Born 28 July 1867 at Stanley House, Clapton, Middlesex, the fourth son and seventh child of Charles Ballance and Caroline Hendebrouck Pollard, his wife. His three elder brothers entered the medical profession, the eldest being Sir Charles Ballance, surgeon to St Thomas's Hospital, noticed above. Hamilton Ballance entered Mill Hill School in 1879 under the headmastership of R F Weymouth, DLit, and left on 1 December 1884, being then a monitor and having played for the school in the cricket XI, in the second XV, and in the chess competitions. He entered King's College, London in 1887 to study science and afterwards became a medical student at University College Hospital; here he filled the posts of house surgeon, house physician, and senior obstetric assistant. At the University of London he gained the silver medal at the first MB examination, was judged worthy of the medal at the second MB, and took the degree of BS in 1892, winning the gold medal. He then spent a short time at Heidelberg and on his return to England settled in general practice at Norwich, where in 1898 he was elected assistant surgeon to the Norfolk and Norwich Hospital on the retirement of Dr Michael Beverly. In February 1900 the governors of the hospital gave him leave of absence to proceed to South Africa as a surgeon to the Imperial Yeomanry. On his return to England at the end of the war he resumed his work at Norwich, devoting himself more especially to the surgical side of the work. On 8 May 1908 he received a commission in the newly formed territorial force as an officer *à la suite*, and when war broke out in August 1914 he was mobilized with the rank of major and was attached to the first Eastern general hospital at Cambridge. He was promoted lieutenant-colonel on 5 August 1915 and temporary colonel AMS on 18 May 1917, upon his appointment as one of the consulting surgeons to the armies in France. His work in this position was so highly appreciated that in June 1919 he was gazetted a Knight Commander of the military division of the most excellent order of the British Empire, having already been decorated a Companion of the Bath. He married on 2 February 1910 Ruth, daughter of the Rev G S Barrett, DD of Norwich. She survived him with two sons and a daughter. The elder son, Ivor Hamilton Ballance, was killed in action on 29 March 1942 when serving as a lieutenant, RNVR, in HMS *Trinidad* and the younger, Tristan George Lance Ballance, MC, on 4 December 1943 when serving as a major in the Durham Light Infantry. Hamilton Ballance died after a long illness on 20 April 1936, and it was said of him that he was a careful and skilful operator, a loyal and trusted colleague. He left £50 to the Norfolk and Norwich Hospital. Publications:- Case of abscess of the right temporo-sphenoidal lobe associated with left hemiplegia and hemianaesthesia. *Brit med J*. 1897, 1, 1275. Seven cases of thoracoplasty for relief of chronic empyema. *Ibid*. 1904, 2, 1561. The best method of approach in cases of acute appendicitis. *Ibid*. 1921, 2, 394. Intermedullary capillary angeioma of the shaft of the humerus leading to spontantaneous fracture; treated by local resection and bone grafting. *Brit J Surg*. 1923-24, 11, 622.