Philip Newman was born in Dovercourt, Essex, on 22 June 1911, the son of a civil servant, John Harker Newman, and his wife Violet Grace, née Williams. He was educated at Cranleigh School and at the Middlesex Hospital Medical School, London University, where he qualified with the conjoint diploma in 1934. In his undergraduate years he obtained the Senior Broderip scholarship and the second year exhibition. He also worked as a demonstrator in the anatomy school. He obtained his Fellowship in 1938. While still a registrar at the Middlesex he joined the supplementary reserve of officers and, as a result, was posted to the 12th Casualty Clearing Station which was sent to France in 1940. In May 1940 the unit was at Béthune and the work load was so heavy that the medical officers disobeyed the order to withdraw. Eventually the doctors were compelled to draw lots to determine who would be evacuated and who would stay with the prisoners. Newman drew the short straw and was taken prisoner. He made several attempts to escape, was recaptured, and punished with solitary confinement. In 1942 the Germans agreed to repatriate some of the severely wounded, then changed their mind and ordered the convoy back to Germany from Rouen. Newman, who was the medical officer delegated to accompany the wounded, and a companion, hid under the train. After many hardships he met a member of the French Resistance and was put on the 'Pat line' which was an escape route set up by a Belgian doctor. In the final stages of his escape he was accompanied by Airey Neave. He was awarded the DSO for services at the evacuation of Dunkirk and after his escape to England he received the MC. After the war Newman was appointed consultant orthopaedic surgeon at the Middlesex Hospital and the Royal National Orthopaedic Hospital. In 1962 he operated on Sir Winston Churchill who had broken his left leg in Monte Carlo. He was appointed a Hunterian Professor of the Royal College of Surgeons in 1954. The subject of his lecture was spondylolisthesis. Many of his contributions to the specialty were concerned with the effect of disease of the spine on the body as a whole. He was Chairman of the Council and of the editorial board of the *Journal of bone and joint surgery* and in 1976 was elected President of the British Orthopaedic Association. He was Francis Fouché lecturer at the South African College of Medicine in 1975 and on retirement in 1976 was appointed CBE. In his retirement he wrote his account of the events surrounding the evacuation of Dunkirk, published as *Safer than a known way* in 1983. Outside his professional interests, Newman was a keen yachtsman, and in his retirement devoted himself to golf in particular. He married Elizabeth Anne Basset, a nurse, in 1943, and they had two sons and a daughter. He died on 31 December 1995.