Alan Hunter Tooley was a consultant general surgeon at North Ormesby Hospital, Middlesbrough. He was born in East Ham, London, on 13 May 1930, the only child of Geordie parents. His father, Henry ('Harry') Hunter Tooley, served in the RAF and took part in the Jarrow march before he left the North Ea

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

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

Syed Zafar Haider was professor of surgery at King Edward Medical College, Lahore, Pakistan. He was born on 27 December 1927 in Lahore; the family’s ancestral home was in Bazaar-e-Hakiman in the Bhati Gate area of Lahore. His father, Mohammad Shah, was a lawyer who also held a masters’ degree in Eng

Born in Bratislava, Czechoslovakia, on September 12, 1909, the elder son of Arnold Kirz, technical manager of a textile concern, and Josephine, née Neumann. He studied at Prague University and qualified in 1935. He began his career as a surgeon as an assistant in a teaching unit. In 1939 he came

Howard Foy was born on 28 September 1919 at Penrhyndeudraeth, Merionethshire (now Gwynedd). He graduated MB ChB at Liverpool in June 1943 and was house surgeon to Professor O Herbert Williams from July of that year to June 1944. He was then senior house surgeon to Professor T P McMurray until March

Peter Goodall was a consultant general surgeon in Derby. He was born on 8 February 1927 in London, the son of the Rev Norman Goodall, a minister of religion, and Doris Stanton, a Birmingham Medical School graduate. Peter was educated at Queen Elizabeth’s Grammar School in Barnet and Highgate School,

Mervyn Dunning was a consultant general surgeon in Shrewsbury. He was educated at Hampton Grammar School, London. He initially trained as a dentist at the Royal Dental Hospital, qualifying in 1941. He held junior posts, as a house surgeon and then senior house surgeon in maxillofacial surgery. He t

Neil MacDonald was a consultant surgeon at the Wythenshawe Hospital, Manchester. He was born on 29 October 1927 in Suffolk, the son of E A MacDonald. He was educated at Ipswich Grammar School and Epsom College, from which he won a scholarship in science to the London Hospital Medical College in 1945

Ken Millar was chief of surgery at the Repatriation Hospital, Heidelberg, Victoria, Australia. He was born in Wangaratta, Victoria, on 13 October 1926, the second son of schoolteachers Leonard James Millar and Marion Millar née Amiet. He grew up in a variety of rural towns in Victoria, before the fa

Anthony Oliver Robertson was a consultant general surgeon based in Tamworth, New South Wales.

Sir Herbert Livingston Duthie (known as Bert to colleagues and family) was provost of the University of Wales College of Medicine. He was born into a modest but happy home in Glasgow, the eldest of three children, and soon made an impression academically, winning prizes throughout his school years.