Hugh Lett came of an Anglo-Irish family but was born on 17 April 1876 at Waddingham, Kirton, Lincolnshire, where his father Richard Alfred Lett (M.B. Dublin 1869) was in general practice; his grandfather had also been a doctor. He was educated at Marlborough College and kept a close connection with the school, becoming a life governor and chairman of the school club and helping to compile the Record of the Old Marlburians. His surgical career was spent at the London Hospital, where he came as a student from Leeds Medical School in 1896. He qualified from Leeds in 1899, took the Conjoint Diploma in February 1901, and the Fellowship in June 1902. He was appointed surgical registrar at the London in 1902, becoming assistant surgeon 1905, surgical tutor 1909-12, surgeon 1915, and consulting surgeon 1934 when he retired. In the first world war Lett served from its outbreak (1914) in France, and later in Belgium and Egypt, was promoted Major, R.A.M.C., and awarded the CBE in 1920. Though his main interest was urology, he was always a general surgeon and his writings, while not frequent, covered many topics. He was one of the first to advocate adequate operation for appendicitis, to prevent recurrence. Between the wars Lett began to find operating sessions wearisome, and it was noticed that in the theatre he lost his usual imperturbability. Fortunately he had great abilities as an administrator and medical statesman, which he became free to use for the benefit of his colleagues and the country by retiring relatively young. Lett's association with the College was long, close, and extremely valuable. He served on the Court of Examiners 1923-25 and on the Council 1927-43. He was elected President in 1938 and held office for the customary three years, which were sadly spoiled for him by the anxieties and disasters of the war. Already before war broke out he was taking a personal initiative in safeguarding the College's treasures. He travelled to Aberystwyth in the summer of 1939 and arranged the removal of the most valuable paintings, books and other treasures to the National Library of Wales, and during 1940 secured a generous grant from the Rockefeller Foundation to evacuate the library to the west country. In May 1941 the Museum was bombed and much of the collection destroyed, in spite of Lett's provision of a deep vault to protect thousands of the Hunterian specimens. After this disaster he actively supported his successor Sir Alfred Webb-Johnson (as he then was) in planning to restore the Museum. He became a Hunterian Trustee in 1942, was the first permanent Chairman of Trustees 1955-59, and lived to see the Museum successfully renewed. He had been Bradshaw Lecturer in 1936, speaking on "The early diagnosis and treatment of tuberculous disease of the kidney", and was Thomas Vicary Lecturer in 1942, when he described "Anatomy at Barbers' Hall", an address based on original research. Lett married in 1906 Nellie, only daughter of (Sir) Buckston Browne F.R.C.S., a leading London urologist and afterwards one of the College's most munificent benefactors. Lett took an active interest in his father-in-law's two foundations at Downe: the Darwin Museum and the Surgical Research Farm. Sir Buckston had also endowed a dinner at the College, and in the year of Lett's Presidency he gave each guest a silver box full of snuff. Lady Lett died before her husband, on 9 August 1963, and Sir Hugh was survived by their three daughters. Lett was created a Baronet in 1941 while President of the College, and KCVO in 1947 to recognise his work for King Edward's Hospital Fund for London, where he had been one of the honorary secretaries since 1941. He was particularly concerned with the King's Fund's work for nurses and was the first chairman of its Staff College of Ward Sisters. He had previously been President of the Hunterian Society in 1917, and its Orator in 1919, President of the Sections of Surgery and of Urology at the Royal Society of Medicine in 1932-33, and Master of the Worshipful Society of Apothecaries in 1937-38. He was Chairman of the war-time Committee of Reference for allocation of medical man-power, and in 1946 succeeded his former surgical colleague Sir Henry Souttar as President of the British Medical Association. In this position his wise statesmanship proved invaluable to the profession and the nation in preparing for the start of the National Health Service. Lett was a tall man of serious demeanour, kindly and affable, utterly without affectation, and upright in all his ways. He was meticulous and regular in business, firm but courteous in personal contacts, and made an admirable chairman, with a wealth of experience and innate common sense. As a young man he enjoyed fencing and golf, but music was his favourite recreation, for he was an accomplished cellist. Lady Lett gave the College the portrait of her husband by Sir James Gunn R.A., which admirably catches his reserved, but slightly quizzical look, and gave a different portrait by the same artist to the Society of Apothecaries. Sir Hugh Lett died at his home at Walmer on 19 July 1964 at the age of 88. He had been so active and prominent in professional affairs that he was still widely known and held in affectionate regard by many colleagues much younger than himself, although he had retired from surgery thirty years earlier. Throughout his long life "he nothing common did or mean", but remained a pattern of unobtrusive and unselfish virtue.