Born on April 18th, 1861, the second son of Charles F Littlewood, of Hempstead Hall, Norfolk. He was educated at Norwich and at University College, London, where he gained the Atkinson-Morley Scholarship in Surgery in 1884, and was House Physician and House Surgeon at the Hospital and Assistant Demonstrator of Physiology and Senior Demonstrator of Anatomy at the College. In 1886 he became Resident Surgical Officer at Leeds General Infirmary, and at the end of four years began practice as a consulting surgeon, being also elected Assistant Surgeon at the infirmary on the death in 1890 of Arthur Fergusson McGill (qv). In 1896 he was promoted to the full staff and had charge of beds for seventeen years, at the close of which period he was elected Consulting Surgeon. At the University of Leeds he was successively Demonstrator of Surgical Pathology, Lecturer in Practical and Operative Surgery, and finally Professor of Surgery. From the first he had shown that he was destined fitly to carry on the high traditions of Leeds surgeons. McGill said of him: "Littlewood is the best man I have ever had to assist me at an operation." He rather shunned specialism in surgery, though his reputation as an abdominal surgeon stood deservedly high. In the early days of his career, and especially during the period of his residence in the infirmary, he laid the foundations of a remarkably sound and varied knowledge of orthopaedic surgery, which enabled him during the latter years of the Great War to organize that branch of work at the 2nd Northern General Hospital. To a mere onlooker some of his finest work would appear to be in connection with the extirpation of aneurysm, and he showed at the meetings of the Leeds and West Riding Medico-Chirurgical Society many cases in which cures had been effected by excision. It is believed that the first specimen which proved the possibility of true ovarian gestation was shown by Littlewood and Mr G P Arming at a meeting in London of the Obstetrical Society in 1899. The report was published in the *Transactions* of that Society for the year 1901. In an appreciation of Littlewood published in the *Yorkshire Post*, Lord Moynihan says: "As an operator he was safe. The rash adventure was foreign to his nature. He considered all aspects of a difficult case, and was hard to move when once he had reached a decision. He was cautious, but never timid; quick, without haste; full of resource in every emergency. His sagacity was almost faultless. Though his mind moved easily along the old paths, he was always ready to seek the new. He devised fresh methods and new devices, some of which have taken their place in contemporary surgical procedure." Littlewood retired to his small estate at Erpingham, near Aylsham, Norfolk, at a time when Europe was at peace, and it seemed probable that he would enjoy undisturbed leisure. He had been the victim of zealous unremitting work, but greater toil was to come. He had lived in retirement only some sixteen months when the European War broke out, and he returned to harness as a Lieutenant-Colonel in charge of the Surgical Section of the 2nd Northern General Hospital, working under Colonel J F Dobson, who had been one of his own students. He took his full share of operating, and, Colonel Dobson falling ill, he administered the hospital alone until after the War had ended and it was handed over to the Ministry of Pensions. His final retirement lasted no very long time, and he died suddenly at Erpingham Lodge on December 19th, 1921. The funeral took place at Ingworth Church, Norfolk, on December 22nd, 1921. At the time of his death he was Consulting Surgeon, not only to the General Infirmary, Leeds, but also to the Victoria Hospital, Keighley, and the Mahon Hospital, Extern Examiner in Surgery at the National University of Ireland, and had been Secretary and President of the Leeds and West Riding Medico-Chirurgical Society. Publications:- *Statistical Surgical Reports of the Leeds General Infirmary*, 1886-9. Article on "Bubo" in Quain's *Dictionary of Medicine*, 3rd ed. "Treatment of some Complications of Injuries about the Elbow-joint." - *Braithwaite's Retrospect*, cxxi. "A Contribution to the Operative Treatment of Malignant Disease of the Rectum." - *Lancet*, 1896, ii, 745. "Seven Cases of Volvulus treated by Abdominal Section." - *Ibid*, 1899, i, 428. "Intestinal Suture." - *Ibid*, 1901, i, 1817. "Malignant Disease of the Colon." - *Ibid*, 1903, i, 1511. "Primary Ovarian Pregnancy" (with G P ANNING). - *Trans Obst Soc*, 1901, xliii, 14. "Adenocarcinoma of Body of Uterus in Association with Adenomyoma Diffusum Benignum" (with M J STEWART). - *Jour Obst and Gynaecol*, 1913, xxiii, 396. *An Address delivered before the Yorkshire College Medical Society on October 18, 1893*, 8vo, Leeds, 1893. "The Treatment of Aneurisms of Arteries of the Extremities by Extirpation of the Sac," 8vo, 2 plates, London, 1895; reprinted from *Lancet*, 1894, ii, 1143, etc.