Moorfields and became a consultant to the Western Ophthalmic and Edgware General Hospitals. He was awarded the Gifford Edmonds Prize in 1946 for his essay *The intraocular foreign body*, and also wrote an important article, *Penetrating war wounds of the eye and orbit*, for the *British journal of ophthalmology*. In 1953 he married Betty Unmack and they had a son, Andrew, and a daughter, Jennifer. He enjoyed golf and after retirement he returned to Sydney where he died on 15 January 1978, aged 82 years.