Anthony (Tony) Benjamin Oliveira was born in Ceylon (Sri Lanka) on 23 November 1923, the only child of Benjamin Ernest Graeme Oliveira and Edith Glenny, née Davies. He was educated at Stowe School and King's College, London, and later at Westminster Hospital. During the second world war he enlist

Peter Knipe was born on 3 March 1929 in Whitehaven, the son of William Edward Knipe, a schoolmaster, and his wife, Doris Margaret. He was educated at Whitehaven Grammar School and St Bartholomew's Hospital, where he played rugby football for the hospital and the United Hospitals XV, and gained honou