James Emerson was born in Chesterfield in 1947, qualified at the Middlesex Hospital, where he did his house jobs, and, immediately he had registered, went to Colombia to work in an outlying district hospital. He always retained this interest in rural life in South America and a concern for the needs

Joseph Edwards studied medicine at King's College and King's College Hospital. After house appointments at King's he was a senior demonstrator in anatomy at the Middlesex Hospital before specialising in plastic surgery. He published extensively on the role of relaxin as an aetiological factor in dia

Bruce Bailey was an innovative plastic surgeon at Stoke Mandeville Hospital. He was born in Bradford, Yorkshire, on 29 February 1928, where his father, John Bailey, was national secretary of the Cooperative party. His mother was Anne née Glaser, the daughter of a tailor. He was educated at Bradford

Sir William Manchester was the Sir William Stevenson professor of plastic and reconstructive surgery at the University of Auckland, New Zealand. He was born in Waimate, south Canterbury, New Zealand, the son of James Manchester and Martha Manchester née Brown. He received his early education at a lo

Roy Routledge was born in Bexhill-on-Sea on 10 May 1918, the son of Robin Coghill Horner Routledge, an engineer, and Gwyneth May, née Davies. He was educated at Bexhill-on-Sea Grammar School and St Bartholomew's Hospital, where he represented his medical school as a flyweight boxer. He qualified in

Neil Solomons was a consultant ENT, facial plastic and reconstructive surgeon in Penang, Malaysia. He was born and brought up in South Africa. He came from a medical family; his father, Arthur Solomons, and an uncle were general practitioners. Another uncle was a plastic surgeon in Port Elizabeth, a

John Hueston was born in Hawthorn, Australia, on 16 January 1926, the son of John Albert Hueston, a civil servant, and Hazel Minnie, a teacher. He was educated at Trinity Grammar School, Melbourne, and at Trinity College, Melbourne University. He qualified in 1948, having gained a number of undergra

Ashall was born in Addis Ababa in 1954 and received his medical education at St Mary's Hospital, whence he qualified in 1978. Dr Geoffrey Irvine, the medical superintendent at Chogoria Hospital in Kenya, where Ashall spent three months in 1973, inspired Ashall to turn to surgery after qualification;

Denis Bodenham was a pioneer plastic surgeon who learnt his basic skills in RAF hospitals during the war, and went on to apply his expertise in peace time surgery, making important contributions to the pathology and the management of malignant melanoma. He was born in Bristol on 20 October 1915, the

Joseph Patrick Irwin Reidy (Pete) was born in London on 30 October 1907, the second son of four brothers and three daughters: his father Jerome Reidy MD was a general practitioner, son of a doctor, who practised in the Commercial Road and who had married an Irish nurse, Miss F W Dawson. His educatio

Ivor William Broomhead was a consultant plastic surgeon at the Hospital for Sick Children, Great Ormond Street, Guy's Hospital and the Royal Masonic Hospital, London. He was born on 7 December 1924 at Armthorpe, Yorkshire, the son of Frederick William Broomhead, head of mining engineering in Doncast

David Wynn-Williams was a consultant plastic surgeon at Nottingham Hospital. Born on 16 August 1914, his father was a general practitioner in Middlesborough. David was a medical student at the Westminster at the same time as his brother, George, who became a gynaecologist at the Chelsea Hospital for