Raymund O’Neil was a professor of oral surgery at University College Hospital, London. He was born in 1926 near Preston and studied dentistry at Manchester Dental School, qualifying in 1948 and gaining his fellowship of the Faculty of Dental Surgery of the Royal College of Surgeons of England in 1952. After deciding to become a hospital dental surgeon, he joined Rupert Sutton Taylor, the pioneering oral surgeon, at the Westminster Hospital, London as a trainee, where he was simultaneously a senior registrar and an undergraduate medical student. He gained his MRCS LRCP in 1957. He was subsequently appointed as a consultant dental surgeon to the maxillofacial unit at Queen Mary’s Hospital, Sidcup and also held an appointment at the Dreadnought Seaman’s Hospital in Greenwich. In the late 1960s he left Sidcup to take up a consultant post at Guy’s Hospital, before being appointed to the chair at University College Hospital. His clinical interests focused on facial pain: he contributed significantly to the literature, including research on the use of the TENS (transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation) machine as a therapeutic tool. By 1963 O’Neil had been elected to the Oral Surgery Club of Great Britain. Around this time, he was involved in discussions over specialty harmonisation throughout Europe. Initially working with Geoffrey Howe and then with Ken Ray, O’Neil helped establish the specialty of oral surgery under the Dental Directives, which aimed to ensure that medical professionals from one state in the then European Economic Community could work in another member state. O’Neil was later to become involved in lengthy discussions over maxillofacial surgery and stomatology under the Medical Directives. O’Neil was secretary of the Oral Surgery Club from 1974 to 1983, and an honorary secretary of the British Association of Oral Surgeons from 1970 to 1973 and president in 1983. At the International Association of Stomatology, he was a member of the editorial board of *Acta Stomatologica Internationalia* and a vice president. He organised and hosted the Association’s 1981 London conference at the Royal College of Surgeons of England. Outside his professional life, he was very active in his local church, enjoyed sailing and caravanning in France. He was also interested in photography and botany, particularly the study of alpine plants. In 1954 he married Hildegarde M Sommer (Helen). O’Neil died on 24 September 2012. He was survived by his wife, four sons and seven grandchildren.