John Dunlop was born on 29 June 1915 in India, where his father, John Dunlop, was a doctor. He was educated, with an entrance scholarship, at Epsom College, and in 1932 gained a scholarship to St Thomas's Hospital Medical School, and qualified in 1937. After holding a number of resident posts at St Thomas's, he became resident surgical officer at the London Clinic. On the outbreak of the second world war he joined the RAMC and was posted to the 17th General Hospital until the fall of France, when he was transferred to the Commandos, and later went to India with the 17th Hospital. Dunlop volunteered for parachute training and served in Burma as Commanding Officer of a mobile surgical unit, ending his Army career with the rank of Major. After the war he worked for a time at Oldchurch Hospital, and later was chief assistant in surgery at Chase Farm Hospital, Enfield. Dunlop was appointed to the staff of Blackburn Hospital in 1950, where he worked particularly in urology; he was especially interested and influential in postgraduate teaching. He had married in 1941, and died after long illness from carcinoma of the oesophagus on 24 July 1972, survived by his wife, two sons and a daughter.