Edward Baker Hanbury Trehair was born in Johannesburg in November 1906 and was educated at the University of Witwatersrand where he graduated MB BCh in 1929. After junior hospital appointments in Johannesburg, which he performed with such success that his teachers advised him to obtain further surgical training overseas, he came to England and studied at St Bartholomew's Hospital for the Primary Fellowship which he passed in 1932. In order to obtain the necessary clinical experience he worked at several provincial hospitals and passed the final FRCS in 1939. Trehair was married during this period of training. He was back in Johannesburg in September 1939, but his appointment to the General Hospital was interrupted by the second world war in which he served, first in the 14th Field Ambulance, and later in No 5 Hospital, Cairo. In 1947 he returned to the Johannesburg General Hospital where he was on very good terms with his colleagues, and where his teaching was much appreciated by the students. He was also surgical consultant at the Chamber of Mines Hospital. Trehair played an active part in the foundation of the South African College of Physicians, Surgeons and Gynaecologists. From 1962 onwards he suffered a series of attacks of coronary thrombosis, and he was forced to abandon all professional work in 1965. Failing health severely impaired the final years of his life and he died on 28 December 1972.