Roy Kenneth Rowley was a general surgeon whose career was largely spent overseas. He was born in Birmingham on 19 February 1931. His father was Harold Herbert Rowley, an inspector for Birmingham City Transport. His mother was Nellie May Perks. He was educated at King Edward's School, Birmingham, from which he entered Birmingham University to study medicine. After junior posts, he served as a surgical specialist in many hospitals overseas, including Monserrat, Fiji, Zambia, Iran and the United Arab Emirates. He often found himself the sole doctor in remote hospitals, working for little financial gain. He sometimes had to anaesthetise and operate on members of his own family, and, on one occasion, saved the life of a revolutionary guard while being threatened at gunpoint by the man's compatriots. He married Elizabeth Ann McKewan in 1954. They had two daughters, Sally and Jane, and three sons, Simon, Michael and David. Simon went on to become a surgeon and an FRCS. He had four grandchildren. Roy Kenneth Rowley died on 15 April 1999.