Gaston Benett was born on 12 November 1922 in Poudre D'Or, Mauritius, the son of Raymond Benett, a hospital pharmacist, and his wife, Suzanne, née Davis, a teacher. He attended the Royal College in Mauritius from where he won a scholarship to Cambridge for his pre-clinical studies. He then entere

Brian Maxwell Andrea was born on 26 January 1925 in Kattang, Western Australia. He studied to become a dental surgeon before graduating MB, BS from the University of Sydney. Having travelled to the UK, he passed the fellowship of the college in 1957 and worked as a registrar at the Royal Hospital, W

Ransford George Kerr ‘Ran’ de Castro was a New Zealand based surgeon. He was born on 1 September 1926, the son of Leopold Ransford de Castro, a general practitioner in Te Kuiti, a town on the North Island of New Zealand, and Edith Mary de Castro née Kerr. De Castro studied medicine at Otago Universi

Edward (‘Ted’) Watson was a general surgeon at Wellington Hospital, New Zealand. He was born in Dunedin, the eldest child of Vera Christian Watson née Cameron and Edward Baden Watson; his father was a surgeon, his mother a music teacher. He had two siblings – Arthur and Diane. Ted’s childhood years

Peter Harold Edwin Courtenay was a consultant surgeon in British Columbia, Canada. He was born in London on 5 June 1928, the only child of Harold Edwin Courtenay and Annie Lillian Courtenay née Currie. He studied medicine in London and qualified in 1951. He gained his FRCS in 1957. In 1955 he mar

Gordon Alexander Dyce Lavy was born on 1 October 1924 in Nablus, Palestine, where his parents were working as members of the Church Missionary Society. Having been ordained at Cambridge, his father spent some time as a missionary in the Middle East before deciding on a career in medicine and qualify

Alan Robert Trist was a surgeon in Sydney, New South Wales. He was born in New Haven, Connecticut, USA, where his Australian father, also Alan Robert Trist, a forester, was studying at Yale University. Trist’s mother was Ivy Alma Trist née Priebe. The family returned to Australia when he was two and

Basil Ireland was surgeon in Sydney, Australia. This is a draft obituary. If you have any information about this surgeon or are interested in writing this obituary, please email lives@rcseng.ac.uk

Paul Chanmugam was born in Jaffna, Ceylon, on 1 June 1900, the son of Anna Annama (née Paul) whose father was resident surgeon at the Friend in Need Hospital, Jaffna, and Joseph Kadir Gamer Chanmugam, Principal of Jaffna Central College, where he received his early medical training before entering K

Jean Anne Evans was an assistant specialist surgeon in renal medicine at Glan Clwyd Hospital, and prior to that at Royal Alexandra Hospital in Rhyl. She was born on 25 May 1930 in Sheffield. Her father, Herbert Oliver ('Bunny') Evans, was a Congregational minister and her mother, Gertrude Mary ('Mol

Bernard Langdon Whitaker was born on 22 October 1927, the son of Harold Whitaker, a marine superintendent, and his wife Helen née Wragg, a schoolmaster’s daughter. He was educated at Woking County Grammar School on a county major scholarship. In 1949 he graduated MB, BS from London University having

Ken Brearley started life in Hampton (Melbourne) where he attended both Hampton Primary and Hampton High schools before winning a scholarship for Years 9-12 at Scotch College, which was quite some distance away in Hawthorn. In 1948, having won a place into Medicine at the University of Melbourne in