Lucas Carl Jansen van Rensburg was always known as Boet. Although he was born in Parys, Free State, South Africa, his family lived mostly on the Zambian copperbelt and he travelled long distances to attend boarding school in Bethlehem. He studied medicine at the University of Cape Town and graduated

James Russell Fergusson Downie (Jim) was born on 5 November, 1932 to George and Gertrude Downie at St Georges Hospital, Kew. He spent his childhood in Auburn attending school firstly at Auburn South Primary School, then Gardenvale, the Melbourne High School where he matriculated with distinction. Th

Arthur Dixon was born in Melbourne on 14 April 1922; the eldest son of R H E Dixon, and was educated at Wesley College, Melbourne. He entered the State Savings Bank as a clerk at the Croydon branch in 1939, living with his family at Lillydale. In 1941 he was conscripted to the Commonwealth Milita

Colin Windsor was a general surgeon in Worcester. He was born on 26 February 1933 in Stourport-on-Severn, Worcestershire, and attended grammar schools in Kidderminster and Stourbridge. He excelled in sports, especially rugby, as well as academic subjects. Qualifying from the University of Birmingham

George Weir Johnston was a consultant general surgeon at the Royal Victoria Hospital, Belfast. He was born into a farming family near Ballymena in County Antrim, Northern Ireland, the youngest of five sons of Thomas Johnston and Jeannie Johnston née Weir. Whatever aspirations he may have had to be

Monica Lewin was a surgeon at Kingston Public Hospital and a part-time lecturer in anatomy at the University of the West Indies. She was born on 15 August 1925, in Clarendon, Jamaica. Her father, James Mahoney Lewin, was the 'grand old man' of the district of Vere, in Jamaica. He founded and became

Gordon Clunie was a pre-eminent figure in the surgical life of Australia, New Zealand and the Pacific. Born in Fiji, he received his primary school education in Suva and secondary schooling at first in Hamilton New Zealand and later in Edinburgh. He studied medicine at the University of Edinburgh, g

Lucian Gladwin Blaise Weliwita-Gunaratne was an accident and emergency surgeon in Kidderminster, and later returned to Sri Lanka, where he was a consultant surgeon at the Central Hospital (Nawinne). He was born on 3 February 1930 at Teldeniya, near Kandy, Ceylon. His parents, Don Zacharias Weliwita-

Alexander Cameron, known as ‘Alistair’, was a consultant surgeon at Norfolk and Norwich Hospital. He was born in Tranent, East Lothian, on 1 August 1933, the son of Alexander Cameron, a miner who became vice-president of the National Union of Mineworkers for the Scottish area, and Margaret née Hogg,

Gavin Smillie (formerly Smellie) was a consultant general and vascular surgeon and honorary clinical lecturer at the Victoria Infirmary, Glasgow. He was born in Glasgow in 1926, the son of William Smellie, a geologist, and Janet Smellie née Douglas, a school teacher. He spent his early years in Arge

Michael Baddeley, universally known to a wide circle of friends as 'Mick', was a consultant surgeon to the United Birmingham Hospitals. He was born at Wolstanton in Staffordshire on 20 September 1932, the elder son of a mining engineer. He was educated at Chesterfield School, Derbyshire, and the Uni

Sir Peter Morris was the Nuffield professor of surgery, chairman of the department of surgery and director of the Oxford transplant centre at the University of Oxford and president of the Royal College of Surgeons of England from 2001 to 2004. He was born in Horsham in the state of Victoria, Austral