Gerald Holmes was a surgeon at hospitals in Nigeria, South Africa, the South Pacific and the Middle East. Born on 7 January 1931 in Rotherham, he was the son of John Holmes, a wholesale confectioner, and his wife Lucy née Roome who was a nurse. He was educated by the Jesuits at Mount St Mary’s Colle

John Robey Cobbett was a consultant plastic surgeon at Queen Victoria Hospital, East Grinstead, and Lewisham Hospital. He was born on 5 May 1930, the third son of Claude Racster Cobbett, a company director, and Constance Evelyn Anne Cobbett née Robey. From the age of four, following the death of his