Raymond Kirk, known throughout his entire professional life as ‘Jerry’, was a late entrant to medicine, having left school at 16 and serving for four years in the Royal Navy in the Second World War, before becoming one of the most celebrated surgical educators of his day through his outstanding teaching and his numerous, bestselling textbooks. An exceedingly modest man, towards the end of his life he wrote: ‘I was not more than a moderate surgeon, examiner, writer; academically and politically I was sub-mediocre.’ Many surgeons of his generation would say that he underestimated his own considerable ability, and that his teaching and prolific writings on abdominal surgery, always with an emphasis on good doctoring, were unique and had a lasting influence on their own careers. Jerry was born on 31 October 1923 in Beeston, a suburb of Nottingham, to a single mother named Beatrice Kirk, who worked as a live-in children’s nurse; he never knew his father or his paternal name. He attended Mundella Primary School in Nottingham and then West Bridgford County Secondary School (a grammar school), where he joined the choir and developed an everlasting love of music. Leaving in 1939 at the age of 16, he worked as a junior clerk in a local branch of the National Provincial Bank, where he remained until 1942 when he volunteered for the Royal Navy. He was accepted as an ordinary seaman, having failed to be selected for officer training as a result of his poor mathematical skills. After shore-based training in the UK, Jerry was posted to serve on the cruiser *HMS Ajax* (which had previously been involved in the Battle of the River Plate in 1939, the first battle of the war), before it sailed to the Mediterranean taking part in Operation Torch – the Allied invasion of North Africa. The ship was often under intense bombardment by Stuka dive bombers and was seriously damaged with much loss of life; in one such attack, the sailor standing immediately next to Jerry was killed instantly. A year into his naval service, Jerry’s potential for leadership was recognised and he was selected for officer training, after which he was commissioned as a midshipman, with later promotion to lieutenant, when he became in command of a minesweeper working off the coast of Italy. It was during his years in the Navy that he obtained his lifelong nickname of ‘Jerry’ as a consequence of a fellow midshipman saying that he did not look like a Raymond and so he would call him Jerry – and the name stuck; but why that particular name was chosen is unknown. At the end of the war, Jerry applied for an ex-serviceman’s grant to enable him to study medicine and was successful in gaining a place at King’s College, London to study for the first MB with subsequent studies at Charing Cross Hospital School of Medicine. He obtained the first MB in 1947 and then spent five years at Charing Cross, from where he graduated in 1952, having won prizes in surgery and obstetrics and gynaecology. After house appointments, he became a lecturer in anatomy at King’s College while studying for the primary FRCS. He then had junior jobs at Guy’s Hospital and Hammersmith Hospital, passing the final FRCS in 1956, before returning to Charing Cross as a registrar. In 1960, he became a senior registrar at the Royal Free Hospital. He claimed that during his training years he was especially influenced by Ian Aird, Richard Franklin, Selwyn Taylor and Norman Tanner, all of whom were always considerate to their patient’s concerns, unlike many of the other chiefs he saw. He was meticulous in emulating these mentors throughout his career. In 1962, he was appointed as a part-time consultant surgeon to Willesden General Hospital, London. In the first few months as a consultant he completed his MS thesis on lymphoedema and, in 1964, he was successful in his application to another part-time post at the Hampstead General Hospital, part of the Royal Free Group. He continued to work at these two institutions until the Royal Free Hospital opened its new building in 1974, when he moved to a full-time appointment, remaining at that hospital until his NHS retirement in 1989. Although he practised the whole range of general surgery throughout his NHS years, his principal clinical interest was in upper gastrointestinal problems, particularly surgery of the oesophagus, and he published and lectured widely in this field. On retirement, having stopped clinical surgery, he was given an honorary appointment to the medical school so that he could continue teaching, which he pursued with enthusiasm. At the age of 80 he was made an honorary professor at University College London in recognition of his long-term teaching of anatomy, basic surgical skills and clinical insights, which he continued for several more years. In 2013, at the age of 90, at a birthday party given by the Royal Free Hospital, Jerry’s unique contributions to that hospital were further recognised by the opening of the Jerry Kirk seminar room. Unusually for a consultant surgeon in London, he eschewed private practice from the beginning of his consultant career, preferring to spend time teaching and writing when not in the operating theatre or outpatient clinic. Apart from his many contributions to journals, he recognised that there was a need for a clearly written textbook of operative surgery aimed particularly at surgical trainees and emphasising the difficulties and potential hazards. This led to *A manual of abdominal operations* (London, Pitman Medical Publishing Co), published in 1967. In 1970, he was awarded a travelling scholarship to visit the USA, in which he studied American surgical training methods. In two months, he visited 46 hospitals in nine cities across the breadth of the country and on return to the UK wrote an account of his visit in the Annals (‘Surgical training’ *Ann R Coll Surg Engl*. 1971 May; 48[5]: 306–312). He found that the tour gave him a fresh view of his own role in teaching young surgeons and a chance to reappraise British practice in general. It galvanised his burgeoning interest in surgical education, a passion which was to last for the rest of his life. He gained a reputation for being a first-rate teacher, always emphasising the principles of good professional relationships with patients, the need for compassion, good communication, gentleness, the importance of integrity and an understanding of human nature. His message to his students was: ‘your ultimate examiner is not the formally appointed individual who approves your registration but the patient confronting you’. This underlying philosophy was emphasised in his later bestselling postgraduate textbooks: *Basic surgical techniques* (Edinburgh, Churchill Livingstone, 1973, 7th edition, published as *Kirk’s basic surgical techniques*, Edinburgh, London, New York, Elsevier, 2018); *Surgery* (London, Pitman, 1974), with J D Maynard and A N Henry; *General surgical operations* (Edinburgh, Churchill Livingstone, 1978, 6th edition, published as *Kirk’s general surgical operations*, Edinburgh, Churchill Livingston/Elsevier, 2013); *Complications of surgery of the upper gastrointestinal tract* (London, Baillère Tindall, 1986) with C J Stoddard; *Clinical surgery in general: RCS course manual* (Edinburgh, Churchill Livingstone, 1993, 4th edition, Edinburgh, New York, Churchill Livingstone, 2004); and *Essential general surgical operations* (London, Churchill Livingstone, 2001, 2nd edition. Edinburgh, London, New York, 2007), with M C Winslet. Through these highly successful books his name became widely known and led to many invitations to speak on training courses at home and overseas and to act as an examiner. A book aimed at medical students and newly qualified doctors written in 1998 and titled A career in medicine (London, Greenwich Medical Media), unlike his postgraduate books, did not receive a wide sale, which greatly disappointed him. Jerry first became involved with the College when he became assistant editor of the *Annals* in 1971. Soon after he was appointed as an examiner for the primary FRCS and subsequently was elected to the court of examiners. In 1983, he was elected to council and in the same year assumed the editorship of the *Annals*, in which post he continued for seven years, making many changes for improvement including the introduction of the *Bulletin*. He became Penrose May tutor, director of the overseas doctors’ training scheme and developed and taught on the early surgical skills courses. He continued teaching on various College courses long after his retirement from the NHS and from council, with his numerous contributions recognised by the award of the rarely bestowed College gold medal in 1997. As well as involvement with the College, he was an enthusiastic member of the Royal Society of Medicine (president of the section of surgery from 1986 to 1987), the Medical Society of London (president from 1988 to 1989) and the Hunterian Society (president from 1995 to 1996). He was also an honorary fellow of the Association of Surgeons of Poland and of the College of Surgeons of Sri Lanka. In private life Jerry was an enthusiastic squash player well into his eighties, an opera devotee, especially loving the music of Wagner (for many years an annual pilgrimage to Bayreuth was mandatory), and a keen cyclist. He read widely and had a particular interest in the derivation of technical words, recording their origin in a notebook he always carried with him. He continued teaching and revising further editions of his books, cycling everywhere, seemingly indefatigable, until nearly 90. He married Margaret (née Schafran), known as Peggy, in 1952, whom he met in the dissecting room at King’s College when they were both students. Peggy became an audiological physician, creating a community audiological service. They had three children, Valentine, an oncologist, Jeremy, a paediatric endocrinologist, and Louise, who became an audiologist following in her mother’s footsteps. Until his early nineties, Jerry was fit and well, hardly different from his sixties, but this could not continue indefinitely: he had a stroke, became progressively unwell and died on 31 December 2019 aged 96.