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 6 August 1860, the son of Alexander Wilson, MD Aberdeen, who was then practising at 223 Lincoln Terrace, Stretford New Road, Manchester. A delicate child, he was sent at an early age to live with Scottish relatives at Lockerbie, Dumfriesshire, where he was taught in the Dryfesdale parish school

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

Born 30 June 1860, the second son of William Emanuel Page, MD, FRCP, and his wife, a daughter of Robert Keate, PRCS 1831 and 1839. W E Page, who had been a Faculty Student of Christ Church, Oxford, was physician to St George's Hospital and died on 2 January 1868, aged 59. H M Page was educated at

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

Born about 1873 he was educated at Bristol medical school, held house appointments at the General Hospital and the Royal Infirmary, Bristol and at the Manchester Royal Infirmary, and was for a time demonstrator of anatomy in the Bristol medical school. During the war of 1914-18 he served in the RAMC

Born in 1856 the son of Captain Charles Edward Mortimer, 4th Middlesex Militia, and his wife Mary Jane Fanstone. He was educated at Bristol and at the Westminster Hospital and St Bartholomew's. He served for a period as prosector at the Royal College of Surgeons. He first intended to practise as an

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

Frankis Tilney Evans was born on 9 March 1900. He trained at St Bartholomew's Hospital but in the first world war was seconded to the RNVR during his clinical course, serving in destroyers on convoy duty and in minesweepers. Thus began a lifelong love of the sea and ships. Returning to Bart's he gra

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.

William Mushin was born in London on 29 September 1910, the younger son of Moses Mushin and Jesse, née Kalmenson. He received his early education at Davenant School and his medical education was at the London Hospital Medical College, where he won the Buxton Prize in anatomy and the Anderson Prize i

Geoffrey Organe was born in Madras on 25 December 1908, the elder son of the Reverend William E H Organe KiH, a missionary, and his wife Alice, née Williams, the daughter of a mining engineer. His early education was at Taunton School before going to Christ's College, Cambridge, where he was honorar