The seventh son and youngest (eleventh) child of John Henry Hewer, MRCS (see the preceding memoir of C M Hewer), he was born on 7 October 1875. He was educated at University College School and from there proceeded to St Bartholomew's Hospital, where he was secretary and vice-president of the Abernethian Society. He served as house surgeon to W J Walsham, and was afterwards assistant house surgeon at the Gloucester Infirmary. In 1903 he took up his residence at 6 Church Street, Stratford-on-Avon, and in 1908 was appointed surgeon to the Stratford-on-Avon Hospital. He soon obtained a large share of the surgical practice of the neighbourhood and during the war was placed in charge of the Clopton War Hospital, his services being recognized by the OBE with which he was decorated in 1919. Hewer married in 1903 Lucy Margaret Newton in Bromsgrove, Worcestershire. She survived him with two daughters. He died after a long illness from lymphosarcoma on 24 October 1931, and was buried in Carna, a small island off the coast of Argyllshire. The island came into his possession after the death of Canon Newton, and he had been accustomed to spend his holidays there fishing. The widespread popularity to which he had attained was strikingly shown by the very large attendance at the memorial service held in the parish church at Stratford-on-Avon. Quiet-spoken, a little above middle height, and somewhat resembling his uncle John Langton, he was a skilled surgeon and a generous friend; late in life he became a mystic. After his death a memorial was subscribed for by the inhabitants of Stratford-on-Avon and others, and on 26 April 1933 the Bishop of Coventry, Dr Mervyn Haigh, opened and dedicated the Earnshaw Hewer Memorial operating theatre and extensions at the Stratford-on-Avon General Hospital.