Donald McGavin was a general surgeon at Leicester Royal Infirmary. He was born on 23 September 1906 in Wellington, New Zealand, the son of Mary Allan née Chapple and Major General Sir Donald Johnstone McGavin, FRCS, who had been director general of the New Zealand Army Medical Services at the end of

Eric John Smith was a consultant surgeon at the Royal Free Hospital, London. He was born on 31 March 1910 in Norwood, Surrey, the second son of Robert Percy and Edith Smith. His early life was overshadowed by the death from Hodgkin’s disease of his elder brother who had been a child prodigy, and Eri

Ghosh practised in Calcutta; he died in India on 25 December 1966, aged about sixty.

Hugh Cecil Fletcher-Jones was born in Yung Ping Fuh on 26 February 1911, the third son of Dr Arthur Fletcher-Jones who was, for 20 years, a medical missionary in China. He was educated at Monkton Combe School in Bath and qualified MB BS in 1935 at the Westminster Hospital, did his residency there an

William Henry Daines Trubshaw was born in Johannesburg in 1908, his father having gone to South Africa during the Boer War and became headmaster of the Mayfair School in Johannesburg. Trubshaw went to King Edward's School and Houghton College, Johannesburg and then came to St Bartholomew's Hospital

William Robert Soutter Hutchinson, the son of a general practitioner, was born at Cannock in Staffordshire and educated at Sedbergh, where he developed his love of the country and the walking and fishing he enjoyed all his life. He then proceeded to Cambridge and completed his medical studies at St

George Qvist was born on 13 August 1910, in London, the third son of Emil Qvist, a bookseller, and his wife Emily. After education at Quintin School he entered University College, London, for his preclinical studies and was elected Bucknill Scholar at University College Hospital. He was awarded the

William Rotherham Hunter was born in Skelmersdale, near Ormskirk, on 18 February 1911, and was educated at Ormskirk Grammar School and the University of Liverpool, graduating MB BCh in 1933. He took the Conjoint Diploma the same year, and after junior posts at the David Lewis Northern Hospital, and

Francis William Shepherd, who was born in Nottingham on 6 December 1906, grew up in Castletown, Isle of Man. With a London BSc he studied medicine at Cambridge and St Bartholomew's Hospital. After holding posts in Hampstead and Ilford he was appointed RSO at Huddersfield in 1938 and, it is said, ser

George Cuthbert Dewe Roberts was born in Plymouth on 20 August 1909. He was the son of George Augustus Roberts and his wife Florence Muriel, née Mills. His father was at that time honorary surgeon to the Royal Hospital, Devonport, before moving to Winchester where he was appointed to the Royal Hamps

Richard Sampson (Dick) Handley was born in London on 2 May 1909, the eldest son of William Sampson Handley and Muriel Rigby, the daughter of the Reverend Clayton Rigby. Dick's father was on the surgical staff of the Middlesex Hospital, a member of both the Council and Court of Examiners of the Colle

Ernest Harold Carr Harper was a consultant surgeon at West Kent Hospital, Maidstone. He was born in Surrey in 1908, where his father Harry was managing director of a shipping company. His mother was Constance née Carr. He was educated at Hurstpierpoint School, before going to St Thomas's to study me