Douglas Donald Currie Howat was a consultant anaesthetist at St George’s Hospital, London. He was born on 10 January 1920, in Denholm in Roxburghshire on the Scottish borders. His grandfather ran a muslin factory in Glasgow, but his father, Reginald Douglas Howat, preferred the life of a country gen

Sir Donald Campbell was a former professor of anaesthesia at the University of Glasgow and President of the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Glasgow from 1992 to 1994. He was born on 8 March 1930 at Rutherglen, near Glasgow, the son of Archibald Peter and Mary Campbell. He attended Hutche

Thomas Cecil Gray was the first professor of anaesthesia at Liverpool University and undoubtedly one of the great British pioneers of modern anaesthesia. He was born in Liverpool on 11 March 1913, the son of Thomas Gray, a local publican, and Ethelreda Unwin. A devout Roman Catholic, Cecil was educa

Gordon Robson was a former director and professor of anaesthetics at the Royal Postgraduate Medical School and Hammersmith Hospital, and the first anaesthetist to be elected vice-president of the college. He was born in Stirling on 18 March 1921, the son of James Cyril Robson and Freda Elizabeth How

Anaesthesia was introduced into surgery in 1846 and for the first 100 years little progress was made. It remained essentially a craft learned by experience rather than a science. Full-time anaesthetists were rare, anaesthetics being administered by general practitioners or any hospital doctors. The

Born on 2 April 1875 at Bannatyne, Barbados, only child of Henry Eudolphus Boyle, sugar-planter, and his wife, *née* Law. He was educated at Harrison College, Barbados, and at St Bartholomew's Hospital. As a student he was president of the Abernethian Society. After a short time as casualty officer

Ashley Skeffington Daly was born on 12 July 1882, his father being an MD in practice in Hackney. He was educated at the Merchant Taylors School and the London Hospital and qualified MRCS, LRCP in 1905. He obtained the DA England in 1935 and was one of the first to practise anaesthetics as a speciali

Born on 25 April 1905 he was educated at Brighton College and the Middlesex Hospital, qualifying with the Conjoint diploma in 1927. He was appointed anaesthetist at the Middlesex Hospital, and in 1938 took the diploma in anaesthetics. In the second world war he served in the RAMC in the Central M

Ronald Jarman was born on 7 August 1898. At the commencement of the first world war, while still a schoolboy in the north of England and an active member of the Officers' Training Corps, he became attached to the Army Staff as a dispatch rider. Very soon, while still under age, he became attached to

Herbert Johann Scharlieb, he changed his name by deed poll in 1914, was born at Madras on 22 July 1868, the younger son and second of the three children of William Mason Scharlieb (died 1891), barrister of the Middle Temple, and Mary Ann Dacomb Bird, his wife, afterwards Dame Mary Scharlieb (1845-19

Ivan Magill was born at Larne, Northern Ireland on 23 July 1888 the son of Samuel, a draper and Sara (née Whiteside). He was educated at Larne Grammar School and Queen's University, Belfast, a strong young man of "enviable physique" being a rugby forward and a heavy-weight boxer for the university.

Second son of Henry Willett, brewer, of Brighton, well known as a collector and antiquarian; cousin of Alfred Willett (qv). Educated at Wellington College, he matriculated in the University of Oxford from New College on Oct 15th, 1875, graduated BA with 1st class honours in the School of Natural Sci