Cover image for
Resource Name:
Resource Type:
External Resource
Metadata
Asset Name:
E004396 - O'Brien, Desmond Patrick (1906 - 1945)
Title:
O'Brien, Desmond Patrick (1906 - 1945)
Author:
Royal College of Surgeons of England
Identifier:
RCS: E004396
Publisher:
London : Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date:
2013-09-04
Description:
Obituary for O'Brien, Desmond Patrick (1906 - 1945), Fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons of England.
Language:
English
Source:
Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Full Name:
O'Brien, Desmond Patrick
Date of Birth:
28 July 1906
Place of Birth:
Oamaru, New Zealand
Date of Death:
1945
Occupation:
Titles/Qualifications:
MRCS and FRCS 1 December 1936

MB ChB New Zealand 1930

FRACS 17 April 1943
Details:
Born 28 July 1906 at Oamaru, New Zealand, son of John O'Brien, of Devonport, NZ, civil servant, and Minnie Cagney, his wife. He was educated by the Marist Brothers at Vermont Street, Dunedin, and at the Sacred Heart College there. He graduated in medicine in 1930 from the Otago Medical School, and came to England for postgraduate study at St Bartholomew's Hospital, and also worked on the continent and in Ireland. He took the Fellowship, though not previously a Member of the College, on 10 December 1936. On returning to New Zealand O'Brien served as deputy superintendent of the Kawakawa Hospital and then as medical superintendent of the Bay of Islands Hospital. He married in January 1939, settled as a consultant at Auckland, and was elected assistant surgeon to the Mater Misericordiae Hospital. He acted as secretary of the Auckland division of the British Medical Association. At the outbreak of war in September 1939 he joined the NZ Medical Corps, and went on service in the Pacific in January 1942. Two years later he was transferred to the Middle East, and later served at a base hospital in Italy and then, as a major, commanded a field surgical unit in the Italian front line. He was invalided to Egypt at Christmas 1944, and while at No 5 NZ General Hospital at Helwan was shot and killed in the spring of 1945 by a drunken sentry, who was convicted of his murder. A requiem mass was held at the Roman Catholic Cathedral at Auckland, at which the bishop spoke of his "largeness of mind and gaiety of heart". O'Brien married at St Patrick's Cathedral, Auckland, in January 1939 Katherine Smyth, who came from Ireland to marry him. Mrs O'Brien survived him, with a son and a daughter.
Sources:
*NZ med J* 1945, 44, 152

Information given by Mrs Katherine O'Brien
Rights:
Copyright (c) The Royal College of Surgeons of England
Collection:
Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format:
Obituary
Format:
Asset
Asset Path:
Root/Lives of the Fellows/E004000-E004999/E004300-E004399
Media Type:
Unknown