Search Results for

First Title value, for Searching Crowfoot, William Miller (1838 - 1918)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-09-07
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001300-E001399
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373531373531
Occupation General surgeon
Details The grandson of William Henchman Crowfoot (often cited as Henchman Crowfoot) (qv), and the elder son of William Edward Crowfoot (qv). The Crowfoots of Beccles were well known as medical men in East Anglia for more than a century, and each generation followed worthily in the footsteps of its fathers. Crowfoot was educated at Fauconberge School, Beccles, and then at Basle; he received his professional training at St Bartholomew's Hospital, where his student career was brilliant, for he won exhibitions and scholarships with ease. In 1857 he won the University of London Gold Medal in Anatomy and Physiology at the Intermediate MB examination, and in 1859 the Gold Medal in Comparative Anatomy, Physiology, and Surgery - carrying with it an Exhibition - and the Gold Medal in Midwifery. He was offered an appointment at St Bartholomew's Hospital immediately after graduating, but preferred to enter into practice with his father at Beccles, where he greatly increased an already large number of patients. He was for many years Surgeon to the Beccles Hospital, of which he was Hon Consulting Surgeon at the time of his death. As a medical practitioner he gained the affection and confidence of a large circle of patients. Always keeping himself abreast of medical knowledge and procedure, his opinions were received with marked attention by his colleagues, and his wide experience was always at the disposal of his younger brethren. Michael Beverley, MRCS, who was associated with him professionally for over fifty years, bore witness to his popularity in the medical circle at Norwich and to his high social and scientific qualifications. Crowfoot was an enthusiastic naturalist, botanist, and archeologist, and an early supporter of the Volunteer movement which started in 1860, and in which he held the rank of Hon Lieutenant-Colonel. He was a sound public man, both as a magistrate, and as a worker on Borough and County Councils and on Diocesan Committees. To the proceedings of medical meetings in Norwich he contributed many valuable papers, and among these his address as President of the East Anglian Branch of the British Medical Association was a signal success. He married Catherine Ann Bayly, by whom he had three sons and three daughters. One son, William Bayly, followed in his father's footsteps and joined him in practice, but died in 1907. One daughter married H Wood-Hill, practising in Beccles, and another daughter married N E Waterfield, FRCS. He died, after his retirement, at his residence, Blyburgate House, Beccles, on April 6th, 1918, and his funeral was attended by the Mayor and Corporation in state.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001348
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Cumberbatch, Alfonso Elkin (1847 - 1929)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-09-07
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001300-E001399
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373536373536
Occupation ENT surgeon General surgeon
Details Born in London on April 11th, 1847, the second son of Mr Cumberbatch, a merchant in Barbados. He was educated at Grosvenor College, Bath. As a medical student at St Bartholomew's Hospital he soon showed himself a skilful dissector, obtained a prize for anatomy, and in due course won the Kirkes Gold Medal for Clinical Medicine. He was appointed House Surgeon by Holmes Coote (qv) in October, 1870, and was elected Assistant Demonstrator of Anatomy at St Bartholomew's Hospital in 1871, becoming full Demonstrator and eventually Senior Demonstrator in charge of the 'rooms'. These offices he filled for ten years and trained a succession of good anatomical surgeons. In 1869 the Governors of St Bartholomew's Hospital established a department for the treatment of diseases of the ear and placed it under the charge of Sir Thomas Smith (qv), then an Assistant Surgeon. He was succeeded in 1873 by John Langton (qv), to whom Cumberbatch acted as unpaid assistant in the scanty leisure he obtained from his work in the Anatomical Department. Langton became full Surgeon to the Hospital and Cumberbatch was elected the first Aural Surgeon. In spite of restricted accommodation he carefully instructed the few students who were far-seeing enough to attend. Towards the latter part of his service he was assisted by Laurie A Lawrence, FRCS. In 1907 Cumberbatch became Consulting Aural Surgeon, and was succeeded by C E West, FRCS, and S R Scott, FRCS. The department had become fittingly housed in the new block of buildings. During the European War (1914-1918) Cumberbatch, aided by Lawrence, resumed active service during the absence of West and Scott. He was also Aural Surgeon to the National Hospital, Queen's Square. Cumberbatch was one of the founders of the Otological Society of Great Britain and Ireland in 1899, serving as Treasurer in 1899 and President in 1905. After his retirement from the hospital he devoted himself entirely to the large private practice which he had built up, first in Queen Anne Street, Cavendish Square, and afterwards in Park Crescent, Portland Place, but later he retired to Great Sarratt Hall, near Rickmansworth, where he died of pneumonia on March 25th, 1929, and was buried in the East Finchley Cemetery. He married Alice Lucy Moffatt in 1881. She died before him, leaving one son and three daughters. Cumberbatch wrote no book but contributed many articles on diseases of the ear to the Otological Society and to the various medical periodicals. He became wealthy by marriage independently of his practice, so that he had no stimulus to make public the knowledge he had amassed in the course of years. He was an excellent teacher of anatomy, especially for students who only required the broad facts, and he left to his juniors the more minute and scientific knowledge. As a man he had many hobbies: he played golf, tennis, and billiards more than creditably; he collected stamps and Oriental porcelain and was an authority upon both. He always had a grievance on some minor point, but as he aired it humorously his friends never took it seriously and were not bored by it because it changed almost daily.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001353
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Cutler, Edward (1796 - 1874)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-09-07
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001300-E001399
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373544373544
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born at Wimborne, Dorset, the son of a clergyman. Entering the Navy at an early age, he found himself not sufficiently robust to continue in that service. Accordingly he took to medicine and was educated in the schools of Great Windmill Street and St George's Hospital. He was gazetted Assistant Surgeon in the Life Guards on July 25th, 1821; retired on half pay on June 21st, 1824, and commuted his half pay November 6th, 1832. Later he assisted Sir Benjamin Brodie in private practice. He was elected Assistant Surgeon to St George's Hospital in 1834, and Surgeon in 1848, when he resigned the office of Surgeon to the Lock Hospital - held by him for many years. His service at St George's Hospital, till he retired in 1861, was most faithful and efficient. In the whole of it he was only once absent for more than a week save on one occasion when ill health prevented his attendance. He was a most dexterous operator, and in cases of lithotomy was uniformly successful. He could use the knife with the left hand equally as well as with the right. He was rarely equalled in the facility with which he performed perineal section. Cutler never lectured, never spoke at Medical Societies, never wrote on professional subjects, yet obtained a practice and an influence over such a number of people of importance as few of his confreres could boast of. Through his connection with the Lock Hospital he enjoyed as large a practice in venereal diseases as any since the time of John Pearson. The older pupils of St George's Hospital may recollect him occasionally visiting a patient in the hospital early in the morning, an overcoat covering the 'pink', previous to a run with the royal staghounds, as Sir Philip Crampton might have been seen in Dublin in bygone days. He died at his residence, 15 New Burlington Street, W, on September 7th, 1874. Mrs Cutler, a daughter of Sir Thomas Plumer, Master of the Rolls, survived him, as did also a daughter and a son - a Chancery barrister. His portrait is in volume ii of *The Medical Profession in All Countries* (1874). At the time of his death he was Consulting Surgeon to both St George's and the Lock Hospitals.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001361
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Crabtree, Norman Lloyd (1916 - 2004)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Cudmore, Roger Edward (1935 - 2004)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Cummins, Brian Holford (1933 - 2003)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-09-23
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000000-E000099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372232372232
Occupation Neurosurgeon
Details Brian Cummins was a consultant neurosurgeon at Frenchay Hospital in Bristol. He was born in Somerset on 10 March 1933, the son of Peter Cummins (known as ‘Cecil’ or ‘Pop’) and his wife, Rita. His early years were spent in Bath, but he moved to Edmonton, Alberta, in 1946, when his family emigrated to Canada. At the age of 16 he entered the University of Alberta to study classics and modern languages, at the same time as helping his father build the family home. He spent his vacations working as a foreman in pipeline construction in Manitoba. He graduated with honours in 1953. A chance encounter with a book on the surgery of epilepsy by Wilder Penfield, director of the Montreal Neurological Institute, raised in him an ambition to become a neurosurgeon and he spent two years on the medical course at Alberta, before returning to England to complete his studies at Bristol in 1961, when he won a gold medal. After qualifying, he held a junior post in neurosurgery in Oxford under Joe Pennybacker and John Potter, where he developed his interest in head injury management, brain tumour and spinal injury. He returned to Bristol in 1968 as senior registrar. He became a consultant neurosurgeon at Frenchay Hospital, Bristol, in 1973. He retired in 1999. Cummins’ interests in neurosurgery were wide, encompassing tumours, spinal surgery and head injuries. He was instrumental in bringing the main technological advances in neurosurgery to Bristol and pioneered teleradiology. He was involved in improving the standards of head injury care in the region by education and guidance on management, and helped the College and the Society of British Neurological Surgeons in producing their booklet on the topic. He was an advocate of multidisciplinary clinics and this, plus his interest in the rehabilitation of head injuries, led to his setting up a head injury unit at Frenchay in 1992, of which he was director for three years. He also took part in the charity Headway which sought to help these patients. He also established a combined clinic for managing brain tumours. In spinal surgery he developed a steel prosthetic joint for implanation into the cervical spine. He was an enthusiastic and patient teacher of junior staff and would spend much time supervising them in operations. Consultant surgeons from at least half the neurosurgical units in the UK trained with him at some stage. He was an adviser on head injury to the Department of Health, the Royal Colleges, and to the World Health Organization in Bosnia. He advised on neurosurgical services in India and South East Asia, and raised funds for a children’s unit. His character was enthusiastic and extroverted. Love of outdoor activities resulted in him breaking both hips rock climbing in 1970. He was so grateful for the help he received from the mountain rescue team that he joined the organisation to advise and teach. He enjoyed skiing, canoeing, hill-walking and travel to remote places, and he was an extremely knowledgeable gardener, studying for a degree in botany during his early retirement. He married Annie in 1961 and they had two sons, Sean and Jason. He died on 16 August 2003 after a short illness of carcinoma of the pancreas.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000045
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Dinning, Trevor Alfred Ridley (1919 - 2003)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-09-23 2010-01-27
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000000-E000099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372237372237
Occupation Neurosurgeon
Details Trevor Dinning, known since childhood as ‘Jim’, was the architect of neurosurgical services in South Australia and the creator of a very successful research foundation. He was born in Dulwich, Adelaide, on 16 February 1919, the second child of Alfred Ernest Dinning, a school inspector and later headmaster of Adelaide Boys High School, and Maud Isabel née Ridley, who died two years after his birth. He was educated at his father’s school and then went on to study medicine at the University of Adelaide, qualifying in 1942 in the top three of the year after completing a shortened wartime course. In 1943 he joined the Army, serving as a captain in the Northern Australia Observer Unit and then in the 2nd 17th Australian Infantry Battalion. He developed pulmonary tuberculosis, which incapacitated him for some two years. He was discharged from the Army in 1946. It was at this time that he decided to make a career in neurosurgery. After his recovery, he took an appointment as lecturer in anatomy at the University of Adelaide, under the brilliant neuro-anatomist Andrew Abbie. During this time he wrote a paper on healed fractures in aborigines, based on the collection of skeletons in the South Australian Museum. Work as an anatomist doubtless contributed to his success as a surgeon: as an operator he was at his best in procedures demanding exceptional anatomical skill. At that time, it was virtually impossible to train as a specialist neurosurgeon in Australia, so, on a grant from the Royal Adelaide Hospital, Jim went to the UK. He entered neurosurgical training at Guy’s Hospital under Murray Falconer. During this appointment he was first author of a paper on ruptured intracranial aneurysm as a cause of sudden death, the work being based on forensic cases. Falconer had been a pupil of Sir Hugh Cairns, who was a pupil of the pioneering American neurosurgeon Harvey Cushing. Jim was to exemplify the best qualities of the Cushing/Cairns school – great interest in the neurosciences, unhurried and meticulous operative technique and total commitment to the welfare of patients. Jim returned to Australia in 1953 and took up an appointment in the Royal Adelaide Hospital, where he was to work for the next 30 years under a variety of titles – first as a member of the honorary staff, then from 1970 as full-time director of neurosurgery. After his resignation in 1979 he remained as a visiting consultant until 1983. He was also chief of neurosurgery in what is now the Women’s and Children’s Hospital. In both hospitals he rapidly established modern neurosurgical units, with rigorous attention to quality control and case audits. He was not the first neurosurgeon to serve these two hospitals – he was preceded Sir Leonard Lindon, one of the founders of Australian neurosurgery. Sir Leonard welcomed and supported Jim, but it is true to say that the development of an integrated state-wide neurosurgical service was very largely Jim’s achievement. He gave special attention to the needs of South Australians living in country areas, and in the 1960s persuaded the then minister of health to equip country hospitals with instruments to care for head injuries. Although he was happiest in his work in public hospitals, he ran a well-organised private service, chiefly at the Memorial Hospital, where after his retirement he treated cases of intractable pain. As a consultant neurosurgeon, Jim was liked and trusted by his colleagues, and admired as a superb diagnostician. As a doctor, he was warm and compassionate. Jim planned his unit with research in mind. When he had promising trainees, he placed them in overseas units with good research facilities, where they learned the skills that have since helped to make Adelaide a leader in head injury research. Most imaginatively, he created in 1964 what is now the Neurosurgical Research Foundation (NRF) to raise funds to sustain research work. The foundation received support because community leaders knew Jim and trusted him, and it received donations from those who knew him as a good doctor. In 1988, when Jim was president of the NRF, fundraising for an academic chair in surgical neuroscience was initiated, and in 1992 the University of Adelaide established a chair of neurosurgery research. This very productive chair is one of Jim’s greatest achievements. Jim was a master of bedside teaching, and he also taught by example. No one who worked with Jim could fail to know that he practised medicine according to the highest ethical standards and expected that his pupils would do the same. His teaching was fruitful. Today, Adelaide’s neurosurgeons are all in a sense his pupils. Some were directly recruited and trained by him. Others came to him trained elsewhere but are proud to have learned from him. Even those who came after his retirement were taught by his trainees and worked in the environment that he made. On a national level, Jim was a major force in the creation of neurosurgical training systems in Australia, which began around 1970, when he was president of the Neurosurgical Society of Australasia. Outside Australia, some of Jim’s pupils now hold distinguished neurosurgical positions in Scotland, England and New Zealand. One of his earliest interns, J K A Clezy, was the first professor of surgery in Papua New Guinea, and brought neurosurgery to that country. Jim married Beatrice Margaret née Hay in 1943 and they had one son, Andrew, and three daughters – Anthea, Josephine and Nadia. He had many interests outside his profession, including photography, farming, stock-breeding, bee-keeping and sailing. He died on 22 September 2003 from chronic renal failure after a long illness. He has many memorials. He is commemorated by the Dinning Science Library at the Royal Adelaide Hospital, which is appropriate – he was a very scholarly man. He is remembered in the research foundation that he created. And, lastly, his example and his teaching have entered into the fabric of Australian neurosurgery.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000050
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Skinner, David Bernt (1935 - 2003)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-11-02 2007-08-02
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000100-E000199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372340372340
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details David Skinner was an eminent American thoracic surgeon and one of the most influential individuals affecting surgical and medical care in the United States in the last quarter of the twentieth century. He was born on 28 April 1935 in Joliet, Illinois, the first child of James and Bertha Skinner, and educated at Cedar Rapids, Iowa. He joined the Boy Scouts and maintained an interest in the movement throughout his life. After graduating with distinction from the University of Rochester, he studied medicine at Yale, where his MD was awarded *cum laude*. He trained in general and thoracic surgery at Massachusetts General Hospital, completing his residencies in 1965, when he went to Bristol as senior surgical registrar to Ronald Belsey and developed a life-long interest in surgery of the oesophagus. During the Vietnam war he served for two years in the US Air Force. He returned to join the surgical faculty of Johns Hopkins Hospital under George Zuidema. At Johns Hopkins he rapidly rose to full professor in 1972. Shortly thereafter he was appointed as the first Dallas B Phemister professor of surgery at the University of Chicago Medical School. He developed an administrative model that encompassed clinical excellence, basic surgical research, dedicated teaching and a remarkable degree of autonomy for faculty growth. His personal devotion to the development of his faculty was life-long and legendary. In 1987 he moved to New York to become President and chief executive officer of the New York Hospital and professor of surgery at Cornell Medical College. Under his leadership financial difficulties were reversed, a new hospital purchased, a new pavilion built and a merger achieved with the Presbyterian Hospital of Columbia University. He retired in 1999, but remained active as President emeritus of the New York Presbyterian Hospital and professor of surgery and cardiothoracic surgery at Weill Cornell. He served on several philanthropic and corporate boards. He generously hosted the group that travelled from our College to New York under the presidency of Sir Barry Jackson. During his career he served as President of several scientific and surgical societies, including the Association of Academic Surgery, the Society of University Surgeons and the International Society for Diseases of the Esophagus, and was a member of multiple societies, including the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Science. He received three honorary degrees and 15 medals or prizes for his contributions. He was made an honorary medical officer of the fire department of New York city, gaining the parking privilege that came with the honour. His faith was extremely important to him: he was a trustee of the Fourth Presbyterian Church of Chicago and the Fifth Presbyterian Church of New York. He died on 24 January 2003, following a massive stroke, and is survived by his widow Elinor and four daughters, Linda, Kristin, Carise and Margaret. Linda is a surgeon at Delaware County Hospital.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000153
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Mayo, William James (1861 - 1939)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2008-03-11
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000400-E000499
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372648372648
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born at Le Sueur, Minnesota on 29 June 1861, the elder son of William Worrall Mayo and Louise Abigail Wright, his wife. The younger son Charles Horace Mayo was also an Honorary FRCS. For an account of W W Mayo, their father, see the life of C H Mayo, above. William J Mayo, was educated at the Rochester High School and at Niles Academy, working in a local drug store during the vacations. When a tornado struck Rochester in 1883, W Worrall Mayo was appointed to take charge of an improvized hospital and a number of Sisters of St Francis worked with him to help the wounded. The Mother Superior proposed to build a permanent hospital in memory of the catastrophe, provided sufficient money for the purpose and nominated Mayo to take charge of it. The hospital was opened in 1889 under the name of St Mary's Hospital with thirteen patients. It was always the rule that each patient paid according to his means, that fees would not be required from charitable organizations, and that the patient's promise to pay was a sufficient guarantee. The institution quickly became known, first as the Mayo Clinic, later (1915) as the Mayo Foundation. The Mayo brothers gave $1,500,000, and on making the endowment William Mayo, speaking also for his brother, said “We never regarded the money as ours; it came from the people, and we believe it should go back to the people.” The two brothers worked throughout in the utmost harmony and to the end of their lives had a common pocket book in which each wanted the other to have the greater share. Both had the essential attribute of a true gentleman, consideration for others. At first neither brother specialized in surgery; later William was the more inclined to operate upon the abdomen, Charles upon the head and neck. Of the two “Willie” was the better administrator, “Charlie” the more original. Both were simple in their lives and actions, both were humble-minded in spite of their great success in life, and both were witty, each in his own way. During the war William, who had received a commission as a first lieutenant in the Medical Reserve Corps in 1913, was promoted major in 1917 and later colonel in the United States Army Medical Corps. During 1917-19 he was chief consultant for the Medical Service; he was appointed colonel, Medical Reserve Corps in 1920 and brigadier-general in 1921. A regent of the University of Minnesota since 1907, William Mayo was president of the Minnesota State Medical Society in 1895, president of the American Medical Association 1905-06, president of the Society of Clinical Surgery 1911-12, president of the American Surgical Association 1913-14, president of the American College of Surgeons 1917-19, and president of the Congress of American Physicians and Surgeons 1925. In 1919 he was awarded a gold medal by the National Institution of Social Sciences for his services to mankind. In 1933 he received a special award from the University of Minnesota in recognition of his distinguished services in the furtherance of scientific studies. He married Hattie M Daman of Rochester, Minnesota. She survived, him with two daughters: Mrs Waltman Walters, wife of a director of the Mayo Clinic, and Mrs Donald C Balfour, wife of the director of the Mayo Foundation. He died in his sleep at Rochester, Minnesota, on 28 July 1939, after suffering from a sub-acute perforating ulcer of the stomach, for the relief of which he had been operated upon in the previous April.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000464
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Albert, Eduard (1841 - 1900)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Alcock, Sir Rutherford (1809 - 1897)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2009-08-21 2016-01-15
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000600-E000699
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372838372838
Occupation General surgeon
Details Son [1] of Thomas Alcock, a medical man practising at Ealing. Educated at Westminster Hospital, where he filled the post of House Surgeon, and in 1832 was appointed Surgeon to the British Portuguese forces acting in Portugal. In 1836 he was transferred to the Marine Brigade engaged in the Carlist war in Spain, and within a year was appointed Deputy Inspector-General of Hospitals. [2] On his return to England he lectured on Surgery at the Sydenham College, [3] but in 1844 he was nominated Consul at Foochow, one of the ports newly opened to trade by the treaty of 1842. He was transferred to Shanghai in 1846 and had with him Sir Harry Smith Parkes. Under Alcock's direction the municipal regulations for the Government of the British Settlement of Shanghai were established and the foundations were laid of the city which has since arisen there. In 1858 he was appointed the first Consul and in 1859 British Minister in Japan, where the admission of foreigners proved so distasteful that an attack was made upon the British Legation on July 5th, 1861, and Alcock with his staff were in serious danger. Alcock returned to England in 1862 and, having already been decorated CB, was promoted KCB on June 19th, 1862, receiving the Hon DCL at Oxford on March 28th, 1863. He returned to Tokio in 1864, leaving in the following year on his appointment as Minister-Plenipotentiary at Pekin. Here he conducted affairs with such delicacy and tact that Prince Kung said: "If England would only take away her missionaries and her opium, the relations between the two countries would be everything that could be desired." In 1871 he retired from the service of diplomacy, settled in London, and interested himself in hospital management, more especially at the Westminster and Westminster Ophthalmic Hospitals, and in hospital nursing establishments. He served as President of the Geographical Society (1876-1878) and as Vice-President of the Royal Asiatic Society (1875-1878). [4] He married: (1) Henrietta Mary, daughter of Charles Bacon, in 1841; (2) Lucy, widow of the Rev T Lowder, British chaplain at Shanghai. He died without issue at 14 Great Queen Street, London, on Nov 2nd, 1897. There is a portrait of him late in life in the Board Room of the Westminster Hospital, a copy is in the collection of the Royal College of Surgeons [5], and one, made in 1843, by L A de Fabeck, is reproduced in Michie's *Englishman in Japan*. Publications: *Notes on the Medical History and Statistics of the British Legion in Spain*, 8vo, London, 1838. *Life's Problems*, 8vo, 2nd ed., London, 1861. *Elements of Japanese Grammar*, 4to, Shanghai, 1861. *The Capital of the Tycoon*, 2 vols., 8vo, London, 1863. *Familiar Dialogues in Japanese with English and French Translations*, 8vo, London, 1863. *Art and Art Industries in Japan*, 8vo, London, 1878. He also edited in 1876 the *Diary of Augustus Raymond Margary* (1846-1875) (the traveller in China). [Amendments from the annotated edition of *Plarr's Lives* at the Royal College of Surgeons: [1] ? Nephew; [2] He was honored with the Knighthood of the Royal Spanish order of Charles III in 1839-40 (*London medical gazette* 1839-40, xxv, 720.); [3] He won the Jacksonian Prize in 1839 and again in 1841.; [4] He was a member of the Board of Guardians of St George's Hanover Square and took "a deep personal interest" in the scheme for emigrating pauper children to Canada. (see his letter to the *Spectator* 5 July 1879 [reprint in the Library]); [5] The words 'a copy is in the collection of the Royal College of Surgeons' are deleted and 'no!' added; Rutherford Alcock contributed to the *London Medical Gazette* on lithotripsy (?) 1829, 4, 464; 1830, 5, 102; on transport of wounded 1837-8, 21, 652; on medical statistics of armies 1838 22 321 & 362; on gunshot wounds & other injuries 1839 24 138 etc; on clinical instruction 1839 25 694, & on his Jacksonian prize 1840, 26, 607 and to *The Lancet* 1839/40, 1, 929 on concussion & 1840-41, 1 & 2 on amputation (a series of lectures); Portrait (No.47) in Small Photographic Album (Moira & Haigh).]
Resource Identifier RCS: E000655
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Aldersey, William Hugh ( - 1885)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2009-08-21 2013-08-06
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000600-E000699
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372839372839
Occupation General surgeon
Details Educated at Guy's Hospital and, in addition to the other qualifications, he passed the First MB Examination at the University of London in 1856. Served as Medical Officer on the Indiana during the Crimean War, and afterwards practised at Buntingford, Herts, for the South-Eastern District of which he was Medical Officer. Later he moved to Hayling and Havant in Hampshire, acting as Medical Officer of Health for the Urban and Rural Districts. He retired to Surbiton, living at 7 St James' Road, where he died on Sept 7th, 1885. He was a Fellow of the Obstetrical Society.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000656
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Aldersmith, Herbert (1848 - 1918)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2009-08-21 2016-01-22
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000600-E000699
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372840372840
Occupation General surgeon
Details Educated at St Bartholomew's Hospital, where he gained the senior scholarship, and during his career as a student won the Gold Medal at the Society of Apothecaries and the Scholarship and Gold Medal at the MB Examination of the University of London. He filled the offices of House Surgeon and House Physician at St Bartholomew's Hospital, and, settling in Giltspur Street, was appointed in 1872 Medical Officer of Christ's Hospital (the Bluecoat School), then in Newgate Street. This post he held until 1913, moving with the school to Horsham. He continued to live at Horsham after his connection with the school ended, died suddenly at Carlton Lodge, Horsham, on March 24th, 1918, and was buried at Itchingfield. [1] Aldersmith lived entirely for the Bluecoat School, and greatly to its advantage. His kindness of heart and his friendly interest endeared him to all the boys brought into contact with him. The declaration made by the Orator at the Speech Day on the occasion of his retirement, that "there is no healthier school in England than Christ's Hospital", was a tribute to his skill and care. He was an influential and respected honorary member of the Medical Officers of Schools Association, who became an authority on ringworm before the recent advances in diagnosis and treatment. He began life as H A Smith, became H Alder-Smith when he began to practice, and finally H Aldersmith, by which name he was generally known in later life. Publications:- Ringworm and Alopecia Areata: their Pathology, Diagnosis and Treatment, 8vo, illustrated, 4th ed., London, 1897. [Amendments from the annotated edition of *Plarr's Lives* at the Royal College of Surgeons: [1] His daughter Dorothy Constance, wife of Charles Ernest Robinson of Hillcote, Storrington died 20 Sept, 1940 (*The Times* 23 Sept 1940)]
Resource Identifier RCS: E000657
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Wilson, Charles Graham (1924 - 2005)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-11-09
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000200-E000299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372471372471
Occupation General surgeon
Details Charles Wilson was a surgeon at the Royal Adelaide Hospital. He was born in Adelaide on 3 April 1924. His father, Sir George Wilson, was a founding fellow of the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons and a foundation fellow of the Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists. His mother, Elsa May Cuzens, had been a nurse. He was educated at St Peter’s College, Adelaide, and Adelaide University, where he won a blue for golf. After qualifying in 1947 he was an intern at the Royal Adelaide Hospital for 15 months before joining the RAMC, serving with the British Commonwealth Occupation Force in Japan for a year. He returned to Australia to spend a year as a resident at the Adelaide Children’s Hospital. He then went to England to study for the FRCS, working at the Royal Postgraduate Medical School, Hammersmith, and Kingston General Hospital. After passing the Edinburgh and English fellowships he returned to Australia in 1954. He was first a registrar and then a senior registrar at the Royal Adelaide Hospital. In 1959 he became an honorary assistant surgeon, becoming a full surgeon in 1969 and a senior visiting surgeon in 1970. He remained at the Royal Adelaide Hospital until 1988. In 1967 he led the South Australian Civilian Surgical Team to South Vietnam, and in 1969 was lieutenant colonel surgeon at the First Australian Field Hospital for three months, remaining as consulting general surgeon to Central Command from 1969 to 1979. At the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons he was chairman of the South Australia state committee, coordinator of surgical training from 1975 to 1980, and served on the Court of Examiners. He was a keen golfer, serving as captain and later president of the Royal Adelaide Golf Club. He married Lois Penelope Fox: they had two daughters, Susan and Philippa, and one son, Thomas Graham Wilson, who is a fellow of the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons. Charles Wilson died on 15 August 2005.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000284
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Richards, Stephen Higgs (1928 - 2006)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Shumway, Norman (1923 - 2006)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-11-09
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000200-E000299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372473372473
Occupation Transplant surgeon
Details Norman Shumway was the father of cardiac transplantation and performed the world’s first heart-lung transplant. Unlike some of his contemporaries who sought the limelight, Shumway spent a decade carrying out research into cardiac transplantation before he was ready to do the operation on a live recipient. It was ironic that he was scooped by his pupil, Christiaan Barnard, in 1967. Born on 9 February 1923 in Kalamazoo, Michigan, where his father kept a creamery, Shumway enrolled at Michigan University to study law. He was then drafted into the Army, where he was found to have an aptitude for medicine, and was sent off to Vanderbilt University, Tennessee, where he qualified in 1949. At first he set up in private surgical practice in a cottage hospital in Santa Barbara, but was invited to join Owen Wangensteen’s research programme at Minnesota. There he gained a PhD for his work on the effect of cooling on the electrical activity of the heart. His work was interrupted by two years in the US Air Force, after which he moved to Stanford University in California, where he started his work on transplantation. He became chief of cardiothoracic surgery there in 1965. While others enjoyed the brief publicity of carrying out cardiac transplantation, which was soon followed by notoriety as rejection almost inevitably took place, Shumway quietly spent his time methodically trying to improve the selection of donors, organ preservation, the technique of heart biopsy and the development of anti-rejection drugs. He was one of the first to use cyclosporine. By 1991 his department had performed nearly 700 transplants with 80 per cent survival for more than five years. A modest man, dressed scruffily, and driving a battered old car, he trained cardiac surgeons from all over the world, He published extensively and received innumerable honours, including our FRCS. Divorced from Mary Lou Stuurmans in 1951, he leaves a son and three daughters, one of whom, Sara, is a professor of cardiothoracic surgery at the University of Minnesota. He died from lung cancer on 10 February 2006.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000286
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Alexander, Henry ( - 1859)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Alexander, James ( - 1895)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2009-09-18 2012-08-30
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000600-E000699
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372847372847
Occupation General surgeon
Details Practised at Edenbridge, Kent, from 1843-1847; then at 12 North Audley Street, W, and at Scarborough from 1853-1856. His last address is given at 30 Walbrook, EC. He died either in 1894 or 1895.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000664
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Alexander, William ( - 1919)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2009-09-18
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000600-E000699
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372848372848
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born at Holestone, Co Antrim; educated at Queen’s College, Belfast, where he had a brilliant career and took the University Gold Medal and Exhibition at his MD examination. Coming to Liverpool as soon as he had graduated, he was appointed Resident Medical Officer at the Workhouse Hospital, and in 1875 became Visiting Surgeon to that institution, his address being 102 Bedford Street South. He was awarded the Jacksonian Prize in 1881 for his essay on “The Pathology and Surgical Treatment of Diseases of the Hip-joint”, and in 1883 he won the Sir Astley Cooper Prize at Guy’s Hospital with an essay on “The Pathology and Pathological Relation of Chronic Rheumatic Arthritis”. He held the office of Surgeon to the Royal Southern Hospital, Liverpool, from 1889-1910, and on his retirement was elected to the honorary post of Consulting Surgeon. For forty years he acted as Visiting Surgeon to the Brownlow Hill Infirmary. At the time of his death he was Lecturer on Clinical Surgery at the University of Liverpool, Ex-President of the British Gynæcological Society, and a Lieutenant-Colonel in the Territorial Force doing duty with the First Western General Hospital. He died after a few days’ illness on March 9th, 1919, at Heswall, near Liverpool, and is buried there. He had been a widower for many years, and his only son, Dr Moore Alexander, the pathologist, died in 1915. Alexander was a good operator, but his claim to remembrance is his work on epilepsy and his determined attempt to relieve those who suffered from the condition, as was shown by his becoming the founder of a Home for Epileptics at Maghull, of which he was the Visiting Surgeon, and where he obtained good results by ligature of the vertebral arteries and division of the sympathetic nerves. He may justly be regarded as the pioneer of surgery of the sympathetic system, which was developed later by Jaboulay and Leriche (qv) in 1882. He also introduced a new method in the treatment of inveterate uterine displacements by shortening the round ligaments. Publications: *The Cure of Epilepsy and of Inveterate Uterine Displacements*, 8vo, London, 1882, reprinted from articles contributed to the *Med. Times and Gaz.*, 1881, ii, 598; 1882, i, 250, 327. “The Treatment of Epilepsy.” – *Brain*, 1883, v, 170. “Effect of Ligature of Vertebral Arteries in Certain Spinal Diseases.” – *Liverpool Med.-Chir. Jour.*, 1882, 124. *The Treatment of Backward Displacements of the Uterus and of Prolapsus Uteri by the New Method of Shortening the Round Ligaments*, 8vo, London, 1884.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000665
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Denne, William (1809 - 1882)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-09-21
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001400-E001499
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373596373596
Occupation General surgeon
Details Studied at St Thomas's Hospital; was at one time Surgeon to the Kent and Canterbury Hospital, then in succession Medical Superintendent of the Middlesex Lunatic Asylum for Women, Hanwell, of the County Asylum, Bedford, and of the Three Counties Asylum, Arlesey Baldock. He invented an invalid bed lift. He retired to The Ferns, Spencer Road, Eastbourne, and died on March 3rd, 1882.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001413
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Dent, Clinton Thomas (1850 - 1912)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-09-21
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001400-E001499
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373597373597
Occupation General surgeon Mountaineer
Details Born at Sandgate, Kent, on Dec 7th, 1850, the eighth child and fifth son of Thomas Dent. He was educated at Eton (1863-1869) and at Trinity College, Cambridge (1869-1873), where he took a 'poll' degree in 1873. He was made Magister Chirurgiae in 1899 in recognition of his eminence as a surgeon; he had long been an Examiner in Surgery at the University. He entered the Medical School of St George's Hospital in 1872 at the age of 21, and in 1876 was House Surgeon. Between 1877 and 1897 he held the teaching appointments of Demonstrator of Anatomy, Surgical Registrar, Joint Lecturer in Physiology, Lecturer in Practical Surgery, and Demonstrator of Operative Surgery. He was elected Assistant Surgeon in 1880, and in 1895 became full Surgeon. At the time of his death he was Senior Surgeon and Chairman of the Medical School Committee. For many years he was Surgeon to the Belgrave Hospital for Children, which owed much to his constant guidance and to his generosity. In 1904 he became Chief Surgeon to the Metropolitan Police. Ample private means, which sometimes interfere with professional activity, had no such paralysing influence on Dent, and merely enabled him to concentrate his energies on worthy objects. He was active in the life of the London Medical Societies, serving as Secretary to the Royal Medico-Chirurgical Society from 1901-1904, and at the time of his death President of the Surgical Section of the Royal Society of Medicine. He read valuable papers between 1890 and 1903 before the Medico-Chirurgical Society, and in 1908 delivered the Annual Oration before the Medical Society of London, of which he was Secretary and Vice-President. At the Royal College of Surgeons his record was one of great distinction. He was Hunterian Professor in 1905, a Member of the Court of Examiners from 1902-1911, Member of the Council from 1903 to the time of his death, and Senior Vice-President in 1912. In 1899 Dent went out to the South African War on his own initiative and acted as Correspondent to the *British Medical Journal*. On his return he delivered an address before the Royal Medico-Chirurgical Society on "The Wounded in the Transvaal War". As a surgeon he was conscientious, careful, and at times, especially in the face of unexpected difficulties, extremely brilliant. He was not inclined to operate unless he was convinced of the need and that benefit would result; and he was always anxious to make a diagnosis before rather than at the operation. Dent was widely acquainted with various forms of athletics, and as an Alpine climber had so long been famous that the world at large thought of him in this, rather than in his professional, capacity. He made the first ascent of the Aiguille du Dru after eighteen unsuccessful attempts, the first ascent of the Rothorn from Zermatt, and of other Alpine peaks, but his greatest achievements were in the Caucasus, where he not only climbed the peaks, but explored the range. He undertook in 1889 the sad duty of searching for the bodies of W Donkin and H Fox, who were killed on Koshtantan in 1888; he had gone out with them and would have shared their fate had it not been that he was prostrated by illness. He joined the Alpine Club in 1872, was elected to the Committee in 1874, was Secretary from 1878-1880, Vice-President in 1884, and President in 1887. Dent was also the first President of the Association of British Members of the Swiss Alpine Club. He was an expert photographer, and often exhibited the fine effects which he had obtained in the Alps and Caucasus, especially at the Graphic Society of St George's Hospital, of which he was at one time President. He had an extensive collection of photographs of patients, and in 1911 gave a cinematograph demonstration of gastric peristalsis in hypertrophic stenosis of the pylorus before the Section for Diseases of Children of the Royal Society of Medicine. He lectured in a manner peculiar to himself, but stimulating to thoughtful hearers, especially at St George's. In 1895 he gave a Friday evening lecture at the Royal Institution "On the Influence of Science on Mountaineering". Two juvenile lectures on "How Mountains are Made and Destroyed" were delivered before the Society of Arts in 1897. As a colleague, Dent showed many fine qualities. At St George's he has been described as a staunch and generous friend of the School, a wise leader, an excellent chairman of committees, sound in judgement, weighty in counsel. He read voluminously, and what he read he digested. He spoke rapidly, as 'a very full man', to quote Dr Johnson's phrase, and shone at his dinner parties, where he displayed conversational command of many subjects. He was an art collector, a connoisseur in old plate, furniture, embroidery, etc. In early life he was fond of amateur acting, wrote a number of farces, and adapted Pailleron's *Étincelle* under the title of *Fruit and Blossom*. He was a member of many social clubs and was on the executive committee of the Athenaeum. His death was little expected by his many friends, who saw him in his usual health at the beginning of his summer holiday in 1912. He died unmarried on August 26th, 1912, of septic poisoning originating in pyorrhoea, after an illness lasting little more than a fortnight. He was buried at Kensal Green, the coffin being carried by members of the Metropolitan Police Force, hundreds of constables following. Interesting portraits accompany his biographies in the *Lancet*, *British Medical Journal*, and the *St George's Hospital Gazette*, 1902 and 1912. In the *St George's Hospital Gazette* for 1912 "L S" contributes a verse, "Ave atque Vale". In the *Lancet* and *British Medical Journal* are several eulogies, containing much valuable detail, from colleagues and friends. The following tribute was circulated throughout the Metropolitan Police District the day after his death: "It is with deep regret that the Commissioner acquaints the Force of the death of the Chief Surgeon. A singularly able man, he devoted to the Metropolitan Police Force, from the time of his appointment in 1904, his whole-hearted efforts. The Police Medical Service has been greatly improved under his care and guidance, and those who have been brought in touch with him by sickness will long remember the personal and kindly interest he took in every case. The Commissioner feels that he has lost an able and fearless counsellor in all medical questions affecting the well-being of the Force." He left estate to the net value of £116,263, and directed that a sum of £1500 should be offered to the Belgrave Hospital. His address was 61 Brook Street, W. Publications: *Insanity following Surgical Operations*, 8vo, Lewes, 1889. "Four Hundred Cases of Amputation" (with W C Bull.) - *Med.-Chir. Trans.*, 1890, lxxiii, 359. "The Behaviour of a Tendon Ligature" (with S DELÉPINE) - *Ibid*, 1891, lxxiv, 369. "Amputation of the Entire Upper Extremity for Recurrent Carcinoma." - *Ibid.*, 1898, lxxxi, 221. "The Wounded in the Transvaal War." - *Ibid*, 1900, lxxxiii, 297. "Congenital Hypertrophic Stenosis of the Pylorus and its Treatment by Pyloroplasty" (with E CAUTLEY) - *Ibid.*, 1903, lxxxvi, 471. "The After-results of Injuries." - Annual Oration, Medical Society, 1908. *Med. Soc. Trans.*, 1908. In this he embodied experience he derived from work among the police in connection with the difficult subject of 'traumatic neurasthenia'. "*John Hunter leaves St George's Hospital, Oct 16th, 1793." An Explanatory Notice of the Picture bearing this Title, painted by A D McCormick, RBA*, portrait of Hunter with Dog, 8vo, London, 1901. The picture was in the Royal Academy Exhibition. "Henry Gray," with portrait and facsimile of a letter by Sir Benjamin Brodie, 8vo, London, 1908; reprinted from *St George's Hosp. Gaz.*, 1908, xvi, 49. "The Nature and Significance of Pain," 1887; reprint of the Introductory Address St George's Hospital; delivered without a note. He translated and edited Billroth's *Clinical Surgery* for the New Sydenham Society, 1881. "Ankylosis," "Ligatures," etc. (jointly), in Heath's *Dictionary of Practical Surgery*. "Traumatism and Insanity" in Tuke's *Dictionary of Psychological Medicine*, 1892, ii. "Insanity and Surgical Operations" in Allbutt's *System of Medicine*. "The Surgery of the Heart" in Musser and Kelly's *System of Treatment*, 1911. "Intestinal Obstruction" in Latham and Kelly's *System of Treatment*, 1912, ii. "The Development of London Hospitals during the Nineteenth Century." - *Lancet*, 1898, ii, 1381. *Above the Snow Line*, 8vo, London, 1885. He edited and wrote a large part of *Mountaineering*, Badminton Series, 1892, 3rd ed, 1900, and contributed many articles in the *Alpine Journal*.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001414
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Dent, Robert ( - 1903)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Halton, John Prince (1797 - 1873)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-02-01 2012-03-28
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000100-E000199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372382372382
Occupation General surgeon
Details The eldest son of the Rev John Halton, MA, St Peter's, Chester; educated at the University of Edinburgh and at Guy's Hospital under Sir Astley Cooper. After Continental travel he settled in Liverpool, and in 1820 was elected Surgeon to the Royal Infirmary, an appointment he held until 1856, when he became Consulting Surgeon. In 1844 he published a pamphlet attacking the heavy mortality following operations at the Liverpool Northern Hospital, as compared with that at the Royal Infirmary during the previous twenty-two years. The reply by the Surgeons of the Northern Hospital as to the salubrity and ventilation of the building breathes a considerable spirit of deference to Halton. He caused a rule to be passed excluding the Surgeons at the Royal Infirmary from the practice of pharmacy, for a surgeon, he said, should restrict himself to cases in surgery. Further, he advocated education at universities and large centres of population. Thus, as a successor of Park and of Hanson, Halton did much to advance the reputation of surgery in Liverpool. He retired from practice in 1885 and died at Woodclose, Grasmere, Westmorland, on Jan 27th, 1873. He married in early life; his wife, a daughter of John Foster, of Liverpool, died in 1871.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000195
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Plaut, Gustav Siegmund (1921 - 2006)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-11-30
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000300-E000399
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372489372489
Occupation General surgeon
Details Gustav Siegmund ‘Gus’ Plaut was a consultant surgeon at Tooting, London. He was born on 2 September 1921 to Ellen Warburg and Theodor Plaut in Hamburg, both from eminent Jewish banking families. His father was dismissed by the Nazis, and took the post of professor of economics at Hull University, where Gus was educated at Hymers College. He went up to Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge, in 1940, where he obtained a double first in natural sciences, and went on to win the Price entrance scholarship to the London Hospital. He qualified with the Andrew Clarke prize in clinical medicine, and after junior posts did his National Service in Freetown, Sierra Leone. Following demobilisation he went on to do junior surgical jobs at Addenbrooke’s, the London Hospital, Chase Farm and the Gordon Hospital in London, from which he passed the Edinburgh and English fellowships and then did a series of locum posts, including one in the Anglo-Ecuadorian oil fields. He had great difficulty in finding a regular consultant post, eventually being appointed at Tooting in 1960. A most entertaining and agreeable companion, Gus was a keen Territorial and spent much of his energy in charitable work, with Rotary, the Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen and Families’ Association and PROBUS. He was a keen sailor and swimmer. Always very modest, he concealed his intellect and his wealth with great urbanity. He married Ivy in 1977, who predeceased him in 1999. He died on 17 January 2006.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000302
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Donald, John (1813 - 1881)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-09-28
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001400-E001499
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373615373615
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born at Aberdeen on November 14th, 1813. He was an alumnus of Marischal College from 1830-1832, was gazetted Assistant Surgeon on August 23rd, 1839, joined the 24th Foot on February 26th, 1841, was promoted Staff Surgeon (2nd Class) on July 18th, 1848, and Staff Surgeon Major on August 23rd, 1859. He retired on half pay with the honorary rank of Deputy Inspector-General of Hospitals on November 11th, 1864, and died at 1 Sydney Place, Bath, on February 4th, 1881.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001432
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Donald, Joseph Rickerby ( - 1893)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-09-28
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001400-E001499
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373616373616
Occupation General surgeon
Details Was a student at St Bartholomew's Hospital. After qualifying he was Resident Medical Officer of the Farringdon Dispensary and Lying-in Charity; he then began to practice at 31 Paradise Terrace, Holloway, was Surgeon to the Holloway and North Islington Dispensary, and Surgeon to the Northern District of the Parish of St Mary's, Islington; Medical Referee of the General Assurance Company; later still, District Medical Officer of Lower Holloway, and District Vaccinator, Islington. He moved to 11 Albion Road, Liverpool Road, Holloway, where he continued to live after retiring from practice, and died there in 1893. His portrait is in the Fellows' Album.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001433
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Fergusson, Sir William (1808 - 1877)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-02-01 2012-03-22
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000100-E000199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372383372383
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born at Prestonpans on March 20th, 1808, the son of James Fergusson. He was educated at Lochmaben, Dumfriesshire, at the High School, and at the University of Edinburgh. He was placed by his own desire in a lawyer's office at the age of 15, but finding the work uncongenial he changed law for medicine when he was 17. He became a pupil of Robert Knox, the anatomist, then at the height of his reputation, who appointed him demonstrator in 1828, when the class consisted of 504 students and the lectures had to be repeated thrice daily. Fergusson quickly became a skilled anatomist, and it is said that he often spent sixteen hours a day in the dissecting-room, and he soon began to lecture in association with Knox. He was elected Surgeon to the Edinburgh Royal Dispensary in 1831, and in that year tied the third part of the right subclavian artery for an axillary aneurysm, an operation which had been published only twice previously in Scotland. He described the appearances seen at the post-mortem examination in the *London and Edinburgh Journal of Medical Science* (1841, i, 617). In 1855 he employed the dangerous method of direct compression of a subclavian aneurysm (*Lancet*, 1855, ii, 197). He married Helen Hamilton Ranken on Oct. 10th, 1833. She was the daughter and heiress of William Ranken, of Spittlehaugh, Peebleshire, and the marriage at once placed Fergusson in easy circumstances. He continued zealous in his profession, and in 1836, when he was elected Surgeon to the Royal Infirmary and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, he shared with James Syme (q.v.) the best surgical practice in Scotland. In 1840 Fergusson accepted the Professorship of Surgery at King's College, London, with the Surgeoncy to King's College Hospital, which was then situated in the slums of Clare Market. He settled at Dover Street, Piccadilly, whence he removed in 1847 to George Street, Hanover Square. His fame brought crowds of students to King's College Hospital to witness his operations. He became Member of the College of Surgeons in 1840, Fellow in 1844, was a Member of Council from 1861-1877, and of the Court of Examiners from 1867-1870, Vice-President in 1869, President in 1870, and Hunterian Orator in 1871. As Arris and Gale Lecturer he delivered two courses on "The Progress of Anatomy and Surgery during the Present Century", in 1864 and 1865. In these lectures Fergusson mentioned three hundred successful operations for hare-lip performed by himself. In 1849 he was appointed Surgeon in Ordinary to Prince Albert, and in 1855 Surgeon Extraordinary to H. M. the Queen. He was made a baronet in 1866, and Serjeant-Surgeon in 1867. The occasion of his receiving a baronetcy was seized upon to make a presentation of a dessert service of silver plate which was subscribed for by three hundred of his old pupils. He was elected F.R.S. in 1848, President of the Pathological Society in 1859-1860, and of the British Medical Association in 1873, and Hon. LL.D of Edinburgh in 1875. He resigned the office of Professor of Surgery at King's College in 1870, but retained the post of Clinical Professor of Surgery and Surgeon to the hospital until his death. He invented the term 'conservative surgery', by which he meant the excision of a joint rather than the amputation of a limb. He introduced great improvements in the treatment of hare-lip and cleft palate, and his style of operating attracted general attention and admiration. As an operator, indeed, he is justly placed at the pinnacle of fame. Lizars said he had seen no one, not even Liston himself, surpass Fergusson in a trying and critical operation, and his biographer, Mr. Bettany, says in the *Dictionary of National Biography*: "His manipulative and mechanical skill was shown both in his mode of operating and in the new instruments which he devised. The bulldog forceps, the mouth-gag, and various bent knives for cleft palate, attest his ingenuity. A still higher mark of his ability consisted in his perfect planning of every detail of an operation beforehand; no emergency was unprovided for. Thus, when an operation had begun, he proceeded with remarkable speed and silence till the end, himself applying every bandage and plaster, and leaving, as far as possible, no traces of his operation. So silently were most of his operations conducted, that he was often imagined to be on bad terms with his assistants." Fergusson was celebrated as a lithotomist and lithoritist, and it was said that to *wink* during one of his cutting operations for stone might involve one's seeing no operation at all, so rapidly was the work performed by that master hand. On one occasion when performing a lithotomy the blade of the knife broke away from the handle. He at once seized the blade in his long deft fingers, finished the operation, and quietly told the class: "Gentlemen, you should be prepared for any emergency." He died in London of Bright's disease on Feb. 10th, 1877, and was buried at West Linton, Peebleshire, beside his wife, who died in 1860. He was succeeded in the title by his sons, James Ranken; a younger son, Charles Hamilton, entered the Army, and there were three daughters. Fergusson's personality was marked. Tall and of fine presence, with very large and powerful hands, he was genial and hospitable. He was beloved by hosts of students whom he had started in life, and of patients whom he had aided gratuitously. Those who could afford to pay sometimes gave him very large sums for an operation. Like John Hunter, he was a good carpenter, and had besides a number of social pursuits and accomplishments. He was a staunch friend, forgiving to those, such as Syme, who opposed him, and his best monument is the life and work of the many pupils whom he influenced and stimulated as few have ever done. He made many contributions to surgical literature, and wrote a *System of Practical Surgery*, of which a fifth edition appeared in 1870. An expressive and nearly full length oil painting of Fergusson by Rudolf Lehmann hangs in the Secretary's office at the College, and there are numbers of portraits in the College Collection. The portrait was painted in 1874, and a replica hangs in the Edinburgh College of Physicians. He was extremely social and given to kind and friendly hospitality in private life. He sometimes invited a small circle of friends to dine at a well-known city hostelry, The Albion Tavern. On one of these occasions he invited the then Editor of *Punch*, who responded in these terms: "Look out for me at seven, look after me at eleven. - Yours, Mark Lemon." PUBLICATIONS:- *A System of Practical Surgery*, of which the first edition in 18mo was published in London, 1842; 2nd ed., in 12mo, 1846; 3rd., 1852; 4th ed., 1857; 5th ed., 1870. The work deals with the art rather than the science of surgery, and was a good text-book for medical students. Paper on lithotrity in the *Edin. Med. and Surg. Jour.*, 1835, xliv, 80. Paper on cleft palate in the *Med.-Chir. Trans.,* 1845, xxviii, 273. The Hunterian Oration, 8vo, 1871, is chiefly remarkable for the generous eulogium of James Syme, his former colleague, with whom relations had been somewhat strained.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000196
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Busk, George (1807 - 1886)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-02-01 2012-03-22
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Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000100-E000199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372384372384
Occupation Biologist Naval surgeon
Details Born at St. Petersburgh on August 12th, 1807, the second son of Robert Busk (1768-1835), merchant, and a member of the English colony there, by his wife Jane, daughter of John Westly, Custom House clerk at St. Petersburgh. His grandfather, Sir Wadsworth Busk, was Attorney-General of the Isle of Man. Hans Buck (1772-1862), scholar-poet, was his uncle; Hans Busk the Younger (1816-1862), a principal founder of the Volunteer movement in England, was his cousin. George Busk was educated at Dr. Hartley's School, Bingley, Yorkshire, and seved a six years' apprenticeship to George Beaman, being articled at the Royal College of Surgeons. He was a student at St. Thomas's Hospital, and for one session at St. Bartholomew's. In 1832 he was appointed Assistant Surgeon to the *Grampus*, the Seamen's Hospital Ship at Greenwich, and afterwards to the *Dreadnought* which replaced it. He served in this capacity for twenty-five years. During his service he worked out the pathology of cholera and made important observations on scurvy. In 1843 he was one of the first batch of Fellows of the College; from 1856-1859 he was Hunterian Professor of Comparative Anatomy and Physiology; from 1863-1880 a Member of the Council; a Member of the Court of Examiners from 1868-1872; Chairman of the Midwifery Board in 1870; Vice-President for the year 1872-1873, and again in 1879-1880; President in 1871; and Trustee of the Hunterian Collection from 1870-1876. He was a Member of the Senate of the University of London, and was for a long period an Examiner for the Naval, Indian, and Army Medical Services. He was also a Governor of the Charterhouse, Treasurer of the Royal Institution, and the first Home Office Inspector under the Cruelty to Animals (Vivisection) Act. The last office he held until 1885, performing the difficult and delicate duties with such tact and impartiality as gained him the esteem both of physiologists and of the Home Office. When he resigned his post of Surgeon to the *Dreadnought* in 1855, Busk retired from the active practice of his profession and turned to the more congenial subject of biology. In this department he did excellent work, more especially in connection with the Bryozoa (Polyzoa), of which group he was the first to formulate a scientific arrangement which appeared in 1856 in his article in the *English Cyclopaedia*. His collection is now in the Natural History Museum at South Kensington. The name *Buskia* was given in his honour to a genus of Bryozoa by Alder in 1856, and again by Tenison-Woods in 1877. The Royal Society elected him a Fellow in 1850, and he was four times nominated a Vice-President, besides often serving on the Council. He received the Royal Medal in 1871. He was elected a Fellow of the Linnean Society in December, 1846, acted as its Zoological Secretary from 1857-1868, served frequently on the Council, and was Vice-President several times between 1869 and 1882. He joined the Geological Society in 1859, served twice on the Council, was the recipient of the Lyell Medal in 1878, and of the Wollaston medal in 1885. He became a Fellow of the Zoological Society in 1856, assisted in the formation of the Microscopical Society in 1839, and was its President in 1848 and 1849. He was one of the Editors of the *Quarterly Journal of Microcopical Science*. In 1863 he attended the conference to discuss the question of the age and authenticity of the human jaw found at Moulin Quignon. His attention being thus drawn to palaeolontogical problems, he visited the Gibraltar Caves in company with Dr. Falconer, and henceforth devoted much time to the study of cave fauna and later to ethnology. He was President of the Ethnological Society before it was merged in the Anthropological Institute, of which he was President in 1873 and 1874. One result of his visit to Gibraltar was his gift of the Gibraltar Skull to the Museum of the College. He died at his house, 32 Harley Street, London, on August 10th, 1886. He married on August 12th, 1843, his cousin Ellen, youngest daughter of Jacob Hans Busk, of Theobalds, Hertfordshire, and by her had two daughters. Busk was full of knowledge, an unwearying collector of facts, a devoted labourer in the paths of science, and cautious in the conclusions he drew from his observations. He wrote but little in surgery, though his surgical work at the Dreadnought was altogether admirable and he was an excellent operator. He was a man of unaffected simplicity and gentleness of character, without a trace of vanity, a devoted friend, and an upright, honest gentleman. A good portrait painted by his daughter, Miss E. M. Busk, hangs in the Meeting-room of the Linnean Society at Burlington House. It was presented by the subscribers in 1885. There is a fine engraved portrait by Maguire and a large photograph of him as an old man. Both are in the College collection. PUBLICATIONS:- *A Catalogue of Marine Polyzoa in the British Museum*, 3 parts, London, 1852-75. Report on the Polyzoa collected by H. M. S. Challenger, 4to, 2 vols., London, 1884-6. An article on "Venomous Insects and Reptiles" in Holmes's *System of Surgery*, 1860. He was a joint translator with T. H. Huxley of Von Kölliker's *Manual of Human Histology* for the Sydenham Society, 2 vols., London, 1853-4, and he translated and edited Wedl's Rudiments of Pathological Histology also for the Sydenham Society in 1855. Buck was editor of the *Microscopical Journal* for 1842, and of the *Quarterly Journal of Microscopical Science* from 1853-1868; of the *Natural History Review* from 1861-1865; and of the *Journal of the Ethnological Society* for 1869-70. Notable amongst his papers in the *Philosophical Transactions* are: (1) "Extinct Elephants in Malta", and (2) "Teeth of Ungulates".
Resource Identifier RCS: E000197
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Woolriche, Stephen (1770 - 1856)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2007-10-18
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000400-E000499
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372594372594
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born on June 3rd, 1770, became Surgeon's Mate, and on May 30th, 1794, was gazetted Surgeon to the 111th Foot. From March, 1798, to May 22nd, 1806, he was on half pay, when he exchanged into the 4th Foot. On June 18th, 1807, he was appointed Surgeon to the Staff. He was on active service in Holland in 1799, at Copenhagen in 1807, in the Peninsula 1812-1814, and was present at the Battle of Waterloo. He was promoted to Deputy Inspector of Hospitals on May 26th, 1814, and Brevet Inspector of Hospitals on Dec 9th, 1823. He retired on half pay on May 25th, 1828, and on July 22nd, 1830, was promoted to be Inspector-General of Hospitals. He was one of the seven officers of the Army Medical Department upon whom the CB (mil) was conferred for the first time in 1850. He lived in retirement at Qwatford Lodge, Bridgnorth, and died on Feb 29th, 1856.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000410
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Andrews, William (1784 - 1862)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2009-10-02
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000600-E000699
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372875372875
Occupation General surgeon
Details Practised at Salisbury, where he died, in the Close, on Feb 19th, 1862.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000692
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Trevor-Roper, Patrick Dacre (1916 - 2004)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-10-26
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Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000100-E000199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372325372325
Occupation Ophthalmic surgeon
Details Patrick Dacre Trevor-Roper, known as ‘T R’, was an acclaimed eye surgeon and a successful campaigner. He was born in Alnwick, Northumberland, on 7 June 1916, where his father, Bertie William Edward Trevor-Roper, was in general practice. His mother was Kathleen Elizabeth née Davison. He was educated at Charterhouse, where he was a senior classical scholar, and won an exhibition to Clare College, Cambridge. He went on to the Westminster Hospital for his clinical training. There he was introduced to the delights of ophthalmology by the leading eye surgeon E F King, who occupied a neighbouring mattress in the hospital air raid shelter and introduced him to Moorfields. He served with the New Zealand Medical Corps from 1943 to 1945 and then specialised in ophthalmology, becoming consultant ophthalmic surgeon to the Westminster and Moorfields Eye Hospitals in 1947. There he established the Moorfields eye bank. He also set up the Haile Selassie Eye Hospital in Addis Ababa and organised the opening of an ophthalmic unit in Lagos and a mobile eye unit in Sierra Leone for the Royal Commonwealth Society for the Blind. He was vice-president of the Ophthamological Society of the UK, section President of the Royal Society of Medicine and a founder member of the International Academy of Ophthalmology. He was Doyne medallist of the Oxford Ophthalmogical Society. The Patrick Trevor-Roper undergraduate award at the Royal College of Ophthalmogists was established in 1997. For 38 years he was editor of the *Transactions of the Ophthalmological Society of the UK* (which became *Eye* when the Society became the Royal College of Ophthalmologists). He wrote several key textbooks on ophthalmology, including *Ophthalmology: a textbook for diploma students* (1955), which later became *Lecture notes in ophthalmology* and then *The eye and its disorders*. But it was as the author of *The world through blunted sight* (London, Thames and Hudson, 1971) that he became known to the wider public. In this amusingly written book, he argued that the proportions, perspectives and palette of many celebrated painters was the result of ophthamological problems such as short sight, astigmatism, glaucoma and cataract. A gentle, dithery, sometimes impatient, boffin-like man, he had an endless sense of fun and was popular with students, who invited him to be president or chairman of many of their societies. His large circle of friends, who would meet at weekends at Long Crichel House in Dorset, a former rectory and a centre for like-minded writers, included music and literary critics, composers, poets, artists and actors. In 1955 he was one of a handful of establishment figures to give evidence to the Wolfenden Committee, which ultimately decriminalised homosexual activity between consenting adults. In those days, this was a brave thing to do. Trevor-Roper told the committee that gay men posed no threat to heterosexual youth, and provided evidence of the extent of blackmail of homosexuals, which had led to many suicides. Later, in the 1960s, he campaigned against the “venal manipulations of drug companies”, particularly the bogus conferences where speakers would puff the companies’ new products. He also campaigned successfully against the opticians’ monopoly of the sale of reading glasses. A trustee of the Medical Foundation for the Care of Victims of Torture, he helped found the HIV/AIDS charity, the Terrence Higgins Trust, which was run from his house until it expanded into larger premises. He travelled widely, visiting, among other places, Borneo, Nigeria, Malawi and the Falklands. In 2003 he was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease and a year later was found to have a cancer in the neck, from an unknown primary. He died on 22 April 2004 and is survived by his partner of many years, Herman Chan. His brother Hugh, the historian Lord Dacre of Glanton, and his sister, Sheila, predeceased him.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000138
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Vane, Sir John Robert (1927 - 2004)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-10-26 2012-03-09
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000100-E000199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372326372326
Occupation Pharmacologist
Details John Vane shared the Nobel prize in 1982 with Bergström and Samuelsson for discovering how aspirin works, based on the research he had carried out at the Institute of Basic Medical Sciences in our College, where he was successively senior lecturer, reader and then professor between 1955 and 1973. Born on 29 March 1927 in Tardebigg, Worcestershire, he was the son of Maurice Vane and Frances Florence née Fisher. As a boy he blew up the kitchen with a chemistry set, so his father built him a shed in the garden to serve as a laboratory. He read chemistry at Birmingham University, graduating at 19, and then went on to St Catherine's College, Oxford, to read pharmacology, winning the Stothert research fellowship of the Royal Society in 1951. Between 1951 and 1953 he was assistant professor of pharmacology at Yale, coming back to our College where the head of the Institute of Basic Medical Sciences was William Paton, succeeded by Gustav Born, then both leading pharmacologists of their day. It was at a time when prostaglandins were being discovered, and Vane had a notion that aspirin might work by inhibiting their formation, and went on to show that aspirin and indomethacin did in fact inhibit prostaglandin synthetase. Later he developed the anti-inflammatory drugs which inhibited cyclo-oxygenase-2 (the Cox 2 inhibitors) and captopril, the first of the ACE inhibitors. In 1973 he left the College to become director of research and development at the Wellcome Foundation, where his research group discovered prostacylin, the agent which dilates blood vessels and prevents platelets from sticking together. He retired from the Wellcome in 1985 to set up a new research establishment, the William Harvey Research Institute at St Bartholomew's Hospital. He retired again in 1995, but continued as the director of the institute's charitable foundation. He was an inspiring teacher and many young surgeons spent a profitable year under his supervision at the College learning the principles of basic scientific research. He married Elizabeth Daphne Page in 1948. Basically shy, he was a most agreeable companion. He and Daphne built a house in Virgin Gorda in the Caribbean, where he enjoyed underwater swimming. He died from pneumonia on 19 November 2004, leaving Daphne and their two daughters.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000139
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Walker, Victor Gordon (1919 - 2004)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-10-26
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000100-E000199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372327372327
Occupation General surgeon
Details Gordon Walker was a consultant surgeon on the Isle of Wight. He was born in Melbourne, Australia, in 1919. He studied medicine at Melbourne University, qualifying in 1942. Shortly afterwards, he joined the Royal Australian Air Force as a medical officer and was posted to the UK, attached to RAAF Spitfire Squadron 453. In 1944 he took part in the D-day landings on an American tank landing craft. After the war, he was demobilised in London, passed his primary and became house surgeon to Ian Aird at the Hammersmith Hospital. He attended lectures at the College and passed the FRCS in 1947. He was resident surgical officer in Colchester and registrar at St George’s Hospital. He was appointed as a consultant surgeon on the Isle of Wight. He was also surgeon to the prisons on the island and to the Osborne House Convalescent Home. He held these positions for the next 30 years. He was Chairman of the Wessex regional health board and a fundraiser for the Police Convalescent and Rehabilitation Trust, helping to establish a series of convalescent homes in the south of England. He was elected to the Court of Examiners in 1970 and was one of the first members of the Surgical 60 Club. In 1979, he went to Damam, Saudi Arabia, to help set up the surgical wing of the Abdulla Fuad Hospital. A year later he returned to Saudi Arabia to teach surgery in Dharan. He finally retired in 1982. He married Judith in 1947. They had four children and five grandchildren. He died from bronchopneumonia on 23 July 2004.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000140
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Wapnick, Simon (1937 - 2003)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-10-26
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000100-E000199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372328372328
Occupation Anatomist
Details Simon Wapnick was an anatomist based in New York. He was born on 25 October 1937 in Pretoria, South Africa, the son of Percy Jacob Wapnick and Fanny née Levitt. He was educated at Pretoria Boys’ High School and then went on to the University of Pretoria Medical School. He held house appointments at Pretoria General Hospital and Harari Hospital, in the then Rhodesia. In 1964 he went to London, where he was a locum registrar at St Stephens and King George’s Hospitals, London, and followed the basic science course at the College and the Fellowship course in surgery at St Thomas’s. In 1965 he was a senior house officer at Great Ormond Street. From 1966 to 1969 he worked as a registrar and clinical tutor at the Royal Postgraduate Medical School in Hammersmith. In 1969 he returned to Africa, as a lecturer and senior lecturer at the department of surgery at the Godfrey Huggins School of Medicine, Rhodesia. From 1972 he was a specialist surgeon at the department of surgery, Ichilov Hospital, Tel Aviv, Israel. He then emigrated to the US, where he was a surgeon at Brooklyn Veterans Administration Hospital in New York. He subsequently taught gross anatomy at Ross University Medical School in the Dominican Republic and at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York. At the time of his death, Simon was an assistant professor in the department of cell biology and anatomy at New York Medical College. He taught gross anatomy to first year medical students and facilitated a postgraduate gross anatomy course for various residency programmes. He wrote papers on a range of topics, including skeletal abnormalities in Crohn’s disease, diverticular disease, hiatus hernia, and carcinoma of the oesophagus and stomach. He was actively interested in various Jewish organisations in Israel and in Africa. He married Isobelle née Gelfand, the daughter of Michael Gelfand, the author of books on tropical medicine and on the Shona people, in 1962. They had two daughters (Janette and Laura) and a son (Jonathan), and three grandchildren (Chloe, Jordan and Michael Joshua). A keen marathon runner, Simon Wapnick died on 26 May 2003 of an apparent heart attack, while out jogging in Central Park.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000141
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Barros D'Sa, Aires Agnelo Barnabé (1939 - 2007)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2007-11-08 2014-07-18
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Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000400-E000499
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372601372601
Occupation Trauma surgeon Vascular surgeon
Details Aires Barros D'Sa was a pioneering vascular and trauma surgeon in Belfast. He was born in 1939 in Nairobi, Kenya, into a Goan family. His father, Inaçio Francisco Purifcação Saúde D'Sa, was a civil servant. His mother was Maria Eslina Inês Barros. Aires grew up in Kenya and was educated at Duke of Gloucester School. He originally intended to study medicine in Bombay, but his plans changed following the Indian blockade of Goa, which heralded the end of Portuguese rule there. He went to Queen's University, Belfast, instead, on a scholarship, as one of only a handful of overseas students. He held a succession of junior posts across Northern Ireland, including at the Royal Victoria, Belfast City, Ulster and Lurgan hospitals. From 1975 to 1977 he was a senior registrar at the Royal Victoria Hospital, and then spent a year at Providence Medical Center, Seattle. In 1978 he was appointed as a consultant vascular surgeon at the Royal Victoria Hospital. He quickly stood out for his charm, warmth and humour, thirst for knowledge and superb clinical acumen. A loyal champion for his nurses and junior staff, he fought continually to ensure the best resources for them and for his patients, and had scant patience with red tape. He expected his own high standards to be met: lazy, incompetent staff were not tolerated and rude patients found terrorising nurses were simply wheeled off the ward, not to be readmitted. The Troubles in Northern Ireland reached their height in the 1970s and the Royal Victoria Hospital received the majority of victims. Many required treatment for horrific bomb blast, shrapnel and gunshot injuries. During this time, Aires gained an international reputation for his pioneering use of shunts in the management of complex limb vascular injuries. His surgical technique was unparalleled - his mentor, Sinclair Irwin, said Aires had the 'best hands' he had ever seen - and, aligned with his courage, stamina and coolness under pressure, he undoubtedly saved many lives and limbs. While Aires, along with colleagues, applied impeccable standards of care to all patients, he despised terrorists and had no time for extremists from either side. In recognition of his pioneering work in vascular trauma he was appointed Hunterian Professor of the Royal College of Surgeons in 1979. Over the next decades he travelled extensively as an invited lecturer, notably in 1983, when he was elected by the James IV Association of Surgeons to represent the British Isles as the 77th James IV Surgical Traveller to North America, Australia and South East Asia. Aires recognised clear advantages in developing vascular surgery as a distinct specialty. In 1978 he initiated the establishment of a dedicated regional vascular surgery unit at the Royal Victoria Hospital, only the third of its kind in the UK, and in 1979 instituted a clinical vascular lab. In 1996 he established a registry for vascular surgical patients in Northern Ireland, among the UK's earliest regional databases. It is still in use today. Despite increasing national and international commitments, Aires retained a love of teaching. Students learned from his expertise, not least his exceptional care and thoughtfulness towards patients in pain and anticipating major surgery. As a lecturer, his excellent knowledge of anatomy and dynamic delivery enlivened the driest subjects. Often he would arrive early for lectures and cover the blackboards with superb anatomical drawings. He designed crests for the Ulster Surgical Club and the Joint Vascular Research Group, one of five national and European societies of which he was a founding member. Hugely committed to vascular research, he published extensively, in particular on vascular trauma. He authored and edited three books, including *Emergency vascular and endovascular surgical practice* (London, Hodder Arnold, 2005). He sat on the editorial board of several vascular journals and was a reviewer on many more. The latter years of Aires' career brought many accolades. In 1999 he was made honorary professor of vascular surgery (personal chair) at Queen's University, and in 2000, in recognition of his services to the specialty, he was awarded an OBE. The following year he was president of the Vascular Society of Great Britain and Ireland, and hosted the annual conference in Belfast. In 2003 he became Deputy Lieutenant of County Borough of Belfast, and in 2005 the Royal Victoria Hospital honoured him by naming the laboratory he had founded 'The Barros D'Sa Clinical Vascular Laboratory'. Health problems prompted his premature retirement in 2001. His final operation was on a young man from South Africa with a large carotid body tumour. A recognised expert in this difficult field of surgery, Aires had one of the largest case series in Europe. He arranged a special weekend slot and successfully removed the tumour after eight hours of surgery. Aires was a true gentleman, a generous friend with an infectious joie de vivre, and a legendary host. His interests spanned politics, literature and the arts; he was an orchestra patron, an environmentalist, and a keen supporter of Irish rugby. Travel remained his foremost love; he and Libby had several global excursions planned for their retirement years. Above all, he was a passionate family man and believed that his life's greatest achievement was raising his four daughters. In his final year, the arrival of a grandson brought him enormous joy. Aires Barros D'Sa died on 29 January 2007 from bronchopneumonia a week after having cardiac surgery. He was 67. He was survived by his wife Libby, a retired anaesthetist, daughters Vivienne, Lisa, Miranda and Angelina, and grandson Tom Barnabé. Lisa Barros D'Sa Paul Blair
Resource Identifier RCS: E000417
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
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First Title value, for Searching Banks, Sir William Mitchell (1842 - 1904)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2009-11-11
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Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000700-E000799
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372931372931
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born at Edinburgh on Nov 1st, 1842, the son of Peter S Banks, Writer to the Signet. He received his early education at Edinburgh Academy and passed from there to the University of Edinburgh. Graduated MD with honours, and won the Gold Medal for his thesis on the Wolffian bodies in 1864. Acted for a time as Prosector to Professor John Goodsir and later as Demonstrator of Anatomy under Professor Allen Thomson at the University of Glasgow. Served as dresser and as House Surgeon to James Syme (qv) at the Edinburgh Royal Infirmary, and visited Paraguay to act as Surgeon to the Republican Government. He became assistant to E R Bickersteth (qv) at Liverpool in 1868 in succession to Reginald Harrison (qv), and joined the staff of the Infirmary School of Medicine, first as Demonstrator and afterwards as Lecturer on Anatomy. This post he retained with the title of Professor when the Infirmary School was merged in University College, Liverpool. He resigned the Chair in 1894 and was then honoured with the title of Emeritus Professor of Anatomy. Meanwhile, having served the offices of Pathologist and Curator of the Museum, he succeeded Reginald Harrison as Assistant Surgeon to the Royal Infirmary, Liverpool, in 1875, served as full Surgeon from 1877 till Nov, 1902, when he resigned and was appointed Consulting Surgeon. The Committee of the Infirmary paid him the unique compliment of assigning him ten beds in his former wards. Mitchell Banks was the first representative of the Victoria University on the General Medical Council, and was a Member of the Council of the Royal College of Surgeons of England from 1890-1896. He was one of the founders of the Liverpool Biological Association and was elected the first President. He was placed on the Commission of the Peace as JP of Liverpool in 1892 and in 1899 he received the honour of knighthood. He was an honorary LLD of Edinburgh. He married in 1874 Elizabeth Rathbone, daughter of John Elliot, a merchant of Liverpool, and by her had two sons, one of whom survived him. He died suddenly at Aix-la-Chapelle on Aug 9th, 1904, whilst travelling home from Homburg, and was buried in the Smithdown Road Cemetery in Liverpool. Mitchell Banks deserves recognition both as a surgeon and as an organizer. The modern operation for removal of the cancerous breast is largely due to his practice and advocacy. He recommended, in the face of strenuous opposition, an extensive operation that should include removal of the axillary glands when most surgeons were contented with local amputation. He drew attention to his method in 1878 and made it the topic of the Lettsomian Lectures at the Medical Society of London in 1900. As an organizer he formed one of the band who built up the fortunes of the Medical School at Liverpool. Finding it a provincial school at a very low ebb, Banks and his associates raised it by dint of hard work first to the rank of a medical college and, finally, to that of a well-equipped medical faculty forming part of a modern university. The plan involved the rebuilding of the infirmary, and Banks was a member of the medical deputation which, with characteristic thoroughness, visited many continental hospitals to study their design and equipment before the foundation stone of the Liverpool building was laid in 1887. Mitchell Banks had a sound knowledge of the history of medicine. His collection of early medical works was sold in seventy-eight lots by Messrs Sotheby, Wilkinson and Hodge in June, 1906. He wrote good English in a pleasant style, as may be seen in “The Gentle Doctor”, a scholarly address to the students of the Yorkshire College at Leeds in Oct, 1892, and in “Physic and Letters”, the Annual Oration delivered before the Medical Society of London in May, 1893. His portrait, painted by the Hon John Collier, was presented to him by his colleagues and students, when he retired from active duties at University College, Liverpool. “The William Mitchell Banks Lectureship” in the University of Liverpool was founded and endowed by his fellow-citizens in his memory in 1905. Publications:- A paper dealing with a more extensive operation in cases of cancer of the breast appeared in the *Liverpool and Manchester Medical and Surgical Reports*, 1878, 192. *Some Results of the Operative Treatment of Cancer of the Breast*, Edinburgh, 1882. *The Gentle Doctor*, Liverpool, 1893. *Physic and Letters*, Liverpool, 1893.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000748
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Banner, John Maurice ( - 1863)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Henriques, Cecil Quixano (1924 - 2008)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Sir Barry Jackson
Publication Date 2009-03-13 2009-06-04
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000600-E000699
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372783372783
Occupation General surgeon
Details Cecil Quixano Henriques was a consultant surgeon at Ipswich and East Suffolk hospitals. He was born on 22 February 1924 in Birkenhead, Cheshire, the son of Wilfrid Quixano Henriques OBE, a civil engineer, and Beatrice Ledward (née Forde), Cecil Henriques was educated at Harrow School and Trinity College, Cambridge, where he read natural sciences. In 1945 he entered St Thomas’ Hospital Medical School, London, from where he qualified in 1948. He was a house officer and casualty officer at St Thomas’ Hospital, before spending two years National Service in the Royal Navy as a surgeon lieutenant on HMS Britannia at Dartmouth. On demobilization he became a registrar at the Royal Northern Hospital, where he was greatly influenced by Sir Reginald Murley and R J McNeil Love. He then moved to King’s College Hospital, London, where he completed his training, becoming a research fellow and senior registrar. Here he was influenced by Sir Cecil Wakeley, Sir Edward Muir and Harold C Edwards. During his time at King’s he was successful in winning the John Everidge research prize in both 1957 and 1960. He was appointed consultant surgeon at Ipswich and East Suffolk hospitals in 1960, where he practised for the rest of his career, retiring in 1988. In 1961 he gave a Hunterian Lecture based on his research at King’s on the veins of the vertebral column and their role in the spread of cancer, some of the experimental work also being carried out at the Buckston Browne Research Farm. This lecture was published in the Annals in 1962, the same year in which he gave an Arnott Demonstration. For several years he was an examiner in surgery for the University of Cambridge and at the College he was a surgical tutor between 1964 and 1971. He had the reputation of being a highly skilled technical surgeon, but was noted for being conservative in his choice of management; if an operation could be avoided, so much the better. Immaculate in dress, in the operating theatre he always wore a pair of Royal Naval officers’ half brogue white leather deck shoes and in private life was never seen without a jacket and tie. He was also noted for owning a succession of Daimler cars. He was a skilled politician in hospital committees, usually winning the day in matters of debate. In retirement he enjoyed gardening and living a quiet country life with his wife Faith (née Sanderson), by whom he had three children. He died on 21 July 2008 in Saxmundham, Suffolk.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000600
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Hardcastle, Brian (1925 - 2008)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Smith, Carey Curloss Kenred (1917 - )

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2009-03-27
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000600-E000699
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372790372790
Occupation General surgeon
Details Carey Smith was surgeon superintendent of Stratford Hospital, Taranaki, New Zealand. He was born in Slad, near Stroud, in Gloucestershire, on 5 June 1917. His father Kenred Smith was a missionary in the Baptist Missionary Society and his mother was Ethel May Walker. He was educated at the Birches, a private school in Stroud, Belmont School and Mill Hill School in London, from which he was sent to Emmanuel College, Cambridge, in 1935, going on to St Thomas’ Hospital in 1938 for his clinical studies. Qualifying in 1941, he completed junior posts at the Royal Surrey County Hospital and Newbury and District Hospital, before joining the RAMC in 1942. He served in Sierra Leone, India and the Arakan region during the campaign in Burma. On demobilisation, he returned to London, first to St Thomas’ and then St James’s Hospital, Balham. From July 1950 to February 1951 he was a house surgeon to N R Barrett at St Thomas’ and then returned to St James, where, from April 1951 to May 1956, he was a senior registrar with Norman Tanner. He then emigrated to New Zealand, as surgeon superintendent of Stratford Hospital Taranaki. This was at that time a small rural hospital with no specialist or ancillary services. His training under Tanner enabled him to provide a comprehensive surgical service, as well as the only gastroscopy service within a radius of 150 miles. He built up the services in every department, installing new operating theatres and wards. There he remained until his retirement in 1982. In 1942 he married Helen Frances Dugon. They had four children. His sons Keith Alexander Carey and Timothy Kenred Carey are both doctors, while his other son, Christopher Mark Carey is an Anglican priest. His daughter, Jill Frances Carey, is a missionary. His death was notified to the College by his family in March 2008.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000607
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Watkins, Sir Tasker (1918 - 2007)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2009-03-27
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000600-E000699
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372791372791
Occupation Lawyer
Details Sir Tasker Watkins was a war hero, holder of the Victoria Cross, Deputy Chief Justice for England and Wales from 1988 to 1993, and an honorary fellow of the College. He was born in Nelson, Glamorgan, on 18 November 1918, the son of a mining engineer. He won a scholarship to Pontypridd County School, where he played rugby football, and was studying to become a commercial attaché when the war broke out. He enlisted into the Welch Regiment and rose to become a lieutenant in command of a company, which was ordered to attack the railway at Bafour, near Falaise, under intense fire. He charged two German posts, killing and wounding the occupants with his Sten gun, and went on to attack an anti-tank gun emplacement when his Sten jammed, so he threw it into a German’s face, and finished him off with his revolver. His company, now reduced to about 30, was now counterattacked by some 50 Germans. Watkins led a bayonet charge which wiped out many of the enemy and then attempted to withdraw round the enemy flank, but was challenged by a German position. Ordering his men to scatter, he charged the post with a Bren gun, silenced it, and led the remnants of his company back to headquarters, having saved the lives of half of his men. For his valour he was decorated with the Victoria Cross and promoted to major. After the war he took up the law. He was called to the Bar in 1948, took silk in 1965 and in 1971 joined the Bench as a judge. He enjoyed a distinguished legal career as Judge of the High Court, Lord Justice of Appeal, and Deputy Chief Justice for England and Wales from 1988 until he retired in 1993. Among his duties was to act as counsel during the enquiry into the Aberfan disaster. He was president of the Welsh Rugby Union from 1993 until 2004. He married Eirwen Evans in 1941 and they had two children, a son, who died in 1982, and a daughter, Mair. He died in the University Hospital of Wales, Cardiff, on 9 September 2007.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000608
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Langley, Douglas Arthur (1917 - 2002)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Enid Taylor
Publication Date 2009-03-27
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000600-E000699
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372792372792
Occupation Ophthalmic surgeon
Details Douglas Arthur Langley was a consultant ophthalmic surgeon at the Royal Northern and Whittington hospitals in London. He was born on 18 April 1917 at Woolwich, London, to Arthur Langley, an Army officer, and Laura Elizabeth née Webber. He was educated at Cottingham College, Plumstead, and Woolwich County Secondary School and received his medical education at King’s College and St George’s Hospital. There he won the Johnson prize in anatomy, the Pollock prize in physiology and the Anne Selim scholarship. During the Second World War he served in the RNVR as a surgeon lieutenant. After leaving the Navy, he began his training in ophthalmic surgery and worked as resident surgical officer at Moorfield’s Eye Hospital, before his appointment as consultant ophthalmic surgeon to the Royal Northern Hospital, the Whittington Hospital and the West End Hospital for Neurology. He was particularly interested in glaucoma and held annual meetings for north London opticians at the Royal Northern Hospital. His interests were varied: he had a private pilot’s licence, was a keen yachtsman and navigator, a skilled pianist and cabinet maker, and loved watching football. He married twice. In 1942 he married Myrtle Chinnery, an old school friend. They had two sons and a daughter. His second wife was Yvonne Patricia Peterson, a nurse, by whom he had a son. His health in latter years was poor and he underwent repair of an aortic aneurysm. He died on 16 June 2002.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000609
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Walker, William Martin (1919 - 2005)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Greaves, Desmond Peel (1920 - 2008)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Enid Taylor
Publication Date 2009-05-15
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000600-E000699
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372794372794
Occupation Ophthalmic surgeon
Details Desmond Peel Greaves was a consultant ophthalmic surgeon at University College and Moorfields Eye hospitals in London. He was born on 14 December 1920 in the West Riding of Yorkshire to Bernard Peel, an optician, and Beatrice Peel. He was educated at High Storrs Grammar School, Sheffield, and then went on to study medicine at the University of Sheffield, where he was the Edgar Allen scholar. After qualifying, he was a demonstrator in anatomy at Sheffield before completing his National Service in the RAF, with the rank of flight lieutenant. His ophthalmic training was at Moorfields Eye Hospital. From 1950 he was senior registrar and Pigott-Wernheiz research fellow at the Institute of Ophthalmology. He was appointed consultant ophthalmic surgeon to University College Hospital in 1952 and to Moorfields Eye Hospital in 1960. He was vice-dean and lecturer at the Institute of Ophthalmology. He was a recognised teacher in London University and a member of the Court of Examiners of our College. He retired in 1985. He was a council member and honorary secretary of the Ophthalmological Society of the United Kingdom, a council member of the European Society of Ophthalmology from 1970 and in 1980 president. From his student days he was an accomplished and enthusiastic pianist and a keen sailor, becoming a member of the Royal Thames Yacht Club. He married Barbara in 1948. They had two children - Francis, who is a doctor, and Julia, a pharmacist. Desmond Greaves died on 11 March 2008.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000611
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Winstanley, John (1919 - 2008)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Enid Taylor
Publication Date 2009-05-15
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000600-E000699
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372795372795
Occupation Ophthalmic surgeon
Details John Winstanley was an ophthalmic surgeon at St Thomas’ Hospital, London. He was born in London on 11 May 1919, the son of Bernard Joseph Winstanley, a captain in the Burma Sappers and Miners, and Grace née Taunton, the daughter of a solicitor. The younger of three sons, he was educated at Stoke House, Seaford, Sussex, and Wellington College, Berkshire. From 1937 to 1946 he served in the 4th Battalion Queen’s Own Royal West Kent Regiment, with the British Expeditionary Force in Europe, in the Western Desert and in Burma. He was wounded twice, was twice mentioned in despatches and won the Military Cross. After leaving the Army, he studied medicine at St Thomas’, qualifying in 1951. For the next five years he held resident medical appointments at St Thomas’ and Moorfields Eye Hospital. From 1956 to 1960 he was chief clinical assistant at Moorfields and senior registrar at St Thomas’. From 1959 to 1970 he was a consultant ophthalmic surgeon to Lewisham and Greenwich health districts. In 1960 he was appointed consultant ophthalmic surgeon to St Thomas’, a post he held until 1983. At St Thomas’ he expanded eye services, amalgamating with the Royal Eye Hospital, and developed a medical eye unit and a charity, the Iris Fund. He contributed papers on medical ophthalmology and medical history. He maintained his association with the armed services, serving as honorary consultant ophthalmic surgeon to the Army, to Queen Alexandra Military Hospital, Millbank, and to the Royal Hospital, Chelsea. He was a member of the Court of Examiners of the College from 1972 to 1978. He was a fellow of the Royal Society of Medicine (and vice-president in 1979). From 1973 to 1985 he was vice-president of the Faculty of Ophthalmologists, and from 1979 to 1990 a member of the council of the Medical Protection Society. A liveryman of the Society of Apothecaries of the City of London, he served on the livery committee from 1982. During his leisure time he enjoyed fishing and reading medical history. In 1959 he married Jane Mary Frost and they had one son (Richard) and two daughters (Emma and Sophie). He died from prostate cancer on 4 January 2008.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000612
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Kapur, Satya Bhushan (1920 - 2008)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Enid Taylor
Publication Date 2009-05-15
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000600-E000699
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372796372796
Occupation Ophthalmic surgeon
Details Satya Bhushan Kapur was an ophthalmic surgeon. He was born on 4 March 1920 in Rangoon, Burma, the second child but first son of Lal Chand Kapur, a civil engineer with Burma Railways, and Bhagwanti Devi, whose father was an Ayurvedic physician. He was educated in Rangoon at the primary DAV School and then at BET High School. He began his medical education in 1938 at the Medical College, Rangoon, but this was interrupted in 1942 when Burma was invaded by Japan. The family were held in Burma during the Japanese occupation, but then fled to India, where he resumed his studies at King Edward Medical College, Lahore, Punjab, qualifying in 1946. He was one of the first Indian graduates to migrate to Britain and train successfully in ophthalmology. He was an ophthalmic house surgeon then a registrar at Guy’s Hospital, London, before becoming a registrar, then a senior registrar at Moorfields Eye Hospital. He was appointed consultant ophthalmic surgeon in 1962 to West Middlesex Hospital and later to St Albans City Hospital and Queen Elizabeth II Hospital, Welwyn Garden City. He was a member of the Royal Society of Medicine and of the BMA, and he served on the council of the Medical Eye Centre Association, UK. A physically fit man, he enjoyed swimming, golf, hill walking, and reluctantly gave up skiing at the age of 85. He married Toini Kylliainen in 1955 and they had two daughters, Suri and Mira, both of whom are medically qualified and live in Australia. He died on 4 April 2008.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000613
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Pierpoint, Matthew (1791 - 1855)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Rae, Sir William (1786 - 1878)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Smith, Samuel (1790 - 1867)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2008-08-08
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000500-E000599
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372722372722
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born in Briggate, Leeds, the son of George Smith, banker; was apprenticed to his brother-in-law, Fawell, a general practitioner in Leeds. He then studied in London, where he was for a time a house pupil of Sir Charles Bell, and in Edinburgh. He began practice in Leeds, and in 1819 was appointed Surgeon to the General Infirmary on the vacancy occasioned by the death of Stansfeld. He held office for forty-five years, and proved a successful operator, especially as a lithotomist, a scrupulously generous colleague, uniformly kind to his patients. In 1864 he voluntarily retired from the active staff, and was appointed to the newly created office of Consulting Surgeon, as were also Hey and Teale. Smith continued to attend the infirmary whenever there were important operations and cases of accident. His abilities as an operator were not in any way affected by advancing years, for a few weeks before his death he performed an ovariotomy. He was active as one of the originators of the Leeds School of Medicine in 1832. He began by teaching anatomy to his pupils, and he later lectured in the Medical School on surgery, midwifery, and the diseases of women and children. He had a large practice as an accoucheur, for he was also Surgeon to the Leeds Hospital for Women and Children. In 1804, at the age of 14, he had joined the Militia formed in view of the threatened invasion, and was afterwards an active member of the Volunteer Corps. On the formation of the Leeds Engineer Corps he became one of their Surgeons and was promoted to Major of the Battalion. In politics a staunch Conservative, and for many years Churchwarden in his parish church, he was a warm advocate of the movement which resulted in the Act for the shortening of the hours of labour in factories, both at meetings and at the Committee of the House of Commons, where he gave evidence on the subject, and by his zeal contributed much to the ultimate success of the movement. He had already some signs of an onset of pleurisy, when he went out to visit patients, fell ill of pleuropneumonia, and died on Nov 19th, 1867, at his house in Park Square, Leeds. He was buried at Moor Allerton, his funeral being attended by a number of his colleagues, including William and Samuel Hey, and some forty students of the Medical School. His portrait had recently been presented by public subscription to the Infirmary as an expression of the esteem in which his services to charitable institutions in Leeds were held. PUBLICATION: “Clinical Lectures on Lithotomy, delivered at the Leeds School of Medicine, 1858,” 12mo, London, 1859; reprinted from *Brit. Med. Jour.*, 1859, 7, etc.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000538
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Pozzi, Samuel Jean (1846 - 1918)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2012-10-10
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E002000-E002999/E002900-E002999
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/375173375173
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born at Bergerac, Dordogne, on October 3rd, 1846, the son of a pastor of Italian origin who had twelve children. He was educated at the *lycées* of Pau and Bordeaux, and in 1869 studied in Paris, becoming a favourite pupil of Broca. He graduated MD in 1873, and obtained the position of Agrégé in 1877. In 1876 he visited Lister in Edinburgh, returned a convinced Listerian, and, with Lucas Championnière, introduced Listerism into France. In 1883 he was appointed Surgeon to the Hôpital de Loureine, afterwards the Hôpital Broca. Directing his attention to gynaecology, he was appointed in 1901 to the Professorship of Gynaecology founded by the City of Paris. In the meantime he acted as Secretary-General of the French Congress of Surgery from 1885-1894; in 1895 he was elected to the Académie de Médecine, and in 1898 was elected Senator for his native Department, and retained the position for the ensuing nine years. On July 25th, 1900, he received the honorary Fellowship of the Royal College of Surgeons of England, where his striking presence was noticeable among the leaders of Continental surgery. He was for many years President of the Surgical Society of Paris, and, in addition to his position as a general surgeon, was the leader of French gynaecologists, President of the Marseilles Congress of Gynaecology in 1898, Vice-President of the International Congress of Gynaecology in Paris in 1900, the representative of the French Government on visits to Germany, Italy, England, Austria, and the United States. In 1909 he returned from the United States and described the work and entourage of the Mayo Brothers, as well as the transplantation of organs of tissues by Carrel at the Rockefeller Institute. He was a keen student of the history of medicine, and added one more guess at the cause of the death of Princess Henrietta, celebrated by Bossuet in an "Oraison Funèbre". Pozzi's theory was that she died of a ruptured extrauterine pregnancy in the first or second month, but there is no precise description either of the acute abdominal attack or of what was seen at the post-mortem examination. At the age of 72 Pozzi was murdered by a lunatic on June 13th, 1918, in his consulting-room, the murderer firing four revolver shots into his abdomen at close quarters. Pozzi had operated on this man two years before, and the madman's complaint was that he would not operate upon him again. Pozzi behaved with calmness and great presence of mind; he instructed his removal to the Astoria Hospital, where he ordered spinal anaesthesia that he might follow the laparotomy performed for twelve perforations of the intestine and a wound in the kidney. He died a few hours later. His portrait is in the Honorary Fellows' Album; one accompanies his biography in the *Lancet*; one forms the frontispiece of the *Livre d'Or, offert au Professeur Pozzi*, 1906. There is a coloured caricature among those of French physicians and surgeons in Paris early in the twentieth century.
Resource Identifier RCS: E002990
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Atkinson, Robert James (1812 - 1879)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Attenburrow, Henry Clinton ( - 1891)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2009-11-04 2016-01-29
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000700-E000799
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372908372908
Occupation General surgeon
Details Surgeon to the General Hospital, Nottingham, and to the County Gaol. He went to Jersey about 1863 and practised for many years at St Brelade's. He died before 1891. [Amendments from the annotated edition of *Plarr's Lives* at the Royal College of Surgeons: ? connected with John Attenborrow, Surgeon, of Nottingham see below life of John Higginbottom p.535. John Attenborrow (-burrow, or -burough) was surgeon to the General Hospital, Nottingham for 62 years 1781-1843. He died on 8 November 1843 aged 87 (*Gentleman's Magazine*) so must have been born about 1756. RCS has a drawing & engraving of him.]
Resource Identifier RCS: E000725
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Austen, John Colmer ( - 1861)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Aveling, Charles Taylor (1844 - 1902)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2009-11-04 2016-01-11
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000700-E000799
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372910372910
Occupation General surgeon
Details Educated at St Thomas's Hospital, where he became House Surgeon. Settled in practice at 14 Portland Place, Lower Clapton, London, where he held a number of public appointments - Public Vaccinator, Police Surgeon, Medical Referee to the Edinburgh Assurance Company, and Medical Officer of the City of London Union House. Later he resided at Cedar House, 136 Stamford Hill, London, where he was in partnership with John Bradshaw White, MD. He was a member of the British Medical Association, of the Hunterian Society, and a Fellow of the Obstetrical Society. He was drowned at Mullion Cove, Cornwall, on Sept 5th, 1902, in a brave attempt to rescue a lady from the like fate.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000727
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Price, James (1792 - 1867)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Price, William (1785 - 1867)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Davies, William Hugh (1923 - 2008)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by N Alan Green
Publication Date 2009-06-23 2010-01-13
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000600-E000699
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372803372803
Occupation General surgeon
Details Hugh Davies was a consultant general surgeon with an interest in urology to the Hereford Hospital Group. Appointed in 1961, he continued work as a popular and well-loved surgeon, always being reticent about any personal achievements. In spite of his many sporting activities, he was a very self-effacing person. He was born in Swansea into a non-medical household on 25 March 1923. Hugh’s father, William Alfred Davies, owned a tin plate manufacturing firm and his mother, Florence (née Morris), was a housewife. From preparatory school in Malvern, he won a scholarship in 1936 to Marlborough College, where he continued to excel at sport. His excellence was seen in the school’s first teams at rugby football, hockey and cricket, and in his school work. He was awarded a scholarship to Caius College, Cambridge, to study natural sciences during the early years of the Second World War. Proceeding to St Thomas’ Hospital for his clinical studies, his sporting activities continued on the ‘rugger’ field and he gained a regular place in the United Hospitals XV. After house appointments at St Thomas’, he entered National Service as a major in the RAMC for 18 months. When his career veered towards surgery, he underwent general training at St Peter’s Hospital, Chertsey, and then in Portsmouth, before returning to his alma mater as a resident assistant surgeon. His wish to sub-specialise led him to travel north for higher training in the Newcastle urology unit. Hugh Davies obtained his definitive consultant post in Hereford as a general surgeon with an interest in urology, an area of the country he particularly enjoyed as it was close to his native Wales. He was a member of both the Association of Surgeons of Great Britain and Ireland and the British Association of Urological Surgeons. One former house surgeon and general practitioner wrote of him: “He was an excellent surgeon to work with and very careful. Perhaps this prolonged his surgery, but we knew he was a perfectionist.” “If asked to do a domiciliary visit, he would not leave it to the next day, but would come that day even if it was late. He would expect me to be there as it was important learning for a GP.” “Certainly we GPs had a high regard for Hugh and knew we would always have an excellent opinion and that our patient would always be very satisfied.” Apparently Hugh had a dry sense of humour: when his hat fell into the wound when operating, his assistants could hardly control their mirth. The surgeon merely raised his head and said “Another hat please, sister!” He married Shirley Peppitt, a general practitioner, in June 1961. Hugh and Shirley had a family of three: Jane, the elder daughter, became a personal assistant to the food critic Egon Ronay and later married; their son, Robert, became a GP and continues to practice in Ledbury, Hereford; the younger daughter, Katie, is a housewife. There are 11 grandchildren. Hugh Davies continued his sporting interests in any spare time by playing golf as a member of the local Worsley Golf Club and, in his earlier years in Hereford, was an active member of the Whitecross (Hereford) Tennis and Squash Club. He enjoyed collecting antiques and water colours and was knowledgeable in both. But above all he was a devoted family man. Shortly before his retirement Hugh he was involved in a road traffic accident and the injuries definitely stifled his latter years. His life continued to revolve around his immediate family, to whom he was very attached. William Hugh Davies died peacefully at Ledbury Cottage Hospital on 3 March 2008 and is survived by Shirley, their children and grandchildren. A service of thanksgiving was held at St Philip and St James Church, Tarrington, Herefordshire. One local general practitioner wrote of this final tribute to a much-loved man: “It was a lovely experience to come to the service and realise what a loving family he had, to hear the grandchildren read and run around the church, to hear of his exploits on the rugby field and to sing ‘Guide me, O thou Great Jehovah’ to the tune of Cwm Rhondda.”
Resource Identifier RCS: E000620
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Gun-Munro, Sir Sydney Douglas (1916 - 2007)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2008-01-24 2009-02-26
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000400-E000499
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372623372623
Occupation General surgeon
Details Sir Sydney Gun-Munro was a former Governor General of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines. He was born on 29 November 1916, the eighth child of an extensive family of Scottish descent on the island of Grenada in the Windward Isles. His father, Barclay Justin Gun-Munro, died when Sydney was only seven. Sydney attended the Anglican Primary School in Grenada, from which he won a scholarship to the Grenada Boys’ Secondary School. On leaving, he gained the Grenada Island scholarship, which took him to London and King’s College Hospital, in the footsteps of his brother Cecil. Always an adaptable soul, Sydney fitted in well with life in London, as he did with his fellow students, despite being some four years their senior, showing one of the characteristics typical of him all throughout his life – his ability to mix comfortably with folk from the most varied backgrounds. As an accomplished raconteur, guitar player and competitive tennis player, he became a popular figure in the social life of his contemporaries. When the anatomy and physiology departments moved to Glasgow at the outbreak of the Second World War, he showed his adaptability by facing a harsh northern winter, always charming his Scottish landladies. When he eventually moved into a flat with three other students they rapidly learned another lifelong characteristic, his ability to organise those around him, in this case acting as kitchen hands and washers-up whilst Sydney presided over the cooking with the accomplishment of a professional chef. On returning to London to start clinical work, his group moved to Horton Emergency Hospital in Epsom, Surrey, with visits to King’s College Hospital for outpatients and special studies. He qualified MB BS with honours in medicine and a distinction in surgery. After qualifying he was house surgeon to the EMS Hospital in Horton throughout the Blitz, and was at his brother’s house when it was struck by a bomb. For four hours he lay buried in the debris and was almost given up for dead. Perhaps realising that the clinical material available at that time in the medical school was somewhat limited, he gained an appointment as medical officer to Lewisham Hospital, where he enjoyed the wide variety of clinical work, under the aegis of his medical director, Humphrey Nockolds, who became a lifelong friend. When Sydney returned to Grenada in 1946 he worked as a district medical officer until 1949, when he was appointed surgeon at the Colonial Hospital, Kingstown, Saint Vincent, continuing there until 1971, apart from a secondment to England to study for the diploma in ophthalmology. In 1963, he was joined by a second surgeon. Many of his contemporaries were surprised when he returned to the West Indies because, with his record, he could undoubtedly have gained prestigious appointments in this country. To those who had the good fortune to visit him there however the wisdom of his decision was soon explained. Apart from the charm of the Windward Islands, it was clear that Sydney had groomed himself for this task throughout his medical training. His wide knowledge of medicine and his skill as a surgeon made him completely fitted for his life on the island of Saint Vincent. The only surgeon to a population of about 90,000 in Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, he was able to give outstanding service in all branches of surgery and many of medicine. He dealt with general surgery, trauma, obstetrics and gynaecology, ear nose and throat surgery and ophthalmology, in which he was particularly interested, and continued to provide a clinic for many years after his retirement. After 20 years he had become known to virtually everybody on Saint Vincent and the neighbouring islands. He was respected for his own qualities and integrity, as well as for the work he had done as a surgeon, work which was recognised by our College, which granted him a fellowship *ad eundem*. It was not surprising therefore that he was appointed the first Governor of Saint Vincent in 1977, for which he was knighted. He became Governor General of the State of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines when independence came in 1979, becoming GCMG. As Governor General he always sought the welfare of the islands, established a successful arrowroot mill with Canadian assistance, a library, and a children’s charity for the welfare of the island’s young people. He married an English nurse, Joan Estelle Benjamin, and they became partners in a very happy marriage that lasted 60 years. Joan herself demonstrated remarkable adaptability in exchanging her life in the home counties for one in the West Indies, as the mother of a growing family, looking after a surgeon who was busy all hours of the day or night, and subsequently as wife of the Governor General, acting as hostess to members of the Royal Family and a broad spectrum of public figures from church and political life, as well as developing interests of her own, including distinguished service to the Red Cross. Apart from Sydney’s professional activities, his interests were in boating and tennis: he and Joan regularly won the mixed doubles at the island tennis club. He died on 1 March 2007, leaving his wife Joan, daughter Sandra and two sons, Rodney and Michael.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000439
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Prichard, John (1800 - 1867)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Prior, Charles Edward ( - 1907)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2012-10-10
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E003000-E003999/E003000-E003099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/375183375183
Occupation General surgeon
Details Studied in Birmingham, London, and Paris. He practised at St Peter's Green, Bedford, was Coroner for the Borough, Surgeon to the Bedford Dispensary, Medical Assistant to the Royal Humane Society, Medical Officer of the Bedford, Biggleswade, and Woburn Unions, and at one time President of the South Midland Branch of the British Medical Association. He published articles on medicine, surgery, and sanitation, and in 1856 gave a lecture on "The Object and Advantages of Literary and Scientific Association". He died at Goldington Road, Bedford, on October 9th, 1907.
Resource Identifier RCS: E003000
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Nachemson, Alf (1931 - 2006)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2008-01-24
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000400-E000499
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372626372626
Occupation Orthopaedic surgeon
Details Alf Nachemson was one of the giants of his generation in the now recognised and developing specialty of orthopaedic spinal surgery. He spent a year or more in the USA, involved in editorial work and research, particularly at Boston, and remained a popular figure at American spinal conferences, where he drove home his strong views. Despite this, he remained scathing of what he considered to be the American tendency of resorting to surgery prematurely in situations where the outcome was still in question, citing particularly spinal fusion. Born on 1 June 1931, Alf Nachemson graduated in medicine from the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, Sweden, in 1956 and, after his internships, studied for his PhD at Uppsala University. He then joined the staff of the Sahlgrenska Hospital, Göteborg, in 1961. Here he was appointed orthopaedic specialist and associate professor. He was promoted to professor and chairman of orthopaedic surgery at Göteborg University in 1971 and remained in this position until his retirement in 1996. He built up the research faculty of his department and developed a large research budget. His major involvement was in basic science research and clinical trials related to spinal orthopaedics. When he was first at Uppsala University, under the direction of Carl Hirsch, he became involved in the in-vitro and then in-vivo studies on lumbar disc mechanics. Initially this work involved intra-discal pressure measurements on post mortem specimens, but he developed his techniques to provide a safe method of measuring in-vivo intra-discal pressures in the lumbar spines of volunteers in different postures of flexion, extension and whilst lifting. This classic study, published in the *Journal of Bone and Joint Surgery* in 1964, and since corroborated in other centres, has become the scientific basis of our understanding of what is and what is not the correct use of the back in sitting, bending, lifting and carrying, according to the avoidance of disruptive internal disc pressures. From the late 1960s onwards, he set up a number of controlled prospective trials and random studies into the results of different spinal surgical procedures, correlating these with the outcomes of conservative treatment for the management of back pain arising in the workplace and in industry. Perhaps the main conclusions, which he derived from these controlled studies, was that bed rest for acute low back pain should be limited to no more than a few days and that lumbosacral fusion was rarely a useful treatment for chronic back pain, except where there is a clear mechanical cause, for example in cases of spondylolisthesis. He travelled the world and banged the table with this message (often literally), particularly in the USA, where there is a much higher prevalence of spinal fusion compared with Europe. Nachemson also made significant contributions to the field of spinal deformities and published on the poor longevity of severe infantile scoliosis, as well as the prevalence and pattern of back pain in different types of adult scoliosis. In the late 1980s he initiated an international multi-centre prospective control study into the effects of bracing in adolescent idiopathic scoliosis funded by the Scoliosis Research Society of the USA. This extended over some five years and its eventual publication concluded that bracing made a significant difference to the natural history of mild cases. Although the trial was at that time unique in its ambitious attempt to coordinate a study across several continents, unfortunately it did not extend the follow-up time long enough to answer the question as to whether bracing significantly altered the likelihood of a braced adolescent with scoliosis avoiding the need for eventual surgical correction. Alf Nachemson published over 500 scientific papers as first author or co-author and gave more than 1,500 lectures worldwide. Not only did he publish in Swedish and international journals, but was the co-founder of the journal Spine and remained their senior editor for 20 years. He was also one of the founders of the Cochrane Collaboration Back Review Group, established in 1993, which promoted a more scientific approach and the need for a higher standard of papers published in the spinal specialty journals. Among his many initiatives, he helped to found the European Spinal Deformities Society and the European Spine Society. Nachemson was appointed an honorary fellow of our College in 1987 and an honorary fellow of the British Orthopaedic Association the following year. In the last decade he had taken up the baton of promoting evidence based medicine, using this as a yardstick against which he felt that all treatments and methods of management must be judged. Undoubtedly his drive in this area has helped to make evidence based medicine not only a priority in spinal management, but also an everyday medical term. It could be said that Alf Nachemson’s greatest contribution was the establishment of a very successful university department of orthopaedics at Göteborg. Among his postgraduate students, 81 PhD theses were successfully defended, and 16 of his PhD students became notable professors in centres around the world. His department attracted many grants and achieved many awards. He worked in close collaboration with the Volvo car company based in Göteborg, which promoted research into back pain. There is good evidence that his team designed the anthropometrics for Volvo car seats. As with most distinguished medical Swedes, his English was impeccable and in addition he was an anglophile. As a result he enjoyed his frequent visits to friends and colleagues in the UK. These included not only to those in his own spinal specialty, but to general orthopaedic surgeons, of whom one stands out. Alf always enjoyed a good debate in the controversial areas of orthopaedics and it was Michael Freeman of the London Hospital who often provided this intellectual stimulus for him. Overall, Alf Nachemson was indeed highly gifted; not only as a lateral thinker with a research mind, but also as a good clinician, and one able to communicate with the patient over the options of treatment and their likely outcomes. One thing he despised was the ‘trigger happy’ surgeon. More than that, he was a charismatic team leader providing inspiration for a generation of spinal surgeons, not only in Sweden but worldwide and in this direction his energies were seemingly limitless. In one extended itinerary as a visiting professor he visited 50 universities in Australia, New Zealand, Asia, South Africa, North and South America and Europe. Outside medicine his interests largely revolved around his close family circle. He died on 4 December 2006 and is survived by his wife Ann and his children Louise, Mikael, Lotta, Sophie and their families.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000442
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Sheldon, Donald Mervyn (1937 - 2007)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2008-01-24 2012-03-09
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000400-E000499
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372627372627
Occupation General surgeon
Details Don Sheldon was a surgeon at the Royal Prince Alfred Hospital, Sydney, specialising in gastro-intestinal surgery. He was born on 5 January 1937 in Sydney, the third of the four children of Margret and Mervyn Sheldon. His mother Margret had been a schoolteacher, while his father Mervyn was head of the biology department and vice principal at Sydney Teachers' College. Don was educated at Earlwood Primary School and Canterbury Boys' High School, where he was *dux* and vice captain in 1953, becoming an accomplished pianist, and playing cricket and tennis for the school. He then studied medicine at the University of Sydney, where he joined the 13th NSW National Service Battalion as a private soldier. He was a prosector in 1955, preparing a dissection of the lateral aspect of the knee joint which remains in the museum today. After qualifying, Don completed junior posts at the Royal Prince Alfred Hospital, Sydney, where he became senior resident medical officer and demonstrator in anatomy. It was at this time he won the Gordon-Taylor memorial prize for the best candidate in the basic sciences part of the FRACS. He went on to become surgical registrar in 1963. While he was surgical registrar in thoracic surgery he was in charge of the Australian thoracic surgical team at Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea, under Rowan Nicks and was a locum for the Royal Flying Doctor Service at Broken Hill. He would fly out to remote districts in an old Drover aeroplane, which would squirt oil over the windscreen. He was appointed superintendent at the Royal Prince Alfred in 1966, and continued to provide a locum service while the only surgeon in Darwin was on six weeks leave. While doing this job he set up a surgical registrar post to which many trainees from the Prince Alfred rotated. He also harvested the cadaver kidneys for the first renal transplant done at the Prince Alfred with Shiel and James May. In 1967 he became surgeon in charge of the 3rd Australian Surgical Aid Team which was invited by the Commonwealth Government to provide surgical services in Vung Tau, South Vietnam. His team, all of whom were volunteers, comprised two surgeons, an anaesthetist, a physician, an intern (on this occasion D K Baird), six nurses, a pathology technician and a radiographer. There he carried out much emergency surgery and also successfully delivered Siamese twins. In 1968 he returned, having lost much weight, to Sydney as honorary surgeon to the Marrickville Hospital, and the following year was appointed to the staff of the Royal Prince Alfred. But in the same year Rodney Smith, who had met him as the McIlnath guest professor at the Royal Prince Alfred, invited Don to be his registrar at St George's as a British Commonwealth scholar. At St George's he worked on the management of complicated hepatobiliary conditions, especially surgical injuries to the bile duct, and took the opportunity to pass the FRCS. Back at the Royal Prince Alfred Hospital, he specialised in upper gastro-intestinal surgery, becoming head of the department in 1986 where, together with George Ramsay-Stewart, he set up a total parenteral nutrition service and published many papers, including one which won a prize in Athens on liver resection for secondary bowel cancer. He was a pioneer in the use of mucosal grafts and balloon dilatation for stenosis of the common bile duct, and was an early advocate of removal of the sloughed pancreatic tissue in acute necrotising pancreatitis, which until then had nearly always been fatal. In 1990 he acquired the instruments and introduced laparascopic methods for cholecystectomy. For his publications he was awarded the Justin Fleming gold medal of the Australian Association of Surgeons. Other appointments and awards followed. He was awarded the Vietnam Logistics and Support medal in 1995, the Graham Coupland lecture and medal of the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons in 1996, and the Active Service medal of 1997. In his College he was on the council and chairman of the board of continuing professional development, a tutor in surgery and an examiner for the University of Sydney. A keen freemason, he was provincial grand district master of the Grand United Lodge of New South Wales and chairman of the division of surgery of the New South Wales Masonic Hospital, later the New South Wales Private Hospital. He was active in medico-legal matters, a member of the review committee of the law of negligence and the Abbot committee into medical indemnity. He was sought after as a visiting lecturer in Indonesia and the Philippines. He bought his first farm in Tarago in 1973, moving on to others in 1976 and 1977, where in Robertson he established a Polled Hereford stud, and then began share farming in wheat and sorghum in Quirindi in 1997, devoting himself to growing his own fruit and vegetables. He died of cancer in the Royal Prince Alfred Hospital on 16 March 2007, leaving his widow Pam, whom he had met while playing tennis at school and married in 1961, 4 children and 13 grandchildren.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000443
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Baker, Charles Ernest (1864 - 1909)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2009-11-04
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000700-E000799
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372921372921
Occupation General surgeon
Details Son of Charles Bernard Baker, CE, of 5 The Crescent, Bedford, and afterwards of St Albans. Born Nov 17th, 1864, at Uttoxeter, Staffs. Educated at Haileybury, where he was admitted in 1878 under Mr Bradby, and entered Trinity College, Cambridge, as a Pensioner on June 16th, 1883, with Mr Image as his tutor. Graduated BA after taking a first class in the Natural Science Tripos, and entered St Bartholomew’s Hospital in 1886. He acted as House Surgeon to Sir Thomas Smith, whose third daughter, Ada Marion, he married in 1895, and by her had two daughters. Held resident appointments at the East London Hospital for Children, at the Royal Free Hospital, and at the Royal Orthopaedic Hospital. He practised at 5 Gledhow Gardens, South Kensington, where he died from taking 7½ gr of veronal on March 28th, 1909. His death was amongst the earliest to show that an idiosyncrasy existed for this hypnotic. Whilst he was busy in practice he made time to act for four years as Clinical Assistant at the Royal Eye Hospital, Southwark.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000738
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Baker, Robert Large (1820 - 1885)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Dabbs, George Henry (1802 - 1882)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Drew, Alfred John (1916 - 2004)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Evans, Arthur Briant (1909 - 2005)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-09-23
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000000-E000099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372241372241
Occupation Obstetric and gynaecological surgeon Obstetrician and gynaecologist
Details Briant Evans was a former consultant obstetric and gynaecological surgeon at Westminster Hospital, Chelsea Hospital for Women and Queen Charlotte’s Maternity Hospital. He was born in London in 1909, the eldest son of Arthur Evans, a surgeon at the Westminster Hospital. He was educated at Westminster School and Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge, before completing his clinical studies at the Westminster Hospital. On the day he qualified in April 1933 his father, who had a large number of theatrical clients, took him to the theatre. They went to see Sir Seymour Hicks in his dressing room in the interval. On hearing that Briant had just qualified, he asked “How do I look?” Briant said, “Very well sir.” “Good, here’s your first private fee,” he replied, handing him a £1 note from his coat pocket. Following junior appointments at Westminster Hospital, Chelsea Hospital for Women and Queen Charlotte’s Maternity Hospital, he acquired his FRCS and the MRCOG. During the war he served in the Emergency Medical Service in London and was in the RAMC from 1941 to 1946, serving in the UK, Egypt (with the 8th General Hospital, Alexandria), Italy and Austria (where he was officer in charge of the No 9 field surgical unit) and was obstetric and gynaecological consultant to the Central Mediterranean Force. He ended the war as a lieutenant colonel. He was subsequently appointed obstetric and gynaecological surgeon to Westminster Hospital, obstetric surgeon to Queen Charlotte’s Maternity Hospital and surgeon to the Chelsea Hospital for Women. He examined for the Universities of Cambridge and London, and for the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists. Briant was much loved and respected by his patients and colleagues. He made operating appear easy. Quiet in manner and ever courteous, he loved teaching and was never happier than when accompanied by students on ward rounds and in the theatre. After retiring he bought a farm in Devon and his son Hugh was brought in to run it. He loved country life. He was a keen gardener, enjoyed sailing and had been a good tennis player in earlier days. His last home was in Buckinghamshire. In 1939 he married Audrey Holloway, the sister of David Holloway, who was engaged to Briant’s sister, Nancy. His wife died before him. They leave three sons (Roddy, Martin and Hugh), eight grandchildren and six great grandchildren. He died from a stroke on 3 March 2005.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000054
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Falloon, Maurice White (1921 - 2004)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Fiddian, Richard Vasey (1923 - 2004)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-09-23 2007-08-23
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000000-E000099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372243372243
Occupation General surgeon
Details Richard Vasey ‘Dick’ Fiddian was a consultant general surgeon at the Luton and Dunstable Hospital from 1964 to 1989. He was born on 6 October 1923 in Ashton-under-Lyne in Lancashire, where his father, James Victor Fiddian, was a general practitioner-surgeon. His mother, Doris Mary née White, came from a farming family. Dick was the last of five children, and the second son. From the age of eight he attended the Old College boarding school in Windermere, and then, at 11, went to Manchester Grammar School. In October 1941 he went up to Emmanuel College, Cambridge, to read for the natural sciences tripos. In 1943 he was drafted into the Army and spent three years as a fighting soldier in the Royal Engineers, rising to the rank of captain. As well as serving in the field with the 14th Army in Burma, he also helped to oversee the rebuilding of the Burma Road with the help of Japanese POWs. In October 1946 he returned to Emmanuel College, completing his first and second MB. He was also awarded an MA in anthropology, physiology, pathology and biochemistry. Whilst at Emmanuel, Fiddian became captain of the golf team, and was awarded a Cambridge blue. After qualifying, he did two years of house appointments at Bart’s, including anaesthetics, and a further year as junior registrar (SHO) to Rupert Corbett and Alec Badenoch. He then took a year off as a ship’s doctor on the Orsova of the Orient Line, before taking his Fellowship in 1956. He then became a registrar to Norman Townsley and John Stephens at the Norfolk and Norwich Hospital. When the Queen came to open the new operating theatres, Fiddian escorted the Duke of Edinburgh round the male Nightingale ward and introduced him to his patients, one of whom had been operated on by Dick, but failed to recognise his surgeon. He was heard to say in a broad Norfolk accent: “Nice to meet the Duke, but who was that good-looking young man in a white coat walking with him?” Dick returned to Bart’s in 1958 as chief assistant to John Hosford, whom Dick greatly admired. He also worked with Sir Edward Tuckwell, whose rapidity as an operator was legendary. After two years he went to the North Middlesex Hospital under Basil Page, the urologist. Spending a year in Boston, Massachusetts, he worked as an assistant in surgery at the Peter Bent Brigham Hospital under Francis Moore, professor of surgery at Harvard and chief surgeon at the Brigham. In 1963 he completed a Milton research fellowship in surgery at Harvard Medical School. In 1964 he was appointed as a consultant to the Luton and Dunstable Hospital. There he developed a special interest in wound infection and made some useful contributions on the use of metronidazole. He retired from the NHS in 1989. In 1985 he started learning Spanish at the local adult education college in Luton, continuing to study the language until he was 80. He visited Spain many times and often went on cultural trips, which he thoroughly enjoyed. After his retirement he studied Spanish literature at Birkbeck College, and received an award from the Institute of Linguists for his command of the language. He married twice. His first wife was Aileen, an Australian he met on board ship. They had one son, Jonathan. After her death he married Jean née Moore, a medical secretary, by whom he had a son, James, and two daughters, Emily and Sarah. They also adopted the child of one of Jean’s friends. Although they became estranged, they remained good friends and Jean cared for him in his latter days, which were marred by a degree of dementia. He died on 30 December 2004. Dick Fiddian was an extremely affable man who was everyone’s friend, not because of a wish to be universally liked, but for his capacity to see the best in people. He was a self-effacing man, describing his contributions to the literature as “numerous, none of which were important”. Conversation with him was always a pleasure, as was listening to his after-dinner speeches which were interspersed with bon mots and limericks which probed the idiosyncrasies of the company, never with malice but always with a twinkle in his eye.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000056
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Fison, Lorimer George (1920 - 2004)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-09-23
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000000-E000099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372244372244
Occupation Ophthalmic surgeon
Details Lorimer Fison was an innovative ophthalmic surgeon who introduced a revolutionary new procedure for the repair of retinal detachment from the United States. He was born on 14 July 1920 in Harrogate, the third son of William James Fison, a well-known ophthalmic surgeon, and Janet Sybil née Dutton, the daughter of a priest. He was educated at Parkfield School, Haywards Heath, and then Marlborough College. He then studied natural sciences at Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge, and then went on to St Bartholomew’s Hospital. After qualifying, he joined the Navy during the war as a Surgeon Lieutenant. Following demobilisation, he became a resident surgical officer at Moorfield’s, despite having caught tuberculosis. He then became a senior registrar at St Thomas’s Hospital and later at Bart’s. In 1957 Fison went to the Schepens unit in Boston in the United States, after Sir Stuart Duke-Elder, the then doyen of British ophthalmology, suggested that fellows be despatched to learn the new techniques of retinal detachment surgery. There Fison learnt the procedure of scleral explantation, and was also impressed by the ophthalmic instruments then available in the US. Back in England, Fison faced some opposition when he attempted to introduce the new procedures he had been taught in the States, but was finally given beds at Moorfield’s annexe in Highgate. With the help of Charles Keeler, he modified the Schepens indirect ophthalmoscope, which was put into production and sold around the world. Fison was also the first to introduce the photocoagulator, the forerunner of the modern ophthalmic laser, which was developed by Meyer-Schwickerath in Germany. In 1962, after a brief appointment at the Royal Free Hospital, he was appointed as a consultant at Moorfield’s. He was held in great affection by his colleagues and juniors, who remember his warmth and generosity. Fison was President of the Faculty of Ophthalmologists from 1980 to 1983 and of the Ophthalmological Society of the United Kingdom from 1985 to 1987. He was an ardent supporter of the merging of these two organisations – they became the Royal College of Ophthalmologists in 1988. At the Royal College of Surgeons he was an examiner for the FRCS in ophthalmology, Chairman of the Court of Examiners in 1978 and a member of Council. He married Isabel née Perry in 1947 and they had one daughter, Sally, who qualified in medicine. On his retirement he moved to Sidmouth, where he continued his hobbies of woodworking and sailing. He died on 12 February 2004.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000057
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Ford, Colin Gagen (1934 - 2004)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-09-23 2007-02-09
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000000-E000099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372245372245
Occupation General Practitioner
Details Colin Gagen Ford was a former general practitioner in Chislehurst, Kent. He was born in Merton Park on 11 December 1934, the son of Bertram Leonard Ford and Kathleen May née Gagen. He attended Rutlish School, but left at 16 after gaining his O levels. He joined Cable and Wireless, becoming a proficient morse operator, and whilst working there attended evening classes to gain the necessary A levels for entry to medical school. His studying was interrupted by his National Service: he served with the Royal Marines, winning the coveted green commando beret and serving in Cyprus. He went on to St Mary’s to study medicine, graduating in 1962. He played rugby for the second XV and rowed for the college. After qualifying, he was a house surgeon to Sir Arthur Porritt and H H G Eastcott at St Mary’s and was then a house physician at Paddington General Hospital. He then went into general practice, but later returned to hospital medicine and developed an interest in orthopaedics. However, he failed to gain a place on a training programme, being told he was “too old and too experienced”, although he did achieve his FRCS in 1973. After several locums, he returned to general practice. He married Ann McAra, a consultant anaesthetist, in 1969 and they had two sons and two daughters – William, Kate, Robert and Helen. He was interested in old cars, sailing and golf. He had a long battle with alcohol and finally retired in 1991 on medical grounds. He died from pancreatitis as a result of alcoholic liver disease on 29 March 2004.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000058
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Fuller, Robert Charles (1914 - 2004)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-09-23 2012-03-22
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000000-E000099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372246372246
Occupation General surgeon
Details Robert Fuller was born in Acton, London, on 4 January 1916. His father, Charles, was a company director. His mother was Mildred Kate née Lambert, a housewife. Robert was educated at St Paul's from 1928 to 1934, and then went on to St Mary's Hospital to study medicine. After qualifying in 1939, with the surgery prize, and following a series of house appointments, he joined the RAF in 1941. He served in the UK, India and South East Asia, where he was involved in the Battle of Imphal, which saw the defeat of the Japanese attempt to invade India. After the war, he returned to specialise in surgery and did registrar jobs in Birmingham, Worcester and London, becoming resident surgical officer at St Mark's, where he developed a special interest in proctology. He was appointed consultant surgeon to Acton, Wembley and Hammersmith Hospitals, and was also visiting consultant to HM Prison, Wormwood Scrubs, from 1977 to 1981. He was a fellow of the Royal Society of Medicine and a member of the Medical Society of London. He married Betty Elaine Maud née Jones, a practising barrister, in 1967. They retired to Herefordshire to grow apples for cider. His hobby was carpentry. He died on 9 May 2004, from peripheral vascular disease and diabetes.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000059
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Porter, Richard William (1935 - 2005)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-06-21 2012-03-13
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000200-E000299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372431372431
Occupation Orthopaedic surgeon
Details Richard William Porter was a distinguished orthopaedic surgeon in Aberdeen. He was born on 16 February 1935 in Doncaster, the son of J Luther Porter, a china merchant and Methodist minister, and Mary Field. He was educated at Oundle and Edinburgh University, and completed his surgical training at Edinburgh. Following house appointments he became a ships' surgeon for three months before returning to Edinburgh as a senior house officer and passing the FRCS Edinburgh and the DObstRCOG. He began his surgical training as a registrar in Sheffield and after obtaining the FRCS England in 1966 he became a senior registrar on the orthopaedic training programme at King's College Hospital, where he was much influenced by Hubert Wood and Christopher Attenborough. He returned to Doncaster as consultant orthopaedic surgeon to the Royal Infirmary and soon took an interest in low back pain, a common problem among the coal miners. He set up a research programme and established a department of bioengineering which attracted postgraduate students from home and abroad. He became an authority on the use of ultrasound in the investigation of back pain published papers and a book on the subject and was awarded an MD in 1981 for this work. His reputation resulted in the presidency of the Society for Back Pain Research and a founder membership of the European Spine Society. He was also on the council of the British Orthopaedic Association and the Society of Clinical Anatomists. In 1990 he was appointed to the Sir Harry Platt chair of orthopaedic surgery in Aberdeen and developed links with China and Romania, and later became the first Syme professor of orthopaedics in the University of Edinburgh and director of education and training at the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh. Following his retirement he returned to Doncaster and, as a devout Christian, played a very full part in the local Evangelical Methodist Church. He published extensively and was the author of three textbooks. In 1964 he married Christine Brown, whom he had known since his schooldays. They had four sons, one of whom is an orthopaedic surgeon, two are Anglican ministers and one a Methodist minister. He died on 20 July 2005.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000244
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Cutler, Geoffrey Abbott (1920 - 2000)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2007-05-10
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000300-E000399
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372529372529
Occupation General surgeon
Details Geoff Cutler was a surgeon in New South Wales, Australia. He was born on 29 February 1920 in Manly, a suburb of Sydney. He was the second of the three sons of Arthur and Ruby Cutler. Their father was a sales representative for Remington, who had been a crack shot and twice winner at Bisley. He was killed in a car accident in 1935 and Geoffrey left school at 17 to work in a bank, whilst studying for a degree at night. When the war came he was keen to enlist, but his mother would not sign the papers as his elder brother, later to become Sir Roden Cutler, future diplomat and Governor of New South Wales, had been seriously wounded in Syria, winning the VC, but losing his leg. Geoff joined the RAAF when he was 21. While he was learning to fly he became bored during a long formation flight to Goulbourn and decided to slip away to do a few loops and rolls, and then found to his consternation that he was quite alone and not sure where he was. He landed his Tiger Moth in a suitable field, but was quickly surrounded by a group of men in uniform, who told him that he was in the middle of a prison farm. Undeterred, on getting directions for Goulbourn, he persuaded them to hang on to his plane’s tail until he had sufficient power to take off. (He kept this story secret for many years.) Later he became a test and ferry pilot, and saw enemy action in Burma and New Guinea. After the war he was able to enrol in medicine, his first love, through the repatriation arrangements provided for ex-servicemen. Enrolling with 726 other students, they were warned that 50 per cent of their year would be failed at the end of the year. He graduated with honours in 1952 and did his house appointments at Manly Hospital, having been attached to the Royal North Shore Hospital as a student. He went to England in 1954, intending to specialise in gynaecology and obstetrics, but changed to surgery, and did junior jobs in Middlesex, Northampton, Guildford and Oldchurch Hospital, Romford, as well as attending courses at the College. After passing the FRCS he returned to Australia in 1957 to a registrar position at the Royal North Shore Hospital, and started in private practice in 1958. Among his other interests were reading history, and breeding Hereford cattle on his farm, which he owned for 25 years. He had met Dorothy Arnold, another Australian, when she was nursing in London. They married in 1959 and had three children, two boys and a girl. Stephen, the eldest, represented Australia at rugby for ten years, before going to the USA to work for the pharmaceutical firm Quintiles. Anne became a physiotherapist and Rob became a solicitor in Sydney. Geoff Cutler died on 20 October 2000 from carcinoma of the colon.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000343
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Goodall, Peter (1927 - 2006)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2007-05-10
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000300-E000399
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372530372530
Occupation General surgeon
Details Peter Goodall was a consultant general surgeon in Derby. He was born on 8 February 1927 in London, the son of the Rev Norman Goodall, a minister of religion, and Doris Stanton, a Birmingham Medical School graduate. Peter was educated at Queen Elizabeth’s Grammar School in Barnet and Highgate School, and then Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge. He then went to Westminster Hospital for his clinical studies, where he won a scholarship in anatomy and physiology and the Chadwick prize in medicine, surgery and pathology. After house jobs at the Westminster Hospital he did his National Service in the RAF Medical Branch. He returned to the Westminster as a resident medical officer, and then went on to a post as surgical registrar at Oxford under ‘Tim’ Till and Joe Pennybacker. He was subsequently a senior registrar in Cardiff under Sir Patrick Forrest and Hilary Wade. Sir Patrick wrote of him: ‘When I went to Cardiff in 1961 there were no research facilities, there were no research staff, but one senior registrar…Peter Goodall. He wanted equipment to study reflux through the oesophageal sphincter. It cost £100 and the department bought it for him. His clinical work was meticulous. He was a perfectionist and liked things to go where they were meant to go.’ Peter Goodall was appointed as a consultant in Derby, where he built up a reputation as a careful and reliable surgeon, particularly in the surgery of the stomach and the thyroid, and one who took pains to train his junior staff. His operating theatre was a temple of silence, so that he could concentrate on the task in hand: woe betide anyone who disturbed the peace. He was active in the section of surgery of the Royal Society of Medicine and the Welsh Surgical Travelling Club, and served on the Court of Examiners of our College. He married Rhonwen (Wendy) Bulkely Williams in 1952, by whom he had a son and three daughters, two of whom went into nursing. He was keen on gardening and was a fine joiner, making many items of furniture out of cedar and green oak. He played the oboe well, and was particularly interested in the music of Finzi. In retirement he continued to enjoy all these hobbies and, together with Wendy, painstakingly restored a house in the Dordogne. Seemingly austere and perhaps a little shy, Peter will be remembered as perhaps one of the last gentleman surgeons, always the champion of his patients. He died on 30 October 2006.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000344
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Harvey, Ronald Marsden (1918 - 2004)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-09-28
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000000-E000099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372257372257
Occupation ENT surgeon
Details Born in London on 28 September 1918, Ronald Harvey trained at King’s College Hospital. He was appointed as a consultant in ENT, first at the Eye and Ear Hospital in 1954, and later at Altnagelvin Hospital, Londonderry, where he remained until he retired in 1983. From an early stage he was involved in the planning of the ENT department at Altnagelvin Hospital, one of the first new hospitals to be built in the new NHS. This was such a success that his advice was always sought in later developments within the hospital, even in retirement. His period as Chairman of the medical staff coincided with the worst period of civil disturbance in Northern Ireland. His leadership was remarkable: he would remain in the hospital for days on end to make sure that the frequent emergency situations were dealt with smoothly. The pressures related not only to treatment of patients with severe and multiple trauma, but to making sure that appropriate surgical teams were available at all times, in spite of difficulties with transport. He was Chairman of the Northern Ireland central medical advisory committee, and he promoted education of undergraduates and postgraduates at Altnagelvin. For this work he was appointed OBE in 1982. Outside the hospital he had many interests: he had a long involvement with the Red Cross, both at local and national level, and was awarded the Red Cross badge of honour. He served on the committee of Hearing Dogs for the Deaf, and got great pleasure from his work with Riding for the Disabled. He served two terms as high sheriff for the City of Londonderry and was a deputy lieutenant for many years. He died on 7 April 2004, and is survived by his wife Eustelle, three daughters, Elveen, Fiona and Maryrose, and four grandchildren, Charlie, Katherine, Andrew and Amy.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000070
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Witte, Jens (1941 - 2003)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-11-02 2012-03-08
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000100-E000199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372347372347
Occupation Colorectal surgeon Oesophageal surgeon Upper gastrointestinaI surgeon
Details Jens Witte, doyen of German surgery, was born on 4 February 1941 in Perleberg, Mark/Brandenburg, the eldest of three sons of a surgeon father. He studied medicine at the Universities of Homburg/Saar, Hamburg and Berlin. After qualifying, he became a medizinalassistent in Bielefeld and Hamburg, spent some time in a mission hospital in Tanzania, and returned to work under Egerhard Weisschedel in Konstantz. There followed a series of brilliant appointments under Georg Heberer, first in Cologne and then in Munich, becoming professor in 1982 and head of viszeralchirugie in 1984. His special interests were in oesophageal and colorectal surgery. He was a prominent member of the professional surgical organisation, becoming its President in 1998. Active in the European Union of Medical Specialists, he was President of the section of surgery in 2002 and devoted himself to the integration and training of surgeons in the former East Germany. He was the recipient of many honours, including that of our College. He died unexpectedly on 12 June 2003 in Augsburg.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000160
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Levy, Ivor Saul (1941 - 2005)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-06-21 2012-03-14
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000200-E000299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372434372434
Occupation Ophthalmologist
Details Ivor Levy was a consultant ophthalmologist at the Royal London Hospital, Whitechapel. He was born in Manchester on 29 June 1941 and educated in Manchester, at Pembroke College, Oxford, and at the London Hospital. After junior appointments, he held a research fellowship at the Bascom Palmer Eye Institute in Miami, USA, which led to his special interest in neuro-ophthalmology. He was appointed to the Royal London Hospital in 1973. He had a particular interest in collecting books, especially those of Sir Frederick Treves. In 2000 he developed a tremor, which was found to be caused by a communicating hydrocephalus, for which he underwent shunt surgery. He died at Addenbrooke's Hospital, Cambridge, on 21 March 2005.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000247
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Shawcross, Lord Hartley William (1902 - 2003)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-06-21 2006-10-11
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000200-E000299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372435372435
Occupation Politician
Details Hartley Shawcross, a barrister, Labour politician and an honorary fellow of the College, will be perhaps best remembered as the leading British prosecutor at the Nuremberg War Crimes Tribunal. He was born on 4 February 1902, the son of John and Hilda Shawcross. He was educated at Dulwich College, the London School of Economics and the University of Geneva. He was called to the bar in 1925. He successfully stood for Parliament as a Labour candidate in 1945 and immediately became Attorney General. From 1945 to 1949 he was Britain’s principal UN delegate, as well as Chief Prosecutor at Nuremberg. He later served as President of the Board of Trade before leaving politics and resigning from Parliament in 1958. He went on to help found the University of Sussex and served as chancellor there from 1965 to 1985. He a board member of several major companies. He married three times. His first wife, Alberta Rosita Shyvers, died in 1944. He then married Joan Winifred Mather, by whom he had two sons and a daughter (who became a doctor). In 1997, at the age of 95, he married Susanne Monique Huiskamp. Tall, handsome and with a commanding presence, Shawcross was a most distinguished member of his party, and a good friend to the College.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000248
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Siegler, Gerald Joseph (1921 - 2005)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-06-21 2009-05-07
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000200-E000299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372436372436
Occupation ENT surgeon
Details Gerald Joseph Siegler, or ‘Jo’ as he known to colleagues, was an ENT consultant in Liverpool. He was born in London on 3 January 1921, and studied medicine at St Bartholomew’s Hospital. He held junior posts in Huddersfield, Lancaster, Nuneaton and Birkenhead, before completing his National Service with the RAF. After passing his FRCS he specialised in ENT, becoming a registrar at the Royal National Throat, Nose and Ear Hospital and then a senior registrar at Liverpool, where he was appointed consultant in 1958. He was past president of the North of England ENT Society and an honorary member of the Liverpool Medical Institute. After he retired in 1986 he continued to be busy, working for Walton jail until 1995. He died from the complications of myeloma on 4 October 2005, leaving a wife, Brenda, two daughters, Sarah and Pauline, and three grandchildren.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000249
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Yellowlees, Sir Henry (1919 - 2006)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-06-21 2012-03-08
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000200-E000299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372437372437
Occupation Chief Medical Officer
Details Sir Henry Yellowlees was Chief Medical Officer for England from 1973 to 1983. He was born on 16 April 1919 in Edinburgh, the son of Sir Henry Yellowlees, a psychiatrist, and Dorothy Davies, a cellist. He was educated at Stowe and University College, Oxford, but deferred his medical training to join the RAF, where he became a flying instructor. After the war he went up to Oxford to read medicine, going on to the Middlesex Hospital for his clinical studies. After house appointments he became a resident medical officer at the Middlesex. His skilful handling of an epidemic among the staff drew him to the attention of Sir George Godber and before long Henry was involved in medical administration, first as medical officer at the South West and later the North West Regional Hospital Boards, and finally the Ministry of Health. There he became Deputy Chief Medical Officer in 1966 and finally Chief Medical Officer in 1973, despite having suffered a coronary thrombosis. During his time the NHS went through a series of massive and destructive reorganisations, wrought by Barbara Castle and her successors just at a time when important new developments were taking place in medicine and surgery. After he left the Department of Health he worked at the Ministry of Defence, restructuring the medical services of the Armed Forces. He married Gwyneth 'Sally' Comber in 1948. They had three children, Rosemary (a nurse), Lindy (a psychiatrist) and Ian (an anaesthetist and pain specialist). After his wife's death in 2001 he married Mary Porter. He died on 22 March 2006.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000250
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Salz, Michael Heinz (1916 - 2005)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Scott, James Steel (1924 - 2006)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2007-05-10
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000300-E000399
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372538372538
Occupation Obstetrician and gynaecologist
Details James Scott was professor of obstetrics and gynaecology at Leeds University. He was born in Glasgow on 18 April 1924, the elder son of Angus McAlpine Scott and Margaret Scott. He was educated at Glasgow Academy and then studied medicine at Glasgow University, gaining his obstetric experience at the Rotunda, Dublin. After qualifying he completed his National Service in West Africa. Following his demobilisation he trained in obstetrics and gynaecology at Queen Charlotte’s Hospital, London, and then in Birmingham, before moving to Liverpool in 1954 as an obstetric tutor. He became a lecturer and then senior lecturer, at a time when Sir Thomas Jeffcoate was head of the department. Here Scott carried out research into placental abnormalities. He was appointed to the chair of obstetrics at Leeds in 1961, becoming dean of medicine in 1986. His main interest was fetoplacental function, and he was the first to recognise that transplacental passage of harmful maternal antibodies could lead to hyperthyroidism and shortage of platelets in the newborn. He had a particular interest in pre-eclampsia, which he discovered was more common and more serious in pregnancies where the mother had a new male partner, and carried out research into repeated miscarriage. He was much in demand as a visiting professor. Always hyperactive, he detested golf, though he wrote a biography of Alister McKenzie, a designer of golf courses. He was a keen skier, was passionate about opera, the arts in general and his house in Scotland. He died from prostate cancer on 17 September 2006, and is survived by his wife Olive (née Sharpe), a consultant paediatric cardiologist, and two sons.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000352
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Till, Anthony Stedman (1909 - 2006)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2007-05-10
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000300-E000399
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372539372539
Occupation General surgeon
Details Anthony Stedman Till, known as ‘Tim’, was a consultant surgeon in Oxford. He was born in London, on 5 September 1909, the eldest son of Thomas Marson Till OBE, an accountant, and Gladys Stedman, the daughter of a metal broker in the City. Tim was educated at Ovingdean Hall, Brighton, and Marlborough, before winning a scholarship to Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge, from which he went to the Middlesex Hospital to do his clinical training as a university scholar. After he qualified he was house physician, house surgeon, casualty officer and registrar, and then became an assistant to Sir Gordon Gordon-Taylor, who was a large influence on him. Tim also studied in Heidelberg and became fluent in German. In 1940 he joined the RAMC, and in the same year married Joan Burnyeat, the daughter of Colonel Ponsonby Burnyeat, who had been killed in 1918. Tim was posted to the Middle East, via Cape Town and Suez. He was taken prisoner during the battle for Lemros and was shipped, via Athens, to Stalag 7A. While a prisoner-of-war he operated not only on his fellow prisoners but also on the local civilians, and later, possibly as a result of his services to the local population, he was repatriated to the UK. He was soon back on the continent with the 181st Field Ambulance, and was with the first medical group to enter Belsen. He was always reluctant to talk about the sights he saw, which made a huge impression on him, but did remember how he picked a flower there, finding this a symbol of hope. Shortly after demobilisation in 1945 he was appointed as a registrar in Oxford and, soon afterwards, consultant surgeon. His special interests were thyroid and abdominal surgery, where he made notable contributions in both fields. He was President of the section of surgery of the Royal Society of Medicine, President of the Association of Surgeons, and a member of the Court of Examiners of our College. Outside the profession, he served as a magistrate. He hunted with the Heythrop, and when he gave up riding he bought himself a mountain bike so that he could ‘ride out’ every morning. In retirement he was the District Commissioner – an onerous task. He was also a skilled fisherman and an accomplished artist in oils and watercolour. He had a long and happy retirement in the Cotswolds with his wife Joan, who gave him stalwart support. He died on 31 August 2006, leaving his widow, three daughters (the eldest predeceased him), ten grandchildren and twelve great-grandchildren.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000353
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Walt, Alexander Jeffrey (1923 - 1996)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2007-05-10 2022-02-03
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000300-E000399
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372540372540
Occupation General surgeon Trauma surgeon
Details Alexander Walt was a former president of the American College of Surgeons. He was born in Cape Town, South Africa, in 1923 and went to school and university there. After qualifying in 1948 he completed his house jobs at Groote Schuur Hospital, Cape Town, before winning a Dominion studentship to Guy’s Hospital in 1951. He then completed a surgical residency in the USA, at the Mayo Clinic, from 1952 to 1956. He returned to the UK, as a surgical registrar at St Martin’s Hospital, Bath, where he remained until 1957. He then went back to Cape Town, to the Groote Schuur Hospital, as an assistant surgeon for the next four years. He was subsequently appointed to Wayne State University School of Medicine in Detroit, Michigan, USA, where in 1966 he became professor and chairman of the department of surgery. He was recognised by his peers by his election to the presidency of the American Association for the Surgery of Trauma in 1997, the presidency of the Western Surgical Association in 1987, and the presidency of the American College of Surgeons in 1995. **See below for an additional obituary uploaded 8 October 2015:** Alec Walt was born in Cape Town in 1923, the son of Isaac Walt, a wholesale grocer who had emigrated to South Africa from Lithuania to escape the pogrom. When only two and a half years of age, his mother, Lea, née Garb, and two sisters were killed in a train crash, but his father was determined that all three sons be educated – and all three became doctors. At Grey High School in Port Elizabeth he distinguished himself as a sportsman and formed a lifelong friendship with Bill (later Sir Raymond) Hoffenberg. Together they entered the University of Cape Town as medical students in 1940, but an acute sense of patriotism led them to volunteer for service with the army medical corps – which was approved only at the third attempt. They served for three and a half years with the 6th SA Armoured Division and 5th US Army in Egypt and Greece, and throughout the whole of the Italian campaign, during which time they spent many hours planning how to fail trivial army examinations so that they could remain together as privates in the same unit. It was service with a surgical team in the field which instilled a long-abiding interest in trauma and served him well in later years during his time in Detroit. He played rugby for the Mediterranean forces, and was disappointed that circumstances did not allow him to accept a place in the army team in London where he hoped to see his brother after a 25 year absence. With army planning at the time, he also missed the appointment for an interview for a possible Rhodes scholarship. On demobilisation in 1945, Alec Walt returned to medical school, graduating in 1948 and serving his internship in Groote Schuur Hospital. In 1947 he married Irene Lapping, with whom he had been close friends since boyhood, and they went abroad for his surgical training, firstly to attend the basic science course for the primary fellowship of the College, and then to undertake residency training at the Mayo Clinic. While there he qualified FRCS Canada in 1955 and MS Minnesota in 1956. Returning to England as surgical registrar at St Martin’s Hospital, Bath, he took his final FRCS in 1956 before returning to Groote Schuur with his wife and three children – John Richard, born in 1952, Steven David, born in 1954, and Lindsay Jane, born in 1955 – as an assistant surgeon and lecturer. However, he became increasingly concerned that his family should not be brought up in the political climate of South Africa and in 1961 left a flourishing practice to return to the United States and an appointment with the Veterans Hospital in Detroit. His abilities were clearly recognised, for in 1965 he was appointed Chief of Surgery at Detroit General (later Receiving) Hospital, and the following year Chairman of Surgery and Penerthy Professor of Surgery of the Wayne State University School of Medicine, from which he retired in 1988. He was assistant and, from 1968 to 1970, associate dean of the medical school. As Professor of Surgery, Alec Walt gained recognition as a superb teacher and distinguished academic. He was designated ‘clinical teacher of the year’ on no fewer than three occasions and in 1984 received the Lawrence M Weiner award of the Alumni Association for outstanding achievements as a non-alumnus. On his retirement in 1988, he was a visiting fellow in Oxford with his old friend Bill Hoffenberg, then President of Wolfson College and also of the Royal College of Physicians. He was elected to the Academy of Scholars and was designated Distinguished Professor of Surgery of Wayne State University. Alec Walt’s avid thirst for knowledge made him an active and prolific clinical investigator, his 165 published papers and reviews concentrating on the surgery of trauma and of hepatobiliary disease which, along with breast cancer, were his prime interests. His army experience, which endowed him with unusual skills in the organisation of trauma services, stood him in good stead during the Detroit riots in 1967, when his paper on the anatomy of a civil disturbance and its impact on disaster planning was a classic. On four occasions he took surgical trauma teams for training in Colombia, whose government presented him with the Jorge Bejarano medal in 1981 Principal author of the first paper describing the prognostic value of oestrogen receptors in breast cancer, he was an active participant in therapeutic trials in this disease and latterly became a strong proponent of the need for multidisciplinary care. His final contribution to Detroit surgery was his development of the Comprehensive Breast Center in the Barbara Ann Karmanos Cancer Institute, now named the Alexander J Walt Center. Alec Walt had a distinctive clarity of writing and speaking which led to his appointment to the editorial boards of several medical journals, including the <i>Archives of surgery</i> and the <i>Journal of trauma</i>. He was in great demand as a lecturer, honouring numerous prestigious national and international commitments. He was Hunterian Professor at the Royal College of Surgeons in 1969 and Moynihan Lecturer in 1988, and in 1995 gave a keynote address at the 75th Anniversary Meeting of the Association of Surgeons of Great Britain and Ireland. He held leadership positions in many North American surgical organisations, including the Presidency of the American Association for the Surgery of Trauma, the American Board of Medical Specialties and was Vice-President of the American Surgical Association. He was elected an honorary Fellow of the College of Surgeons of South Africa in 1989, and of the Royal Colleges of Surgeons of Edinburgh and Australasia in 1993 and 1995 respectively. A keen contributor to the affairs of the American College of Surgeons, Alec Walt served as a Regent from 1984 to 1993 and as Chairman of the Board of Regents from 1991 to 1993. He was elected 75th President in 1994, an office to which he immediately brought great panache. Unfortunately, during his presidential year he developed a massive recurrence of a bladder cancer, first treated twelve years previously. With typical courage he elected to have chemotherapy ‘spaced’ so that he could preside over the Annual Clinical Meeting, at which his successor was to be inaugurated. The attributes which contributed to Alec Walt’s great distinction as an academic surgeon were a keen intelligence, capacity for hard work, absolute integrity, a deep concern for all people, particularly the young, and, greatest of all, a deep and sincere humility. He did not suffer fools gladly and had no hesitation in attacking the uncritical, unscientific or badly presented paper with a characteristic irony; but he would always have a kind congratulatory word for those who had given of their best. A top sportsman – champion hurdler at school, captain of cricket and an athletic Blue at university – he led by example, not dictate. Realising a boyhood dream of climbing to 17,000 feet in Nepal with one of his sons and his daughter at the age of 62 while recovering from treatment of his bladder cancer, he took with him Tennyson’s Ulysses, a favourite poem, passages from which he would loudly declaim. He was devoted to his wife Irene, his three children, his son-in-law and his 20 month old granddaughter Eve Lenora, all of whom gave him the love and respect which nourished him throughout his professional life, and supported him during his final illness. Alec described his mother as a ‘homemaker’, and his wife had been no less. From the earliest days of his marriage Irene provided a home with an ever-open door, a kindness which endeared her to impoverished and hungry British fellows at the Mayo Clinic, of which I was one. Vivid personal memories of Alec Walt are firstly early days together in Rochester, Minnesota when, as the deluded captain of the first and only Mayo Clinic cricket team which lost their match in Chicago he chastised us for our dismal performance and undisciplined behaviour on the previous night; later, when as visiting professor to his department in Detroit, joint discussions with his students revealed the depth of his feelings for the inequalities of care for women with breast cancer which, later on at midnight in the emergency room, was extended to all of those others whom society had deprived; then at the Asian Association of Surgeons when, as President of the American College of Surgeons he gave a masterly address on surgical training, during which his deep sense of responsibility for the future of young surgeons was only too evident; and finally, on the beach in Bali, when we shared our feelings of good fortune to have had a job in life which had provided us both with such great fulfilment, pleasure, and even fun. Shortly before his death he advised his son John to ‘work hard, be honest, and the rest will take care of itself’ – advice which is exemplified by the life he led. He died on 29 February 1996 aged 72, survived by his wife Irene and his children – John, a lawyer, Steven, a professor of law, and Lindsay Jane, a sculptress. Sir A Patrick Forrest with assistance from Mrs Irene Walt
Resource Identifier RCS: E000354
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Jayasekera, Kodituwakku Gnanapala ( - 2001)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-10-12
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000000-E000099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372268372268
Occupation General surgeon
Details Kodituwakku Gnanapala Jayasekera was a distinguished surgeon in Sri Lanka and Australia. He was born in Sri Lanka (then Ceylon). He travelled to the UK, where he became a Fellow of the College in 1948. Soon after, he returned to Sri Lanka. In 1954 he was appointed as honorary surgeon to the Queen, during Her Majesty’s visit to the country on her coronation tour. In 1970, alarmed by the prospect of political violence in Sri Lanka, he emigrated to Australia with his family, with the help of his good friend Sir Edward ‘Weary’ Dunlop. At the time of his departure he was the senior consultant surgeon at the General Hospital, Colombo, and President-elect of the Sri Lanka Society of Surgeons. In Australia he practised general surgery in Melbourne for a further 20 years. When he finally retired from surgery, he continued to practise general medicine until his death on 26 September 2001.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000081
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Johnson-Gilbert, Ronald Stuart (1925 - 2003)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-10-12 2012-03-22
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000000-E000099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372269372269
Occupation Administrator College secretary
Details Ronald Stuart Johnson-Gilbert, or 'J-G' as he was known with affection throughout the College, was our secretary from 1962 to 1988. He was born on 14 July 1925, the son of Sir Ian A Johnson-Gilbert CBE and Rosalind Bell-Hughes, and was proud to be a descendant of Samuel Johnson. He was educated at the Edinburgh Academy and Rugby, from which he won an exhibition in classics and an open scholarship to Brasenose College, Oxford. During the second world war he served in the Intelligence Corps from 1943 to 1946 and learnt Japanese. On demobilisation he became a trainee with the John Lewis partnership for a year and then joined the College on the administrative staff in 1951, becoming the sixth secretary in 1962, having previously been secretary of the Faculties of Dental Surgery and Anaesthetists. He worked under 13 presidents, from Lord Porritt to Sir Ian Todd, bringing to everything he did an exceptional administrative skill, an ability to write succinct and lucid prose, an unrivalled knowledge of the most arcane by-laws of the College and above all an unruffable charm. He served as secretary to the board of trustees of the Hunterian Collection, the Joint Conference of Surgical Colleges and the International Federation of Surgical Colleges. He was the recipient of the John Tomes medal of the British Dental Association, the McNeill Love medal of our College and the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons medal. He served the Hunterian Collection as a trustee for 10 years. A skilled golfer, his other interests included music, painting, literature and writing humorous verse. He married Anne Weir Drummond in 1951 and they had three daughters, Clare, Emma and Lydia. He died on 23 April 2003.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000082
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Jonas, Ernest George Gustav (1924 - 2003)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-10-12
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000000-E000099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372270372270
Occupation Obstetrician and gynaecologist
Details George Jonas was a consultant obstetrician and gynaecologist at the Hillingdon Hospital. He was born in Berlin in 1924, and qualified from the Middlesex Hospital in 1947. After National Service and training posts in London and Liverpool, he was appointed to Hillingdon in 1964. He played an important part in developing women’s services and setting up training schemes for students and junior doctors with London teaching hospitals. His interests included the study of foetal growth retardation, and he developed a cervical screening programme. He was a pioneer in the computerisation of clinical obstetric records. He examined for the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists. He retired to Herefordshire, where, despite failing health, he continued to pursue many interests, including painting, pottery and bridge. He died from cardiac failure on 1 December 2003, leaving a wife, Gill, two daughters and four grandchildren.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000083
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Cook, Charles Alfred George (1913 - 2003)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2007-06-08
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000300-E000399
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372542372542
Occupation Ophthalmic surgeon
Details Charles Cook was an ophthalmic surgeon in London. He was born on 20 August 1913. His medical education was at Guy’s Hospital, where he qualified in 1939. During the war he served in the RAMC with great distinction. In 1944 he was awarded the George Medal for rescuing two gunners, pulling one from a burning truck, and leading another out of a minefield. Within four months he was again commended for his courage, gaining the Military Cross for his bravery in treating and evacuating the wounded under heavy shellfire during the March 1945 break into Germany. After the war he turned to ophthalmology and was initially appointed consultant ophthalmic surgeon to West Middlesex Hospital, Isleworth. He was subsequently appointed consultant ophthalmic surgeon to Moorfields and Guy’s hospitals, and for many years was vice-dean of the Institute of Ophthalmology. He was married to Edna. An intensely private man, he died on 24 December 2003.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000356
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Organ, Claude H (1927 - 2005)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-11-23 2006-12-21
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000100-E000199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372358372358
Occupation General surgeon
Details Claude Organ was a distinguished American surgeon and the second African-American President of the American College of Surgeons. He was born in 1927 in Marshall, Texas, and educated at Terrell High School, Denison, and then Xavier University, Louisiana. Denied acceptance to the University of Texas on account of his colour, he studied medicine at the Creighton University School of Medicine, Omaha. After qualifying in 1952 he served in the US Navy, before returning to Creighton to complete his surgical training, rising to become chairman of his department in 1971. There he became famous for encouraging his trainees to pursue bio-molecular research. He then went on to be professor and chairman of the department of surgery at the University of Oklahoma, leaving in 1988 to establish the University of California Davis-East Bay department of surgery in Oakland, now UCSF East Bay department of surgery. He remained there as chairman until 2003. He was chairman of the American Board of Surgery and President of the American College of Surgeons, being honoured by the distinguished service award of that Association, in addition to gaining numerous honorary degrees from all over the world, including the honorary Fellowship of our College. The author of more than 250 papers and five books, he was for 15 years the editor of *Archives of Surgery*. He was a frequent visitor to the UK, and in 1999 was invited to tour the British Isles as the *British Journal of Surgery* travelling fellow to review our methods of surgical training and the role of women in surgery, as a result of which he presented a detailed and perceptive report to the Association of Surgeons in 2000. He died on 18 June 2005 in Berkeley, California, and is survived by his wife Elizabeth Lucille Mays, five sons (Brian, Paul, Gregory, David and Claude) and two daughters (Sandra and Rita). The Claude and Elizabeth Organ professorship at Xavier University has been endowed in his memory.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000171
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Rajani, Manohar Radhakrishnan (1935 - 2004)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-11-23 2012-03-09
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000100-E000199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372359372359
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born on 19 January 1935, Manohar Rajani qualified in Bombay and after junior posts went to England to specialise in surgery. After passing the FRCS he did a series of training posts, before going to Canada in 1965, where he passed the Canadian FRCS and settled down in practice in Toronto. He died on 13 April 2004.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000172
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Williams, Robert Edward Duncan (1927 - 2004)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-11-23 2006-12-21
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000100-E000199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372360372360
Occupation Urological surgeon Urologist
Details Bob Williams was a distinguished urological surgeon based in Leeds. He was born on 18 December 1927 in Motherwell, Lanarkshire, the son of Robert Williams, a steelworker, and Janet McNeil. He was educated at Dalziel High School, Motherwell, and Glasgow Medical School. After house jobs in Glasgow he did his National Service in the RAMC, serving as resident medical officer to the Northumberland Fusiliers in Hong Kong. On his return, he received his general surgical training under Sir Charles Illingworth in Glasgow and John Goligher in Leeds, before deciding to specialise in urology, which in those days was emerging as a separate entity. He became senior registrar to Leslie Pyrah in Leeds, who had set up a pioneering stone clinic. There he carried out a painstaking and far-reaching study of the natural history of renal tract stone, which won him his MD. After this he went to work with Wyland Leadbetter at the Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, in 1964, where he carried out research on total body water and whole body potassium, which was to win him a commendation for his MCh thesis. On his return he was appointed to the consultant staff of the University of Leeds urological department in 1966. He had many interests which were shown in his numerous publications, most notably on urinary calculi, bladder cancer and lymphadenectomy. He followed Leslie Pyrah in the energetic pursuit of the establishment of urology as a separate discipline in the British Isles, which won him the admiration and respect of his colleagues. Bob was president of the section of urology of the Royal Society of Medicine in 1989 and a very active member of BAUS, of which he was president from 1990 to 1992. He was awarded the St Peter’s medal of the Association in 1993. He examined for the Edinburgh and English Colleges, and was an invited member of Council of our College from 1989 to 1992. In 1958 he married Lora Pratt, an Aberdeen graduate who was a GP and part-time anaesthetist. They had a son (Duncan) and two daughters (Bryony and Lesley), all of whom became doctors. A genial, cheerful and amusing colleague, Bob was struck down by renal failure caused by polycystic disease of the kidneys, but continued with great courage to work and publish and play an active part in BAUS, despite the need for regular dialysis. A renal transplant unfortunately underwent rejection, and he was, reluctantly, obliged to retire in 1991. He died on 26 August 2004.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000173
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Maguire, William Brian (1925 - 2007)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2008-02-07
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000400-E000499
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372632372632
Occupation Orthopaedic surgeon
Details Bill Maguire was an orthopaedic surgeon in Brisbane, Australia. He was born in Newcastle, New South Wales, on 6 March 1925, the second son of John Francis Maguire, a schoolmaster, and his wife, Margaret née Jones. His father had lost his leg in France during the First World War and Bill later based his design for a simple prosthesis on that used by his father. Bill was educated at Coorparoo State Primary and the Church of England Grammar School in Brisbane, where he became a good swimmer and middle distance runner, and played rugby. He also developed an uncommon skill with languages, particularly French, and on leaving school he at first planned to teach French, but later decided to study medicine, for which he won a Commonwealth scholarship to the University of Queensland. There he paid his way by working at the Carlton and United Breweries, the Coca Cola factory, and as a labourer in the Mount Isa mines, working deep underground, freeing rocks that had become jammed after blasting. After a year at university he volunteered for the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF), where he won his wings and gained his licence. He returned to complete his medical degree, and then held junior posts at the Royal Brisbane Hospital and did his Primary from a post as demonstrator in anatomy. In 1952, by now married to Dorothy Friend, a nurse, he took a ship to England, to work as a registrar at the Queen Alexandra and the Royal hospitals in Portsmouth. He attended the FRCS course at St Thomas’s, passed the FRCS, and then worked at Walsall Hospital. In 1956 he returned to Australia, as medical superintendent at Toowoomba Base Hospital. There he did all types of surgery, but increasingly specialised in orthopaedics. He moved to Brisbane in 1958 as an orthopaedic supervisor. In 1964 he moved into private practice as visiting consultant at the Princess Alexandra and Greenslopes Repatriation hospitals. In the Australasian College Maguire helped develop the training programme in orthopaedics, examined in that specialty, and helped to set up a programme for training Indonesian surgeons in orthopaedics. In 1968 he joined an Australian medical team in Vietnam, where he found his facility in French helpful in dealing with the French-speaking nuns who nursed his patients. There he carried out a number of operations on lepers. When hostilities were over he continued to help Vietnamese doctors who had come to Australia. Bill Maguire was president of the Queensland branch of the Australasian Orthopaedic Association in 1983, served on the Australian Medical Association council in 1961, and continued in the RAAF reserve as a consultant orthopaedic surgeon with the rank of wing commander. He published *All you need to know about joint replacement* (Brisbane, Boolarong, 1990) and various papers on orthopaedic topics, published in the *Medical Journal of Australia* and the *Australian and New Zealand Journal of Surgery*. In 1996, whilst on holiday in Tasmania, Bill was involved in the notorious Port Arthur massacre, when a mentally disturbed young man murdered 35 people. Bill was one of the first doctors on the scene and helped tend the victims. He was decorated for his bravery. Outside medicine, Bill Maguire had many interests. He continued to fly and was a keen sailor. He was a voluntary doctor at the Commonwealth Games in Brisbane in 1982. Above all, he was devoted to all things French, being a member of the French Orthopaedic Association, where he gave his papers in French, enjoyed Proust, and acted as the interpreter for the Australian Rugby Tour of France in 1984. Taking up golf later in life, he achieved two holes in one. He and his wife, Dorothy, had five sons, John William, Alan Henry, Bruce Douglas, Stephen Francis and Robert Evan. Bill Maguire died on 12 March 2007.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000448
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Coates, Henry (1779 - 1848)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2008-02-21
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000400-E000499
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372633372633
Occupation General surgeon
Details Received his professional training at St George’s Hospital. He practised at Salisbury, where he was Surgeon to the Infirmary from 1804-1847. He died at Salisbury on April 6th, 1848. Another Henry Coates seems to have been entered as six-months’ pupil to Benjamin Brodie at St George’s in August, 1830, and to have become MRCS in 1833 and LSA in 1834. Mr R R James, FRCS, Dean of St George’s, believes this Henry Coates to have been FRCS, 1844.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000449
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
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First Title value, for Searching Fisk, Geoffrey Raymond (1916 - 2007)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2008-02-21 2009-02-10
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000400-E000499
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372634372634
Occupation Orthopaedic surgeon
Details Geoffrey Fisk was a senior orthopaedic surgeon at Princess Alexandra Hospital, Harlow. He was born in Goodmayes, Essex, on 26 May 1916. His father, Harry Marcus Fisk, company director of Meredith and Drew, the biscuit manufacturers, was a descendent of an ancient Suffolk family. One of his ancestors, Nicholas Ffyske (1602-1680), was a physician and a prominent Parliamentarian. Geoffrey’s mother was Jane Gerdes. He was a scholar at Ilford County High School, from which he went on to study medicine at St Bartholomew’s Hospital. After qualifying in 1939, he was house surgeon to Harold Wilson, and then casualty officer and senior orthopaedic house surgeon to Sidney Higgs. In 1941 he went to the Emergency Medical Service (EMS) unit at Addenbrooke’s Hospital, Cambridge, as a junior surgeon, registrar and chief assistant, before joining the RAF medical branch in 1945. He was in charge of the orthopaedic division at Northallerton, then went to Wroughton Hospital, before becoming senior orthopaedic specialist at the Central Medical Establishment in London. Leaving the RAF as a wing commander in 1948, he returned to Bart’s as an orthopaedic registrar, was senior registrar at Black Notley and the Seamen’s Hospital, Greenwich, and was appointed as a consultant orthopaedic surgeon at Albert Dock Orthopaedic and Accident Hospital, Bishop’s Stortford Hospital and St Margaret’s Hospital, Epping, in 1950. In 1965 he moved to the new Princess Alexandra Hospital in Harlow, remaining there until he retired in 1981. Geoffrey Fisk was awarded a Fulbright scholarship in 1952 and spent a year in St Louis, Missouri. Geoffrey was an active member of the management committee of the West Essex Group of Hospitals for 12 years and secretary, then chairman, of the North East Thames Orthopaedic Advisory Committee from 1975 to 1981. He was a Hunterian Professor in our College three times, in 1951, 1968 and 1978, presenting different aspects of his wide experience in hand surgery, on which he published extensively. He was a founder member and later president of the British Society for Surgery of the Hand and received the ‘Pioneer’ award of the International Federation of Societies for Surgery of the Hand in 1998. Inevitably, he was a fellow of the British Orthopaedic Association. When the Bart’s Orthopaedic Rotational Training Programme was devised in 1969 it included segments at Harlow, where the trainees greatly benefited from his excellent teaching and he regularly attended their meetings until the year of his death. His many interests outside surgery included gardening and classical music. He was a Freeman of the City of London and a Liveryman of two Livery Companies, the Makers of Playing Cards and the Apothecaries, and he was a member of the Royal Institution. Following his retirement, he became a student at Darwin College, the postgraduate Cambridge college, which had been founded in 1964. There he took an MPhil in anthropology, and in 1995 bequeathed first editions of Andreas Vesalius’ *Fabrica* (1543) and Adrian Spigelius’ *Opera* (1645), which includes an early reprint of Harvey’s description of the circulation of the blood. He died on 10 November 2007 at the age of 91 and was survived by his wife of 63 years, Susan Airey (MB ChB Leeds) and by a daughter (Susan Clare) and two sons (Simon James and Jonathan, who is a consultant psychiatrist).
Resource Identifier RCS: E000450
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
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First Title value, for Searching Reid, Douglas Andrew Campbell (1921 - 2005)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-01-13
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000100-E000199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372365372365
Occupation Plastic surgeon Plastic and reconstructive surgeon
Details Campbell Reid was a leading hand surgeon. He was born on 25 February 1921 in Cardiff, the son of David William Reid, a general practitioner, and Edith Mary née Smith, a nurse. His grandfather, David Spence Clark Reid, had also been a GP. He was educated at Christ’s College, Finchley, where he played in the first XI in football and cricket, and won prizes for shooting. After premedical studies at Queen Mary College he entered the London Hospital Medical College, which at that time was evacuated to Cambridge. After qualifying he was a house surgeon at Chase Farm Hospital and then at Hackney Hospital, where he worked through the V1 air raids. He was then a casualty officer, assistant anaesthetist and house physician at the London Hospital. From 1945 to 1946 he was a casualty officer at Chase Farm Hospital, and then went on to be an anatomy demonstrator at the London Hospital, passing his primary in April 1946. He then passed the final from a registrar post at Haslemere. He decided to specialise in plastic surgery, first as senior registrar to Sir Harold Gillies at Park Prewett, Basingstoke, and later as senior registrar to R G Pulvertaft at Derbyshire Royal Infirmary and at the Royal Hospital, Sheffield. During this time he was awarded a research prize for an essay on reconstruction of the thumb and was later the first to undertake pollicisation in the UK using the Littler neurovascular pedicle. In 1962 he was appointed consultant plastic surgeon to the United Sheffield Hospitals, the Sheffield Children’s Hospital and Chesterfield Royal Hospital. He won the Frank Robinson silver medal from the United Hospitals of South Manchester in 1980, and was the Sir Harold Gillies lecturer and gold medallist of the British Association of Plastic Surgeons in 1981. He served on the council of the British Association of Plastic Surgeons from 1952 and was on the editorial board of the British Journal of Hand Surgery. He published widely on all aspects of hand surgery, including *Surgery of the thumb* (London, Butterworths, 1986) and *Mutilating injuries of the hand* (Edinburgh, Churchill Livingstone, 1979). Outside surgery he was a keen ornithologist and photographer. In 1946 he married Margaret Joyce née Pedler, who was an archivist and head of her division at the Foreign Office. They had a son and two daughters. In 1969 he underwent an emergency replacement of the aortic valve and in 1982 he retired to Eastbourne. He died on 16 August 2005.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000178
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Keane, Brendan (1926 - 2005)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-10-26
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000200-E000299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372454372454
Occupation General surgeon
Details Brendan Keane was a surgeon at the Whakatane Hospital, Bay of Plenty, New Zealand. He was born in Dublin on 9 May 1926, one of six children. His father rose to become private secretary to Eamon de Valera and head of the Irish Civil Service. His mother was a teacher from the Aran Islands, where the family spent their summers in thatched stone cottages. His early schooling was at Roscrea, a Cistercian monastic boarding school where the examinations were all in Gaelic. From there he went to University College, Dublin, to study veterinary surgery, but changed to medicine after a year. After a period as house surgeon at Coombe Hospital, Dublin, he went to England, to work at Sefton General Hospital, Liverpool, as a casualty officer. He then joined the RAMC, spending two years in Malaya, rising to the rank of major, treating British and Gurkha soldiers and their families. He returned to Halifax General Hospital, Yorkshire, to complete a series of training posts in surgery, obstetrics and gynaecology. In 1965 he moved to Gibraltar, where he remained for six years. During this time he became a passionate lover of the Spanish language. He then sailed for New Zealand, working as a consultant surgeon at Whakatane Hospital in the Bay of Plenty. On retirement he continued his study of Spanish, enrolling on a short course at the University of Zaragoza, and began to learn French from scratch. His other hobbies included golf, snooker, Irish history and jazz. He married Christine in 1957 and they had four children. He died on 22 October 2005.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000267
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Sanderson, Christopher John (1947 - 2005)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-01-13
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000100-E000199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372368372368
Occupation General surgeon
Details ‘C J’ Sanderson was a gastro-enterologist on Merseyside. He was born in Blackpool on 2 December 1947. His father, Joseph Sanderson, was a schoolmaster. His mother was Patricia Mary née Caunt. From Blackpool Grammar School he went to Liverpool University Medical School, where he was county swimming champion. After qualifying in 1971 he did house jobs at Liverpool Royal Infirmary, and went on to do registrar posts at Clatterbridge, Chester Royal Infirmary and Alder Hey Children’s Hospital. He then spent a year as a research fellow in the department of surgery, Chicago University, before becoming consultant general surgeon at St Helen’s Knowsley. His main interest was in gastro-oesophageal cancer and laparoscopy. Outside surgery he was an enthusiastic follower of motor racing. He married Jane Seymour in 1971, and they had three sons. He died on 22 July 2005.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000181
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Sen, Adosh Kumar (1942 - 2005)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-01-19
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000100-E000199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372369372369
Occupation General surgeon
Details Adosh Sen was a surgeon based in New Delhi, India. He was born in Dalhousie, India, on 27 June 1942. His father, Santosh Kumar Sen, a surgeon, and his mother, Sita Sen, a gynaecologist, had founded the celebrated Dr Sen’s Nursing Home, in New Delhi. He was educated at the Modern School, Barakhamba Road, New Delhi, where he excelled in sport, particularly swimming. He did his premedical studies at the Hindu College, before going on to study medicine at the Maulana Azad Medicel College, where he continued to swim, representing his state in the All India championship. After house jobs he went to England to specialise in surgery, and completed training posts at Rowley Bristow Orthopaedic Hospital, Pyrford, St Peter’s Hospital, Chertsey, and Barking General Hospital. He returned to India as a general surgeon in his father’s clinic in New Delhi. He married Rehana Tasadduq Hosain in 1969 in London, who had a masters degree in English and taught that subject in New Delhi. They had three sons, Ashish, Nikhil and Shirish, none of whom went into medicine. Sen continued to be a keen sportsman, his main sport being swimming, but he was also a keen follower of cricket. Among his many interests was education, and he was vice president of the Magic Years Educational Society, which promotes Montessori education, and served on the board of trustees of the Modern School and its many branches. He died on 18 April 2005.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000182
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Shapland, Sir William Arthur (1912 - 1997)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-01-19 2012-03-09
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000100-E000199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372370372370
Occupation Accountant Philanthropist
Details Sir William Shapland, an honorary fellow of the College, was born on 20 October 1912, the son of Arthur Frederick Shapland and Alice Maud née Jackson. Educated at Tollington School, he joined the firm of Allen Charlesworth & Co, chartered accountants. He was given the responsibility of dealing with the accounts of John Blackwood Hodge & Co and Bernard Sunley & Sons, and, later, of advising the chairman, Bernard Sunley, a construction magnate. So valuable was his advice that, in 1946, he was invited to join the group as a non-executive director. In 1954 he became an executive director, succeeding Sunley as chairman of Blackwood Hodge ten years later. In 1960 he helped set up the Bernard Sunley Charitable Foundation, which distributes almost £3 million a year to good causes. Charities and institutions as varied as the Scout movement, Charing Cross Hospital and the Wild Fowl Trust have benefited. Among his many honours he was a Waynflete fellow of Magdalen College, Oxford, and honorary fellow of St Catherine's College, Oxford. He died on 1 October 1997, leaving his wife Madeleine and two daughters.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000183
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Corry, Martin (1939 - 2005)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-10-26 2015-09-14
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000200-E000299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372465372465
Occupation General surgeon
Details Martin Corry was born on 23 May 1937 in Oxford, the son of D C Corry, a distinguished surgeon in that city and a Fellow of the College. It seems to have been assumed from early on that he would follow his father's profession and, after schooling at the Dragon in Oxford and at Rugby, he went up to Queen's College, Oxford, to read medicine. Going on to the University College Hospital in London for his clinical training, he qualified MRCS in 1964, graduating BM in the following year. After a number of junior hospital posts in and around London, including Great Ormond Street Hospital, St Mary's Hospital and Stoke Mandeville, he became a surgical registrar at Arrowe Park Hospital in the Wirrall and later a research associate at St Thomas's Hospital. He gained his FRCS, but evidently found little enthusiasm for a fully committed surgical career. He assisted in his father's private practice for a time and took a series of locum posts but held no long-term appointment. Sailing was his hobby, and he kept his boat on the Fal. After his parents' death he continued to live alone in the family home and his health began to suffer with poorly controlled diabetes. Vascular complications and an infection led to leg amputation and he was admitted to a care home. He died after a long illness on 27 September 2005.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000278
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Henson, Philip (1914 - 2005)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Nevill, Gerald Edward (1915 - 2003)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-11-09
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000200-E000299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372467372467
Occupation General surgeon
Details Gerald Nevill was a consultant surgeon in Kenya. He was born on 22 December 1915 in Nurney, County Carlow, Ireland, the son of Alexander Colles Nevill, Archdeacon of the Church of Ireland, and Rosettah Fitzgerald, a teacher of modern languages and one of the first women to graduate from the University of Dublin. He was educated at Kilkenny College, where he gained a scholarship to Campbell College, Belfast. He subsequently won the McNeil medal for mathematics and played rugby for his school. He won an entrance sizarship to Dublin University, won first class honours in all his examinations, came first in the final examinations, was awarded the Hudson medal and scholarship, and played rugby for the university. After qualifying, he was house surgeon at the Adelaide Hospital, Dublin, Salford Royal Hospital, St Mary’s Hospital, Portsmouth, and the Royal Children’s Hospital, Brighton. From 1940 to 1944 he served with the East African Forces. He went to London to do the Guy’s FRCS course and, having passed the FRCS, returned to Kenya as the successor to Roland Burkitt in Nairobi. He was appointed honorary consultant surgeon to the Native Civil Hospital, later the King George VI Hospital, and subsequently the Kenyatta National Hospital in Nairobi. He held honorary lecturer appointments at the Makerere University Hospital, Kampala, and the University of Nairobi Medical School, and was on the organising committee of the new medical school. He published many articles on general surgical topics in the *East African Medical Journal* and was a foundation member and later president of the Association of Surgeons of East Africa. Gerald Nevill married twice. His first wife was Hilda Francis Lurring, a school teacher, by whom he had three sons, one of whom became a doctor. His second marriage was to Mary Evelyn Furnivall née Brown. He continued on the rugby field for many years as a referee and was chairman of the Kenya Referees Society from 1965 to 1980. He was a keen fisherman and freemason. He died on 23 January 2003.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000280
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Moshakis, Vidianos (1946 - 2005)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Wright, John Kenneth (1918 - 2003)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Crowther, William Lodewyck (1817 - 1885)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-09-07 2022-09-12
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001300-E001399
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373532373532
Occupation General surgeon Politician
Details Educated at St Thomas's Hospital and at the Hotel-Dieu and La Charité, Paris. He settled in practice in Hobart Town, Tasmania, and was Surgeon to HM General Hospital from 1860-1869. Towards the close of his life he devoted himself to politics and was a well-known public man, being a member of the Legislative Council and of the Tasmanian Court of Medical Examiners, and twice a Minister without a portfolio. He was also Surgeon Major in the South Tasmanian Volunteer Artillery. About the year 1868 or 1869 he sent a valuable Tasmanian Collection to the Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons, and for this service received the signal honour of the Honorary (Gold) Medal (1869), of which the previous recipients had been very few - viz, James Parkinson in 1822, Joseph Swan (qv) in 1825, and George Bennett (qv) in 1834. Subsequent recipients have been men of the highest distinction, such as Owen, Erasmus Wilson, Paget, and Lister. The Library contains a "List of Specimens presented to the Museum...by W L Crowther...Hobart Town" in Sir William Flower's handwriting. The Hon Mr Crowther died of peritonitis at his residence in Hobart on April 12th, 1885, being then one of the oldest practitioners in the Colony. Publications: "On the Median Operation for Stone, with Section of the Urethra only, and Dilatation of the Prostate." - *Lancet*, 1867, ii, 126. "Urethrotomy or Lithotrity in Aged and Debilitated Subjects." - *Ibid.*, 1873, ii, 624. **See below for an expanded version of the original obituary which was printed in volume 1 of Plarr’s Lives of the Fellows. Please contact the library if you would like more information lives@rcseng.ac.uk** William Lodewyck Crowther was a surgeon, naturalist and politician who served as premier of Tasmania from 20 December 1878 to 29 October 1879. He is known to have collected and dissected the bodies of Aboriginal Tasmanians; in 1869 he was suspended from his post as an honorary medical officer at Hobart General Hospital after being charged with mutilating the body of William Lanne, then considered the ‘last’ male Aboriginal Tasmanian. Crowther was born on 15 April 1817 at Haarlem in the Netherlands, the son of William Crowther, a doctor, and Sarah Crowther née Pearson, the daughter of George Pearson, a former mayor of Macclesfield, Cheshire. The family emigrated to Hobart in what was then known as Van Diemen’s Land in 1825. Crowther became a boarder at Claiborne’s Academy, Longford in around 1828, and it was while he was at school that he developed an interest in natural history. In 1832 he was apprenticed to his father for five years and then became a partner as a surgeon apothecary and accoucheur. In February 1839 he sailed on the *Emu* to England, arriving in June. He sold a natural history collection of Tasmanian animals to the Earl of Derby and used the money to pay for his living costs and fees at St Thomas’s Hospital Medical School and for another year of study in Paris. He gained his conjoint examination in 1841. On 12 November 1841 he married his cousin Sarah Victoria Marie Louise Muller, the daughter of Colonel A B Muller, equerry to the Duke of Kent. They had 11 children. In 1842 Crowther returned to Hobart and took over his father’s practice. His focus was on surgery, particularly of the bladder for stone and he rose rapidly in his profession. He wrote two papers for *The Lancet* (‘A few remarks on the safety of the median operation for the removal of stone from the bladder, the section being limited to the membranous urethra, with simple dilation of the prostate gland’ *Lancet* 1867 ii 126 and ‘Urethrotomy or lithotrity in aged and debilitated people’ *Lancet* 1873 ii 624). In 1860 he was appointed as an honorary medical officer at Hobert General Hospital. He continued collecting and was elected as a corresponding member of the Royal Zoological Society. Between April 1840 and 1868 he donated a large number of specimens to William Flower, the curator of the museum at the Royal College of Surgeons of England. The collection included the complete skeleton of a sperm whale, Tasmanian fish and a dolphin, together with ‘the bones of an Australian male’. In March 1869 he was awarded the gold medal of the College. In the same month he was suspended from his post at Hobart General Hospital after being charged with mutilating the body of William Lanne, a whaler, and reputedly the last ‘full-bloodied’ male Aboriginal Tasmanian. Lanne died in early March 1869 in Hobart from cholera and dysentery aged just 34. His body was taken to the morgue at the General Hospital and, as *The Times* reported on 29 May 1869, there followed an ‘unseemly struggle’ for his skeleton: ‘It is stated that on the night before the funeral a medical gentleman connected with the hospital abstracted the skull, intending to send it to the English College of Surgeons, and inside the scalp the skull of the corpse of a white man, also in the dead-house, was inserted in lieu of that which had been removed. When this mutilation was discovered the hands and feet were cut off to frustrate any attempt of the first mutilator to obtain the whole skeleton. The trunk was then buried, the coffin carried to the grave covered by a black opossum skin rug and followed by above a hundred citizens. In the following night, it is stated, the body was raised from the grave by order of the house surgeon of the hospital.’ An inquiry took place. Crowther was suspected as having carried out the first mutilation and was suspended from his post. A petition was sent to the Governor Charles Du Cane seeking an annulment of his suspension, but without success. The outcry over what had happened to Lanne directly led to the introduction of the 1869 Anatomy Act, regulating the practice of anatomy in the colony and protecting the dead from dissection without prior consent, the first legislation of its kind in Tasmania. Lanne’s skull was later donated to the anatomy department of the University of Edinburgh by Crowther’s son, Edward. It has since been returned to Tasmania. Crowther was a popular if controversial figure in Hobart and was active in politics. He was elected to the House of Assembly as the member for Hobart. He resigned, but from 1869 to 1885 held the Hobart seat on the Legislative Council. From 1876 to 1877 he was a minister without portfolio in the administration of Thomas Reibey. In December 1878 he was invited to form his own government as premier and served until October 1879, the first medical practitioner to hold that office in Tasmania. Apart from his surgical career, Crowther also had a number of successful business interests. In the 1850s he owned saw mills and exported timber to other Australian colonies and New Zealand and frame houses to California. He also owned whaling ships and shipped guano to Tasmania and the mainland. He later transferred his interests to the new Anglo-Australian Guano Company. Crowther became a fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons of England in 1874. In 1889 a statue of Crowther was erected in Franklin Square in Hobart. After a campaign led by the Tasmanian Aboriginal Centre, in August 2022 the City of Hobart Council voted to remove the monument. Sarah Gillam
Resource Identifier RCS: E001349
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Crozier, Alexander William (1816 - 1863)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-09-07 2014-06-18
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001300-E001399
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373533373533
Occupation Military surgeon
Details Was a surgeon in the Bengal Army (52nd Regiment) at the time he became a Fellow. He is confused in the *Calendar* with the better-known William Crozier. He died apparently some time between 1862 and 1865. **See below for an expanded version of the original obituary which was printed in volume 1 of Plarr's Lives of the Fellows. Please contact the library if you would like more information lives@rcseng.ac.uk** Alexander William Crozier was a surgeon in the Indian Army. He was born on 3 November 1816 in Cape Town, where his father, Robert Crozier, was Postmaster General of the Cape Colony. He studied medicine at Guy's Hospital and gained his MRCS in 1839. In December of the same year he joined the East India Company as an assistant surgeon. From 1841 to 1843 he served with HM 26th Regiment in China and was present at the taking of Amoy, the recapture of Chusan and the occupation of Ningfo, for which he received a medal. Returning to India, he served in the Gwailor Campaign and was present at the battle of Punniar, for which he received the Bronze Star. In January 1846 during the First Sikh War he served with the 16th Lancers, who led the cavalry charge against the well trained Sikhs at the battle of Aliwal. The Lancers lost nearly half their men but managed to break through. Sir Harry Smith, the officer in charge, especially thanked Crozier for his services that day and he received another medal. He was elected as a fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons on 1 December 1854. During the Indian Mutiny he officiated as superintending surgeon in the action on 1 July 1857 near Agra. He had a horse shot under him and was again mentioned in despatches. He was in medical charge of the 3rd European Regiment in action at Agra and Oreyah, serving the whole hot weather campaign of 1858. His regiment had joined the Mynpoorie Movable Column under the command of Colonel WM Riddel, who wrote in his dispatch, quoted in *The Edinburgh Gazette* on 24 September 1858: 'The services of Surgeon A W Crozier have been most valuable and owing to his unremitting attention to the sick no less than his judicious sanitary precautions, I attribute in great measure the almost perfect immunity from sickness we have been mercifully permitted to enjoy.' He received another medal and was promoted to surgeon major on 19 December 1859. Altogether he was thanked 12 times for efficient and valuable services. He died on 7 March 1863 at Dehra Dun aged only 46, survived by his only surviving child, Robert George, and his wife Caroline née Cracklow. Deborah van Dalsen
Resource Identifier RCS: E001350
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Cumming, Alexander (1793 - 1858)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Cumming, Arthur James ( - 1901)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Cumming, Robert Butterfield ( - 1887)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Cundy, Osbert Fishlake (1818 - 1897)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-09-07 2013-12-13
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001300-E001399
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373540373540
Occupation General surgeon
Details Educated at St George's Hospital, where he was House Surgeon and then Demonstrator of Anatomy at the School in Kinnerton Street. He was also at different times House Surgeon to the Lock Hospital and Surgeon to the Pimlico Dispensary and North London Ophthalmic Infirmary. He practised at 36 St James's Street, and about the year 1855 at 25 Chapel Street, Belgrave Square, being then in partnership with T F Chilver (qv), of New Burlington Street. Later he practised at 1 Lancaster Road, Belsize Park, Hampstead, and then at Sussex House, The Hoe, Plymouth. He died on January 27th, 1897 in Nice, France.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001357
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Curling, Henry ( - 1887)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Curry, William (1809 - 1886)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Cutfield, Alfred Baker (1816 - 1863)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Cutliffe, Henry Charles (1832 - 1873)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Shaw, Denis Latimer (1917 - 2004)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-11-02
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000100-E000199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372339372339
Occupation General surgeon
Details Denis Shaw was a consultant surgeon at Keighley and Airedale. He qualified at Leeds in 1940, having represented the Combined English Universities at fencing, and taking his turn at fire-watching. He always remembered watching bombs dropping on the City Museum. After house jobs he joined the RAMC, rising to the rank of Lieutenant Colonel, serving as a specialist surgeon, mainly in Ceylon. After the war he returned to Leeds Infirmary, marrying ward sister Barbara Dunn, and completing his training in surgery. He was appointed consultant surgeon at Pontefract with sessions in Goole and Selby in 1954, and in 1962 to Keighley Victoria Hospital, transferring to the new Airedale General Hospital when it was opened by Prince Charles in 1970. He retired in 1982. Among his many interests were archery, gardening, music, cooking and carpentry. Quiet and good-humoured, he was a keen teacher. His last years were marred by rheumatoid arthritis, though this never seemed to impair his surgical dexterity. He died from chronic heart failure on 6 September 2004 leaving his widow and three sons (Michael, Jonathan and Andrew) – a daughter (Joanna) was to die a few days after his funeral.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000152
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Simpson, David Andrew (1954 - 2003)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-11-30
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000300-E000399
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372487372487
Occupation Consultant in accident and emergency medicine Accident and emergency surgeon
Details David Simpson was a consultant in accident and emergency medicine. He was born in London in 1954 and entered King’s College Hospital for medical training. He had considered a career as an engineer, but changed his mind after early training in this discipline. After gaining his FRCS, he became a surgical registrar at the Westminster Hospital and then settled on a career in accident and emergency medicine. He became an associate member of the British Association of Orthopaedic Surgeons and a member of the British Association for Accident and Emergency Medicine, and his future career seemed assured at a time when the specialty was expanding from the old ‘casualty departments’ to the modern ones capable of dealing with a variety of emergencies. He was very interested and had a great knowledge of ‘Scott of the Antartic’, to whom he was distantly related. On entering the Cambridge/Norwich senior registrar training programme he was described as a likeable and hard working, intelligent trainee, but then he developed health problems which dogged his lifestyle and made it difficult for him to engage in permanent posts. Eventually he went to the Middle East, working mainly in Saudi Arabia, and from thence to New Zealand, where he died suddenly on 14 July 2003. He is survived by Raja, his second wife, and Sue and his children, Duncan and Victoria.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000300
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Robin, Ian Gibson (1909 - 2005)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-11-30 2009-05-07
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000300-E000399
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372488372488
Occupation ENT surgeon
Details Ian Robin was a distinguished London ear, nose and throat consultant. He was born at Woodford Green, Essex, on 22 May 1909, the son of Arthur Robin, a Scottish general practitioner, and Elizabeth Parker née Arnold, his American mother. He was educated at Merchiston Castle School, in Edinburgh, and at Clare College, Cambridge, where he achieved a half blue in cross country running (once getting lost in the fog) and gained a senior science scholarship to Guy’s Hospital, London. There he won the Treasurer’s gold medal in both clinical surgery and clinical medicine, the Charles Oldman prize in ophthalmology and the Arthur Durham travelling scholarship. At Guy’s he returned to rugby, in which sport he had won a school cap at Merchiston, and subsequently captained the hospital’s first XV. He also played regularly for the United Hospitals and the Eastern Counties. After graduating in 1933 he became house physician to Sir Arthur Hirst and Sir John Conybere and house surgeon to Sir Heneage Ogilive and Sir Russell Brock at Guy's and house surgeon to Sir Lancelot Barrington-Ward at the Royal Northern Hospital, during which time he passed the FRCS. He was so highly thought of that in 1937 he was invited back to the Royal Northern to become a part-time ENT consultant whilst still working as a senior ENT registrar and chief clinical assistant at Guy's Hospital, where he was much influenced by W M Mollison, T B Layton and R J Cann. In the same year he started his private practice, which he continued until 1994. In 1947 Ian Robin was appointed consultant ENT surgeon to St Mary's Hospital, Paddington. He served both St Mary's and the Royal Northern until his retirement in 1974. At the onset of the Second World War Ian was invalided out of the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve because of his left total deafness (the result of mastoid surgery as a child) and served with the EMS Sector 3 London Area seconded to the Royal Chest Hospital. He put his disability to good use and, always a practical optimist, he used to remark that ‘if he turned in bed onto his good ear he did not hear the guns and doodle bugs.’ Although he, together with J Golligher, in 1952 performed the first colon transplant in the treatment of post cricoid cancer, he was principally an otologist and was deeply concerned about deaf people and those who cared for them. A member of the medical and scientific committee and one-time vice chairman of the Royal National Institute of the Deaf (from 1954 to 1958) he was also, in 1953, a founder member of the Deaf Children's Society (later the National Deaf Children's Society) and, through the British Association of Otolarynoglogists, of which he became president in 1972, he fought hard for improved recognition and pay of audiological technicians and was the first chairman of the Hearing Aid Technicians Society. Determined to relieve children of the burden of body-worn hearing aids, Ian tried to convince the then Secretary of State for Health (Barbara Castle) that the newly available post-aural aids should be issued to children. In the Royal Society of Medicine Ian Robin was vice-president of the section of otology (from 1966 to 1969) and president of the section of laryngology (from 1967 to 1968), where his presidential address on ‘snoring’ raised much public interest. He gave the Yearsley lecture on ‘the handicap of deafness’ in 1967 and the Jobson Horne lecture in 1969. He jointly wrote *A synopsis of otorhinolarynoglogy* (John Wright, Bristol, 1957), and chapters on deafness in the second and third editions of *Diseases of the ear, nose and throat*. His last article, entitled ‘Personal experience of deafness’ was published in ENT News in 2003. Always popular with his colleagues and loved by his patients, he treated his juniors with great friendliness, regarding them as equals. He also took an active part in many student activities at St Mary’s Hospital. In his long retirement Ian Robin was able to continue his hobbies of golf, bowls, gardening, furniture restoration and painting, where he was an active exhibiting member of the Medical Art Society. In later retirement he progressively lost his sight and remaining hearing, but this did not stop him at the age of 90 becoming singles champion of Rutland Blind Bowls Club or completing a computer course to learn a voice activated programme. His first wife Shelagh (née Croft), whom he married in 1939, died suddenly in 1978. In 1994 Ian happily married Patricia Lawrence (Pat), who was the first patient that he operated on when he became a consultant at the Royal Northern Hospital when he was aged 28 and she 13. Neil Weir
Resource Identifier RCS: E000301
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Fonseka, Merrennage Neil Thomas (1940 - 2005)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-12-21
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000300-E000399
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372509372509
Occupation General surgeon
Details Neil Fonseka was foundation professor of surgery at the University of Ruhuna, Sri Lanka. A twin, he was born in Colombo on 19 July 1940, the son of Merrennage Gilbert Thomas Fonseka, a clerical officer, and Eugene Wilta Fonseka a school teacher. He was educated at St Matthew’s College, Dematagoda, and Ananda College, where he was an excellent student and also won prizes for sports. He qualified with second class honours from the University of Colombo and won distinctions in microbiology, pathology and obstetrics and gynaecology, as well as the Loos gold medal for pathology. After junior posts he went to England, where he worked at St Peter’s, St Mark’s and St Bartholomew’s hospitals in London and was senior registrar at Charing Cross and King Edward VII Hospital, Windsor. In 1976 he was appointed surgeon to the prosthetic and vascular centre at Selly Oak Hospital, Birmingham, and, in 1978, surgeon-in-charge at the prosthetic and vascular centre at Brighton Hospital. In 1980 he returned to Sri Lanka to become the foundation professor in surgery at the new University of Ruhuna. There he threw himself into the life of the university, taking a keen interest in student welfare, becoming a member of the senate and council of the university and dean of the faculty of medicine from 1988 to 1989, during horrifying days of terrorism. He founded the Ruhuna University Medical Students Alumni Association, the Galle branches of the Jaipur Foot Project and the Cancer Society, and was president of the Galle Medical Association in 1985. He was interested in cricket, tennis, chess, bridge, poker, singing, watching films, reading classics and fiction, and jokes. He owned an estate where he cultivated coconuts. He married Pushpa, a professor of community medicine at the University of Ruhuna, who cared for him devotedly during his long and disabling last illness. He died on 15 May 2005.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000322
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Annandale, Thomas (1838 - 1907)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2009-10-02 2016-01-29
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000600-E000699
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372877372877
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born at Newcastle-upon-Tyne, the second son of Thomas Annandale, surgeon, [1] by his wife E Johnstone. Educated at Bruce's Academy, Newcastle-upon-Tyne, and apprenticed to his father. Matriculated at Edinburgh in 1856 and graduated MD in the University in 1860, gaining the highest honours and winning the Gold Medal for his thesis "On Injuries and Diseases of the Hip-joint". Acted as House Surgeon to James Syme (qv) at the Edinburgh Royal Infirmary and as Syme's private assistant from 1861-1870. Appointed a Junior Demonstrator of Anatomy in the University by Professor John Goodsir. He was a lecturer on the principles of surgery in the extramural school at Edinburgh in 1863, and gave a yearly course of lectures until 1871, when he began to lecture on clinical surgery at the Royal Infirmary. In 1864 he won the Jacksonian Prize at the Royal College of Surgeons of England with his dissertation on "The Malformation, Diseases and Injuries of the Fingers and Toes with their Surgical Treatment". The essay was published at Edinburgh in 1865. Annandale was elected Assistant Surgeon to the Edinburgh Royal Infirmary in 1865, and became Acting Surgeon in 1871. He was appointed Regius Professor of Clinical Surgery in the University in 1871 [2] in succession to Joseph, Lord Lister (qv), who migrated to King's College, London. He was made an honorary DCL of the University of Durham in April, 1902. He joined the Royal Archers, His Majesty's Bodyguard in Scotland, as an Archer in 1870, and was Surgeon-General to the corps from May 27th, 1900, until his death. He married in 1874 Eveline, the eldest daughter of William Nelson, the publisher, of Edinburgh, and had by her three sons and three daughters. He died suddenly on Dec 20th, 1907, having operated as usual on the previous day. A bust executed by W G Stevenson, RSA, is in the lecture theatre of the Edinburgh Royal Infirmary, and there is a small portrait of him in the collection at the Royal College of Surgeons of England. Annandale lived through the revolution in surgical practice. He kept himself abreast of all the varying phases and combined the good parts of each. He was keenly interested in University matters, and more especially in the welfare of the students. He was prominent at the Students' Union and in the Athletic Club. The 'Annandale Gold Medal' for Clinical Surgery commemorates him at the University of Edinburgh. Publications: Surgical Appliances and Minor Operative Surgery, Edinburgh, 1866. Abstracts of Surgical Principles, 6 Parts, 1868-1870. 3rd ed., 1878. Observations and Cases in Surgery, 1875. On the Pathology and Operative Treatment of Hip Disease, 1876. [Amendments from the annotated edition of *Plarr's Lives* at the Royal College of Surgeons: [1] to the Newcastle infirmary 1854-66; [2] '1871' is deleted and '1877 see *BMJ* 1938, 2, 436' added]
Resource Identifier RCS: E000694
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Appleyard, John (1848 - 1905)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Archer, Edmond ( - 1869)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2009-10-02
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000600-E000699
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372879372879
Occupation General surgeon
Details Practised first at the Cape of Good Hope. He died at King’s Lynn on Aug 12th, 1869, where he was Physician to the West Norfolk and Lynn Hospital.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000696
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Archer, John (1809 - 1886)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2009-10-02 2013-08-06
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000600-E000699
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372880372880
Occupation General surgeon
Details Educated at St Bartholomew's Hospital and practised at Birmingham, where he was Surgeon to the Lying-in Hospital. He took an active interest in the local Medical Societies and in the Medical Institute from the time of its formation. He was a familiar figure at Fellowship elections at the Royal College of Surgeons. He died at his residence, 9 Carpenter Road, Edgbaston, on March 8th, 1886.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000697
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Carpue, Joseph Constantine (1764 - 1846)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2007-10-18 2016-04-15
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000400-E000499
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372599372599
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born on May 4th, 1764, at Brook Green, the son of a gentleman of small fortune descended from a Spanish family. As a Roman Catholic he was educated at the Jesuits' College, Douai, being at first intended for the Church. At the age of 18, before the Revolution, he travelled about France on foot, saw Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette at the dinner table with Philip Egalité, Duke of Orleans, waiting on them. Later, in Paris, he listened to the declamations of Danton, Marat, and Robespierre. This was the beginning of what he continued through life, journeying on foot through Wales and the Highlands of Scotland with Sharon Turner the historian, also through Holland, Italy, Germany, and even, in 1843, the Tyrol. After the Church Carpue next thought about becoming a bookseller in succession to an uncle Lewis in Great Russell Street; then his admiration for Shakespeare turned his thoughts towards the stage, and up to the time of his death he continued to advocate the erection of a colossal iron statue of Shakespeare at the mouth of the Thames. Finally, fixing on surgery, he studied at St George's Hospital under Keate and George Pearson. On qualifying as a surgeon he was appointed Staff Surgeon to the Duke of York's Hospital, Chelsea, in 1799, and, through Pearson, became an ardent vaccinator. The former post he resigned Oct 1st, 1807, because he declined to go on foreign service, but he continued Surgeon to the National Vaccine Institution until his death. At the Duke of York's Hospital he held classes in anatomy with a fee of 20 guineas for the course, and had for years an overflowing attendance. He delivered three courses of daily lectures during the year without intermission except for a few days in summer. He also gave lectures on surgery twice a week in the evening. A strange occurrence happened in 1800. West, President of the Royal Academy, Sir Joseph Banks, and Cosway, agreeing that the classical representation of the Crucifixion was unsatisfactory, called upon Carpue. A murderer was about to be executed. Keate, Master of the College of Surgeons, gave permission. A structure was erected, including a cross, near the place of execution. The executed murderer, whilst still warm, was nailed on the cross, the cross suspended, and after the body had fallen into position, a cast was taken under the direction of Banks. The cast was removed to Carpue's anatomy theatre, and in 1843 was still in existence in the studio of Behnes. In connection with his anatomy teaching Carpue published a *Description of the Muscles of the Human Body*. He took up medical electricity, had a fine plate machine in his dining-room and made many experimental researches, including that on himself for the relief of lumbago, by passing the current through his loins. He published a book on the subject in 1803. On the occasion of the illness of Princess Amelia, at Worthing, Carpue was introduced to the Prince Regent, who talked with him on medical subjects, as he did later when king. Hence, when Carpue published his *Account of Two Successful Operations for Restoring a Lost Nose*, in December, 1815, he dedicated it to the Prince Regent. Carpue began with an historical account of the Tagliacotian operation by tracing the first description of the operation to the Sicilian surgeon Branca in 1442. Tagliacozzi (1546-1599) first noted his operation in his *Epistola ad Hieronymum Mercurialem de Naribus multo ante abscissis reficiendis*, 1587. He described it more fully in *De Curtorum Chirurgia per Insitionem*, libri duo, 1597, which included the well-known engraving of an arm attached to the nose by a flap of skin. Outside Italy the only reported case subsequently had been that by Griffon, of Lausanne, in 1590, mentioned by Fabricius Hildanus. The operation had been popularly confused with transplantation of skin, particularly from the buttock of a donor. Butler, in the 1st canto of his *Hudibras*, had mixed up this transplantation of skin with the superstition about sympathy. The nose restored from the donor's buttock, Butler's 'parent breech', was said to disappear on the death of Nock, the donor, the portion of the donor's spirit, or numen, having to rejoin that of its parent breech, alias Nock- "When the date of Nock was out, Off dropped the sympathetic snout." What had occurred in several instances was healing by first intention when a cut-off nose had been sutured into place at once. Carpue entered upon a long disquisition concerning healing by first intention, and mentioned more or less veracious instances. Yet owing to cold or other causes, a restored nose might shrivel up or slough off. Carpue's attention had been attracted to the description of the Indian method in the *Gentleman's Magazine*, 1794, given by two English surgeons, Thomas Cruso and James Findlay. It was also described in Pennant's *View of Hindoostan*, 1798, ii, 237, as a procedure practised from time immemorial by the caste of the Koomas - potters and brickmakers. His first case was that of an officer the tip of whose nose had sloughed in 1809, not so much the result of syphilis as from the excessive administrations of mercury for hepatitis. There are four plates in illustration of the operation and result. The second case was that of an officer the tip of whose nose had been cut off at the Battle of Albuera, in 1810; Plate V illustrates the deformity and the result of the operation. In both instances an exceedingly good result was obtained considering the surgery of the time. In 1819 Carpue published a *History of Suprapubic Lithotomy*, giving a history of other methods, without adding anything from his own experience, but the book is a useful compendium. Carpue saw the operation performed in Paris by Soubervielle. Franco had pushed up the calculus in a boy's bladder; John Douglas and Cheselden injected water to distend the bladder. In either procedure the fold of peritoneum was likely to be raised. But Frère Côme introduced his sonde-à-dard, by an incision in the perineum, to push forward the wall of the bladder after he had emptied it of urine. Consequently a perforation of the fold of peritoneum was likely. Either this accident, or the over-distension of the bladder causing rupture, was the reason why the operation failed. Suprapubic lithotomy was resuscitated by Carson, who showed that the fold of peritoneum was raised when the rectum was inflated; by Petersen, of Kiel, who carefully distended the bladder; and by the method of Sir Henry Thompson in pushing up the exposed fold bluntly with the fingers. Carpue was also Surgeon to the St Pancras Infirmary, and after seeing at Greenwich Hospital multiple punctures made into inflamed areas, he adopted the practice. It was especially through Sir Joseph Banks that Carpue was elected Fellow of the Royal Society. At the College of Surgeons he was one of the original Fellows but was not elected to the Council. Although successful at first in attracting a large anatomical class, private medical schools died out as the staff of the great hospitals set themselves to give medical instruction systematically and ceased to take private pupils. J F South, although he allowed that Carpue was a very good anatomist, depreciated him for holding private classes. Soon after the opening of the railways to Brighton, Carpue in travelling there put his two daughters in a first-class carriage, whilst he himself with two servants travelled in an open car. A collision occurred which threw him and his servants out upon the line. One of the servants was killed, and Carpue sustained severe contusions. After a tedious process at law he obtained a verdict for damages in the sum of £250, most of which had already been spent in costs. He did not recover, suffered from increasing bronchitis, and died on Jan 30th, 1846. His portrait, as well as a marble bust, was presented to St George's Hospital by his daughter, Miss Emma Carpue, who left St George's Hospital £6,500 and £1000 to the Society for the Relief of the Widows and Orphans of Medical Men. Carpue is described as a tall, ungainly, good-tempered, grey-haired man who wore an ill-fitting suit of black relieved by an enormous white kerchief which encircled his neck like a roller towel. He was a facile draughtsman on the blackboard and thus earned the name of 'the chalk lecturer'. Each pupil was made to repeat after him and in identical words the description of the bone or organ which he had just given. Tom Hood alludes to Carpue in his "Pathetic Ballad of Mary's Ghost":- "I can't tell where my head is gone, But Dr Carpue can. As for my trunk, it's all packed up To go by Pickford's van." Publications:- "Cast of Crucifixion," from an unpublished MS in Carpue's handwriting. - *Lancet*, 1846, I, 167. *Description of the Muscles of the Human Body*, London, 1801. *An Introduction to Electricity and Galvanism, with Cases showing their Effects in the Cure of Disease*, London, 1803. *An Account of Two Successful Operations for Restoring a Lost Nose from the Integuments of the Forehead in the Cases of Two Officers of His Majesty's Army*, to which are prefixed historical and physiological remarks on the nasal operation, including descriptions of the Indian and Italian methods, with engravings by Charles Turner, London, 1818, translated into German, Berlin, 1817. *A History of the High Operation for the Stone by Incision above the Pubes* (with observations on the advantage attending it, and an account of the various methods of Lithotomy from the earliest periods to the present time), London, 1819.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000415
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Bancroft-Livingston, George Henry (1920 - 2007)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2007-11-08
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000400-E000499
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372600372600
Occupation Obstetrician and gynaecologist
Details George Bancroft-Livingston was a consultant obstetrician and gynaecologist at the Lister Hospital, Stevenage. He was born in Ross, California, on 13 October 1920, one of two children of Henry Livingston, a diplomat, and Barbara née Bancroft. He was educated at Stonyhurst College, Lancashire, from the age of eight, the second of three generations to attend the school. He went on to study medicine at Middlesex Hospital, qualifying in 1944. From 1946 to 1949 he served as a squadron leader in the RAF, based in Wales. Formerly a senior registrar and research assistant at the Middlesex Hospital, he moved to Belfast in 1953 and became the Barnett tutor in obstetrics and gynaecology in 1954, and subsequently lecturer in midwifery and gynaecology at Queens University, Belfast. He moved to England in 1958 to take up the post of consultant obstetrician and gynaecologist to the North Herts Hospital, Hitchin, and the Luton and Dunstable Hospital, before moving to the Lister Hospital in Stevenage. He was awarded his FRCOG in 1960, and went on to examine for the college, especially in Northern Ireland and Basra, Iraq. George married Stella Pauline Deacon in 1950. They had a son, Mark, who became a general practitioner, and four daughters. George upheld his Catholic faith during his professional life, steadfastly refusing to undertake any abortion work as a gynaecologist. He retired in 1985 and became a Brother of the Order of St John in 1996, receiving his ten-year medal of service posthumously at his funeral. He died suddenly on 16 April 2007 after a short illness.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000416
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Archer, William (1809 - 1891)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2009-10-02
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000600-E000699
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372881372881
Occupation General surgeon
Details For a time he practised at 1 Montagu Street, Portman Square, London, where he was Surgeon in Ordinary to the Ottoman Embassy Resident in London. Practised later at 7 Boyne Terrace, Notting Hill, London, where he died on Feb 25th, 1891.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000698
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Kilpatrick, Francis Rankin (1908 - 2005)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2007-02-01
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000300-E000399
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372518372518
Occupation Urological surgeon Urologist
Details Francis Rankin Kilpatrick, known as ‘Kilp’, was a urological surgeon in London. He was born in Windsorton near Kimberley in Cape Province, South Africa, on 18 September 1908. His father had been a draper’s assistant who emigrated from Northern Ireland to South Africa in 1897, where he flourished, ending up as the owner of his store. He returned only once to Ireland, to bring back his wife, Annie Rankin. He died in 1923, leaving Annie to bring up Kilp (then only 14) and three other children. Kilp and his brother John went to England before the war to study medicine at Guy’s Hospital. Kilp qualified in 1933, and held house jobs and junior surgical posts. He left Guy’s to be RMO at Putney Hospital for a few years, where his reputation grew, and he was invited back to Guy’s. But for the war he would have been appointed to the staff (according to his backer, Nils Eckhoff). Instead he was appointed surgeon to the Emergency Bed Service, working at Guy’s and the Wildernesse (where he was surgeon superintendent). At the outbreak of war Hedley Atkins was responsible for the surgical organisation: Kilp and Sam Wass were the surgical registrars who took turns to deal with the emergency surgery throughout the Blitz, the anaesthetics being provided by another South African, Abe Shein. Those days have been vividly described: the casualties were operated on in an improvised four-table operating theatre in a cellar. The operations went on day and night, even though the hospital itself was heavily damaged. On five occasions the daily total of admissions was more than 100. This intense activity was to be repeated later in the war during the V1 and V2 attacks of 1944 and 1945. After the war Kilp was appointed consultant surgeon to Guy’s in 1946 and to St Peter’s Hospital in 1948. At St Peter’s Kilp was worshipped by the younger RSOs for his meticulous technique of retropubic prostatectomy, which in his hands was notably gentle and bloodless, and for the endless pains he took in teaching. In a day when some surgeons were famous for their arrogance, few people were so courteous and friendly to people of every walk of life. His juniors like his patients regarded him as their friend. He married Eileadh Morton, a radiographer, in 1939. They had three children – Stewart, Bruce and Fiona. He retired to Fittleworth, where he developed a keen interest in bird-watching and photography. He died on 19 August 2005, aged 96.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000331
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Wheeldon, Francis Tasker (1917 - 2005)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Murley, Sir Reginald Sydney (1916 - 1997)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2007-03-08 2007-03-21
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000300-E000399
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372520372520
Occupation General surgeon
Details Reginald Murley, known universally to friend and foe alike as ‘Reggie’, was a consultant surgeon at the Royal Northern Hospital and a former President of the College. He was born on 2 August 1916. His father, Sydney Herbert, was a fur trader and a general manager of the Hudson Bay Company. His mother, Beatrice, was a cousin of Lillian Bayliss, founder of the Old Vic theatre. Reggie was educated at Dulwich College, where some of the features of his rugged extrovert personality rapidly became apparent. In 1934 he entered St Bartholomew’s Hospital, then at its zenith as one of the leading teaching hospitals, where he won several prizes in anatomy and physiology. Anticipating that war was inevitable, he joined the Territorial Army early in 1939 and a week before the second world war began found himself in the No 168 City of London Cavalry Field Ambulance, and as a consequence had to wear breeches, spurs, and learn to ride a horse. He travelled widely in the Army, seeing service in Palestine, Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, Iraq, Egypt, Sudan, Eritrea and Ethiopia, gaining invaluable experience, mainly in plastic surgery. He returned to England in 1944 and was posted as a surgeon to No 53 Field Surgical Unit in France, Holland and Germany, and gained extensive experience of the surgical aspects of modern warfare prior to his demobilisation as a Major. Following his return to civilian life, he was appointed as an anatomy demonstrator at Bart’s. From 1946 to 1949 together he was surgical chief assistant there, with clinical assistantships at St Mark’s and St Peter’s Hospitals. He passed the final FRCS examination in 1946. In the same year, he was appointed consultant surgeon to St Alban’s City Hospital, and in 1952 as consultant surgeon to the Royal Northern Hospital in London. He continued to serve both these institutions with distinction for the remainder of his professional life. He did some excellent research on Geoffrey Keynes’ conservative approach to breast cancer and demonstrated that it had advantages in survival rate over the then widely practised radical mastectomy. He also worked on the detection and prevention of venous thrombosis, was awarded an Hunterian Professorship on this subject, and became an early advocate of emergency pulmonary embolectomy. Although he always saw himself first and foremost as a practising surgeon, by the mid 1940s Reggie became increasingly apprehensive about the introduction of a National Health Service and his interest in, or rather his disillusionment with, medical politics dates from this time. As a senior surgical registrar at a special meeting of the Fellows of the Royal College of Surgeons just before the NHS began he had the courage and temerity to criticise the College and the President for “*a tactical blunder which had confused and divided the profession, weakened the position of the BMA and strengthened the hand of the minister*”. Though he and his fellow rebels lost the ensuing vote, Reggie remained opposed to ‘nationalised medicine’ and he firmly believed that the profession had been sold out by the machinations of a few senior members. He was a founder member of the Fellowship for Freedom in Medicine and was its President in 1974. As one of the College’s first surgical tutors and a regional adviser, he was elected to the Council in 1970, and as President on Bastille Day (14 July) in 1977. He devoted himself with his customary vigour to that office: he was frequently controversial, loyally adherent to his principles, acerbic but amusing, argumentative but endearing, and, above all, devoted to the College and its history. He was an accomplished public speaker and punctiliously disciplined in keeping to his allotted time span, which was remarkable given that he was an inveterate chatterer who attempted to dominate every conversation. Much as he enjoyed his three years as President, he came to feel in his latter years that his most important contribution to the College was his eight years as Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the Hunterian collection. John Hunter, the founder of scientific surgery, was Murley’s hero and his devotion to the collection of Hunter’s specimens knew no limits. Ever alert to the slightest whiff of a threat, he fiercely opposed any attempt to diminish the importance of Hunter in the College’s scheme of priorities. During a particularly difficult period, when his health was already in decline, he earned the unfailing support of the elected trustees during a long period of arduous meetings and only relinquished the chair when he felt that the ship was in calmer waters once more. Reggie’s appointment to the 1st Cavalry Division in 1939 was apposite, for this ambience suited his attributes well, and he remained a cavalryman at heart throughout his life. With his booming, resonant voice, accompanied by a hearty guffaw, staff and patients alike became aware of his arrival long before he appeared in person. Not for him the constraints of devious Machiavellian diplomacy which he generally termed ‘pussy-footing around’. He remained firmly wedded to the Cardigan principle of a full-blooded frontal assault, sabre drawn, no matter how great the odds. It was these very qualities which made him such a steadfast ally and stalwart opponent: no one was left long to linger in anguished doubt as to the respective camp to which they had been assigned. Reggie was without question a member of that rapidly dwindling band of men known as ‘characters’: a quality composed of a judicious mixture of intelligence, ability and individuality; difficult to define but instantly recognisable features common to many men who made our country great and now in very short supply. In 1947, he married Daphne Butler née Garrod who had been twice widowed in the war; he inherited a step daughter, Susan, and they had a further two daughters, Jennifer and Hilary, and three sons, David, Gavin and Anthony. There are nine grandchildren. Sadly his final years were clouded by steadily progressive disability and he died on 2 October 1997.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000334
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Alpar, Emin Kaya (1943 - 2005)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2007-03-15 2007-08-02
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000300-E000399
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372521372521
Occupation Trauma surgeon
Details A trauma surgeon, Emin Alpar was a former medical director of the Birmingham Accident Hospital. He was born on 30 August 1943, in Istanbul, Turkey, the son of Mithat Alpar, an industrialist, and Nevin Alpar, a housewife. He was educated at Ankara College, where he gained a baccalaureate in 17 subjects, and went on to study medicine at Ankara University. In 1966 he graduated with first class honours. He trained in surgery at Bristol, the Royal National Orthopaedic Hospital, Oswestry, Liverpool and Columbia Presbyterian Medical Center, New York. He was particularly influenced by Donal Brooks, Robert Owen and Sir Reginald Watson-Jones. In 1973 he returned to Turkey to complete his National Service, working as a consultant orthopaedic surgeon to the Sarikamis Military Hospital. In 1975 he was appointed associate professor of orthopaedic surgery at Hacettepe University. Five years later, in 1980, he transferred to Birmingham, as a senior lecturer at the University of Birmingham department of surgery. He was appointed consultant orthopaedic surgeon at the Birmingham Accident Hospital (1981), Birmingham General Hospital (1993) and University Hospital Birmingham (1995). From 1990 to 1993 he was medical director of the Birmingham Accident Hospital. In 1994 he set up a MMedSci course in surgery of trauma at the University of Birmingham, and was course director until 2000. He was chairman of the Institute of Accident Surgery from 1993 to 2002. Essentially a trauma surgeon, he felt that the trauma surgeon must be a generalist because trauma does not observe anatomical boundaries. He was particularly interested in the treatment of whiplash injury and the association with atypical carpal tunnel syndrome. A committed teacher and trainer, he was supportive of all staff. As a result of his experience he was much in demand as an expert witness in medico-legal disputes. Alpar played basketball as a young man and enjoyed swimming and walking later in life. He was interested in history and specifically the history of medicine. In 1966 he married Oya, now professor and head of the centre for drug delivery research at the School of Pharmacy, University of London. They divorced in 2003. They had two sons – Bora and Burak, both of whom work in the finance sector. Alpar died early in November 2005.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000335
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Bendall, Robin (1933 - 2006)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2007-03-15 2007-05-24
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000300-E000399
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372522372522
Occupation Orthopaedic surgeon
Details Robin Bendall was an orthopaedic surgeon in London. He was born on 1 April 1933 in Notthingham, where his father, Oliver Francis Bendall, was a wholesale grocer. His mother was Winnie May née Barrett. He attended West Bridgford Grammar School, Nottingham, and then went on to Guy’s Hospital Medical School, where he qualified in 1956. After serving as house surgeon to J S Batchelor at Guy’s he did his National Service in the RAF, with postings to Christmas Island and Nocton Hall Hospital. Following demobilisation he became a general surgical registrar at Queen Mary’s Hospital, Sidcup, gaining his FRCS in 1964. He was then an orthopaedic registrar at St George’s Hospital, London, and subsequently held a senior orthopaedic post at Charing Cross Hospital, where he was influenced by David Trevor. He was appointed as a consultant to St George’s Hospital, St James’s Hospital, Balham, and Queen Mary’s Hospital for Children at Carshalton. Influenced by Douglas Freebody, he developed an interest in the treatment of low back pain and published on the subject. At Carshalton he treated children with scoliosis. He set up the St George’s orthopaedic training scheme, and was secretary of the south west metropolitan orthopaedic advisory committee and a member of the clinical and orthopaedic sections of the Royal Society of Medicine, serving as secretary of the latter in 1980. He was a fellow of the British Orthopaedic Association. In 1958 Robin Bendall married June Mary Nicholls, a nursing sister, by whom he had two sons, Stephen (a consultant orthopaedic surgeon) and Timothy, and a daughter, Claire. He later divorced and married Tricia. Sadly, Tricia died and he brought up their son, Olly, on his own. His grandchildren were Emma, Gabby, Georgie and Max. Robin Bendall died quite suddenly from a heart attack on 5 October 2006 whilst removing his luggage from an airport conveyor belt.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000336
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Dixon, James William Theodore (1921 - 2003)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2007-03-15 2009-05-07
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000300-E000399
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372523372523
Occupation ENT surgeon
Details James Dixon was an ENT surgeon in Glasgow and later Devon. He was born on 28 September 1921 in Trong, Perak, Malaya, where his father, William John Dixon, was working as a doctor. His mother was Grace Gertrude née Holmes. He was educated at St Peter’s, Exmouth, and Epsom College, from which he went to University College Hospital with an entrance scholarship. There he was much influenced by Gwynne Williams, Myles Formby, Gavin Livingstone and Ronald Macbeth. On qualifying he did his house jobs at University College Hospital, Hampstead General Hospital, the Postgraduate Medical School Hammersmith and the Royal Ear Hospital. He served in the RAMC from 1946 to 1948, reaching the rank of major. He returned to University College Hospital as a registrar and senior registrar, specialising in ENT. He was a senior registrar at the Radcliffe Infirmary, Oxford, before being appointed surgeon in charge of the ENT department, at the Royal Infirmary, Glasgow, in 1959, with the honorary position of lecturer in otolaryngology. In 1970 he moved to Devon, as a consultant for the Devon and Exeter clinical area, based at Torbay Hospital. He published articles on acute otitis media in children, carcinoma of the larynx and solitary neurilemmomata. Dixon was honorary secretary of the section of laryngology of the Royal Society of Medicine from 1966 to 1968 and a member of the council of the British Association of Otolaryngologists from 1970. Whilst in Glasgow he examined for the final FRCS in Edinburgh, Glasgow and Ireland. He married a Miss McCay in 1955, and had three sons and a daughter. He died suddenly on 6 April 2003. Neil Weir
Resource Identifier RCS: E000337
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Ranger, Ian (1925 - 2008)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by N Alan Green
Publication Date 2008-05-01 2014-06-30
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000500-E000599
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372693372693
Occupation General surgeon
Details Ian Ranger was a true general surgeon who worked in the United Norwich Hospitals from 1967 to 1988. He was the son of William Ranger and Hatton Thomasina née Grigg. His father had been a schoolmaster, army officer and businessman, who emigrated to Australia in 1920, where Ian and his brother (Sir) Douglas were born. He was educated at Scott's College, Warwick, Queensland, and the Church of England Grammar School, Brisbane, returning to England before the Second World War to finish his schooling. He followed his elder brother Douglas to the Middlesex Hospital. After qualifying he worked for a year at the Bland Sutton Institute of Pathology under Leslie Le Quesne. In 1958 he spent a year at the Boston City Hospital under J Englebert Dunphy, with whom he retained strong links and whilst there gave practical classes in surgical technique to medical students. Carl Walter, inventor of the Fenwal bag used in blood transfusion, made students smear their forearms with lamp black and scrub it all off before operating. This may have altered Ian's views on his own scrub up technique, as at times he used a special cream to smear his hands and arms, declaring that it was better after a gentle soap and water wash to trap any residual germs in! On returning to the UK, Ian completed his thesis on oesophageal reflux. In 1964 he began a long locum in Cambridge during the illness of Brian Truscott and was appointed to his definitive post in Norwich in 1967. He worked with one surgical firm at the West Norwich Hospital with his equally enthusiastic senior colleague, Alan Birt. Other commitments were to the Jenny Lind Hospital for Children. But he displayed even more energy in his enthusiastic efforts at Cromer and District Hospital. Here he performed some major and heroic surgery, much to the consternation of the anaesthetists, and certainly the pathology department and perhaps some of the registrars working in Norwich. He recommenced emergency surgery there to the benefit of so many patients in north Norfolk, and liaised with a voluntary organisation, the Cromer Allies, to raise funds for an extra ward and new operating theatre. He published papers on sialography, the dissemination of micro-organisms by a suction pump, superior mesenteric artery occlusion, and was a Hunterian Professor in 1961. Naturally left-handed, he was completely ambidextrous, working rapidly with never a wasted movement. Many residents went to Norwich from overseas to rotate through the surgical firms. Ian was surgical tutor for East Anglia for three years. In retirement he divorced himself from medical activities, but is remembered by his colleagues for his enthusiasm and forceful character. He married Janet, who predeceased him. They had two sons, Alistair and Piers. Alistair became a GP in Scotland. Ian Ranger died quite suddenly in Cringleford, Norwich, on 14 February 2008, after a period of ill health with heart problems.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000509
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Neame, John Humphrey (1926 - 2007)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Neil Weir
Publication Date 2008-05-01 2009-05-07
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000500-E000599
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372694372694
Occupation ENT surgeon
Details John Humphrey Neame was an ENT surgeon in Norwich. He was born in London on 14 July 1926, the eldest son of Humphrey Neame, an ophthalmological surgeon on the staff of Moorfields Hospital, and Minnie née Goodwin. Neame followed his father to Cheltenham College and then went to Lincoln High School, Portland, Oregon, during the war, returning to Trinity Hall, Cambridge. He went on to complete his clinical studies at University College Hospital, London, where he was influenced by Miles Formby. After junior posts, he specialised in ENT, becoming house surgeon, registrar and senior registrar at the Royal National Throat Nose and Ear Hospital. He was appointed consultant ENT surgeon to the Salisbury Hospital Group and Swindon and Marlborough hospitals. He was blessed with plenty of opportunities to fish and much enjoyed working with electronics. In 1960 he married Ruth Richards, with whom he had two sons, Stephen and Robert, and a daughter, Rachel. Both of his sons have entered the medical profession. He died on 13 July 2007, the eve of his 81st birthday.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000510
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Smith, Charles William (1923 - 2006)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Neil Weir
Publication Date 2008-05-08 2009-05-07
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000500-E000599
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372695372695
Occupation ENT surgeon
Details Charles William Smith was a consultant ENT surgeon in York. He was born in Kenton, London, on 24 October 1923, the first son of Cecil Smith and Mabel née Gibb. His father, who had served in the First World War with the Royal West Kent Regiment (known as ‘the Dirty Half Hundred’), was badly wounded in the face at the Battle of the Somme, and remained disfigured and partially incapacitated for the rest of his life. Charles Smith and his brother were both educated at the Merchant Taylors’ School in Northwood and were brought up in a happy Christian household. He always maintained that his acceptance at St Thomas’ Medical School was more due to the fact that the Dean recognised his father from the war than his own academic prowess. At medical school he was a keen athlete and rugby player. His first house job was with the ENT department, which no doubt shaped his future career. He continued his training at the Royal Waterloo, the Charing Cross and the Royal Marsden hospitals, and then fitted in his National Service (spent in the Royal Army Medical Corps serving in Chester and Klagenfurt, Austria), before becoming chief assistant to the ENT department at St Thomas’ in 1956. He was appointed, initially as the sole ENT consultant, to the York hospitals in 1959 and served there until 1988. During this time he not only developed his own department, but was also the lead clinician in the planning of the new York District Hospital. Charles Smith became a member of the Court of Examiners at the RCS in 1962. He served as chairman of the York division of the BMA and was president of the North of England Society of Otolaryngology, the section of otology at the RSM and the Visiting Association of Throat and Ear Surgeons of Great Britain. He was honorary treasurer of the British Academic Conference in Otolaryngology, and served as honorary treasurer and then president (from 1984 to 1987) of the British Association of Otolaryngologists. During the time of his presidency he did much to represent the specialty’s interests in Europe and was founder president of the European Federation of Oto-Rhino-Laryngological Societies (EUFOS). At the end of his term of office he was awarded a gold award by the International Federation of Oto-Rhino-Laryngological Societies (IFOS). His appointment to the Archbishop’s council reflected his longstanding friendship with Donald Coggan who, ahead of him at school, had been a curate to the Rev Marshall Hewitt (Charles’s future father-in-law). He persuaded his superior that Charles was a suitable match for his only daughter, and was given the privilege of marrying them at All Soul’s Langham Place. When Charles Smith eventually arrived in York he found Donald Coggan was Archbishop. Charles Smith married Moyra (née Hewitt) in 1955. They had five children, Penn, Basil, Johanna, Rupert and Jeremy. His wide range of other interests included his local church, motor caravanning, gardening, photography, golf, natural history and fly fishing. He was master of the Merchant Taylors’ Company of York. He died on 2 October 2006.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000511
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Ryan, Rowena Marion (1958 - 2005)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Neil Weir
Publication Date 2008-05-08 2022-03-17
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000500-E000599
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372696372696
Occupation ENT surgeon
Details Rowena Ryan was an ENT consultant at Northwick Park Hospital, London. She was born in East London, South Africa, on 4 February 1958, where her father, Cecil Crawford Lindsay Ryan, was serving as a diplomat. Her mother, Dorothy Hazel née Lampkin, had been a secretary. Her paternal grandfather had qualified at Trinity College, Dublin, and became a general practitioner in Bath. She was educated at Alexandra College, Dublin, where she won the Governors Association scholarship, and went on to read medicine at Trinity. After qualifying she held junior posts at the West Middlesex, Stoke Mandeville, Hammersmith and Addenbrooke’s hospitals, before becoming an ENT registrar at the Royal Ear Hospital and senior registrar at the Royal National Throat, Nose and Ear Hospital. She was appointed as a consultant ENT surgeon to Northwick Park and the Central Middlesex hospitals in 1996, where her principal interest was in paediatric audiology. She was an examiner for the intercollegiate FRCS (otol) and was chair elect of the ENT comparative audit group of the British Association of Otorhinolaryngologists - Head and Neck Surgeons. In 1989 she married Audoen Healy, a dentist, with whom she had a daughter, Greta, and a son, Duncan. Outside work and family, her passions were music, literature, foreign languages, squash and tennis. She died of cancer of the pancreas on 9 December 2005.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000512
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Young, Austen (1914 - 2005)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Goodlad, William ( - 1844)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2008-06-12 2012-02-15
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000500-E000599
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372698372698
Occupation General surgeon
Details Practised as a surgeon in Bolsover, then in Bury, and finally in Mosley Street, Manchester, where he was Surgeon to the Union Hospital. He died at his residence at Cheetham Hill on Feb 14th, 1844. He became known as a medical author by winning the Jacksonian Prize in 1812 with his Essay entitled "Diseases of the Vessels and Glands of the Absorbent System", republished as *A Practical Essay on the Diseases of the Vessels and Glands of the Absorbent System. To which are added Surgical Cases with Practical Remarks,* 8vo, London, 1814. On his title-page it appears that this republication is the Jacksonian Essay in substance, and we also infer from the dedication that he received his professional training at the Manchester Infirmary as pupil of its Surgeon, Robert Wagstaffe Killer, to whom he dedicates his book "as a token of respect for his abilities, and of gratitude for his friendship". The book was published by Goodlad in German in conjunction with Carmichael and Henning under the title *Ueber die Skrofelkrankheit*, the translator being J L Choulant (Leipzig, 1818). His Jacksonian Essay in MS (4to) is in the College Library. PUBLICATIONS: In addition to the work mentioned, Goodlad further published:- "Observations on Mr Barlow's Theory on the Origin of Urinary Calculi." - *Edin. Med. and Surg. Jour.*, 1809, v, 438. "Observations on Purulent Ophthalmia." - *Ibid.,* 1810, vi, 15. "Case of Inguinal Aneurysm, Cured by Tying the External Iliac Artery." - *Ibid.*, 1812, viii, 32. "Additional Observations on the Treatment of Scrofula." - *Ibid.*, 1815, xi, 204. "Observations on Diseases which are produced by Irritation in the Urethra." - *Lond. Med. Repos.*, 1814, ii, 449. "History of a Tumour Successfully Removed from the Face and Neck, by previously Tying the Carotid Artery." -* Lond. Med.-Chir. Trans.*, 1816, vii, 112. *A Letter to Sir B. C. Brodie containing a Critical Inquiry into his Lectures illustrative of Certain Local Nervous Affections*, 8vo, London, 1840.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000514
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Sheppard, James Pook (1787 - 1854)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2008-06-12
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000500-E000599
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372699372699
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born at Dorchester on Aug 12th, 1787. He was educated at Lymington, Hants, was then placed under a well-known surgeon at Salisbury, and in 1807 entered St Thomas’s Hospital, where, under the tuition of Sir Astley Cooper and Cline, he soon acquired a superior knowledge of anatomy and surgery. Sir Astley Cooper chose him as his prosector, in which capacity he prepared many of the dissections used in Sir Astley’s lectures. He was promised the post of Demonstrator of Anatomy and was strongly urged to accept it by his masters, who had formed a high opinion of his talents. Sheppard, however, felt debarred by his health from settling in London. He had been struck by Worcester on passing through it, and there he settled without local friends or connections. He won his way by merit, his career being watched with interest by both Cline and Cooper, the latter of whom became his personal friend. In 1815 he was unsuccessful in obtaining the post of Surgeon at Worcester General Infirmary, but succeeded in 1819. In hospital, as in private, practice he endeared himself to his patients by his tenderness and humanity. He made it his rule, if summoned to the hospital and to a private patient at the same time, to attend first to the public duty. He loved his profession sincerely, and continued throughout life to be an ardent student, in this emulating his master, Sir Astley Cooper. He was ready at all times to foster every effort made in the provinces to advance medical science, and was lavish in his endeavours for the good of others, often going unrewarded, though he had a numerous family to provide for. The thought of personal gain never entered into his calculations. He was a very skilful operator, but no man was ever more anxious not to operate without due cause. As an accoucheur he won celebrity and was for some years frequently consulted in difficult cases. In diagnosis he was remarkable for his accuracy. In consultation his opinions were given with clearness and confidence, but with the greatest courtesy to those who differed from him. He had the gift of making his patients feel, in times of sickness and sorrow, that they had a friend on whose sympathy and religious principle they might depend. Thus he made many lasting friendships. In 1828 he became one of the proprietors and surgical editor of the *Midland Medical Reporter*, published for four years in Worcester, and afterwards - in 1832 - led to the formation of the Provincial Medical and Surgical Association which has since developed into the British Medical Association. With Sir Charles Hastings he was appointed joint Hon Secretary of the Association in 1832, and held that office till 1843, when Sir Charles Hastings was appointed President of the Council and Sheppard retired in favour of Robert James Nicholl Streeten, who became sole Secretary with a salary of a hundred guineas a year. In 1849, on Streeten’s death, Sheppard - then an active member of the Central Council - succeeded him in the office, and discharged its onerous duties till his death. He was as valuable in social as in professional life. His nature was eminently truthful, his judgement sound, and his memory accurate. While these qualities gave weight to his opinions, they made him candid and courteous to the opinions of other men. His tastes were simple and his disposition gentle; and if ever his dislike of all unfairness and dissimulation gave occasion for him to administer a rebuke, he performed it as an unwelcome task. He was very well read, especially in politics and history. He possessed in a high degree the then popular art of quotation from favourite authors. He knew his Shakespeare thoroughly. His domestic affections were very strong and he avoided society. In March, 1853, he fell ill and lingered for a year, dying in Worcester on Feb 20th, 1854. During the whole of his trying illness he behaved with the most exemplary fortitude and patience, very frequently expressing his sense of ‘the value of suffering’.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000515
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Barendt, Frank Hugh (1861 - 1926)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Wingfield, Charles (1787 - 1846)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Cantrell, William (1801 - 1876)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Barker, Arthur Edward James (1850 - 1916)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2009-11-11
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000700-E000799
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372935372935
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born in Dublin, the son of Dr William Barker. Studied medicine at the Medical School of the College of Surgeons, Dublin, and later at the University of Bonn, where he acquired a written and spoken knowledge of German as well as of French, which was of primary importance to him. Indeed, his first distinction came through his translation of the *Histologie und Histochemie des Menschen* by Professor Heinrich Frey, of Zurich. The work, first published in 1859, was illustrated by many woodcuts by Kölliker, much in advance of anything published before, and had been recommended to Barker by his teacher, Professor Max Schultze. The translation was published in 1874 and Barker’s preface is in a style characteristic of his subsequent writing. He was then living in Hume Street, Dublin, and was Surgeon to the City of Dublin Hospital, Demonstrator of Anatomy at the College of Surgeons, and Visiting Surgeon to the Convalescent Home at Stillorgan. Barker’s appointment at the age of 25 to the post of Assistant Surgeon at University College Hospital, London, in 1875, was out of the ordinary in that he had not passed the FRCS England, nor, indeed, did he qualify FRCSI, until the following year, 1876. Moreover, he received the FRCS England, in 1880 ad eundem. These occurrences have not repeated themselves. None the less, time, as it passed, showed Barker to be a leader of surgery in his day, fortified by his acquaintance with German surgery during its particularly flourishing period. University College Hospital was then the centre of Listerian surgery in London, from which Barker, following German surgeons (*see under* Bergmann, E von) began to deviate by using salicylic wool, perchloride of mercury, and adopting the so-called aseptic methods. The following is a selection in order of date from among Barker’s great surgical achievements during forty years: In 1880 he removed the kidney for a malignant tumour through an abdominal incision in a woman aged 21; the tumour had been noticed for eight months. The patient died of pulmonary embolism on the second day, after which it was found that the operation had been well performed, but there were secondary growths in the lungs the size of nuts. Barker referred in detail to Simon’s recently published monograph, including the record of twenty-eight cases, half of which had recovered and half had died. In clinical lectures in 1885 and 1889, he described further renal operations. In 1883 he rewrote articles in the third edition of the *System of Surgery* by Holmes and Hulke, on “Diseases of Joints”, “Diseases of the Spine”, and “Diseases of the Tongue”. In this last article there is a full account, with histological drawings, of leukoplakia, already recognized as a precursor of epithelioma. In 1886 he described four cases of removal of deep-seated tumours of the neck, which a few years before would have been held to be incurable. One case was probably an instance of an accessory thyroid, the others enlarged and tuberculous lymphatic glands. Also in 1886 he was the first to perform gastroenterostomy in London, and that successfully, for cancer of the pylorus in a woman aged 57, using the anterior method, the jejunum being turned over towards the right from its commencement. The patient survived for just over a year. In 1898 he noted that he had adopted von Hacker’s posterior gastrojejunostomy. In 1887 he published *A Short Manual of Surgical Operations*, illustrated by his own drawings, a capital résumé of the subject at that date. He was called upon at the hospital to examine and treat cases of ear disease before the institution of a special department, and this gave him opportunities for extending surgical measures beyond the opening of abscesses over the mastoid process after fluctuation had been detected. He had noted and explained anatomically the extension of suppuration from the middle ear to the temporomandibular joint. In four cases he trephined the mastoid antrum and drained the middle ear, so that in one case optic neuritis disappeared. In a case under Sir William R Gowers he first cleared out the disease from the middle ear and antrum, then trephined and drained a temporosphenoidal abscess. This appears to be the first case in which a cerebral abscess, due to tympanic suppuration, had been correctly diagnosed, localized, and then evacuated by operation, with complete success. Barker published a similar case in 1888, and his experience in this branch of surgery formed the subject of his Hunterian Lectures in 1889 on “Intracranial Inflammations Starting in the Temporal Bone”. To Barker is due the chief credit for establishing in this country the early diagnosis and immediate operation upon cases of intussusception. Previously there had been delay in making a definite diagnosis, and attempts at reduction by distending with water the bowel below the intussusception were generally disastrous failures. Barker saw the patient, a boy aged 4, twelve hours after the onset of the symptoms. He first distended the bowel with water until the tumour became imperceptible; five hours later he operated, reduced the intussusception, and the boy recovered. The table of cases showed how unsuccessful had been laparotomy done late in the case. He also operated successfully on the other variety of intussusception, that caused by a new growth in the rectum. Further reports on intussusception were published in 1894, 1897, and 1903 – the last in German. On the subject of active surgical interference with tuberculous disease of the hip- and knee-joint at an early stage Barker was led into error by following German authorities. In evidence of this, note the list at the end of his third Hunterian Lecture in 1888. He was quite right in substituting the term ‘tuberculous’ in place of the indefinite ‘strumous’ used, e.g., by Howard Marsh (qv) in his *Diseases of Joints*, 1886; but the getting rid of a disease which, however it had got there, had become completely localized in the joint, by removing the interior of the joint at a surgical operation, was an erroneous assumption. Howard Marsh stated the experience gained at the Alexandra Hospital for Hip Disease in favour of prolonged rest under good conditions, together with any surgical measures as restricted as possible. There followed increased support of Marsh’s contention, and great advances have occurred in combination with fresh air and sunlight. In 1887 Barker described thirty-five cases in which he had undertaken the radical cure of hernia, just at the time when that operation was coming into general use. He introduced improvement, including the removal of the neck of the hernial sac at its junction with the peritoneum. By 1898 he had operated upon 200 cases with three deaths. He had modified his earlier procedure to that of Bassini’s “as the best operation of any yet devised”. He used hard twisted Chinese silk, boiled in 5 per cent of carbolic acid; in 21 of the 200 there were reports that silk knots had worked out. In 1892, and again in 1896, he described his method of applying a ‘subcutaneous suture’ to bring together a recent fracture of the patella. His second report confirmed his primary experience, but in other hands and even in the earliest cases it proved difficult to get the fractured surfaces into apposition with none of the aponeurosis intervening. Hence with increasing certainty as to asepsis, the open operation continued the standard method. He published in 1895 two cases illustrating obliteration of psoas abscesses after one washing out, scraping, and closure without drainage. His flushing spoon was adopted as most useful and convenient, the actual scraping of the inside of a psoas abscess being practically omitted. The closure without drainage had the advantage over that of Lister’s success in draining, that there was no chance of secondary infection through the drainage tube. Barker gave great attention to detail in the designing of instruments and apparatus, and in carrying out exact asepsis, as well as in the use of local anaesthesia. In 1898 he published the description of the ‘sewing machine needle’ for the introduction of sutures whether intestinal or cutaneous. A reel of silk, after sterilization by boiling, was fixed on the handle of the instrument, so that the reel could be turned to pay out or wind up the thread by the thumb. The needle was held at right angles to the handle, threaded from the reel. It could thus be used for passing interrupted sutures, by cutting the thread beyond the needle. Strictly speaking it lacked the sewing-machine shuttle carrying the under thread and moving at the same time as the needle armed with the upper thread. Barker passed the needle well through, drew it back a little to form a loop, and then with his left thumb and finger passed the free end of the thread through the loop – to make a continuous looped stitch. Practice with both hands was necessary, and also practise in regulating the tightness of the stitch. In describing his sewing-machine needed he noted silk as the thread, but in 1902 he adopted linen sewing-machine thread for ligatures and sutures. In 1899 Barker gave a “Clinical Lecture and Demonstration on Local Analgesia” “which has of late been practised in many parts of the world”, using 1-1000 eucain ß in normal saline solution. He continued in subsequent years to make reports of improvements in technique. In 1907 he published a full description of spinal analgesia in 100 cases by injecting stovaine. In the following year a further series exhibited improvement by the addition of 5 per cent glucose to increase the density and limit the spread of the fluid. The Obituary Notice in the *British Journal of Surgery* said: “The profession in this country is deeply indebted to him for the share which he took in promoting the subject, and for recording his work with sufficient detail to enable others to practise the method with a great measure of success”. Of all the Clinical Lectures which Barker published none was better, and bears re-reading with greater advantage, than that delivered in 1906, entitled, “The Hands of Surgeons and Assistants in Operations”. The title does not cover all the ground. He commenced: “We have now arrived at an era in which we may claim to know a great deal about septic processes”, and he proceeded to summarize half a dozen possible avenues of infection where operations are undertaken: access from the patient’s own body; access from without, from his skin, from the atmosphere, from the instruments employed in making the wound and in its treatment, ligatures, swabs and dressings, and in addition to the “Hands of Surgeons and Assistants, their Clothes and Breath”. No surgeon spent more of his time and his attention over the technique of the surgeon. In the Address on Surgery at the Belfast Meeting of the British Medical Association in 1909, he reviewed in particular the advances made in intestinal surgery in which he had taken such a great part, including a definition of the protective power of the peritoneum, the faculty possessed by the intestinal coats in health of preventing migration of micro-organisms and the loss of this faculty as a consequence of disease and accident, the wider choice of anaesthetics, the success in removing malignant disease of the colon. In 1914, in apparently his last communication, he returned to the subject of leukoplakia which he had described so ably forty-one years before in the Holmes and Hulke *Surgery*. A charming and witty conversationalist, Barker was not a lively speaker. As a teacher he was at his best when discussing and explaining some subject in which at the time he was particularly interested. When lecturing he was apt to deal in allusions and to get above the level of his hearers. He examined at the Universities of London and Manchester, but he seemed to find it difficult to maintain rigorously his attention upon an exacting task. He had acted as Consulting Surgeon to the Queen Alexandra Hospital, Millbank, and to the Obsborn Convalescent Home for Officers. At the outbreak of the War he served as Colonel AMS, at Netley, next at Malta, and then at Salonika. He died there of pneumonia on April 8th, 1916. He practised at 144 Harley Street. A portrait appears in the *British Journal of Surgery*. By his marriage in 1880 to Emilie Blanche, daughter of Mr Julius Delmege, of Rathkeale, Co Limerick, he had issue two sons and four daughters. In the midst of all his work he had great anxiety even during the last days of his life. The younger son died of acute ear disease. The elder, after entering the Army, developed signs of chronic bilateral pulmonary tuberculosis, for which he was invalided. He rejoined six weeks before the outbreak of War, was wounded and taken prisoner. During this time the tuberculosis again became active. On his release after his father’s death the disease was held in check until an attack of bronchopneumonia proved fatal. Publications:- *The Histology and Histo-chemistry of Man*, by Heinrich Frey, translated from the 4th German edition by A E J Baker, 1874. “Nephrectomy by Abdominal Section” – *Med.-Chir. Trans.*, 1880, lxiii, 181; also “Clinical Lectures Illustrating cases of Renal Surgery.” – Lancet, 1885, i, 93, 141; 1889, i, 418, 466. Holmes and Hulke, *System of Surgery*, 3rd ed, 1883, ii. “On the Removal of Deepseated Tumours of the Neck.” – *Lancet*, 1886, i, 194. “A Case of Gastro-enterostomy for Cancer of the Pylorus and Stomach.” – *Brit. Med. Jour.*, 1886, i, 292, 618; also *The Surgical Affections of the Stomach and their Treatment*, 1898. *A Short Manual of Surgical Operations*, 1887. Erichsen and Beck, *Science and Art of Surgery*, 8th ed. 1884, ii, 600. Gowers and Barker, *Brit. Med. Jour.*, 1886, ii, 1154; 1888, i, 777. “Hunterian Lectures on Intracranial Inflammation Starting in the Temporal Bone, their Complications and Treatment.” – *Illust. Med. News*, London, 1889, iv, 10, 35, 63, 82, 108. “A Case of Intussusception of the Caecum, Treated by Abdominal Section with Success.” –*Lancet*, 1888, ii, 201, 262. “A Case of Intussusception of the Upper End of the Rectum due to Obstruction by a New Growth. Excision with Suture. Recovery.” – *Med.-Chir. Trans.*, 1887, lxx, 335. “Cases of Acute Intussusception in Children.” – *Brit. Med. Jour*., 1894 , i, 345. “Fifteen Consecutive Cases of Acute Intussusception with Appendix of all Cases at University College Hospital.” – *Trans. Clin. Soc. Lond*., 1897-8, xxxi, 58. “Zur Casuistik des Darm-Invagination.” – *Arch. f. klin. Chir*., 1903, lxxi, 147. “Three Lectures on Tubercular Joint Disease and its Treatment by Operation.” – *Lancet*, 1888, i, 1202, 1259, 1322. “Diseases of Joints” in Treves’ *System of Surgery*, 1896. “Operation for the Cure of Non-strangulated Hernia.” – *Brit. Med. Jour.*, 1887, ii, 1203; 1890, i, 840; 1898, ii, 712. “Permanent Subcutaneous Suture of the Patella for Recent Fracture.” – *Brit. Med. Jour.*, 1892, i, 425; 1896, i, 963. “Two Cases Illustrating Obliteration of Psoas Abscesses after one Washing out and Scraping and Closure without Drainage.” – *Trans. Clin. Soc.*, 1895, xxviii, 301. “Sewing Machine Needle.” – *Brit. Med. Jour.*, 1898, ii, 148. “A Short Note on the Use of Linen Sewing Machine Thread for Ligatures and Sutures.” –*Lancet*, 1902, i, 1465. “Clinical Lecture and Demonstration on Local Analgesia.” – *Lancet*, 1899, i, 282; 1900, i, 156; 1903, ii, 203. “A Report on Clinical Experiences with Spinal Analgesia.” – *Brit. Med. Jour.*, 1907, i, 665; 1908, i, 244. “Clinical Lecture on the Hands of Surgeons and Assistants at Operations.” – *Lancet*, 1906, i, 345. “Progress in Intestinal Surgery.” – Address on Surgery at the Belfast Meeting of the British Medical Association. – *Brit. Med. Jour*., 1909, ii, 263. “Leukoplakia.” – *Practitioner*, 1914, xciii, 176.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000752
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First Title value, for Searching Heyse-Moore, George Henry (1946 - 2007)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2009-03-13
Unknown
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URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372784372784
Occupation Orthopaedic surgeon
Details George Heyse-Moore was a consultant orthopaedic surgeon who practised at the James Paget Hospital, Great Yarmouth. He was born and brought up in Exeter, where his father, Henry Dendy Moore, practised as a general surgeon. The ‘Heyse’ component of his name came from his mother, who was a sculptor practising under her maiden name, Jacqueline Heyse. George was one of two sons who entered the medical profession - his brother is a consultant in palliative care. After training at the Middlesex Hospital, George Heyse-Moore decided to specialise in orthopaedics, undertaking most of his training in the Exeter area. In 1983 he was appointed to his consultant post in Great Yarmouth. Two areas interested him in particular: revision hip surgery and the management of back problems and associated sciatica. He tackled the latter with his anaesthetist colleague, William Notcutt, who ran the pain relief clinic at the James Paget. In the 1990s they recruited a specialist spinal physiotherapist to an interdisciplinary team for the secondary care of back problems. George Heyse-Moore did not enjoy the non-clinical aspects of medicine, which sometimes brought him into conflict with management. He was an avid writer of rather stroppy letters to the national and local press that always seemed to hit the target with devastating precision. He admired P G Wodehouse, and had a special way with words, writing short stories and three novels. Shortly after taking up his consultant post in Great Yarmouth, his first wife, Monica, was killed in a car accident, leaving George to care for two young children, Tom and Hannah. Inevitably it took a long time for him to recover from this tragedy, but later he found happiness again as he married Elaine, who helped care for his children. George Heyse-Moore developed prostatic cancer which was unresponsive to treatment, and retired early because of this. He died on 1 May 2007.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000601
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First Title value, for Searching Bohn, Gordon Leonard (1913 - 2007)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Marshall Barr
Publication Date 2009-03-13
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Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000600-E000699
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372785372785
Occupation General surgeon
Details Gordon Bohn was a consultant general surgeon at the Royal Berkshire and Battle hospitals, Reading. He was born in Forest Gate, London, on 17 February 1913, the son of Leonard Gayton Bohn, a ship-owner, and Sophia Bohn (née Cattermole). From the County High School, Ilford, he went to the medical school of St Bartholomew’s Hospital. After two and a half years in junior posts at Bart’s he had already passed the final fellowship examination. Sir James Paterson Ross told him “now is the time to learn some real surgery”. Leonard Joyce, the brilliant honorary surgeon at the Royal Berkshire Hospital, was a Bart’s man who had close links with the surgical professorial unit, so in 1937 Bohn went to the Royal Berkshire in Reading. He dropped a rank to become house surgeon to Joyce. In 1938 he became a registrar and married Freda Stace. When Joyce died in 1939, Aitken Walker became honorary surgeon and Bohn an honoary assistant surgeon. He joined Aitken Walker in private surgical practice and as co-owner of Dunedin Nursing Home, which would later become a large private hospital in a national chain. At the Royal Berkshire Hospital he was promoted to honorary surgeon in 1942, but was soon called to military service. He went with the RAMC to West Africa and Burma, reaching the rank of major. With the coming of the NHS, he was appointed consultant surgeon, becoming active on many local and regional committees. From 1969 he served for a year as head of the British paediatric team in South Vietnam. On his return he plunged into the planning for a new acute services unit being built at Battle Hospital. When it opened as the Abbey Block in 1972, Bohn, who had served at the Royal Berkshire on every surgically related committee from records to sterilising services, totally changed his allegiance: he brought his own surgical unit to the Abbey Block and worked tirelessly to improve the clinical services at Battle until his retirement on his 65th birthday in 1978. Even then, he stayed on to do two years of research. Bohn was a skilled general surgeon, with particular interests in peptic ulcer surgery and paediatrics, equally at home in dealing with a massive haematemesis or pyloric stenosis in a neonate. His mastery of clinical diagnosis was a source of wonder to a succession of surgical registrars. If a junior called with a problem, he would come in at once. In theatre he was calm, quiet and unflappable, much-loved by the nursing staff. Outside work, he was a skilled church organist and choirmaster. He continued as organist in the Royal Berkshire Hospital chapel for many years after retirement. He was completely unostentatious, although his great joy after music was an immaculate vintage Rolls Royce. A short time before both their deaths, Gordon Bohn married Maisie Cook, the ex-superintendent of theatres at the Royal Berks and Battle, who had been his companion for many years. He died on 10 December 2007 in Reading, leaving three daughters (Frances, Elizabeth and Griselda), six grandchildren and seven great-grandchildren. The second daughter, Elizabeth Calder, became an associate specialist in the Derriford Hospital dialysis and transplant unit. Her son, Alistair Calder, is a consultant radiologist at Great Ormond Street Hospital.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000602
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First Title value, for Searching Mortensen, Peter James (1926 - 2007)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by John Blandy
Publication Date 2009-03-13 2012-03-13
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Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000600-E000699
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372786372786
Occupation Urological surgeon Urologist
Details Jim Mortensen was a urological surgeon in Melbourne, Australia. He was born in Yarrawonga, Victoria, Australia, on 15 May 1926, the only child of Henry Newman Mortensen and Lorna née Bray, who were both general practitioners. His father went to England in the early 1930s to specialise in surgery and passed the FRCS Edinburgh, returning in 1937 to Melbourne to found the urological unit at St Vincent's Hospital. He was also president of the Urological Society of Australia and New Zealand on three occasions and, in 1964, was the first Australian to be made an honorary member of British Association of Urological Surgeons (BAUS). His mother Lorna specialised in anaesthetics, was a Nuffield scholar at Oxford and subsequently returned to the Royal Melbourne Hospital as a consultant anaesthetist. Jim was educated by the Jesuits as a boarder at Xavier College, where he rowed in the first VIII and became a school prefect. He studied medicine at Melbourne University, residing at Newman College. After qualifying, he was a resident at St Vincent's Hospital, where he received permission to marry at the end of 1950. After three years as a resident he went to England, to work at St Peter's Chertsey, where he passed the FRCS. He returned to Melbourne as assistant urologist on his father's unit. In 1959 he won the Babcock travelling fellowship to Ann Arbor, Michigan, then led by Reed Nesbit, the doyen of transurethral resection. There he learned the new Bricker technique of ileal conduit urinary diversion. He returned to St Vincent's in 1966 to become head of the department, remaining in charge until he retired in 1988. Under his leadership St Vincent's became one of the leading urological units in the world, developing transplant surgery in the 1960s and installing the first extracorporeal lithotriptor in Australia. He was also consultant urologist to Williamstown and Box Hill hospitals from 1957 to 1973, worked at Swan Hill District Hospital from 1970 until he retired in 1994, and also worked in Indonesia and India, encouraging young surgeons from those countries to visit St Vincent's. In 1969 Jim followed his father by becoming president of the Urological Society of Australia and New Zealand. An excellent golfer and tennis player, Jim enjoyed reading, music and his garden. For a time he bred Murray Grey cattle, and he and Margot (née Collins) made several trips by Land Rover to central and Western Australia to see wild flowers in the outback. He and Margot had a long and happy marriage, with eight children and 18 grandchildren. By a sad irony he succumbed to cancer of the prostate which led to spinal cord compression from a metastasis. He died on 28 September 2007.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000603
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
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First Title value, for Searching Wilson, Peter ( - 2005)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2009-03-27 2013-02-01
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000600-E000699
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372787372787
Occupation General surgeon
Details Peter Wilson was a consultant surgeon at Whitybush Hospital, Haverford West. He studied medicine in Edinburgh, qualifying in 1956. After junior posts he moved to Cardiff, where he became senior registrar in general surgery at the United Cardiff hospitals. He was then appointed to his consultant position at Haverford West. He was elected FRCS ad eundem in 1979. The college was informed of his death in May 2005.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000604
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First Title value, for Searching Shanmugalingam, Thamotharampillai Nadarajah (1928 - 2007)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Sarah Gillam
Publication Date 2009-03-27 2014-06-19
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Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000600-E000699
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372788372788
Occupation Orthopaedic surgeon
Details Thamotharampillai Nadarajah Shanmugalingam was a consultant orthopaedic surgeon in Sri Lanka. He was born on 26 September 1928, in Point Pedro, Ceylon, the son of Thamotharampillai Nadarajah, a land owner and merchant, and Vettrivetpillai Muthuratnam, a housewife. He was educated at Hartley College, Point Pedro, and then Pembroke Academy, Colombo. He went on to study medicine at the University of Ceylon, qualifying in 1951 with a distinction in surgery. After junior posts he studied for the primary FRCS, winning the Hallett prize in the examination held in Ceylon in 1956. He then went to England to study surgery, passed the fellowship of the Edinburgh and English colleges in 1960, and then specialised in orthopaedics, passing the Liverpool masters degree in 1962. He then returned to Ceylon, becoming, in 1962, a consultant orthopaedic surgeon attached to the department of health services of the government of Ceylon. He also taught undergraduate and postgraduate medical students, and was an examiner for undergraduate examinations. He was initially based in the General Hospital, Galle, where he organised a new orthopaedic unit. From 1963 to 1965 he was an orthopaedic surgeon at the General Hospital, Badulla, where he again started an orthopaedic unit. From 1966 until his retirement in 1988 he was one of three orthopaedic surgeons at the General Hospital, Colombo. During his tenure there he dealt with many difficult, often neglected, orthopaedic problems, including TB of the spine, missed congenital dislocation of the hips, diseases of the shoulder and other major joints. He also treated all types of trauma, including closed and open fractures. He was an overseas fellow of the British Orthopaedic Association, and a member of the College of Surgeons of Sri Lanka and the Sri Lanka Medical Association. He married Padmajothy (Pala) in 1952 and they had two sons, Shrikharan, a consultant surgeon practising in Sri Lanka, and Easwaran, and a daughter, Sumathi. Thamotharampillai Nadarajah Shanmugalingam died on 7 December 2007, aged 79.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000605
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First Title value, for Searching Carter, Robert Brudenell (1828 - 1918)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2010-02-11
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000800-E000899
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373042373042
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born at Little Wittenham, Berkshire, on October 2nd, 1828, traced his descent from Thomas Carter, armiger, of Higham, Bedfordshire, who lived in the reign of Edward IV. When he had authenticated his descent to the satisfaction of the Heralds’ College, and established his right to armorial bearings, he became qualified in the Order of St John of Jerusalem to be promoted from a Knight of Grace to a Knight of Justice. A later ancestor, the Rev Nicolas Carter, preached before the Long Parliament. His grandfather, the Rev Henry Carter, was Rector of Lower Wittenham for fifty-seven years. The sister of his grandfather was Elizabeth Carter (*Dict. Nat. Biog.*), the Greek scholar who translated Epictetus, and was the friend of Johnson, Edmund Burke, and Horace Walpole. His father, Major Henry Carter, Royal Marines, and his wife were staying with the grandfather when he was born. He was christened Robert Brudenell, the name of his father’s neighbour and lifelong friend Robert, sixth Earl of Cardigan, the father of Lord Cardigan of the Light Brigade. Carter’s mother died soon after his birth, and he was brought up by Mrs Fearne. After serving an apprenticeship to a general practitioner, he entered the London Hospital at the age of 19, and qualified in 1851. He then acted as an assistant to a practitioner in Leytonstone, during which he made his first publication, *The Pathology and Treatment of Hysteria* (1853). In 1854 he moved to Putney and published a second book, on *The Influence of Education and Training in Preventing Diseases of the Nervous System*. One may smile at the subjects adopted by a young medical assistant, but his account of hysteria, which he based upon the teaching of Stephen Mackenzie, to whose memory he dedicated the book, shows remarkable literary talent together with much observation, apparently made during his apprenticeship in the country. The obituary in *The Times* noted this first evidence of his talent. With the Crimean War he volunteered and was appointed a staff surgeon in Turkey, where he came under the notice of W H Russell, correspondent of *The Times*; with this introduction he wrote letters to *The Times* from the front, which subsequently determined his future; also letters and contributions to the *Lancet*. He received both the English and Turkish War Medals. On his return he moved from Putney to Fulham, then to Nottingham for five years. There in 1859 he took part in founding the Nottingham Eye Infirmary, and at the same time began to direct special attention to ophthalmology. Once again, in 1862, he moved to Stroud to a partnership with George Samuel Gregory, and had a share in establishing the Gloucestershire Eye Institution. Meanwhile he published *The Physiological Influence of Certain Methods of Teaching, The Artificial Production of Stupidity, The Principle of Early Medical Education, The Marvellous*. In spite of all this, he said: “Nevertheless I was able to go up from my country practice for the FRCS examination without either rest for study or coaching – and to pass.” He married at the age of 40, and looking around for better opportunities he applied to *The Times*. Concerning this crisis he referred to himself in a letter to the *Lancet* as “a conspicuously unsuccessful general practitioner in the country.” His Crimean letters were looked up, and as a result he was put upon the editorial staff. This determined him to settle in London. In the following year, 1869, he was appointed Surgeon to the Royal Eye Hospital, Southwark, and held the post until 1877. He became Ophthalmic Surgeon to St George’s Hospital in 1870 in succession to Henry Power (qv), and was appointed Consulting Surgeon in 1893. His literary abilities gave distinction to his writing on ophthalmology, and his *Students’ Manual* was the most widely used of the day. Another of his appointments was that of Ophthalmic Surgeon to the National Hospital for Paralysis and Epilepsy. In addition to *The Times* Carter joined the staff of the *Lancet*, and at that time James Wakley (qv) was desirous of initiating the ‘Hospital Sunday’. Carter wrote on this and also in *The Times*. On the start of the Mansion House Fund Carter was elected a member of the first Council. He was Hunterian Professor at the College in 1876-1877; Orator in 1874; Lettsomian Lecturer in 1884, and President in 1886, of the Medical Society of London. From 1887-1900 he was the representative of the Apothecaries’ Society on the General Medical Council, and was instrumental in introducing a modification in the procedure of that body, whereby before deciding upon an offence an interval of probation might be afforded by postponing a definite decision until the following session. But it was his position on the staff of *The Times* which enabled him to place the views of the medical profession on subjects of the day before the general public, and the lucidity of his style always enabled him to do so with effect. Said the *Lancet*: “Eloquent, incisive, more than occasionally bitter, he was also a generous writer, and few members of the Medical Profession have wielded greater power with the pen, while he possessed the equally valuable gift of being able to speak in public with the same command of language and high level of literary style. Carter’s ‘leaders’ belong to an older day; he used the Latin ‘period’ and a rotund full-dress method; but any appearance of pomposity thus given to his writings was purely superficial; no writer of to-day is more fastidious than was Carter in his choice of language, or more resolutely averse from the use of ‘stale metaphors, trite tags and obvious morals’.” Although his handwriting was good, he was the first on *The Times* to use a typewriter. Carter sat on the first London County Council, and obtained a special committee to report upon the Care of the Insane. The Council did not accept the recommendations, and he was not re-elected. At the age of 87 he volunteered to write again for the *Lancet* whilst the staff were depleted by the War. He died at his house on Clapham Common on October 23rd, 1918, in his ninety-first year, and was buried at West Norwood Cemetery. There is a portrait of him by ‘Stuff’ in the *Vanity Fair Album* wearing two pairs of spectacles, a habit also noted by ‘Jehu Junior’ in the biographical note, *Vanity Fair*, April 9th, 1892. There is also a portrait in the *Leicester Provincial Medical Journal*, 1890. Carter was twice married: (i) to Helen Ann Beauchamp, daughter of John Becher, and (ii) to Rachel Elizabeth, daughter of Stephen Hallpike, and widow of Walter Browne. He had four sons. Publications:– *On the Pathology and Treatment of Hysteria*, London, 1853. *On the Influence of Education and Training in Preventing Diseases of the Nervous System*, London, 1855. “Hints on the Diagnosis of Eye Disease,” Dublin, 1865; reprinted from *Dublin Quart. Jour. Med. Sci.*, 1865. “The Training of the Mind for the Study of Medicine” (Address at St George’s Hospital), London, 1873. *A Practical Treatise on Diseases of the Eye*, with plates, Philadelphia, 1875. Translations of Schaller on “Ocular Defects”, 1869, and of Zänder on “The Ophthalmoscope”, 1864. Contributions to Holmes’s *System of Surgery*, and to Quain’s *Dictionary of Medicine*. *Ophthalmic Surgery* (with W A Frost), 1887; 2nd ed. 1888. *On Defects of Vision remediable by Optical Appliances* (Hunterian Lecture RCS), London, 1877. *Eyesight Good and Bad.* A treatise on the exercise and preservation of vision, London, 1880; translated into German, Berlin, 1884. Cantor Lectures on “Colour Blindness” delivered at the Society of Arts, London, 1881. “Eyesight in Civilization,” London, 1884; reprinted from *The Times*, 1884. “The Modern Operations for Cataract” (Lettsomian Lectures, Medical Society of London), London, 1884. “Eyesight in Schools” (Lecture before the Medical Officers of Schools), London, 1885; reprinted from *Med. Times and Gaz.*, 1885. “On Retrobulbar Incision of the Optic Nerve in Cases of Swollen Disc.” – *Brain*, 1887, x, 199. “On the Management of Severe Injuries to the Eye.” – *Clin. Jour.*, 1894, iv, 317. *Sight and Hearing in Childhood* (with A H Cheatle), London, 1903. *Doctors and their Work; or Medicine, Quackery and Disease*, London, 1903. “Medical Ophthalmology” in Allbutt’s *System of Medicine*, vi.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000859
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First Title value, for Searching Glenn, James Francis (1927 - 2009)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by John Blandy
Publication Date 2009-10-21
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000700-E000799
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372900372900
Occupation Urologist
Details Jim Glenn was an internationally celebrated urologist, a former chief of urology at Duke University and dean of Emory University school of medicine. He was born in Lexington, Kentucky, and educated at the University High School there, from which he went to Rochester University and afterwards to Duke University to study medicine, qualifying in 1952. He specialised in urology and completed a surgical residency at Peter Bent Brigham Hospital in Boston and trained in urology at Duke University. He served briefly on the academic staff at Yale and at Wake Forest University, before returning to Duke in 1963 as a professor and later a chief of urology. He went on to Emory University in Atlanta as dean of the medical school and was later president of Mount Sinai Medical Center in New York City. He then returned to Kentucky, where he was director of the Markey Cancer Center at the University of Kentucky from 1989 to 1993 and chief of staff at the University of Kentucky Hospital from 1993 to 1996. He was acting chairman of surgery at the University of Kentucky from 1996 to 1998. He was a born organiser, becoming president of the American Association of Genitourinary Surgeons in 1993. A past president of the Société Internationale d’Urologie, in 2007 he received that organisation’s highest honour. He was a former governor of the American College of Surgeons and a former president of the American Urological Association. He received the Association’s lifetime achievement award in 1994. He was a frequent visitor to England, and always went out of his way to welcome visitors from the UK. He was made an honorary fellow of our College in 1987. He was awarded the St Paul’s medal of the British Association of Urological Surgeons in 1996. He died on 10 June 2009, leaving his widow Gay née Elste Darsie, two sons (Cambridge F Glenn II and James M Glenn), two daughters (Sarah Brooke Glenn and Nancy Carrick Glenn) and seven grandchildren.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000717
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First Title value, for Searching Gray, Thomas Cecil (1913 - 2008)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2009-10-21
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Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000700-E000799
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372901372901
Occupation Anaesthetist
Details Thomas Cecil Gray was the first professor of anaesthesia at Liverpool University and undoubtedly one of the great British pioneers of modern anaesthesia. He was born in Liverpool on 11 March 1913, the son of Thomas Gray, a local publican, and Ethelreda Unwin. A devout Roman Catholic, Cecil was educated at the Convent of the Sacre Coeur in Bath and then Ampleforth. It had been his intention to enter the Monastery, but being caught smoking in the bushes within two months of becoming a novice monk made it clear to all except Cecil that this was not his vocation. To the dismay of his mother, he returned to Liverpool to study medicine. Graduating with distinction in anatomy in 1937, he became a trainee in general practice in the city, before purchasing a practice in Wallasey with the help of his father. He rapidly became fascinated by anaesthesia, which at that time was mostly practiced on a part-time basis by general practitioners. Under the tutelage of Robert Minnitt, he rapidly collected the 1,000 cases required for the diploma in anaesthesia, which he obtained in 1941, and shortly afterwards became a full-time anaesthetist to several hospitals in the city of Liverpool. His academic career began in 1942 with his appointment as demonstrator in anaesthesia in the University of Liverpool. Largely as the result of Minnitt’s mission to ensure proper teaching and training in anaesthesia, Cecil was appointed reader and head when the academic department was established in 1947. In 1959, he was awarded a personal chair in anaesthesia, which he held until his retirement from active practice in 1976. He was the first postgraduate dean of the faculty of medicine in Liverpool University from 1966 to 1970 and then dean of the faculty of medicine until 1976. Very early in his full-time career in anaesthesia Cecil Gray and John Halton set out to investigate the feasibility of inducing neuromuscular blockade by means of a derivative of wourali, the crude South American arrow poison which was eventually purified as d-tubocurarine chloride by Burroughs Wellcome. Within a year they had collected 1,200 surgical cases in which the drug had been used safely. Their first public dissertation ‘A milestone in anaesthesia – d-tubocurarine’ was delivered to the section of anaesthesia of the Royal Society of Medicine on 1 March 1946. Much often sceptical discussion about the safety of this potential poison took place at subsequent meetings of the section. In April 1948, Cecil Gray attempted to allay this scepticism with his detailed report on 8,500 patients anaesthetised by a group of enthusiastic colleagues across the Liverpool region who had willingly adopted the technique of hypnosis, muscle relaxation and controlled ventilation without serious morbidity or mortality, thereby confirming Cecil’s firm belief that one of the most potentially dangerous of drugs was one of the least toxic when used carefully. With modification this technique has survived nationally and internationally to the present day. He must also be remembered for his major contribution to education and standards of training in anaesthesia. Aware of the changes which would follow the establishment of the National Health Service in 1948, he saw the need for a high standard of formal training and postgraduate education in anaesthesia and an examination structure similar to the Royal Colleges of Physicians and Surgeons. On becoming reader and head of the new department of anaesthesia in the University of Liverpool in 1947, he persuaded the dean of the Liverpool Medical School and the board of clinical studies to support the establishment of a postgraduate course. The first enrolments took place in October 1948. Within a year the hospital authorities within the area accepted the proposals for a full-time course and empowered the academic department to recruit junior staff for the hospitals throughout the region. Most of the surgeons tacitly agreed to the presence of trainees in the operating theatres. All trainees would attend lectures until 11am each morning, including Saturday, and all were required to have had some anaesthetic experience prior to enrolment. This course was the first in the United Kingdom, and by 1952 had expanded its horizons, drawing students from the Indian sub-continent, Singapore, Malaysia, Hong Kong, South Africa and Australia. Cecil’s profound interest in medical education and his organisational skills led to his election as a foundation member of the board of the faculty of anaesthetists of the Royal College of Surgeons in 1948. He served as vice-dean from 1952 to 1954 and as dean from 1964 to 1967. He also played an active role in the foundation of the World Federation of Societies of Anaesthesiology and the European Congress of Anaesthesiology. He was invited as either a visiting professor or lecturer to many university departments and anaesthetic societies overseas. In 1948 Cecil and Edward Faulkner Hill were appointed as joint editors of The British Journal of Anaesthesia and oversaw a gradual improvement in coverage, quality and circulation. He retired from this role in 1964. Cecil was invited to deliver numerous eponymous lectures. His many honours included the Clover medal, the James Young Simpson gold medal, the Henry Hill Hickman medal of the Royal Society of Medicine, the George James Guthrie medal, the gold medal of the Royal College of Surgeons, the John Snow silver medal and the Magill gold medal of the Association of Anaesthetists. In 1982 he was awarded a gold medal by Pope John Paul II in recognition of the role which he had played in the organisation of the Pope’s visit to Liverpool. In 1961 he became the first anaesthetist to be awarded the Sims Commonwealth travelling professorship of the Royal Colleges of Physicians, Surgeons and Obstetricians and Gynaecologists. This provided the opportunity for Cecil and his wife to travel to Australia, where they spent three months engaged in educational activities and valuable interchange of ideas. He wrote numerous papers and co-edited several editions of *General anaesthesia* (London, Butterworths), which became the ‘Liverpool Bible’ of anaesthesia. His last publication in 2003 was the biography of Richard Formby, the founder of the Liverpool Medical School at the Royal Institution, which subsequently moved to the Infirmary in 1844. Cecil was president of the section of anaesthesia of the Royal Society of Medicine, the Association of Anaesthetists, the Liverpool Society of Anaesthetists and the Liverpool Medical Institution. He was active in the British Medical Association and the Medical Defence Union, of which he was vice-president from 1954 to 1961 and again from 1983 to 1988, and served as honorary treasurer from 1976 to 1981. From 1966 to 1983 he was a much respected member of the Liverpool Bench. Cecil, a man of great charm, talent and boundless energy was a gifted teacher, inspiring students, trainees and colleagues with devotion and enthusiasm. His advice, either deliberately sought or volunteered, was always sound. No problem was insurmountable. Consequently he had a profound influence on the lives of many whose progress he followed assiduously and with considerable pride. A good friend and mentor of many, friendships made endured. Cecil was married twice. In 1937 he married Marjorie (Margot) Kathleen née Hely, a talented amateur actress and artist, by whom he had two children, David (who is a consultant anaesthetist in Liverpool) and Beverley. Marjorie (Margot) died in 1978. In 1979 he married Pamela Mary (Corning). Their son James Frederick was born in 1981. Cecil, a true native of Liverpool, was a generous, entertaining host with a wicked sense of humour. He had a passion for amateur dramatics, as both a player and producer of the Irish Players for over 20 years. An accomplished pianist and opera lover, he was a member of the Royal Philharmonic Society, the Liverpool Welsh Choral Society and the Verdi Society. The night before he died he gave a faultless rendition of Debussy’s ‘Clair de lune’. He died on 5 January 2008.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000718
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Juby, Herbert Bernard (1925 - 2004)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Neil Weir
Publication Date 2009-10-21
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000700-E000799
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372902372902
Occupation ENT surgeon
Details Bernard Juby was a consultant ENT surgeon at the Ipswich Hospital. He was born in Stowmarket, Suffolk, on 9 April 1925, the only son of L H Juby, a draper, and Ethel née Quinton. He was educated at Culford School. His early wish was to be a farmer, but was encouraged by his mother to read medicine. He attended St Bartholomew's Medical School from 1942 to 1947. As a house surgeon to F C W Capps he had an early experience of ENT surgery. After a surgical officer post at the Luton and Dunstable Hospital, where he gained from the influence of Donald Barlow, Juby became an ENT registrar at the Norfolk and Norwich Hospital and was later a senior registrar at the Royal National Throat, Nose and Ear Hospital. His training was interrupted by National Service in the RAMC in Berlin. There he rapidly learnt to cope with all surgical emergencies, including salvaging the one remaining upper limb of a brigadier involved in a road traffic accident. Bernard Juby’s interest in ENT must have been maintained during this period as in 1953 he published a paper entitled ‘The incidence of middle ear disease in serving soldiers’ in the *Journal of the RAMC* (*J R Army Med Corps*, 1953 Apr;99(3):115-7). In early 1958 he was appointed as a consultant ENT surgeon at the Dryburn Hospital and the following year to the Durham and Shotley Bridge General Hospital. He longed, though, to return to his native Suffolk and, in 1962, was appointed to the West Suffolk General Hospital in Bury St Edmunds. Three years later, on the retirement of Kenneth Mackenzie, he moved over to Ipswich Hospital, where he continued his ENT practice until his retirement in 1987. Juby’s was a general ENT practice, but he will be remembered for his review paper published in 1969 in the *Journal of Laryngology and Otology* entitled ‘The treatment of pharyngeal pouch’ (*J Laryngol Otol* 1969 Nov;83(11):1067-71)and for his chapters on the same subject in Rob & Smith's *Operative surgery* (London, Butterworth’s, 1986). Bernard Juby represented East Anglia on the council of the British Association of Otolaryngologists and served on council of the section of otology of the Royal Society of Medicine. He was medical officer to Ipswich Town football club. Outside medicine, he built a dry stone wall whilst in Yorkshire. He was a keen golfer and a long-standing member of the Ipswich Philatelic Society. A charming man with a dapper demeanour, Bernard Juby married Elizabeth Birdwood (a Bart’s nurse) in 1949. They had two sons (one a solicitor) and two daughters (one a nurse who died of cancer of the spine at the age of 46 and the other an occupational therapist). Bernard Juby died peacefully in St Elizabeth Hospice, Ipswich, of hepatocellular carcinoma on 22 May 2004.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000719
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Atkins, James Ramsey (1802 - 1869)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2009-11-04
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000700-E000799
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372903372903
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born in HM Dockyard at Devonport, where his father held an important office. Educated at a neighbouring Grammar School he was articled at the age of 17 to Dr James Bell, the surgeon to the dockyard. After four years’ apprenticeship, during which time there were opportunities of seeing casualties and attending operations, he came to London and became a student at Carpue’s School and was a pupil of Sir George Tuthill, working at the Middlesex Hospital under Dr Southey and Sir Charles Bell, and later attending obstetric lectures at Guy’s Hospital. He passed for the Navy Board and was appointed Assistant Surgeon to the Royal Naval Hospital at Plymouth, where he came under the notice of Sir Stephen Love Hammick. He retired from the Navy after uncomfortable experiences in HM Sloop Pelorus and became medical superintendent of a private lunatic asylum – Holly House, Hoxton – which he conducted successfully for twelve years before he removed to Stoke House, Newington Green, where, as a licensed proprietor, he received a limited number of mild cases. He died on Dec 24th, 1869, at 29 Lordship Road, Stoke Newington. Publications: Atkins published a work on Mania in 1849 and another on Organic and Animal Life in 1859. He also contributed to the Reports of the Commissioners of Lunacy in 1847 – “Observations on the Medical Treatment of Insanity”, and was the author of several statistical papers relative to insanity.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000720
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Atkins, William (1817 - 1875)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Taffinder, Nicholas James (1965 - 2006)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Sir Barry Jackson
Publication Date 2008-01-24 2018-05-10
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000400-E000499
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372621372621
Occupation Colorectal surgeon
Details Nick Taffinder was widely considered to be one of the brightest and most able young consultants when, at the age of 39, he was diagnosed with metastatic malignancy, from which he died two years later. He showed academic talent as a schoolboy, being a scholar at King's College, Taunton, from where he won an exhibition to Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge. His clinical training was undertaken at St Thomas' Hospital, London, where he won the Sutton Sams prize in obstetrics and gynaecology. Graduating in 1990, his first surgical house officer post was on the rectal firm and he retained this early interest in coloproctology throughout his career. Subsequent SHO jobs were in Southampton and Portsmouth, where he spent six months on the intensive care unit, before being appointed a specialist registrar to the training rotation of St Mary's Hospital, London. After a year on the academic surgical unit, he was seconded to Paris for a year, where he worked as a registrar in a world-renowned laparoscopic centre with Gérard Georges Champault and where he learned advanced laparoscopic skills. Returning to St Mary's he became a research fellow to Ara Darzi (later Lord Darzi), where he studied the quantification of manual dexterity in laparoscopic surgery, the effects of sleep deprivation on surgical dexterity and the impact of virtual reality on surgical training. His thesis on this subject was accepted for the MS degree and the work gained him two international prizes, one in the UK and one in the USA, as well as many publications. In the year 2000 he was awarded two travelling scholarships, both to European centres, to further enhance his laparoscopic skills and the following year he completed his colorectal training with an appointment as RSO at St Mark's and Northwick Park hospitals. He was then appointed consultant colorectal surgeon to William Harvey Hospital, Ashford, where he practiced and taught advanced laparoscopic surgery until his untimely death. Nick Taffinder contributed widely to surgery outside of clinical activity. He continued to publish regularly after his consultant appointment, his last paper appearing in print after his death. At the College, he taught on the care of the critically ill surgical patient course (CCRISP) and also trained the faculty for this course, a reflection of his own early experience in intensive care medicine. He was a faculty member on numerous laparoscopic courses, both basic and advanced. He was a council member of the section of surgery of the Royal Society of Medicine and of the Association of Endoscopic Surgeons of Great Britain and Ireland. He was in constant demand as a lecturer at home and abroad. In private life he was equally talented. His first love was his family, Jane his wife and four children, Jacques, Louis, Max and Jessica. But outside of family life he was an enthusiastic pilot, a good games player (tennis and squash), a snowboarder, paraglider and oarsman, to say nothing of his ability as a conjurer. He was universally popular. In early 2004 he was diagnosed with malignant fibrohistiocytoma of the pelvis with lung metastases. He underwent multiple operations, radiotherapy and chemotherapy. Throughout, he showed truly remarkable fortitude and wrote a moving personal view in the *British Medical Journal* (2005, 331, 463) of how he diagnosed a rectal cancer in a male nurse of his own age at four o'clock in the morning while he himself was an in-patient awaiting his third operation. Despite returning to work between operations and treatments his disease pursued a relentless course and deprived the profession of a much loved and greatly talented colleague before his full potential could be realised.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000437
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Forrest, Duncan Mouat (1922 - 2004)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2008-01-24
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000400-E000499
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372622372622
Occupation Paediatric surgeon
Details Duncan Forrest was a distinguished member of that first generation of paediatric surgeons, most of whom trained at Great Ormond Street in the early years of the National Health Service, who pioneered specialist surgical units in children’s and in general hospitals across the country. Later in life he was to put the same enthusiasm and dedication into caring for the victims of torture. He was born on 19 December 1922 in New Zealand into a medical family. His father died when he was six and he was educated at a boarding school. He went on to Otago University, where he qualified in 1946 and then travelled to England to specialise in surgery, working his passage as a ship’s doctor. After junior posts at St George’s and gaining his fellowship in 1951, he went to Great Ormond Street as an able young surgeon whose faultless good manners barely concealed his passionate determination to develop and apply his surgical skills for the benefit of children with major congenital disorders. Unlike most of his contemporaries he was inspired not so much by the work of Denis Browne and his team, but by George Macnab, who was treating hydrocephalus by diversionary shunts, a treatment pioneered in the USA by Holter, which had so far been little employed by British neurosurgeons. Duncan soon developed considerable expertise in these procedures and when, following the completion of his training, he was appointed to the Westminster Children’s Hospital, to Sydenham Children’s Hospital and to Queen Mary’s Carshalton, although taking on a wide range of surgery with an interest in cleft palate in particular, he made hydrocephalus and spina bifida his main concern. It takes an element of idealism to pursue the management of some of these most severely disabled children, but this was a quality which Duncan possessed, fortunately modified by a shrewdness to perceive what was and what was not possible. He created at Carshalton a centre with an international reputation and contributed largely to the literature. He went on to distinguish himself as president of the British Association of Paediatric Surgeons and of the section of paediatrics of the Royal Society of Medicine. From early in life he had been deeply involved in human rights issues and had campaigned with Amnesty International against torture. He became a senior medical examiner for the Medical Foundation for the Care of Victims of Torture, examining many survivors, and travelling all over the world seeking evidence of the cruel treatment of Sikhs in Punjab, Kurds in Iraq, and prisoners in Israel, Egypt and Guantanamo Bay. He wrote extensively on these and allied topics, culminating in the textbook *Guidelines for the examination of survivors of torture* (Medical Foundation for the Care of Victims of Torture, 1995 and 2000). He was predeceased by his wife June, a former actress who became a nurse. He died on 2 December 2004, leaving a daughter (Alison) and three sons (Ian, William and Paul).
Resource Identifier RCS: E000438
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Chesterfield-Evans, Hugh Harvey (1922 - 2005)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Arthur Chesterfield-Evans
Publication Date 2009-05-15 2021-05-20
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000600-E000699
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372797372797
Occupation General surgeon
Details As a consultant surgeon working in rural Australia, Harvey Chesterfield-Evans was a founder member and past president of the Provincial Surgeons Association. He was born in North Korea on 19 January 1922, the son of an Australian who worked for an American mining company and a New Zealander. He was educated at a missionary school, which left him with a marked distrust of organised religion. Before returning to Australia as a 16 year old, he had already assisted in operations and helped administer anaesthetics for the only doctor in the district. He had also witnessed the destructive Japanese occupation of North Korea, travelled widely, and absorbed Eastern cultures and philosophies, which encouraged a broader diagnostic approach in his later career. Harvey attended Sydney Grammar School and Sydney University faculty of medicine, graduating with second class honours. He married his wife Enid and became a general practitioner in Brisbane. With his wife and first child, Arthur, Harvey went to the UK to study for the fellowship, which he passed in 1955. They then returned to Australia, now with Deirdre and Nigel, to be followed two years later by Jan. Harvey established himself in a surgical practice in Wollongong. In 1968 he returned to the UK study neurosurgery in Edinburgh under John Gillingham, which greatly benefitted his patients in Wollongong, the nearest neurosurgeon then being in Sydney. Harvey dealt with a wide variety of surgical problems. The Port Kembla steelworks and the local mines were a constant source of accident and injury, in addition to the usual car accidents and elective surgery. As one of four ‘honoraries’ he was on call for 48 hours non-stop, every fourth weekend. The honorary system allowed specialists to admit private patients to hospital provided that pensioners or those who could not afford it were treated free of charge. This paternalistic system before Medicare ensured that no one who needed emergency surgery would go untreated. He believed in this system and treated everyone equally. Perhaps because of his upbringing in Korea, Harvey was always practical and inventive in his approach to surgical problems. As the senior surgeon in Wollongong for some years, his patients left hospital within four days, while other surgeons’ patients stayed in for ten. Together with a physiotherapist friend, Peter Swan, he developed a post-operative system for hand injuries which is now in widespread use. A strong believer that ‘prevention is better than cure’, he refused to operate on overweight patients because of the inherent risks and would tell them to “stop smoking and come back when you’ve lost three stone”. It did not help his popularity with some, but many complied, and it did help his success rate. He was an active member of the South East Medical Association, a local affiliate of the Australian Medical Association, but it was into the Provincial Surgeons Association (PSA) that he put his heart and soul, as one of its founders. In the 1950s, with the influx of post-war immigration and later the ‘ten pound’ immigrants, the need increased for experienced surgeons in the country regions of Australia. As with today, city-trained Australian doctors were reluctant to ‘go bush’, whilst surgeons who had trained in the UK and were emigrating to Australia found it impossible to obtain a position in a city. These surgeons were not products of the Royal Australasian College and had no affiliations or associations in Australia. Working in country towns, often far away from the capital, they were isolated. They faced everything from elective surgery to acute trauma, head injuries requiring decompression, caesarian section and multiple fractures. It was to meet this need that the PSA was formed. It quickly became not merely a fraternity, but a forum for brainstorming. At its meetings surgeons discussed their successes, their failures and their ideas. They invented new instruments and brought them to meetings to be discussed and fine-tuned. They telephoned each other when faced with a perplexing problem or shared a textbook over the phone. Lateral thinking was encouraged and indeed vital to their work. At the time of its inception the PSA was the only forum, medical or political, for rural surgeons. Today, the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons is specifically training surgeons for work in rural areas. As its founder and past president Harvey was involved in every aspect of the PSA, worked tirelessly to extend its membership, organised and hosted meetings, maintained its records and wrote its history – *A mantle of care: a history of the first twenty five years of the provincial surgeons of Australia* (Mangerton, NSW: Provincial Surgeons’ Association of Australia, c.1991). He was very proud of his work on the road trauma committee of the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons, which worked for some years to get seatbelts made mandatory. This was successful and the State of Victoria, home of RACS, was the first jurisdiction in the world to make wearing seatbelts mandatory. He spoke about the complete change in the pattern of road trauma injuries: instead of cases coming in with terrible head injuries, facial injuries from going through the windscreen and major chest injuries from the steering wheel hitting the chest, they were more likely to have abdominal organ ruptures, which were at least repairable with the hope of a normal life in the medium term. He was then part of RACS’ campaign for random breath testing to discourage drink driving. This campaign was also successful and caused another significant drop in Australia's road toll, which had been the highest in the world. Harvey was a generous contributor to his local area: he taught doctors and nurses, taught first aid to St John’s ambulance officers for 25 years (recognised by being made a serving brother of St John of Jerusalem). He was a charter member of West Wollongong Rotary, and was awarded its highest honour, a Paul Harris fellowship in 1989. He was a practical handyman, and as a founder member of the Illawarra Alpine Club, helped to build their lodge and organised the team that built the Rutherford scout hut at Tudor House. Meanwhile he raised four children and read voraciously – always fact rather than fiction, constantly educating himself. He resigned from his practice in 1984 with the re-introduction of Medicare. Having experienced the British NHS when training for the FRCS, he was disgusted that Australia could envisage an inferior system. He feared bureaucratic interference and, whilst espousing capitalism, practised socialism in terms of his attitude to people. In the two years before his death Harvey would have liked voluntary euthanasia, but did not have the strength: his demise was protracted by a system that, as he said, “has no mercy”. His mind was active until close to the end. After Sunday dinner with his family, he announced that he would not leave his bed again, had a last beer with a few friends, before losing consciousness under the care of the palliative care team and died on 15 September 2005 in Wollongong.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000614
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Horton, Robert Lister (1889 - 1955)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2009-06-11
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000600-E000699
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372798372798
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born in 1889 son of Dr Thomas Horton of Torquay, he was educated at Mill Hill where he was awarded an entrance scholarship and at University College where he was Bucknill scholar. After a house surgeon’s appointment at University College Hospital and obtaining the Fellowship he joined the RAMC in 1914 for the duration of the war, becoming a surgical specialist in France and being mentioned in dispatches. In 1919 he became surgical registrar at University College Hospital and surgical tutor to dental students, obtaining a gold medal in the MS examination in 1920. He then entered a general practice in Weymouth as surgical partner, being attached to the Weymouth and District Hospital, the Dorset County, the Bridport and the Herrison Mental Hospitals. In 1946 he retired to Bournemouth but continued to work at Bridport until 1954. He was chairman of the West Dorset division of the BMA in 1934-36 and was an examiner for the General Nursing Council. In 1938 he was appointed JP for County Dorset. He was a kindly, high principled man of great energy; a good anatomist and a skilled operator. He married Elizabeth Mackay McDonald RRC in 1917 by whom he had a son and a daughter Jean, FFARCS.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000615
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
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First Title value, for Searching Baxter, James Sinclair Rennick (1935 - 2009)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by N Alan Green
Publication Date 2009-06-23 2014-04-03
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000600-E000699
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372799372799
Occupation Otorhinolaryngolologist
Details James Sinclair Rennick Baxter was first appointed as a consultant in otorhinolaryngology at King's Lynn, Norfolk, in 1969, but spent a very productive period of his clinical years in Canterbury, Kent, from 1971 until 1997. He was born in Canada on 6 September 1935. His father, James Sinclair Baxter, was a well-known anatomist and expert embryologist. His mother, Mona Earls, was a nurse. 'Rennie' went to school at Clifton College, Bristol, and spent his pre-clinical years at Emmanuel College, Cambridge. Proceeding to Charing Cross Hospital on a Thomas Henry Huxley exhibition, he qualified in 1960. House appointments at Putney Hospital and Charing Cross were followed by a rotating senior house officer appointment in Norwich, where he had the advantage of experience in general and plastic surgery. A further post in Bristol determined his future career in ENT. In Canterbury he instigated the audiology department and witnessed its growth. Rennie was an extremely amiable and outgoing colleague who had many musical interests. He sang in several choirs, including the Canterbury Choral Society, played the trumpet and was interested in organ building. Always a DIY enthusiast, he was a fine craftsman in carpentry, plumbing and electrical work. These led to the restoration of several old houses. A few months before his retirement, he had a major stroke that rendered many of his interests difficult to pursue. He read widely and hoped that physiotherapy would improve his disability so that he could pursue his other passions. Rennie remained a member of the council of the Sue Ryder Foundation from 1995. He married Patricia Noël Dunning on 5 March 1960. She pursued many interests of her own and was co-founder of Hope-Romania, a children's home and bakery project in north west Romania. Patty encouraged Rennie through his dark moments and nursed him over these years until he died in septic shock on 9 February 2009. Rennie was a practising Anglican and, after his stroke, worshipped regularly at Canterbury Cathedral on Sunday in his buggy. His funeral service was held in the undercroft of the cathedral. James Sinclair Rennick Baxter leaves his wife of 49 years, three children and six grandchildren. His daughter, Sara, is an anaesthetist. Timothy, who also qualified as a doctor, now works in the Department of Health. Adam was a political analyst and lobbyist for the trade union Equity, and is currently with Offcom.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000616
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
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First Title value, for Searching Bolam, Reginald Frederick (1924 - 2007)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by John Blandy
Publication Date 2009-06-23
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000600-E000699
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372800372800
Occupation General surgeon
Details Reg Bolam was a locum consultant general surgeon. He was born on 3 January 1924 in south London, the first of the three children of Harriet and Frederick Bolam. He grew up in Streatham and won a scholarship to Bec College, was in the top stream, joined several public libraries and borrowed several books from each, every week. Childhood holidays were spent with relatives who had a farm in Lincolnshire, to which his father took the family on his motorbike and sidecar, Reg riding pillion. At the outbreak of war the school was evacuated to Lewes, and Reg was billeted on a farm. There he learned to help with the harvesting, and to shoot rabbits for the pot. He played the piano, sang in the local church choir and played piccolo in the Boys’ Brigade, with whom he went to the Albert Hall. He became a good middle distance runner, and for a time was in the same club as Roger Bannister. He injured his right elbow as a boy, when falling through a trapdoor. This resulted in an ankylosed elbow, but the experience influenced him to become a surgeon, an ambition not encouraged by his headmaster, who thought him too shy and short-sighted. At 16 he had to leave school to help with the family finances, and worked in the Civil Service until he was old enough to volunteer for the Royal Navy. He served for the last three years of the war in Malta as a petty officer radar mechanic. It was there that he met his first wife, Joyce, saving all his tots of rum for the wedding. On demobilisation, he was awarded a grant to complete his education and entered University College Hospital to study medicine, qualifying in 1952. After junior posts he passed the FRCS in 1962 and was appointed consultant surgeon to the Kent and Sussex Hospital, Tunbridge Wells. There he was a really general surgeon. In the sixties he worked as a consultant surgeon in the Middle East, where he made good use of the opportunities to indulge his interest in archaeology. On returning to England he did a series of locum consultant posts, until he retired in his sixties. The long hours worked by junior doctors, and the repeated necessity of moving house every six months or so, put great strain on his marriage to Joyce, who had given him his first son, Roderick. Like so many wartime marriages, it failed. He then married Marie, who gave him his second son, Andrew. They moved to Tonbridge, and fostered a little girl called Anita. Sadly, Marie developed a terminal illness and died in 1994. He then married Susan, by whom he already had a daughter, Polly. One of his many interests was opera: he was a friend of the English National Opera and a keen member of the Tonbridge Music Club. In 2002, he suffered a fall on an escalator coming back from the British Museum, from which he never fully recovered. He died on 28 July 2007 in hospital in Tunbridge Wells, as a result of extensive cerebrovascular disease and epilepsy.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000617
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Cook, John Holford (1943 - 2006)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2009-06-23
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000600-E000699
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372801372801
Occupation Anaesthetist Ophthalmologist
Details John Holford Cook began his career as an ophthalmologist, but later re-trained as an anaesthetist. Born on 16 May 1943, in the middle of the Second World War, he did not meet his father until he was three years old. He studied medicine at the Royal Free Hospital, London, and, following qualification, trained as an ophthalmologist. He later switched to anaesthesia, and ultimately became director of the intensive care unit at Eastbourne. There ‘Cookie’, as he was always known, was an enthusiastic teacher and trainer. He was clinical tutor for his hospital and a college tutor for the Royal College of Anaesthetists. He had many interests outside medicine. He had long been an enthusiastic radio ‘ham’ and built his own equipment and branched out into designing circuits for the radio control of the model boats that were built by his step-father. He mastered machine code for his computers and, when his children took up music, he decided to learn the trombone, which he played in the British Legion Band and the Eastbourne Concert Orchestra, using his computer to make new arrangements for his band. He developed adenocarcinoma of the lung and died on 27 December 2006, leaving his wife Lesley, four children and a grandson.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000618
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Davidson, Colin Mackenzie (1928 - 2008)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Sir Barry Jackson
Publication Date 2009-06-23
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000600-E000699
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372802372802
Occupation General surgeon
Details Colin Davidson was a general surgeon at Frenchay and Cossham Memorial hospitals. He was born on 11 January 1928 in Glasgow, the son of Norman Davidson, a one-time senior surgeon of the Victoria Infirmary and Mary Scott née Mackenzie, a teacher of classics. He schooled at the Glasgow Academy and Rugby School, before attending Glasgow University for his medical studies. After qualification, he worked with Sir Charles Illingworth at the Western Infirmary and W A Mackie at the Royal Infirmary, Glasgow, before being awarded a McCunn scholarship to visit the Lahey Clinic in Burlington, Massachusetts, where he spent 18 months. On his return to England, he obtained a senior registrar appointment at Bristol Royal Infirmary, working with Robert Milnes Walker. During the tenure of this post he was seconded as senior lecturer to the University of Khartoum, Sudan, where he gained vast operative experience in a wide range of pathology. In 1968 he was appointed consultant general surgeon at Frenchay Hospital, Bristol, where he worked for the rest of his career. He took an active part in local surgical society life, becoming president of the Cossham Medical Society, the South West Surgical Club and the Colston Research Society, Bristol. He was also sometime president of the Moynihan Chirurgical Club. His outside interests included fishing, shooting, golf and photography. He married Robina McMurtrie Macgregor in 1953 and had four daughters and nine grandchildren. He died after a short illness on 30 January 2008.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000619
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Prichard, Augustin (1818 - 1898)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2012-10-10 2014-07-03
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E002000-E002999/E002900-E002999
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/375181375181
Occupation General surgeon Ophthalmic surgeon
Details Born at 39 College Green, Bristol, on July 16th, 1818, the second son of James Cowles Prichard, FRS, a physician, famous as the author of *The Natural History of Man*. His mother was the daughter of Dr Estlin, Unitarian Minister and Co-Pastor at Lewin's Mead Chapel, a scholar and friend of Coleridge, Southey, and Robert Hall. Prichard's eldest brother and his two younger brothers were distinguished Fellows of their College at Oxford. The Prichards were a family of Welsh origin, having a marked facial type, of strong individuality and intellectual distinction. Augustin Prichard went to a private school, then to Bristol College, where Francis Newman, brother of Cardinal Newman, was an Assistant Master. In 1834 he was apprenticed at the age of 16 to his uncle, John Bishop Estlin, founder of the Dispensary for the Cure of Complaints of the Eyes. He served his apprenticeship at the Bristol Infirmary and Medical School under John Harrison, entering St Bartholomew's Hospital in 1839, where he was Dresser to Sir William Lawrence, studied medicine under Latham and Burrows, and midwifery under Rigby. He caught scarlet fever when attending the Fever Hospital under Dr Tweedie, and might have succumbed had he not been nursed by his fellow-student, Dr Goodeve. He went to Berlin and studied under Johannes Müller, Schönlein, and Dieffenbach, who was operating for strabismus by a new method. He took the MD Berlin with a Thesis on "Iritis". Next in Vienna he attended the pathological teaching of Rokitansky and of Jaeger, the best operator for cataract. Prichard learnt the value of, and always used, Baer's triangular knife, and never employed a speculum or caught hold of the conjunctiva with forceps; nor did he adopt the assistance of an anaesthetic. In the spring of 1842 he attended in Paris the lectures of Cruveilhier, Civiale, and Claude Bernard, and in the autumn he began to practise in the old Elizabethan house, Red Lodge, which his father had vacated on being appointed a Commissioner in Lunacy. Prichard joined his uncle, Estlin, as Surgeon to the Eye Dispensary, and gained a wide reputation for his operative skill on the eye. In 1843 he was appointed Lecturer on Anatomy at the Bristol Medical School and continued until 1854; in 1850, after a severe contest, he was elected Surgeon to the Royal Infirmary. He lectured on Surgery from 1849-1864. In 1857 he read to the Bristol Branch of the British Medical Association a paper on the membrana pupillaris and the persistence of a small central portion as the cause of anterior central capsular cataract. In 1853 he delivered the address in surgery at the Annual Meeting of the Association on the extirpation of a blind and diseased eye in the interest of the remaining eye, and he did much in this country to establish the procedure. In his Address at the Bristol Meeting in 1863 he recommended the insertion of potassa fusa into a carbuncle, followed by pressure. An expert lithotomist, he popularized the use of the wrist and ankle buckle and straps for holding the patient in the lithotomy position. He developed the custom of publishing a collection of cases: *Ten Years' Operative Surgery in the Provinces - being the Record of 875 Operations performed between* 1850 *and* 1860 - Parts I and II (12mo, London, 1862, 1863). For lithotomy he recommended Allarton's median operation. His cataract operations were done with great dexterity in the fashion mentioned, but in a haphazard way, regardless of surroundings, as described by anecdotes in his *Some Incidents in General Practice*. Prichard acquired a large private practice in Bristol and Clifton, and in 1853 removed to 4 Chesterfield Place, Clifton, where he continued in active practice after retiring from the Infirmary under the rule, after twenty years' service. He was a man of great natural gifts, improved by untiring industry, tall and handsome, with a firm expression. He was well read in the classics, a fine draughtsman, devoted to sketching, and a pioneer in photography. He was President of the Surgical Section at the Worcester Jubilee Meeting in 1882, and for the last time was present at the Annual Meeting in 1894 and able to entertain friends although affected by increasing deafness. He was taken ill before Christmas, 1897, underwent three operations with some temporary relief, but died on January 5th, 1898. He married in 1845 Mary Sibellah, daughter of the Rev Thomas Ley, Vicar of Rame, Cornwall, by whom he had four sons and three daughters. Mrs Prichard died in 1892, aged 73. Two of their sons were in the medical profession, one being Surgeon to the Bristol Infirmary. A portrait accompanied his biography in the *British Medical Journal* (1898, I, 250), and the "In Memoriam", *Bristol Medico-Chirurgical Journal* (1898, xvi, 1), in addition to reminiscences by contemporaries, included a bibliography of 71 entries. He wrote two books of permanent interest, the first being *Some Incidents in General Practice*, with portrait and autograph (Bristol, 1898), the second being a series of reminiscences with the title, *A Few Medical and Surgical Reminiscences* (12mo, Bristol, 1896). **This is an amended version of the original obituary which was printed in volume 1 of Plarr’s Lives of the Fellows. Please contact the library if you would like more information lives@rcseng.ac.uk**
Resource Identifier RCS: E002998
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Dawson-Edwards, Paul (1919 - 2008)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by N Alan Green
Publication Date 2009-06-23
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000600-E000699
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372804372804
Occupation Urologist
Details Paul Dawson-Edwards was appointed consultant surgeon to the United Birmingham Hospitals in 1957 and became a well-regarded urologist based at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital and a teacher at the University of Birmingham. His interest in urology was fired by Hugh Donovan, and he formed an excellent unit with his colleague Guy Baines and then, up to his own retirement in 1984, with Michael Hughes. Paul was born in Coventry on 28 October 1919. Albert John Edwards, his father, was an engineer who worked for many years with the ‘Alvis’ racing team and his mother, Gladys Dawson, was a milliner. He was educated at Centaur Road Junior School and then, from 1930 to 1938, at King Henry VIII School, Coventry. There he excelled at most sports and became the school’s leading sportsman. For his medical studies he entered Birmingham University, where he had a good academic record and obtained a clinical prize in surgery. Again he excelled in a wide variety of sports. As vice-captain of the University Rugby XV he played mainly as a wing-three quarter and was a valued member of the athletics team. He also played for both Coventry and Moseley first XV teams. After qualification and house appointments, Paul married (Elizabeth) Jean Button, a nurse, on 14 April 1944. For two years he was a resident surgical registrar at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital, where he gained good general experience. At this time he became a flight-lieutenant in the Royal Air Force Volunteer Reserve, based at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital and later at RAF Northallerton, where he specialised in trauma and orthopaedics. He went abroad from 1946 to 1947 as a squadron leader (orthopaedic specialist) in charge of Surgical Unit No 10 General Hospital, Karachi. Returning to the UK, surgery was obviously his ambition and Paul Dawson-Edwards commenced higher training as a demonstrator of anatomy at Birmingham University for a year before returning to the Queen Elizabeth Hospital as a surgical registrar. This was followed by a four year rotating appointment at senior registrar level in Birmingham. On becoming a consultant in 1957, he obtained study leave for a year in Boston, Massachusetts at the Peter Bent Brigham Hospital, where he was an assistant in surgery and carried out research at Harvard University. An interest in renal transplantation was fired by Francis D (Franny) Moore. He did animal research work with Joseph Murray, a pioneer in this field, who was awarded a Nobel prize in 1990. Paul was fortunate to be under the wing of Hartwell Harrison, who became a lifelong friend. Returning to Birmingham, the kidney unit was set up as an offshoot of the urology unit. By 1962 a minicoil artificial kidney had been developed by Denys Blainey and permission was given to start renal transplantation at the end of 1967. Paul carried out his first renal transplant in May 1968. He was associated with dialysis and transplantation for many years, before returning to full time ‘general’ urological practice. He amassed a large series of patients with benign and malignant retroperitoneal fibrosis, publishing on this subject, as well as the minicoil artificial kidney and the clinical aspects of renal transplantation. Although he was a fine surgical technician and natural teacher, he was regarded by some as a hard task-master. Certainly he did not suffer fools gladly, but was more than happy when all the ‘team’ pulled together. Paul and his wife, Jean, hosted regular ‘firm’ parties: at one of these he told students that they were more staid than those of his generation. The Dawson-Edwardses woke the next morning to find the entrance to their drive had been bricked up. He was a member of British Association of Urological Surgeons (BAUS) and served on its council (from 1970 to 1974) and on that of the Urological Club of Great Britain and Ireland. He was a founder member of the Midlands Urological Group who met each year at different centres to learn what other urologists were doing. Sport and cars played an important part of his life, although he was not as adept at maintaining the latter as was his father. After giving up rugby, he took up squash and tennis seriously and also enjoyed sailing and mountain walking. All these activities were continued until his knees needed replacing. His love of mountain walking inspired him to set up the Vacancy Club: once a year a group of registrars persuaded their consultant bosses to climb a peak in Snowdonia, perhaps in the hope of creating a vacancy! Paul was a formidable mixed hockey player and always enjoyed the traditional Boxing Day match against the General Hospital. Retiring in 1984, Paul and Jean were able to spend more time at their cottage in north Wales. He was a keen photographer and took up painting late in life, no doubt tutored by his friend and colleague, Arnold Gourevitch. Predeceased by his wife, Jean, he lived in his old home until his health forced him to enter a nursing home. But he enjoyed hearing from his friends and chatting with them at length over the phone: his intellect and memory remained sound. Paul Dawson-Edwards died of heart failure on 6 December 2008 and is survived by his three children (Elizabeth ‘Liz’, a retired company director, John, a civil engineer, and Sarah, a consultant radiologist in Norwich) and by his four grandchildren.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000621
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Mizbah, Geoffrey (1931 - 2005)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Nohl-Oser, Herman Christian (1916 - 2008)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Raymond Hurt
Publication Date 2009-06-23
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000600-E000699
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372806372806
Occupation General surgeon
Details Herman Christian Nohl-Oser was a consultant surgeon at Harefield Hospital, where he specialised in pulmonary and oesophageal surgery, with a special interest in paediatric surgery. He was born Herman Christian Nohl (in the 1960s he add the ‘Oser’) in Jena, Germany, in April 1916, the son of Herman Nohl. His father originally intended to study medicine, but, finding anatomy not to his liking, switched to philosophy and in 1920 was appointed to a chair in Göttingen. In 1937 he was dismissed by the Nazis and sent to work in a factory. After the war, he was reinstated as professor and dean of the philosophy faculty. Despite his first name, Chris was considered one quarter Jewish, and in 1934 he went to England with Kurt Hahn, the founder of Gordonstoun School, who had a very great influence on his life and subsequently became a lifelong mentor and personal friend. Chris was a ‘late developer’, but despite this became head boy at Gordonstoun, where he had a classical education. In 1936 he entered St Peter’s Hall (now College) in Oxford to matriculate and then study medicine. He was interned on the Isle of Man for one year, won a prize for the best medical and surgical dissertation, and qualified at Oxford as a doctor in 1944. Because of his German background, he found it difficult to obtain junior hospital posts but nevertheless gained considerable general surgical experience and obtained his FRCS in 1951. Despite this higher qualification, his application for a senior registrar post at the Middlesex Hospital was rejected in favour of a much junior English doctor and, with the encouragement of Sir Thomas Holmes Sellors, whom he had first met in Oxford during the war, he decided to train in thoracic surgery. Junior posts at the London Chest and Brompton hospitals allowed him to study the lymphatic drainage of the lung and the value of scalene node biopsy in the assessment of bronchial carcinoma. He continued this research following his consultant appointment to Harefield Hospital in 1960 and this led to an Oxford DM the same year and to a Hunterian professorship in 1971. When he was appointed to Harefield Hospital open-heart surgery was just beginning and this he undertook with enthusiasm until the appointment of a specialist cardiac surgeon to the hospital in 1967. Thereafter he confined his work to pulmonary and oesophageal surgery, with a special interest in paediatric surgery. He published his research extensively, both in English and European journals, and lectured widely in England and also in Germany. His magnum opus was a textbook on surgery of the lung, published in Germany, printed in English and later translated into German and Spanish, but unfortunately the book was little known in the UK. His obvious erudition and ability were not always recognised by his colleagues. He was a founder member of Pete’s Club, a travelling surgical club which pioneered the informal discussion of mistakes and errors of judgement – the only rule of the club was that no member was allowed to report a case which reflected credit on himself. He was devoted to his surgical career and to his wife Inge, whom he married in the same week that he qualified and who later suffered increasing disability from multiple sclerosis which presented soon after the birth of their child. His only son died tragically after an accident in 1987 and his wife died in 1991. In 1975 Chris had two coronary vein graft operations which were only partially successful in relieving his angina; thereafter a regime of graduated exercise completely relieved his symptoms. He died from a myocardial infarction on 13 June 2008.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000623
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Jennett, William Bryan (1926 - 2008)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by T T King
Publication Date 2009-06-23
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000600-E000699
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372807372807
Occupation Neurosurgeon
Details Bryan Jennett, professor of neurosurgery at the University of Glasgow, devised, with colleagues, two key diagnostic tools – the Glasgow Coma Scale, used throughout the world to assess consciousness, and the Glasgow Outcome Scale, used for patients with head injury. His work led to the defining of persistent vegetative state and the establishment of criteria for brain death. He was born on 1 March 1926 in Twickenham, Middlesex, the son of Robert William Jennett, a civil servant, and Jessie née Loudon. His mother’s family had farmed in Lanarkshire, Scotland, though there was a tradition of medicine. His father, an Irish Protestant, worked in the offices of the Royal Irish Constabulary in Dublin, but after his marriage was transferred to the British Civil Service in London, an option offered after the Troubles of 1916 and the establishment of the Irish Free State. At the start of the Second World War, Jennett was evacuated to rural Scotland, and then to Southport, where he attended George V School. He went on to study medicine at Liverpool, qualifying at the top of his year, in 1949, having been president of the British Medical Students’ Association. During his period in Liverpool, he was influenced towards neurosurgery by the lectures of Lord Cohen of Birkenhead on neurology. A neurosurgical house appointment at the Radcliffe Infirmary, Oxford, with Sir Hugh Cairns and J B Pennybacker was followed by National Service at the Military Hospital, Wheatley, which confirmed him in a career in neurosurgery. At the suggestion of Walpole Lewin, who was responsible for the care of head injuries at the Radcliffe Infirmary, Jennett undertook a study of the incidence and features of epilepsy after blunt head injuries, work which later resulted in his important monograph on the subject (William Heinemann Books, 1962). From Wheatley and Oxford, he went to Cardiff and, in 1957, was appointed senior lecturer at Manchester, a post he held until 1962. During his period he was a Rockefeller travelling fellow at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), with W Eugene Stern. There he carried out experimental work on the effects of brain compression on tentorial herniation and the pupil, from which came two papers. The experience in UCLA introduced him to experimental work and research, and he considered staying on in the States, but in 1962 he was recruited to a combined academic and NHS appointment at Killearn Hospital in the West of Scotland Neurological Unit, Glasgow. There he was influenced by Sir Charles Illingworth, who had established a tradition of clinical surgical research. He published, in 1964, the first of five editions of *An introduction to neurosurgery* (London, Heinemann Medical), a small textbook in which he showed his skill in exposition. In 1968, he was given a chair of neurosurgery and, two years later, moved to the new Institute of Neurological Sciences at the Southern General Hospital, which he made into an outstanding centre of neurosurgical research and education in the UK. British neurosurgery had not been orientated much towards research, especially the laboratory sort for which Jennett had become enthusiastic after his experience in Los Angeles. In his new appointment, he showed a gift for co-operation and for enlisting accomplished scientists from other disciplines. With Murray Harper, he set up a Medical Research Council group on cerebral circulation, which studied the effects of carotid ligation, raised intracranial pressure, the sympathetic nervous system and the effect of anaesthetic agents on cerebral blood flow in primates and humans. He continued his studies of post traumatic epilepsy and greatly advanced the study of the pathology and outcome of head injuries. Together with Graham Teasdale, his successor in the chair, he devised a method of quantifying a head injury by using simple clinical observations. This became the Glasgow Coma Scale, an essential instrument in grading the severity of a brain injury. He and Michael Bond, who later became professor of psychological medicine at Glasgow, also devised a simple categorisation of the outcome of head injuries. Jennett’s studies with Hume Adams on the pathology of fatal head injuries drew attention to neuropathological evidence that these brains showed ischaemic damage, presumably occurring in the period immediately following the injury and, therefore, due, at least in some cases, to avoidable factors. This offered the opportunity of improving the outcome by attending to ventilation and avoiding hypotension in the early period after injury and controlling, if possible, raised intracranial pressure. Another co-operative effort, this time with Fred Plum of Cornell University, New York, led to the separation of a group of patients following severe head injury in which lack of awareness and of willed movement was associated with cycles of waking and sleeping, which they termed ‘vegetative state’, usually, though not always, permanent. Jennett’s special and characteristic contribution to the management of head injuries was to look at the evidence or collect new evidence, rather than rely on general impressions and past assumptions. If this sometimes seemed slightly cold-blooded, it was very successful in his hands and greatly changed the position of this important if somewhat depressing branch of trauma surgery. Management now depended on rational knowledge, rather than hopeful expectancy. In 1981 he published, with Graham Teasdale, *Management of head injuries* (Philadelphia, F A Davis Co. 1981), which incorporated these studies. Comparison of this book with earlier publications on the same subject shows how greatly the study of head injuries had advanced in a decade. Jennett’s later work inclined towards more general ethical, legal or administrative problems. When the development of heart transplantation created a need for organs to be taken from patients whose heart and circulation were still functioning, there developed a desire to redefine the criteria for death. Artificial ventilation of patients with very severe brain injuries produced a group of patients who appeared eventually to have no cerebral activity or cerebral circulation, if they were investigated, and who would die if ventilation were to be stopped, since they could not breathe spontaneously. Their circulation, however, continued as the heart remained beating. Such patients, at the endpoint of an overwhelming injury, provided an indispensable source of material for heart transplants. After much discussion, criteria were laid down which pronounced them to be, in effect, dead and therefore available as organ donors. This translation of a prognosis into a ‘state’ was not accepted by everyone in the profession and there was some unease and agitation about it. Jennett successfully brought his skill in laying out an argument, and in public debate, to bear on the problem. A somewhat similar difficulty arose over patients in the permanent ‘vegetative state’ he had described. They could live for many years in this state, fed by tube but showing no signs of higher mental functions, often to the distress of their relatives. The question arose whether their lives could be terminated by ceasing tube feeding. In the end, a judgement of the House of Lords decided it could. Jennett wrote an extensive study *The vegetative state: medical facts, ethical and legal dilemmas* (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2002), which examined all aspect of this difficult problem. The increasing expense of highly complex medical treatment, its effectiveness and its value for money was the subject of his Rock Carling fellowship and monograph (*High technology medicine: benefits and burdens*, London, The Nuffield Provincial Hospitals Trust, 1984) in which, in his usual clear and even-handed way, he examined all aspects of the subject, admitting its failings, which he tended to attribute to misapplication by doctors, but generally defending it. His intellectual and organisational gifts made him sought-after as an administrator. He was on many committees in the UK, especially those concerned with head injuries, epilepsy, criteria of brain death and allocation of resources. He was dean of the faculty of medicine of Glasgow University from 1981 to 1986, visiting professor to universities in the USA, Canada, Australia and New Zealand, a corresponding member of the American Neurological Association and the American Association of Neurological Surgeons, an honorary member of the Society of Neurological Surgeons in America and the stroke council of the American Heart Association. He was president of the International Society for Technology Assessment in Health Care. Jennett was a small man with great energy. He had a sharp tongue, pen and wit, and could be harshly dismissive of people of whom he had little opinion, which sometimes produced enemies. He married Sheila Pope, a fellow medical student at Liverpool, who became a respiratory physiologist at Glasgow. There were three sons of the marriage and one daughter. He and his wife pursued outdoor activities and he was interested in flora and fauna. He was a keen sailor, owned a series of yachts and did much cruising around the coast of Scotland and England. Though tone deaf, he was a sponsor of musical activities. His daughter became a professional cellist. Jennett died on 26 January 2008, aged 81, from the effects of multiple myeloma.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000624
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Osborne, David Robert (1943 - 2008)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2009-07-10 2015-09-14
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000600-E000699
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372808372808
Occupation General surgeon Urological surgeon Urologist
Details David Osborne was a consultant surgeon who established the first urological department in Basildon. He was born in Weston-super-Mare on 12 December 1943, the son of Alan John Osborne, a leading aircraftman, and his wife, Tilly Fleming née Straiton. He was educated at Hazelcroft Primary School and then Weston-super-Mare Grammar School. He studied medicine at the Royal Free Hospital Medical School from 1963 to 1968, winning the Ruth Bowden anatomy prize and the George Quist surgery prize, and playing in the first XV rugby team. After qualifying, he was a house officer at Hampstead General Hospital and then at St Andrew's Hospital. In 1970 he was a casualty officer at the Royal Free. He then held senior house officer posts at Luton and Dunstable, and at Frenchay and Southmeads hospitals, Bristol. He was then a registrar in general surgery at Cheltenham and Gloucester. From 1976 to 1983 he was a lecturer in surgery at the Royal Free Hospital. In 1983 he was appointed as a consultant general surgeon with an interest in urology to Basildon and Thurrock hospitals. In 1985 he became a consultant surgeon to South Ockendon Hospital and in 1991 became head of the department of urology with full-time responsibility for urology services. He established a specialist urology department with three surgeons, each with a subspecialty interest. He was interested in reading, gardening, walking and painting, and loved fine wines. In 1969 he married Brenda Mary Cornforth, a general practitioner and a fellow student at the Royal Free, who was the daughter of Sir J W Cornforth FRS KBE. They had one son, Andrew John (a GP in New Zealand), and a daughter, Catherine Jane (a marketing manager). He died on 17 October 2008. His love of surgery was so great that he continued seeing patients and operating until three weeks before he died.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000625
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Chicken, Rupert Cecil (1850 - 1925)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-04-20 2013-08-07
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001100-E001199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373342373342
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born in Nottingham about the year 1850, and was educated at Guy's Hospital, where he was House Surgeon and Resident Obstetric Assistant. He was afterwards Registrar at the Evelina Hospital for Children, and acted as Prosector at the Royal College of Surgeons. He then entered into partnership in Nottingham with Isaac Watchorn, who, dying in the early eighties, left Chicken in charge of a large and varied general practice. Much surgery came his way, and he was able to keep up his operative skill, for he was essentially a surgeon. He was elected to the staff of the Nottingham General Hospital in October, 1891. For a period of from ten to fifteen years he became a very active surgeon both at the hospital and in private. He was elected President of the Nottingham Medico-Chirurgical Society in 1892, and contributed a long succession of papers which demonstrate the wide range of his surgical interests. He was appointed Consulting Surgeon to the hospital in December, 1907, on his retirement from the staff and from practice on account of long-continued ill health. After leaving Nottingham he acted as a ship's surgeon for a year or more in the hope of regaining health. During the War (1914-1918) he was Surgeon to Whipps Cross War Hospital at Leytonstone. He resided also at Hemel Hempstead, Chichester, and lastly at Sunnybank, Sandgate, Kent. His death occurred on October 3rd, 1925, and he was survived by his wife, one son, and two daughters. Chicken was a sound and careful surgeon, well abreast of the knowledge and technique of his day. He did not adopt new methods without careful consideration and conviction of their utility. If he pinned his faith to sponges after the era of swabs had come in, he could claim with justice that his wounds remained free from sepsis. If he refused to treat his fractures along lines which at the time were new and revolutionary, he lived to see the day when some leading surgeons are advocating a return to older methods. He was a man of wide culture and reading, a collector of old oak and silver. He took much interest in local history and archaeology, as is witnessed by his published *Index to Deering's History of Nottingham* (1899), and by his booklet entitled, *Excavations at the Nottingham General Hospital during the Building of the New Wing* (1899). Publications: In addition to the works mentioned above, Chicken also wrote:- *The Treatment of Hernia: an address delivered to the Nottingham Medico-Chirurgical Society*, Nov 2nd, 1892, 8vo, Nottingham, 1892. This was his Presidential Address. "Treatment of Advanced Cancer." - *Quart. Med. Jour.*, 1894-5, iii, 46. "Enterotomy." - *Ibid*., 1895-6, iv, 248.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001159
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Childe, Charles Plumley (1858 - 1926)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-04-20
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001100-E001199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373343373343
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born in South Africa, the eldest son of the Rev G F Childe, MA Oxon., Professor of Mathematics at the South African College and Assistant Astronomer of the Royal Observatory, Cape Town. He received his education at the University of the Cape of Good Hope, where he graduated with honours in Arts, and obtained the Maynard Scholarship and University Exhibition in 1877. He then entered Magdalene College, Cambridge, of which he was a Scholar. He received his medical training at King's College, London, where he gained a Warneford Scholarship. He started in general practice at Southsea early in 1886, being later joined in partnership by his former friend, John Lister Wright. He soon devoted himself entirely to surgery, and after taking the Fellowship, was appointed Assistant Surgeon to the Royal Portsmouth Hospital, where he rapidly made a reputation as one of the leading surgeons in the South of England. He was greatly instrumental in raising the hospital to its modern standard of efficiency, and when in obedience to the age regulations he retired in 1923, he was appointed Senior Hon Consulting Surgeon and Chairman of the Committee of Management. In addition to his brilliant and laborious work at the hospital, he was Surgeon to the Hampshire and Isle of Wight School for the Blind, and had been Surgeon to the Home for Sick Children, Southsea, Anaesthetist to the Portsmouth and South Hants Eye and Ear Infirmary, and Senior Surgeon to the South Hants Medical and Surgical Home for Women. In 1912 his medical colleagues pressed him to take part in municipal affairs, and he became representative of the Mile End Ward on the Town Council. In 1919 he was made Chairman of the Health Committee, and as such was able to influence the Council in the direction of greatly improving the housing conditions in Portsmouth. He was a most painstaking investigator of all questions which came before his committee and a most incisive speaker, and there is no doubt that Portsmouth owes much to his labours. During the Great War (1914-1918) Childe was for some time in charge of the 5th Southern General Hospital, and held the rank of Lieutenant-Colonel in the RAMC (T). He was devoted to the interests of the British Medical Association, being President of the Southern Branch in 1912, and Chairman of the Portsmouth Division in 1914, having previously been Hon Secretary and Treasurer for three years and Clinical Secretary from 1910. At the Portsmouth Meeting in 1899 he was Secretary of the Section of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, and at the meeting there in 1923 he was elected President of the Association. The meeting, greatly owing to his efforts, was a success, and in July, 1925, he was elected a Vice-President. He was much interested in the prevention and cure of cancer, and strongly advocated early diagnosis and removal. Slight of build, Childe was none the less a man of unbounded energy, a keen follower of cricket and tennis matches, an ardent golfer, founder of the Childe Challenge Cup for medical players of the game; a charming companion. In all his work thoroughness was his characteristic. He died at Monte Carlo on Jan 30th, 1926, from influenza and pneumonia, and was buried at Highland Road Cemetery, Southsea, on Feb 10th, 1926. He practised at Cranleigh, Kent Road, Southsea. Publications: *The Control of a Scourge, or How Cancer is Curable,* 8vo, London, 1907. The book was an attempt to substitute sound knowledge and hope for ignorance and despair. *Operative Nursing and Technique: A Book for Nurses, Dressers, House Surgeons, etc.*, 12mo, 9 plates, London, 1909; 2nd ed, 1916; 3rd ed, 1920. "Operative Treatment of Intra-Oral Cancer." - *Brit. Med. Jour.*, 1909, i, 6. "Cancer, Public Authorities, and the Public." - *Ibid.*, 1914, i, 643. "The Area of Acute Abdominal Conflux, and the Incision of Incidence." - *Lancet*, 1907, i, 936. This is a notable paper. "Abdominal Panhysterectomy for Carcinoma of Cervix Uteri by Clamp and Cautery." - *Brit. Jour. Surg.*, 1914-15, ii, 119. Cancer leaflets, now (1926) often issued by Health authorities, doubtless originated with Childe, who caused the Portsmouth Health Department to issue the first educational leaflet on cancer.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001160
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Blake, Valentine Walshman (1818 - 1881)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2010-03-18
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000800-E000899
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373081373081
Occupation General surgeon
Details Educated at Guy’s Hospital. He was a Fellow of the Obstetrical Society and practised at Birmingham, where he was at one time Surgeon to the Industrial School; to the Midland Counties Lying-in Hospital and Dispensary for Diseases of Women and Children; the Saltley Reformatory; and the Midland Counties Idiot Asylum, Knowle District. At the time of his death he was Consulting Surgeon to the Lying-in Charity and Industrial School. He had at one time also been Lecturer on Midwifery and the Diseases of Women and Children at Sydenham College. He practised latterly at 6 Old Square, Birmingham, and Five Lands, Moseley. He died at Moseley on November 24th, 1881. His photograph is in the Fellows’ Album.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000898
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Bartlet, Alexander Henry (1800 - 1887)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Bartlett, William (1808 - 1873)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Barton, Alfred Bowyer (1825 - 1905)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Barton, George Kingston (1815 - 1890)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Barton, Samuel (1790 - 1871)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Barwell, Richard (1827 - 1916)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2009-11-25
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000700-E000799
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372967372967
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born at Norwich of an old Norfolk family; entered St Thomas’s Hospital and was dresser to Joseph Henry Green in 1847, and later House Surgeon. During the cholera epidemic of July to September, 1849, he superintended the admission of cholera patients, and subsequently recorded his experiences. “Beyond all doubt,” he stated quite erroneously, “cholera spreads by an epidemic or atmospheric quality, and contagion has little or nothing to do with it. Hence there is nothing about the spread of cholera through pump water infected by sewage.” He acted as Demonstrator of Anatomy in the Medical School until 1855 when he was appointed Assistant Surgeon to Charing Cross Hospital. Among his seniors Hancock was the most distinguished. He lectured on comparative anatomy from 1856-1866, and on anatomy from 1866-1874, when he was appointed Lecturer on Surgery. In 1872 he became Surgeon to the hospital, and retired in 1888. His chief attention was devoted to orthopaedic surgery, on which he gained additional experience as Surgeon to the Homes for Crippled Boys and Girls. For the treatment of club-foot he advocated instrumental methods, and opposed the excessive adoption of tenotomy by the so-called subcutaneous surgery then prevailing. Scoliosis was at the time excessively common among girls and young women, and he elaborated a mass of devices, hardly needed at all now that girls prevent themselves from becoming the subjects of lateral curvature. Barwell wrote about antiseptic surgery, and whilst expressing appreciation of Lister’s methods, appears not to have adhered to the strictest Listerian precautions, at a time when there was no alternative way of performing an operation aseptically. Hence his recommendation to ligature the right common carotid and right subclavian artery on the distal side of an innominate aneurysm was not free from danger. Barwell used a strip of the aorta of an ox, first dried. This was a broad ligature, which when tightened round an artery did not divide the inner and middle coats. In that particular Barwell correctly anticipated the more careful aseptic procedure of Sir Charles Ballance. The danger of a septic ligation of the common carotid in its continuity was experienced when Barwell did this for a case of unilateral hypertrophy of the head and face; death followed from secondary haemorrhage. Later he described the case of a thoracic aneurysm, treated by electro-puncture, an even more hazardous way than distal ligation, of promoting intra-aneurysmal clot formation. Barwell was an enthusiastic skater at the Skating Club in the Toxophilite Gardens, Regent’s Park, and this, along with fishing, contributed to his hale old age. “No one would imagine that his trim figure and almost boyish step and carriage belonged to a man approaching 90 years of age”, said his obituary notice. His photograph is in the Fellows’ Album. After being for several years Senior Fellow of the College he died at Norwich on Dec 27th, 1916. He married Mary Diana Shuttleworth, of Preston, Lancashire; his son Harold Shuttleworth Barwell followed his father and took the FRCS diploma. Publications: *On Asiatic Cholera*, 1855. *On Aneurysm, Especially of the Thorax and Root of the Neck*, 1880; also in Ashhurst’s *Surgery*, iii. “Experience and Specimens of Ox Aorta Ligature.” – *Med.-Chir. Trans*., 1881, lxiv, 225. “Case of Unilateral Hypertrophy of the Head and Face.” [Specimen in Charing Cross Hospital Museum]. – *Pathol. Soc. Trans.*, 1881, xxxii, 282. *On the Cure of Club Foot without Cutting Tendons, and on Certain New Methods of Treating other Deformities*, 1863, 1865. *Lateral Curvature of the Spine*, 1868, 1877, 1895, 1905. The 4th and 5th editions contain a description of the scoliosis gauge for obtaining a precise measurement of all deviations. *Diseases of Joints*, 1861, 1881; also in Ashhurst’s *Surgery*, iv. An edition appeared in Philadelphia in 1861 and in New York in 1881. “Case of Thoracic Aneurysm Treated by Electro-puncture.” – *Lancet*, 1886, i, 1058.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000784
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Annis, David (1921 - 2003)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Aylett, Stanley Osborn (1911 - 2003)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-07-06 2012-07-19
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000000-E000099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372192372192
Occupation Bowel surgeon General surgeon
Details Stanley Aylett was a distinguished bowel surgeon. He was born in Islington, north London, on 8 July 1911, the youngest son of Arthur John Aylett, a building contractor of the firm John Aylett and son, founded by Stanley's grandfather in the 1850s. His mother was Hannah Josephine née Henman. He was educated at Highgate School and won an open scholarship to read medicine at King's College Hospital, where he obtained a BSc in physiology with first class honours and qualified with honours in medicine. He captained the United Hospitals Rugby Football XV. He completed junior posts at St Giles' and King's College Hospital, and spent a year as a ship's doctor with the Blue Funnel Line, before becoming a resident surgical officer at East Ham and Gordon Hospitals. In 1939, he was a surgical registrar at King's and a clinical assistant at St Peter's Hospital, and then a senior registrar at King's. He resigned his post at the outbreak of the second world war, in order to join the RAMC. He and his anaesthetist joined a surgical team in France, at first in a general hospital and later in a casualty clearing station at Lille. During the retreat, he set up operating posts at several locations until he reached de Panne, close to Dunkirk. When ordered to leave on 29 May, he and his companions commandeered a beached pleasure launch, dragged it into the sea, loaded it with their wounded and set off. The leaking vessel soon began to sink, but Aylett and some 20 men were rescued by a destroyer, HMS Havant. After arriving in England, he was sent to Dover to set up a small hospital in the Citadel in anticipation of a German invasion. In 1941, he sailed to the Middle East, to a posting at Alexandria, and then requested a move to forward surgical units, into the Western Desert and Tobruk just as the Axis forces were recapturing it Aylett's was the last surgical unit to escape. In January 1944, he was back in Cambridge, to train and command a field surgical unit, with which he sailed on D-day and accompanied the forces into Germany. In May 1945, he was sent into Sanbostel concentration camp, as a part of the first RAMC unit to reach the camp. His repeated requests for a hospital were turned down, until Lieutenant General Sir Brian Horrocks appeared and at once agreed. Aylett was awarded the French Croix d'honneur for his work in the camp. Later he was sent to Copenhagen to help in the evacuation of German wounded from their hospitals in Denmark. In August 1945 he was posted to Hanover as officer in charge of a surgical division of a general hospital with the acting rank of Lieutenant Colonel. In November 1945 he was demobilised. After the war, he was briefly a surgeon in the Emergency Medical Service in the King's College sector and then a surgical registrar at the Royal Marsden Hospital. At the start of the NHS, he was appointed consultant surgeon to the Gordon, Metropolitan and Potter's Bar Hospitals and consulting surgeon to the Manor House Trade Union Hospital in Hampstead. He developed a special interest in the treatment of inflammatory bowel disease, or colitis. At that time, the standard treatment was removal of the diseased bowel and a permanent stoma. Aylett pioneered a more conservative resection, allowing the retention of lower-most bowel, avoiding a stoma. The surgical establishment condemned his approach, with surgeons voicing concern that the patient would have intractable diarrhoea and would risk developing cancer in the retained bowel. However, Aylett soon showed good results and demonstrated that the risk of cancer could be overcome by careful follow-up. His approach, ileo-rectal enastomosis, became a standard treatment. Aylett gained many honours. He was Hunterian Professor at the College and in 1974 was made a member of the Académie de Chirurgie Française. He was President of the section for coloproctology at the Royal Society of Medicine, President of the Chelsea Clinical Society, and an honorary member of the American Society of Colon and Rectal Surgeons. He published extensively and wrote a textbook on colonic surgery, Surgery of the caecum and colon (Edinburgh and London, E & S Livingstone, 1954), as well as an autobiography based on his war diaries called Surgeon at war (Bognor Regis, New Horizon, c.1979). Among his hobbies were French history, gardening and cooking. In retirement, he enjoyed a full life, travelling to his beloved France and collecting antiques, porcelain and medical instruments. His first marriage to Winsome Clare in 1949 produced a son, Jonathan Stanley, a land agent in Devon, and two daughters, Deidre Clare, a nurse, who predeceased him, and Holly Josephine, a television producer and director. After his marriage was dissolved he married his outpatient sister, Mary Kathleen 'Kay' Godfrey. Stanley Aylett died on 7 January 2003.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000005
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Guthrie, Charles W Gardiner (1817 - 1859)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-07-07 2012-07-19
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000000-E000099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372193372193
Occupation General surgeon
Details The younger son of George James Guthrie (q.v.) by his first wife Margaret Paterson, daughter of the Lieutenant-Governor of Prince Edward's Island. He was educated at the Westminster Hospital, where he was elected Assistant Surgeon in 1843 on the resignation of his father in his favour. He became Surgeon and Lecturer on Surgery, and resigned on the ground of ill health shortly before his death. He was also Assistant Surgeon to the Westminster Ophthalmic Hospital, where his father was Surgeon, and succeeded him as Surgeon. He practised at 18 Pall Mall East, but retiring to Clifton died there of ascites due to a liver complaint in August, 1859. He never married, his elder brother left no children, and his sister died unmarried, so that the family of Guthrie ended. Charles Guthrie was a capable surgeon and a dextrous operator, both in the large operations of general surgery and the more delicate ones on the eye. He was kindly, generous, and very sociable; a cause of much anxiety to his father, who on more than one occasion had to pay for cattle shot on the Thames marshes under the impression that they were big game. He might have done well. PUBLICATIONS: - *On the Cure of Squinting by the Division of one of the Straight Muscles of the Eye*, 8vo, London, 2nd ed., 1840. *Report on the Result of the Operations for the Cure of Squinting performed at the Royal Westminster Ophthalmic Hospital between 18 April and 30 October,* 1840, 8vo, Westminster, 1840. *On Cataract and its Appropriate Treatment by the Operation Adapted for each Peculiar Case*, 8vo, plate, London, 1845.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000006
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Hames, George Henry ( - 1909)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-07-20 2012-03-28
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000000-E000099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372194372194
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born in Lincolnshire; entered St Bartholomew's Hospital in 1871 and distinguished himself there, gaining the Foster Prize in 1872, being Brackenbury Medical Scholar in 1875, and Kirkes' Scholar and Gold Medallist. He was House Surgeon to G W Callender (qv) in 1875 and House Physician to Reginald Southey in 1876-1877. Meanwhile in 1873-1874 he was Prosector at the Royal College of Surgeons and for some years Hon Secretary of the Abernethian Society. After leaving St Bartholomew's he studied at the Rotunda Hospital, Dublin, was Chloroformist at the Cheyne Hospital for Children, and Surgeon to the Western General Dispensary. He became a well-known practitioner in Mayfair at 29 Hertford Street, 125 Piccadilly, 113 Sloane Street, and died at 11 Park Lane on May 28th, 1909. Publication:- Hames was a contributor to the *Saturday Review*.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000007
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Keate, Robert (1777 - 1857)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-07-20 2012-07-19
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000000-E000099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372195372195
Occupation General surgeon
Details The fourth son of William Keate, D.D., rector of Laverton, Somerset; was born at Laverton on March 14th, 1777. John Keate, his elder brother (1773-1852), was the well-known and ferocious head master of Eton. Robert Keate was educated at Bath Grammar School until 1792, when he was apprenticed to his uncle, Thomas Keate, who in 1798 was elected Surgeon to St. George's Hospital in succession to Charles Hawkins, and was also appointed in the same year Surgeon General to the Army in succession to John Hunter. Robert Keate entered St. George's Hospital in 1793, and was made Hospital Mate in 1794 and Deputy Purveyor to the Forces on Sept. 26th, 1795. In 1798 he became a member of the Surgeons' Corporation and was appointed Staff Surgeon in the Army, from which he retired on half pay on March 25th, 1810, with the rank of Inspector-General of Hospitals. In 1800 he was appointed Assistant Surgeon to his uncle at St. George's Hospital, where he succeeded him as full Surgeon in 1813, and held the post until 1853, outstaying his powers. He was early introduced to practice among the royal family. In 1798 he attended the Princess Amelia at Worthing, who was suffering from a "white swelling of the knee". The Duke of Clarence, later King William IV, always showed great confidence in him, and made him Serjeant-Surgeon Extraordinary, and in 1841 Queen Victoria continued him as Serjeant-Surgeon. Keate used to say, "I have attended four sovereigns and have been badly paid for my services. One of them, now deceased, owed me nine thousand guineas"; but William IV always paid, though there is no doubt that Keate's frequent visits to Windsor led to some loss of practice. It is told of him that he one day received an urgent summons to Windsor to see Queen Adelaide, and he arrived there about the breakfast hour. The Queen, who was suffering from a pain in the knee, gave Keate a hint that the presence of the King might be dispensed with. Keate accordingly said to the King, "Will your Majesty be kind enough to leave the room?" "Keate," replied the King, "I'm damned if I go." Keate looked at the King for a moment and quietly said, "Then, your Majesty, I'm damned if I stay." When Keate got as far as the door the King called him back and said, "I believe you are right, and that you doctors can do anything; but had a Prime Minister or the Lord Chancellor ventured to do as you have done, the next day I should have addressed his successor." Keate contributed little to the literature of his profession, yet he rose to the highest eminence in it. He was anxious to avoid operations, yet he was a good operator, accurate in diagnosis, and a sound practitioner. Timothy Holmes (q.v.) remembered Keate as a very old man when he but seldom visited the hospital. He once saw him operate and his hand shook terribly. Holmes, too, recollected his saving the limb of a lad from amputation after the Assistant Surgeon had actually ordered the boy into the operating theatre. He was a terror to his house surgeons and dressers from the violence of his temper and language. He clung to office at the hospital - there was no rule as to retirement then - until he was bullied into giving up by certain of the governors, who persisted in inquiring at every meeting how often the senior surgeon had visited the hospital, and for how long, and who did the work there which he did not do. Keate was sensible of the value of the scientific advancement of surgery, and deserves our recollection as a good surgeon and an honest man. Sir Benjamin Brodie spoke highly of Keate, who was slightly his senior; and he joined with Brodie in the effort, which the latter began, to raise the surgical practice of the hospital to a higher level, by more careful and systematic visits to the patients, and by more constant and regular instruction of the students. He won the warm friendship of his great contemporary, who speaks of him in his autobiography in the following terms: "He was a perfect gentleman in every sense of the word; kind in his feelings, open, honest and upright in his conduct. His professional knowledge and his general character made him a most useful officer of the Hospital; and now that our *game has been played*, it is with great satisfaction that I look back to the long and disinterested friendship that existed between us." With his death was ended the direct connection of the Serjeant-Surgeoncy with the Army. At the College of Surgeons he was co-opted to the Court of Assistants in 1822, being the last person to be so chosen, and continued as a life member of the Council until 1857. He was President in the years 1831 and 1839, and he served and acted as Examiner from 1827-1855. He married the youngest daughter of H. Ramus, an Indian Civil Servant, by whom he had two sons and four daughters. [One daughter married W E Page FRCP and was the mother of H M Page (1860-1942) FRCS 1886, qv in Supplement.] One of his sons, Robert William Keate (1814-1873), was successively Governor of Trinidad, of Natal, and of the Gold Coast. Keate is described as being a square, compact little man, with a rough complaining voice. He was unmistakably a gentleman, but there was something of the 'Scotch terrier roughness' in all that he said and did. He was always a favourite with the pupils, who never turned him into ridicule in spite of his trying ways. Keate was perfect in minor surgery, the placing of limbs, and bandaging, and was reputed to be the only man who could make a linseed-meal poultice to perfection. He did marvels, too, with red precipitate ointment, saying, "My uncle used it for many years. I have used it all my life, that's why I use it." In standard operations, such as amputation of the thigh by the circular method, he excelled even Robert Liston (q.v.). In chronic and painful diseases of joints he used the cautery freely, and his judgement of tumours was good but wholly empirical. He did not care for anatomy, and he had no other tastes but surgery. He died in Hertford Street, Mayfair, on Oct. 2nd, 1857. A portrait of him hangs in the Board Room at St. George's Hospital. PUBLICATIONS: - Keate wrote only two papers: - "History of a Case of Bony Tumour containing Hydatids Successfully Removed from the Head of a Femur." - *Med.-Chir. Trans.*, 1819, x, 278. "Case of Exfoliation from the Basilar Process of the Occipital Bone and from the Atlas after Excessive Use of Mercury." - *Lond. Med. Gaz*., 1834-5, xvi, 13 (with drawing): Le Gros Clark referred to the specimen and reproduced the drawing in the Med.-Chir. Trans., 1849, xxxii, 68.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000008
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Lynn, William Bewicke (1786 - 1878)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-07-20 2012-07-19
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000000-E000099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372196372196
Occupation General surgeon Military surgeon
Details Was gazetted Assistant Surgeon in the 5th Foot on July 13th, 1809, and retired on half pay on Sept 25th, 1817, commuting his half pay on June 22nd, 1830. He saw active service in Walcheren in 1809 and served in the Peninsula War from 1810-1814. He also served in Canada during the years 1814-1815. After he had retired he settled in practice in Westminster, and by 1847 had removed to Claygate in Surrey, and later to Aldenham Grove, Elstree, Herts, whence he returned to Claygate, where he died on July 27th, 1878. His son was W T Lynn, the Cambridge astronomer.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000009
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Thomas, Honoratus Leigh (1769 - 1846)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Vincent, John Painter (1776 - 1852)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-07-20 2012-07-19
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000000-E000099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372198372198
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born at Newbury, Berkshire, where his father, Osman Vincent, was a silk merchant and banker, living at Donnington. Captain Richard Budd Vincent, CB (1770?-1831), was John's elder brother. Vincent was apprenticed to William Long (d 1829), Surgeon to St Bartholomew's Hospital and the Bluecoat School, and as an apprentice he had occasion to attend Leigh Hunt, then a schoolboy. Hunt says of Long, "he was dark like a West Indian and I used to think him handsome, but the sight of Mr Long's probe was not so pleasant, I preferred to see it in the hands of Vincent". He was one of the last Members admitted by the Company of Surgeons on March 20th, 1800. Two days later, on March 22nd, 1800, the College Charter was granted and Vincent was again examined. There were thirty-nine candidates for the diploma, many of whom were 'referred'. John Smith Soden (qv) and Richard Spencer (qv) were amongst those who satisfied the examiners. Vincent was elected Assistant Surgeon to St Bartholomew's Hospital on August 13th, 1807, on the resignation of his master, William Long, whose house he took in Lincoln's Inn Fields. At the election he received 154 votes and his opponent, William Wadd, obtained 56. He became Surgeon on Jan 29th, 1816, and resigned on January 21st, 1847, when he was elected a Governor. At the Royal College of Surgeons Vincent was co-opted a Member of the Council in 1822 and held office till his death. He was a Member of the Court of Examiners from 1828-1851, Hunterian Orator in 1829, Vice-President in 1830, 1831, 1838, and 1839; and President in 1832 and 1840. He was not in favour of establishing an order of Fellows of the College. He married: (1) On May 28th, 1812, Maria, daughter of Samuel Parke, of Kensington and Lysonby Lodge, near Melton Mowbray, by whom he had six children, of whom three sons survived him. She died in October, 1824, and he then married (2) Elizabeth Mary Williams, who outlived him. He died of paralysis after several years of ill health at Woodlands Manor, near Sevenoaks, Kent, on July 17th, 1852, and was buried in the church he had built at Woodlands. A three-quarter-length portrait in oils, sitting, by E U Eddis hangs in the Great Hall at St Bartholomew's Hospital. It was painted by subscription for his pupils and represents Vincent as a frail-looking man. The likeness was said to be good. It was presented to the Hospital on Sept 10th, 1850, and an autographed engraving from it by Henry Cousins was issued to the subscribers. Sir James Paget, writing from personal knowledge, said that he remembered him, "as a very practical surgeon, shrewd in diagnosis and always prudent and watchful, but apparently shy and reserved and not at all given to teaching even in the wards. He never taught in the school - never even, I think, gave a clinical lecture." Luther Holden (qv), writing in greater detail on January 11th, 1897, tells of his recollections in the following words: "At last, after much delay, which I regret, here are a few items which I have gathered from the mouldy memories of my respected friend and teacher, John Painter Vincent. All that I tell you is limited to the estimation in which we students held him. "We used to call him 'Old Vinco'. He was very popular with us - always kind, always ready to help a fellow in distress, a man of few, but always gentle, words. He lived in Lincoln's Inn Fields, and always walked to the Hospital. His walk bespoke a character about which there was no mistake. He came shuffling along with short steps, his hands never in his pockets, never behind him, but always clasped in front, as if ready to do handy work. He was very careful of his hands, and well he might be, for they were his best instruments, not that we thought him a good operator in the usual sense of the word. He 'operated' best without instruments. He had a natural dexterity and fine surgical touch. This was best seen when he 'set' a fracture or reduced a dislocation or when he was examining the nature of a tumour, but best of all when he was reducing a hernia. Many a time I have seen him reduce a hernia which had baffled his house surgeon and dressers. 'Old Vinco' would come down, grasp the hernia with his magic hands, give it a bit of a shake, and tuck it up, much to the disappointment of the 'boys', who wanted an operation. In this matter of 'legerdemain' we all agreed that he was far more dexterous than his colleagues. Unfortunately for us, Vincent did not explain to us how to do the trick, for he was a man of very few words, and never, so far as I know, gave a clinical lecture. He was certainly a conservative surgeon, disposed to avoid operations, unless obviously necessary. His highly educated surgical teaching was probably appreciated by his colleagues. In doubtful cases it was their wont to instruct their respective house surgeons to request Mr Vincent to give his opinion. In his time there were no special days, as now, for surgical consultations. "As regards Vincent's personality, there is an admirable likeness of him in the Great Hall of St Bartholomew's Hospital. He was exceedingly modest, quiet, unobtrusive. I am not aware that he ever published much, if anything, but I believe there is a very good memoir of him by his son in our library. He wore a brown wig, which never altered in colour as he grew older. Eventually he died paralytic, after a very long confinement to bed, [still] Senior Surgeon to St Bartholomew's. "The above is all that I can fairly remember of 'old Vinco'. Even this little has given me pleasure to recall. Do what you like with it." "Always sincerely yours, "Luther Holden." PUBLICATIONS: - *The Hunterian Oration*, 8vo, London, 1829. *Observations on Some of the Parts of Surgical Practice*, 8vo, London, 1847. *An Address to the Council of the College of Surgeons,* 1841.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000011
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching White, Anthony (1782 - 1849)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Cooper, Samuel (1781 - 1848)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Lawrence, Sir William (1783 - 1867)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-07-28 2012-07-19
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000000-E000099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372201372201
Occupation Anatomist General surgeon Medical Lecturer Ophthalmic surgeon
Details Born on July 16th, 1783, at Cirencester, where his father, William Lawrence (1753-1837), was the chief surgeon of the town. His mother was Judith, second daughter of William Wood, of Tetbury, Gloucestershire. The younger son, Charles Lawrence (1794-1881), was a scientific agriculturist who took a leading part in founding and organizing the Royal Agricultural College at Circencester. William Lawrence went to a school at Elmore, near Gloucester, until he was apprenticed in February, 1799, to John Abernethy, who was then Assistant Surgeon to St. Bartholomew's Hospital. Abernethy became Lecturer on Anatomy in 1801 and appointed Lawrence his Demonstrator. This post he held for twelve years, and was esteemed by the students as an excellent teacher in the dissecting-room. He was elected as Assistant Surgeon to the Hospital on March 13th, 1813, and in the same year was elected F.R.S. In 1814 he was appointed Surgeon to the London Infirmary for Diseases of the Eye, in 1815 to the Royal Hospitals of Bridewell and Bethlehem, and in 1824 he became full Surgeon to St. Bartholomew's, a post he did not resign until 1865. In 1829 he succeeded Abernethy as Lecturer on Surgery and he continued to lecture for the next thirty-three years. He had also lectured on anatomy for some years before 1829 at the Aldersgate Street School of Medicine. He became a Member of the College in 1805, a Fellow in 1843, was a Member of Council from 1825-1867, a Member of the Court of Examiners from 1840-1867, Chairman of the Midwifery Board in 1854, Vice-President four times, and President in 1846 and 1855. He obtained the Jacksonian Prize in 1806 with an essay on "Hernia, and the Best Mode of Treatment", which went through five editions in its published form, and he delivered the Hunterian Oration in 1834 and 1846. From 1816-1819 he was Professor of Anatomy at the Royal College of Surgeons. At his first lecture in 1816 he criticized Abernethy's exposition of Hunter's theory of life. His views on the "Natural History of Man" (1819) scandalized all those who regarded life as an entity entirely separate from, and above, the material organism with which it is associated. The lectures caused a serious breach between Abernethy and Lawrence, who was accused of "perverting the honourable office entrusted to him by the College of Surgeons to the unworthy design of propagating opinions detrimental to society, and of loosening those restraints on which the welfare of mankind depend." Lawrence regarded life as the assemblage of all the functions and the general result of their exercise, that life proceeds from life and is transmitted from one living body to another in uninterrupted succession. In his lectures on comparative anatomy he endorsed the views of Blumenbach, and showed that a belief in the literal accuracy of the early chapters of Genesis is inconsistent with biological fact. The lectures on the "Physiology, Zoology, and Natural History of Man" - the beginning of modern anthropology in this country - were republished by Lawrence, but Lord Eldon characteristically refused to protect his rights in them on the ground that they contradicted Scripture. Lawrence valued the work so little that he announced its suppression, and having, in the satire of the day, been ranked with Tom Payne and Lord Byron, he was thereupon vilified as a traitor to the cause of free thought. This form of abuse pursued him still more fiercely when, like Burke, who changed his views after an introduction to the King's Cabinet, he became a Conservative in the College Council Room, after having headed an agitation against the rule of the Council of the College. In 1826 there appeared a "Report of the Speeches delivered by Mr. Lawrence as Chairman at two meetings of Members, held at the Freemasons' Tavern". On the occasion of his second Hunterian Oration in 1846 a new charter which had lately been obtained failed to satisfy the aspirations of the Members of the College. An audience mostly hostile had assembled, and Lawrence defended the action of the Council and spoke contemptuously of ordinary medical practitioners, thereby raising a storm of dissent. "All parts of the theatre", says Stone, "rose against him. So great was the storm that Lawrence leant back against the wall, folded his arms, and said, 'Mr. President, when the geese have ceased their hissing I will resume.' He remained imperturbable, displayed his extraordinary talent as an orator, and concluded his address in a masterly peroration which elicited the plaudits of the whole assembly." Lawrence was at one time much in the councils of Thomas Wakley, the founder of the *Lancet*, with whom he conducted a weekly crusade against privilege in the medical world. This, of course, had not been forgotten when he appeared as the advocate of the College in 1846. As a lecturer on purely medical subjects Lawrence had a long career, during which he was without superior in manner, substance, or expression. He republished his lectures on surgery in 1863, and the work was praised by Sir William Savory and Sir Jonathan Hutchinson, who said of them that, "though superseded by other works, they are still a mine of carefully collected facts to which the student refers with pleasure and profit". Sir G. M. Humphry (q.v.) and Luther Holden (q.v.) have also borne witness to his powers as a lecturer and to his genius as a clinical exponent. Sir James Paget (q.v.), who attended his lectures, did not at the time, he says, esteem them enough, but when he came to lecture himself he followed their method and thought it the best method of scientific speaking he had ever heard: "every word had been learned by heart and yet there was not the least sign that one word was being remembered. They were admirable in their well-collected knowledge, and even more admirable in their order, their perfect clearness of language, and the quietly attractive manner in which they were delivered." Brodie described William Lawrence as remarkable for his great industry, powers of acquirement, and inexhaustible stores of information. He had a considerable command of correct language, a pure style of writing free from affectation, was gifted with the higher qualities of mind, and possessed a talent seldom surpassed. He was a vigorous, clear, and convincing writer. In addition to many contributions to the *Lancet*, the *Medical Gazette*, and the *Transactions of the Medical and Chirurgical Society*, of which he was President in 1831, he published in 1833 *A Treatise on Diseases of the Eye*, which embodied the results and observations obtained in his large ophthalmic practice. Lawrence lived to a great age and enjoyed a high degree of physical strength combined with an intense mental activity. On one occasion a friend ventured to congratulate him on looking so well. "I do not know, sir," replied Lawrence, "why I should not look as well as you do." At the age of eighty he was photographed by Frank Hollyer, and the picture, now in the College Collection, well displays his magnificent physical qualities. He became Serjeant-Surgeon to H.M. the Queen in 1858, was created a Baronet on April 30th, 1867, and died in harness in July, 1867. As he was mounting the College stairs in his capacity of Examiner, he had a stroke of paralysis, which deprived him of the power of speech. He was helped down to the Secretary's office from the second landing on the main staircase, where the seizure took place, by Mr. Pearson (the College Prosector) and others. "When taken home, he was given some loose letters out of a child's spelling-box," says his biographer, Sir Norman Moore, "and laid down the following four: B, D, C, K. He shook his head and took up a pen, when a drop of ink fell on the paper. He nodded and pointed to it. 'You want some black drop, a preparation of opium,' said his physician, and this proved to what he had tried to express." He married Louisa, daughter of James Trevor Senior, of Aylesbury, and left one son and two daughters. His son, Sir Trevor Lawrence, became Treasurer of St. Bartholomew's Hospital, the daughters died unmarried at a very advanced age. His grandson, Sir William Lawrence, was for many years an almoner at St. Bartholomew's Hospital. Lawrence died on July 5th, 1867, at 18 Whitehall Place, S.W., where he had lived for many years. His children founded a scholarship and medal in his memory in 1873. The former was increased by his daughter to the annual value of £115 and is tenable at St. Bartholomew's Hospital as the chief surgical prize. The medal was designed in 1897 by Alfred Gilbert, R.A., and is a fine example of numismatic portraiture. A three-quarter-length portrait in oils by Pickersgill hangs in the Great Hall of St. Bartholomew's Hospital; it was painted by subscription and has been engraved. A bust by H. Weekes, R.A., is in the College; it was ordered in 1867 and is placed near the head of the staircase. It is a fine likeness. A crayon portrait by Samuel Lawrence is in the possession of the family. Lawrence was a masterful man who, by virtue of his energy and long life, impressed himself upon the growing Medical School at St. Bartholomew's Hospital, where, almost in spite of himself, he carried on the tradition of Abernethy; Paget, Savory, Humphry, and to a lesser extent Sir Thomas Smith and W. Harrison Cripps, fell under his sway and were influenced by him. He was a great surgeon, though not an operator equal to Astley Cooper, Robert Liston, or Sir William Fergusson; but his powers of speech and persuasion far exceeded the abilities of the rest of the profession. It was truly said of him that had he gone to the bar he would have shone as brilliantly as he did in surgery.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000014
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Travers, Benjamin (1783 - 1858)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Blundell, Thomas Leigh (1788 - 1872)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2010-03-25
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000900-E000999
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373092373092
Occupation General surgeon
Details Educated at St Bartholomew’s Hospital. He was at one time Senior Physician to the London Dispensary, and Lecturer on Midwifery and Diseases of Women and Children at the Aldersgate Street School of Medicine. At the time of his death he was Consulting Physician to the Royal Maternity Charity, and Medical Referee to the Caledonian Assurance Company. He resided latterly at 12 Wellington Square, St Leonards-on-Sea, where he died on February 22nd, 1872.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000909
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Bodington, George Fowler (1830 - 1902)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2010-03-25 2013-08-07
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000900-E000999
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373093373093
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born in 1829 or 1830, the eldest son of George Bodington, of Sutton Coldfield, the well-known pioneer in the outdoor treatment of tuberculosis, whose claim to fame was brought forward by Dr Tucker Wise, in 1902, who drew attention to his work on *The Treatment and Cure of Pulmonary Consumption* in 1840 (see *Brit. Med. Jour.*, 1902, i, 447). George Fowler Bodington was educated at Queen's College, Birmingham. After qualifying he held the post of House Surgeon at Queen's Hospital, Birmingham, and then, as a ship's surgeon, visited Natal and India. He spent some time practising his profession in the back settlements of Pietermaritzburg, where his fees were paid him in elephants' tusks, of which he brought away some hundreds of pounds' worth as the fruits of about eight months' work. At that time the elephant still roamed the forests of Natal, and life there suited Bodington's hardy frame and adventurous disposition. He might have made his mark in those primitive regions, but he preferred to return to England, where he married and settled in practice at Kenilworth in partnership with his uncle, William Bodington (qv). He removed to Middlesbrough-on-Tees in 1866, where he was Surgeon to the North Riding Infirmary, and to Saltburn, where he remained till he was summoned to take the management of a private asylum which his father had established at Sutton Coldfield, Birmingham. The asylum was prosperous, and Bodington, being only about seven miles from the great Midland city, was brought into touch with its 'vivid medical life'. He became an active member of its medical societies and took a leading part in establishing the Birmingham Medical Institute, of which he was an early President. He was President of the Birmingham and Midland Branch of the British Medical Association in 1876, and was full of activity, taking an immense interest in all that made for social and political progress. He associated himself in particular with Donald Dalrymple in the movement to obtain legislation for the care and control of inebriates. The asylum, owing to the falling in of the lease, was removed to Ashwood House, Kingswinford, Staffs, and here the second Mrs Bodington, whom he married at this time, fell into ill health and so continued for several years. This set Bodington to seek a new home for his family; he sold the asylum, and after some wanderings eventually settled in British Columbia, where he bought a farm and started in practice, not, apparently, with much success. The march of Western civilization brought with it insanity, and Bodington was appointed in 1895 Medical Superintendent of Provincial Asylum, New Westminster, BC, a large new state lunatic asylum. Here, though not in robust health, he achieved great results and popularity. He resigned after six years of most arduous toil, during the greater part of which he was in sole charge of the asylum. The Government of British Columbia voted him a retiring allowance in recognition of his services, and he came back to England the year before his death. At the last he settled in Paris, where his son, Mr Oliver Bodington, was well known in the Anglo-American Colony. His death occurred in Paris, after a very short illness, on May 8th, 1902. He was then a widower and was survived by a large family of children settled in Europe and Canada. He was a Member of the Medico-Psychological Association of Great Britain. He is described by his biographers as a man of magnificent physique and fine presence, a delightful companion, and an enthusiastic man of letters. Publication: "Restraint in the Treatment of Insanity," 8vo, Birmingham, 1878; reprinted from *Birm. Med. Rev.*, 1878.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000910
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Bodington, William (1790 - 1872)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Bolton, David (1806 - 1878)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2010-03-25
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000900-E000999
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373095373095
Occupation General surgeon
Details Was at one time Professor of Anatomy at Queen’s College, Birmingham, having previously been Demonstrator of Anatomy and Private Teacher. He was also Surgeon at the General Hospital and Lecturer on Surgery at Sydenham College. Later he moved to Clifton, and then to Cheltenham, where he died, at his residence, 4 Montpelier Parade, on November 23rd, 1878. Publications: Papers on “Encephaloid Disease of Bone.” – *Midland Quart. Jour. of Med. Sci.*, 1858, 44. Papers on “Diffused Popliteal Aneurism.” – *Ibid.*, 1858, ii, 211.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000912
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Bolton, George Buckley ( - 1847)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2010-03-25
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000900-E000999
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373096373096
Occupation General surgeon
Details Practised as a surgeon in Pall Mall (No 9, and later No 53). His death occurred before July 19th, 1847. He was a Member of the Medico-Chirurgical Society. Publication: “On the United Siamese Twins,” 4to, plate, London, 1830; reprinted from *Phil. Trans*. He there dates from 3 King Street, St James’s Square. The copy of the tract in the Library of the Royal College of Surgeons is inscribed by him, “Dr Stroud with the Author’s best respects.”
Resource Identifier RCS: E000913
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Bond, John ( - 1880)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2010-03-25
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000900-E000999
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373097373097
Occupation General surgeon
Details Practised at 19 Grafton Street, Fitzroy Square, and was Hon Member of the London Vaccine Institute, which was in Russell Place near-by (*see* TOMKINS, JOHN NEWTON). In 1848 he was appointed a Medical Officer under the Board of Health, and held this post to the sixties or later, when his address no longer appears in the Medical Directory. According to the Registry at Somerset House he died in 1880. Publications:- *Tabula Nosologica, or the Classification of Diseases*, compiled principally from Mason Good’s *Practice of Physic*, comparing it with the works of previous celebrated nosologists “Treatise on Cholera.” Latin thesis “On Uterine Hæmorrhage.” “On Inflammation of the Brain.” Contributions to *Lancet*, *Med. Times*, etc.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000914
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Benfield, Thomas Warburton (1822 - 1890)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Bennett, Edward Hallaran (1837 - 1907)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2009-12-17
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000800-E000899
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373001373001
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born April 9th, 1837, at Charlotte Quay, Cork, was the fifth son of Robert Bennett, Recorder of Cork; his mother was Jane Hallaran, daughter of William Saunders Hallaran, MD, of Cork, who wrote on insanity in 1810 and 1818; his grandfather, James Bennett, was a physician in Cork. A kinsman, James Richard Bennett, was a distinguished teacher of anatomy in Paris about 1825. Bennett was educated in Cork at Hamblin’s School and at the Academic Institute in Harcourt Street, Dublin, kept by the Rev Daniel Flynn. He entered Trinity College in 1854 and graduated in 1859, taking also the new degree, MCh, then conferred for the first time. In 1863 he became FRCSI without having previously been admitted a licentiate. He was appointed Surgeon to Sir Patrick Dun’s Hospital and University Anatomist in 1864, in succession to John Kellock Barton. In 1873, on the death of Robert William Smith, he became Professor of Surgery in Trinity College and Curator of the Pathological Museum. In 1880 he was President of the Dublin Pathological Society; from 1884-1885 President of the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland; from 1894-1897 President of the Royal Academy of Medicine in Ireland; from 1897-1906 he represented the University of Dublin on the General Medical Council; from 1902-1905 he was Surgeon to the Lord Lieutenant, the Earl of Dudley; and in 1900 was elected FRCS Eng. His photograph, with signature, is in the Album of Honorary Fellows. He married Frances, daughter of Conolly Norman, of Fahan, Co Donegal, and had two daughters. He died on June 21st, 1907, at 26 Lower Fitzwilliam Street, Dublin, and was buried at Mount Jerome Cemetery. Bennett is distinguished by his remarkable collection of fractures, dislocations, diseases, and surgery of bones, which he arranged and catalogued, together with their clinical histories, in the Pathological Museum of Trinity College. In 1880 he described for the first time at the Cork Meeting of the British Medical Association, and in 1881 at the Dublin Pathological Society, the fracture of the metacarpal bone of the thumb, now known universally as ‘Bennett’s fracture’. He began by correcting previous statements, first as to frequency. Malgaigne and Hulke had correctly stated that the first metacarpal was more frequently fractured than its fellows, but not near its distal extremity as Astley Cooper had stated, nor through the middle of its shaft. In five specimens of united fractures there was evidence of an oblique fracture through the base, displacing the articular facet which projects into the palm, with corresponding changes in the articular surface of the trapezium. He made many other important communications, chiefly in connection with bones. He was one of the earliest surgeons in Dublin to adopt Lister’s methods. There are two bronze medallions placed respectively in the School of Physic, Trinity College, and in Sir Patrick Dun’s Hospital by subscription of his pupils. A bronze medal, bearing on one side Bennett’s portrait by Sheppard, and on the other a metacarpal bone showing the fracture, is given to the winner of the Surgical Travelling Prize in the School of Physic. Publication:- Bennett’s original paper appeared in *Dublin Jour. Med. Sci.*, 1882, lxxiii, 72, with plate.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000818
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Bennett, Francis (1807 - 1866)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Bullen, George (1791 - 1871)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Bulley, Francis Arthur (1808 - 1883)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2010-11-11
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001000-E001099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373251373251
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born on May 18th, 1808, the son of J Bulley, who came of an old Berkshire family long connected with Reading. His mother was a Blagrave, another ancient Reading family, which produced a regicide, distinguished mathematicians, and for three centuries the Reading Members of Parliament. Bulley's father and grandfather were well-known Reading medical men. His father, who was in practice there for fifty-five years, was Surgeon to the Gaol and to the Dispensary. After the usual classical school education, Francis Arthur Bulley began the study of the profession under his father, and was then apprenticed for five years to James Stocker, Resident Medical Officer of Guy's Hospital. He was soon elected Assistant Surgeon to the County Prison, Reading, where he succeeded his father as Surgeon in 1850. In 1839 he was elected a Surgeon of the Royal Berkshire Hospital, an institution which he had early promoted and for which he had raised a penny fund amounting to one hundred guineas. In conjunction with Dr Richard Thomas Woodhouse and others he was also the organizer of a Convalescent and a Samaritan Fund for the hospital, which rose to fame, both on account of its staff and of its internal arrangements, design, management, and of the fact that none but the poorest were allowed to benefit by it. Bulley was an inventor, and in Weiss's cabinet which obtained the Gold Medal at the Great Exhibition were many of his instruments. Perhaps the most useful of his additions to practical surgery were: (1) A splint for broken thighs, by which graduated extension is applied both by the foot and by a band around the thigh, just above the knee, the special advantages of which are the easy prevention of deformity and the absence of the looseness of the knee-joint which so frequently follows extension effected by the foot alone; (2) An apparatus for the application of pressure to the femoral artery in cases of popliteal aneurysm, in which, by means of two traversing screw-pads, the instrument may be so applied that there can be a relaxation of the pressure at either of the two points, for the retardation of the arterial stream, without the necessity of having to remove the apparatus when such alteration is desirable; (3) A tourniquet for arresting the flow of blood through the subclavian artery in shoulder-joint operations; (4) A uterine compress for arresting haemorrhage during or after labour, which may be employed either as a simple obstetric bandage or for the purpose of producing firm but at the same time easily regulated pressure upon the walls of the uterus. At the time of his death Bulley was Consulting Surgeon to the Royal Berks Hospital, Surgeon to the Berkshire County Constabulary, and to the Reading District of the Great Western Railway, and had been Surgeon to the Berkshire Dispensary. In appearance he was tall, well over six feet, and stout, but well-proportioned. His biographer notices that he did not neglect exercise as did many of his contemporaries, though he was fond of studying and the pursuit of his professional work. He was popular in Reading, the interests, institutions, and amusements of which he promoted. His death occurred at his residence, 40 London Road, Reading, on April 21st, 1883. There is a good woodcut portrait of him in the *Medical Circular*, 1853. (Bully in the Fellows' *Register*.) Publications: *Account of some Cases of the Epidemic Cholera, Treated by Hot Water Applications*, 8vo, London, 1850. "Cases of Urinary Calculus Dissolved in the Bladder by Means of Alkaline Internal Remedies." - *Med. Times*, 1849. Bulley published many papers in the *Medical Times*, most of which evince research, acuteness of perception, and practical knowledge. Among these may be specified several communications on scrofula; an account of malignant scarlet fever treated by diaphoresis produced by means of hot-water packing, the patient becoming convalescent in four days; papers on the nature and treatment of febrile diseases, in which he advocates the employment of the same means, in imitation of the natural efforts of the system, to produce a crisis of the disease by diaphoresis; the treatment of chronic trismus by mechanical dilatation, the instrument, which is peculiar, having been invented by himself; surgical reports from the Royal Berkshire Hospital; an account of a simple means of diminishing the effects of fire in the human body by the application of treacle and water to the burned part.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001068
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Bullock, Henry (1829 - 1893)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Bullock, Joseph (1797 - 1863)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Bulteel, Christopher (1832 - 1897)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Bunce, John Strudwicke (1816 - 1875)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2010-11-11 2013-08-07
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001000-E001099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373255373255
Occupation General surgeon
Details Educated at University College. He practised at Woodford, Essex, in partnership with William George Groves, MRCS, and died there after his retirement, on September 29th, 1875.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001072
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Bunch, Frank Vigers (1869 - 1894)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Buncombe, Charles Hope (1818 - 1897)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Stirk, David Ian (1916 - 2009)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2009-12-17
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000800-E000899
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373005373005
Occupation General surgeon
Details David Stirk was a consultant general surgeon in Barnstaple and an authority on golf. He was born in Exeter on 1 March 1916, the son of a doctor. He was educated at Blundell’s and studied medicine at St Mary’s Hospital. After five years in the RAMC, three of which were spent in India, he returned to London to specialise in surgery and passed the FRCS in 1952. He then went to Singapore to take up an appointment as a general surgeon, returning in 1959 as the first consultant general surgeon at the North Devon Infirmary in Barnstaple, where he remained until his retirement in 1980. Hitherto the North Devon Infirmary had been looked after by GP specialists, but David now built up a department of surgery, which, on its new site at the North Devon District Hospital, now has seven consultant surgeons. He published papers on duodenal haematoma, strangulated inguino-femoral hernia, pneumothorax and penetrating abdominal injuries. Although he was the leading surgeon in north Devon during the latter phases of his working life, he was better known throughout Great Britain as an outstanding golfer and made many friends in the golfing world. After retiring from his medical work, he became a leading authority on old golf equipment, particularly clubs, of which he had an impressive collection. With Ian Henderson, he wrote the leading work on the subject, *Golf in the making* (Crawley, Hants, Henderson and Stirk Ltd, 1979), as well as 11 other books on golfing subjects. He advised many of the oldest golf clubs in the country on their collections and one of the leading auctioneers of old golfing equipment. He played an important role in the establishment of a museum at the Royal and Ancient Golf Club of St Andrews, of which he was a member. Amongst his achievements as a player, he was runner up in the British Seniors’ Championship, twice winner of the Devon Open Championship (a competition open to professionals as well as amateurs), winner of the Devon Amateur Championship and of the Singapore Amateur Championship. In later years he was one of the few golfers who have completed a round of golf in fewer strokes than their age, a feat which he accomplished frequently, although he himself did not think it really counted unless it was done under strict medal competition conditions from the very back tees. David and his wife Joan-Anne were married on 3 September 1949 and celebrated their diamond wedding anniversary in 2009. He is survived by Joan-Anne, their three sons (Ian, Denzil and Graeme) and five grandchildren. He died peacefully in Exmouth Hospital on 15 September 2009, aged 93.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000822
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Boulter, Patrick Stewart (1927 - 2009)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by N Alan Green
Publication Date 2010-05-20
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000900-E000999
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373176373176
Occupation General surgeon
Details Patrick Boulter, or ‘Paddy’ as he was affectionately known, was a consultant surgeon to the Royal Surrey County Hospital and the Regional Oncology Centre, Guildford, Surrey. He was elected president of the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh and served from 1991 to 1994. He was born in Annan, Dumfriesshire, on 28 May 1927, the second child of Frederick Charles Boulter, a civil engineer, and his wife, Flora Victoria (née Black). The Boulters later moved to Wimbledon, where Paddy went to King’s School for his early education. The family then went north to Carlisle. His schooling continued at Carlisle Grammar School, where he developed his love of hill-walking and climbing, which was to become a life-long passion. He enjoyed cycling and on one occasion cajoled some friends to cycle from Carlisle to Coniston to climb ‘Coniston Old Man’. In school holidays he worked on Glasgow boats supplying the Highlands and Islands. Although appreciating the beauty of the Western Isles, he developed an aversion to kippers. In his final year at school Paddy decided to study medicine, having previously concentrated on the arts and classics. He entered Guy’s Hospital Medical School to study for the first MB examination, following his sister Joy, who trained as a nurse at Guy’s. Although brilliant at chemistry and physics, he failed botany (although he was later to become knowledgeable on alpine flowers). He decided to enter the RAMC for National Service, where he worked as an operating department technician. While in London he met and fell in love with Mary (Patricia Mary Eckersley) Barlow, a student. They married in 1946 while he was doing his National Service. In due course their two daughters were born in Carlisle. Jennifer (‘Jenny’) became a nurse and Anne, a physiotherapist. After demobilisation, he passed the first MB. While waiting to re-enter Guy’s Hospital to complete his medical education, he took a job at the Cumberland Royal Infirmary and worked with consultant surgeon Bill McKechnie, who had a profound effect on his future career. The two became life-long friends and shared a love of climbing and hill-walking. Paddy had a distinguished academic career at Guy’s Hospital Medical School, winning prizes in anatomy, pathology and clinical surgery, and graduating in 1955 with honours, a university gold medal and the Handcock prize from the Royal College of Surgeons of England. After house appointments at Guy’s Hospital, he became a lecturer in anatomy to Guy’s Hospital Medical School. Surgical training progressed as a registrar at the Middlesex Hospital, where he was greatly influenced by David Patey, and returned to Guy’s as a senior registrar to Sam Wass and Sir Hedley Atkins. He was appointed to the Royal Surrey County Hospital, Guildford, in 1962, where he was a general surgeon with endocrine and breast interests. Later he was appointed as an honorary professor in surgical science at the University of Surrey at Guildford. He enjoyed private practice at Mount Alvernia Hospital, which was run by a Franciscan order of nuns. This afforded him an even closer contact with patients. He kept fit by an early morning run across the Merrow Downs accompanied by his retriever. As a well-respected breast surgeon, his unit, with that of Sir Patrick Forrest in Edinburgh, did much to develop population screening for breast cancer in the UK. His reputation as a teacher and researcher resulted in visiting professorships to surgical centres around the world. Paddy wrote many papers and chapters in books on breast, skin and endocrine disorders. He was a popular and effective trainee of young surgeons, many of whom became friends and enjoyed the generous hospitality of the Boulter home, as did many other visitors from around the world. R C Bennett, giving the oration when Paddy received his honorary fellowship of the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons, noted: “He is a warm-hearted, generous man, with a wonderful wife, Mary…. She has been a great companion and constant help to him in his work, as well as a friend and second mother to the many overseas trainees passing through his, or should I say ‘their’, hands.” He was an active member of many societies, including the Association of Surgeons, British Breast Group, Australia and New Zealand Breast Cancer Study Group, Surgical Research Society, Melanoma Study Group, European Association of Surgical Oncology and International Surgical Society. He was an honorary member of the North Pacific Surgical Association and of the Association of Surgeons of India and was an honorary citizen of the State of Nebraska, USA. In our College, he was a regional surgical adviser and Penrose May tutor and was largely responsible for setting up the postgraduate centre in Guildford. He was an examiner for the universities of London, Edinburgh, Queensland, Singapore, Malaya, and the Edinburgh College. He represented the Edinburgh College for 10 years as a trustee for the Thalidomide Trust. He was elected a member of the Edinburgh College council in 1984 and succeeded Geoffrey Chisholm as president in 1991. Throughout his presidency, he conducted the business of the College with great skill and quiet authority and, in his seemingly endless round of international surgical diplomacy, he was able to use his natural charm to great effect. The citation he delivered on the occasion of Mother Theresa being awarded the honorary fellowship of the Edinburgh RCS was gracious and moving – Paddy at his eloquent best. He thrived on travel, on meeting people and many of his visits produced new contacts and new overseas partners for his College. His remarkable collection of honorary fellowships attested to the highest esteem in which he was held. He and Mary shared an interest in skiing and mountaineering. Paddy was active in the Alpine Club and Swiss Alpine Club, and in their travels relished the challenge of new mountain peaks in the Himalayas and Rockies. Another shared passion was angling, which they both enjoyed in retirement, within sight of his beloved Cumbrian hills. He was a member of Yorkshire Fly Fishers’ Club and the Penrith Angling Association. Uniquely conscious of his Scottish roots, it was with great pride that he kept his father’s Scottish number plate, OSM 420, on a series of cars. When examining overseas, as the team returned at a late hour from being entertained, Paddy took great delight in leading the singing of traditional Scottish airs with gusto. He was occasionally in tune. After many happy early years in Cumbria, Paddy and Mary bought ‘Quarry Cottage’, Great Salkeld, and spent as much time as they could preparing this for their retirement, creating a lovely garden, fishing in the river Eden and hill-walking. Patrick Stewart Boulter died peacefully on 30 November, 2009 at the age of 82. A Service of Thanksgiving was held at St Cuthbert’s Church, Great Salkeld, Penrith, Cumbria. Richard Notley, a long-time friend and colleague, gave a fitting tribute. Boulter is survived by Mary, his two daughters, Jenny Bond and Anne Wood, their husbands, five grandchildren and five great grandchildren.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000993
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Wilson, Sir William James Erasmus (1809 - 1884)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-03-22 2014-07-23
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000200-E000299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372394372394
Occupation Dermatologist
Details William James Erasmus Wilson, generally known as Erasmus Wilson, was the son of William Wilson, a native of Aberdeen, who had been a Surgeon in the Navy and had settled as a parish surgeon at Dartford and Greenhithe in Kent. He afterwards opened a private asylum at Denham in Buckinghamshire. Erasmus was born on November 25th, 1809, in High Street, Marylebone, the house of his maternal grandfather, Erasmus Bransdorph, a Norwegian. He was educated at the Dartford Grammar School and afterwards at Swanscombe in Kent, but was soon called upon to help in his father's practice. At the age of 16 he became a resident pupil with George Langstaff (qv), Surgeon to the Cripplegate Dispensary, and began to attend the anatomical lectures given by John Abernathy at St. Bartholomew's Hospital. At his master's house he became acquainted with Jones Quain, Sir William Lawrence, and Thomas Wakley, whilst his skill in drawing and his neat dissections soon attracted general attention. Wilson was one of the first students at the Aldersgate School of Medicine, and won prizes for surgery and midwifery in the session 1829-1830. In 1831 he was asked by Jones Quain, Professor of Anatomy and Physiology at the London University, to become his Assistant. He accepted the post and was soon afterwards appointed Demonstrator of Anatomy. He filled this post until Jones Quain retired from the London University in 1836, when Wilson established a School of Anatomy, called Sydenham College, which proved unsuccessful. In 1840 he lectured upon anatomy and physiology at Middlesex Hospital, and in the same year he became assistant editor of the *Lancet* under Thomas Wakley, whose son, Thomas Henry Wakley (qv), he had 'coached'. He was also Consulting Surgeon to the St. Pancras Infirmary, and on Feb 20th, 1845, he was elected FRS. Erasmus Wilson began to devote himself more particularly to dermatology about 1840, largely, it is said, at the suggestion of Thomas Wakley, who advised him to link himself so closely with skins that when he entered a room the company would scratch themselves. He did so with such success that he left a fortune of £200,000. At the Royal College of Surgeons Erasmus Wilson sat on the Council from 1870-1884, was Vice-President in 1879 and 1880, and President in 1881. In 1870, at an expense of £5,000, he founded the Chair of Dermatology, of which he was the occupant till 1878. The Trust was varied in 1879, in 1881, and in 1908. The Professorship has now become the "Erasmus Wilson Lectureship". In 1870 he presented to the Museum his very extensive and valuable collection of drawings and models illustrative of diseases of the skin. In 1883 he gave to the Museum a valuable collection of anatomical specimens. The College marked its appreciation of these benefactions by presenting him with the Honorary Medal, which has only been bestowed thirteen times since it was instituted in 1802. Wilson was particularly fond of foreign travel. He visited the East to study leprosy, Switzerland and the Vallais to examine goitre, and Italy to become more closely acquainted with tinea pellagra and other diseases of the skin in the underfed and dirty vegetarian peasantry. He became particularly interested in the study of Egyptian antiquities, and in 1877 he paid the cost (about £10,000) of the transport of 'Cleopatra's Needle' to London. He was President of the Biblical Archæological Society and was President of the Medical Society of London in 1878 after he had given the Oration in 1876. One of the most notable incidents of Wilson's career occurred on the occasion of an inquest taking place at Hounslow upon the body of a soldier who had died from the effects of a regimental flogging. Owing greatly to Wilson's evidence a final verdict was returned by the jury, after ten adjournments, to the effect that the man had really died of his injuries. The coroner on this occasion was Wakley, and the result of the inquest was a Parliamentary inquiry, which led to the abolition of flogging in the army. He married Miss Doherty in 1841. She survived him, but there were no children. He died on August 7th, 1884, at Westgate-on-Sea, after two years of ill health. Erasmus Wilson ranks as one of the first and best of English specialists in diseases of the skin. He found the field of dermatology almost virgin. To his teaching we owe in a great measure the use of the bath which has since become a conspicuous feature in the life of our upper and middle classes, and to his advocacy is to be attributed the spread of the Turkish bath in England. Skillful investments in the shares of gas and railway companies made him a rich man, and he devoted his wealth to various charitable objects, for he was a prominent Freemason. He restored Swanscombe Church; he founded a scholarship at the Royal College of Music; and was a large subscriber to the Royal Medical Benevolent College at Epsom, where he built a house for the head master at his own expense. At a cost of nearly £30,000 he built a new wing and chapel at the Sea-Bathing Hospital at Margate, where diseases of the skin were extensively treated, and in 1881 he founded the Erasmus Wilson Professorship of Pathology at the University of Aberdeen in memory of his father. The bulk of his fortune reverted to the Royal College of Surgeons of England in 1884 on the death of Lady Wilson. A bust by Thomas Brock, RA, stands in the Library of the College. It was ordered by the College on May 14th, 1885. A three-quarter-length portrait in oils in the robes of a Lecturer at the College of Surgeons is in the possession of the Medical Society of London. The Silver Medal presented to him by the Royal Humane Society is in the possession of the College. It was awarded for saving the life of Olivia Green, who attempted to commit suicide by jumping into the Regent's Park Canal on April 22nd, 1857. Publications: It is unquestionable that Wilson knew more about skin diseases than any man of his time. He identified the dermatological terms used by Celsus (vi, i-v) and thereby showed himself to be a learned as well as a practical physician. Hs works on dermatology, though they met with pretty searching criticism at the time of their appearance, have nearly all maintained their position as text-books. These works were: - *Diseases of the Skin*, 1842; 4th ed., Philadelphia, 1857. *On the Management of the Skin as a Means of Promoting and Preserving Health. Ringworm*, 8vo, London, 1847. *Atlas of Portraits of Diseases of the Skin*, folio, London, 1848-55. *The Anatomist's Vade Mecum*, 8vo, London; 2nd ed, 1842; 11th ed, 1892. "Skin" in Cooper's famous *Surgical Dictionary*. He also prepared elaborate anatomical plates in conjunction with Jones Quain, and published various articles and reports in the scientific journals. *History of the Middlesex Hospital during the First Century of its Existence*, 8vo, London, 1845. In 1867 he established the *Journal of Cutaneous Medicine and Diseases of the Skin*, and acted as editor until 1870.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000207
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Bennett, George (1804 - 1893)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2009-12-23
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000800-E000899
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373007373007
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born at Plymouth on Jan 31st, 1804. While still a boy he visited Ceylon in 1819, returning to England by way of Mauritius, where he stayed for six months. Entering on the study of medicine in his native town, he went afterwards to London and entered the Middlesex Hospital and the Windmill Street School, where his masters were Charles Bell, Herbert Mayo, and Caesar Hawkins. After qualifying he went on a voyage to New Zealand, and there studied coniferous trees including the Thuja pine, the Kawaka of the Maoris. (See Lond. Jour. of Botany, 1842, i, 570.) He also described the ‘moki’, or method of preparing heads, of the New Zealanders. His greatest discovery, however, during this early voyage was the Pearly Nautilus in its living state. It was found on Aug 24th, 1829, floating in Marakini, or Dillon’s Bay, Island of Erromango in the New Hebrides group. (See Bennett’s Gatherings of a Naturalist.) He sent this unique specimen to his friend Richard Owen, at that time assistant to William Clift at the Royal College of Surgeons’ Museum, and thus enabled Owen to write his brilliant description of it which was published in 1832. During this early expedition he visited and described several islands in the New Hebrides group. The child Elau, a native of Erromango, was brought home by the expedition in 1831, and was the first of her race to appear in England. She died at Plymouth in 1834. Other islands visited by him were the Philippines and the Caroline Group, Tahiti and the Sandwich Islands. He published in the Asiatic Journal an account of the Polynesian dialects and of the practice of medicine among the New Zealanders and other Polynesians. He revisited New South Wales in 1832 to study the natural history of the Colony, especially the habits and anatomy of the Ornithorhyncus. Many descriptions of the animal occur in some thirty letters which he wrote to Owen. They are preserved in the College (Owen Collection). In one letter he tells of two specimens brought by him to Sydney from the interior, whence they were with difficulty conveyed some two hundred miles on horseback. One has died, but the other is running about the room as he writes. These familiar letters are most interesting as showing the manner in which Owen obtained his specimens. The letters date from 1833 to 1840, and some are written from ship-board in the Indian Ocean when he was using the drag-net. Bennett visited Java, Sumatra, Singapore, and China after leaving Australia, and embodied his observations in his well-known work, The Wanderings of a Naturalist in New South Wales, Batavia, Pedir Coast, Singapore and China, published in two volumes by Bentley in 1834. In this and in his Gatherings of a Naturalist is much for which we look in vain in the letters to Owen. Bennett sent numbers of specimens to the College in 1833 (see “Minutes of the Board of Curators”). His donations amounted to some five hundred. In the year 1834 the Royal College of Surgeons awarded him the Honorary Gold Medal for his discovery of the Pearly Nautilus and for preparations illustrating the developmental history of the Kangaroo and Ornithorhyncus. In 1832 he was elected a Corresponding Member of the Zoological Society of London, and was the first to present to the Society’s collections a living specimen of the Mooruk or Morrup (Casuarius Bennettii or Bennett’s Cassowary), from New Britain, in 1857-1858, and specimens of the Kagu (Rhinochetus jubatus) from New Caledonia (1862-1863), the Tooth-billed Pigeon, or Little Dodo (Didunculus strigirostris) (1864), Eyton’s Tree Duck (Dendrocygna Eytoni) (1867), the New Caledonia Rail, the Wood Hen Rail from Lord Howe’s Island, and the Yellow Bellied Phalanger. He also presented specimens of the Ursine Dasyure or Tasmanian Devil, and the Australian Bustard (1859-1867). The Zoological Society awarded him its Silver Medal on May 7th, 1862. Bennett settled in New South Wales after 1834, and began to practise in Sydney in 1836 in order to add to the income (£100 per annum) derived from the Secretaryship of the Australian Museum Committee, to which he was appointed by the Secretary of State for the Colonies on the advice of the President of the Royal College of Surgeons and other College authorities. He continued constantly on the alert for fresh discoveries in natural science, and his liberality and energy in procuring new objects in order to make them known to the world, were frequently and widely recognized. In 1835, soon after reaching Sydney, he was appointed by Government to report upon the epidemic catarrh of sheep, which was very prevalent in the Colony and which threatened its wealth and resources. He pronounced it to be influenza. His findings, to which he refers in a letter to Owen, were published by Government after careful investigation. His connection with the Australian Museum was a long one. He was its first Secretary. In January, 1836, he writes to Owen to say that it is “arranged, classified and contains about 320 specimens”. He published a catalogue in 1837, and resigned in 1841, but, when this famous institution was incorporated in 1853, he was appointed a trustee and remained so for more than twenty years. He was active in establishing the Sydney School of Arts (1838-1850), and worked hard both as a Lecturer on Zoology and on the Committee, being Vice-President for many years. He allowed himself a respite from his many labours in 1859, and made a long European tour. When in London he published his best-known book Gatherings of a Naturalist (1860). It is a store-house of facts as to the natural and general history of Australia. He was appointed an Associate and a Member of the Committee of the Biological Section of the British Association (Aberdeen) in 1859, and held the same positions at the Oxford (1860) and Plymouth (1877) Meetings. He was elected a Member of the Board of Examiners in the Faculty of Medicine in the University of Sydney in 1856, and three years later Professor Harvey dedicated to him Volume II of his Phytologia Australica. In 1860 he was appointed a Member of the Imperial Australian Zoological and Botanical Society. An Acclimatization Society having been formed in Sydney in 1861, he delivered a lecture on “Acclimatization and its Adaptation to Australia”, which was afterwards published by the Melbourne Acclimatization Society and largely distributed in Sydney. He was Hon Secretary of the Sydney Acclimatization Society from 1863-1871. At the end of his tenure of office a long correspondence was carried on with the Government of India on the subject of the cultivation of silk, and that portion of it which related to New South Wales was published by the Government (1870). Bennett also corresponded with Japan on the same subject, and was sent full information and a collection of choice eggs to found an Australian silk-worm industry. He became a member by election of the Imperial Society of Cherbourg in 1864 and a corresponding member of the Royal Society of Tasmania. In 1871 he began a search for fossil mammalia and reptilia and discovered many important new specimens in the Queensland drifts. Professor Owen published his letter on his journey and his mode of search in the Annals of Natural History 1872 (4th Ser., ix, 314-21). Bennett was awarded the Silver Medal of the Acclimatization Society of Victoria in 1873 in recognition of his services in their cause, and in 1874 he was appointed Hon Consulting Physician to St Vincent’s Hospital, Sydney. He took a trip to Europe in 1877, travelling via North America, and returned in 1879 via Bombay and Ceylon. During this visit he was elected Corresponding Member of the Literary and Philosophical Society of Liverpool, Hon Member of the Geographical Society of Rome, Fellow of the Royal Colonial Institute, and Hon Corresponding Secretary. He acted as Executive Commissioner representing the Ceylon Government at the Sydney International Exhibition (1879-1880), and in 1882 was elected President of the New South Wales Zoological Society. In 1888 he was elected President of the Natural History Association, and was re-elected in 1891, when the Society was re-named the Field Naturalists’ Society of New South Wales. In this year he presented a stained glass window to the Medical School of Sydney University. The Clarke Memorial Medal of the Royal Society (NSW), awarded “for Meritorious Contributions to the Geology, Mineralogy, or Natural History of Australia to men of science, whether resident in Australia or elsewhere”, was bestowed upon him in December, 1890, and the same year he bequeathed scientific works to the value of over £2000 to the Library of Sydney University. The gift included the valuable works of John Gould, with whom he had been much associated, and whom, with many other leading naturalists, such as Cumming, he often mentions in his letters. For the last ten years of his life Bennett took little active part in the work of his profession, though he continued to act as Co-examiner in Materia Medica and Therapeutics at the University, subjects in which he had always been greatly interested. His mental faculties remained remarkably clear to the close of his long life, and he died, full of honours – in fact, the Patriarch of Colonial Science – on Sept 29th, 1893, at his residence, 167 William Street, Sydney. He was then within four months of being a nonogenarian. He was buried in the Monumental Division of the Church of England Cemetery at the Rookwood Necropolis, Sydney, where his widow erected a handsome memorial. There is a fine photograph of George Bennett in the Council Album, which is reproduced in the Australasian Medical Gazette. There is an early photograph of him by Maull and Polyblank in the College Collection. Bennett’s name is remembered by Zoologists and others at every turn. “Bennett’s Wallaby” (Dendrolagus Bennettianus) is the Queensland Tree Kangaroo which he was the first to discover. It is figured in the Cambridge Natural History. Birds named after him are the Casuarius Bennettii, or Moruk of New Britain and the Ægotholes Bennettii (Bennett’s Cross Toad, Castlereagh River), and Diporophoron Bennettii, a lizard, discovered by Sir George Gray in North-West Australia. The following have also been named after him by various naturalists, etc: – Phanerogams – Eupomatia Bennettii, Queensland; Flindersia Bennettiana, Queensland; Mucuna Bennettii, New Guinea; Ficus Bennettii, South Sea Island; Antiaris Bennettii, Tucopia, Fiji. Cryptogams – Claudea Bennettiana, Spectacle Island. Insecta – Eupholus Bennettii, New Guinea. Mollusca – Helix Bennettii, Ipswich, Queensland; Goniodorus Bennettii, Angas, Port Jackson. Finally, Richard Owen commemorated his friend by naming two paleontological specimens after him – Diprotodon Bennettii, from Mandoona, NSW, and Chlamydosaurus Bennettii, from Gowrie Station, Darling Downs. Publications:– Bennett wrote voluminously, and to reconstruct his bibliography, even approximately, is no easy matter. The following are indications only:– Papers, descriptive of his first expedition to the South Seas, in the Asiatic Jour., United Service Jour., Med. and Phys. Jour., Med. Gaz., Loudoun’s Mag. Nat. Hist., and other scientific journals. Observations on the Coniferous Trees of New Zealand in Lambert’s Description of the Genus Pinus, Feb 6th, 1832. “The Mode of preparing Heads among the New Zealanders.” – Roy. Inst. Jour., 1831, June. Papers in the Mirror, 1831, edit. Timbs, including the first published account, with engraving, of the monument of La Pérouse, at Botany, Sydney. Papers on several of the Polynesian Islands, viz., Rotuma, Tongatalu, and some of the New Hebrides, in United Service Jour., 1831. Papers on the Islands of Erromango and Tanna, New Hebrides, Asiatic Jour., 1831-2. An Account of Elau, a Malayan Papuan Child, Native of the Island of Erromango, one of the New Hebrides Group, Southern Pacific Ocean, 8vo, with photograph, privately printed, Sydney, n.d. Papers on Manilla and on the Pulowat Islands, and on the Polynesian Dialects, Asiatic Jour., 1831. A number of papers, including “Notes on the Karaka Tree and on the Tutu or Wine-Berry Tree, the Puredi, and other New Zealand plants”, with engravings by Vizetelley, Lond. Med. Gaz., 1831-2, ix and x. Extracts from “A Journal of Natural History”, from England to New South Wales, Batavia, Sumatra, Singapore, etc., and notes on the Practice of Medicine among the New Zealanders and others of the Polynesians. Papers on the Kava, and on other plants, and on the intermittent fever of Erromango in Med. Phys. Jour. 1832. Notes on the Island of Tahiti, 1831. Notes on the Sandwich Islands, 1831. “Botany of Tahiti.” – Loudoun’s Mag. Nat. Hist., 1832, v. “Notices on the Native Plants of the Island of Rotuna.” – Ibid. “An Account of the Ungka Ape of Sumatra.” – Ibid. 1832, v, 131. “An Account of the Sandalwood Tree, and Observations on some Plants of the Sandwich Islands.” – Ibid. The Wanderings of a Naturalist in New South Wales, Batavia, Pedir Coast, Singapore and China, 2 vols., 8vo, London, 1834. “Notes on the Natural History and Habits of the Ornithorhynchus Paradoxus.” – Proc. Zool. Soc., 1834, Part 2, 191; and Trans. Zool. Soc., 1835, i, 229. Report on the Epidemic Catarrh affecting Sheep, NSW Govt. publication, 1835. Catalogue of the Australian Museum, 1837. Papers on various subjects, Lit. News, 1837. Gatherings of a Naturalist in Australasia, 8vo, 8 col. plates, London, 1860. Acclimatization: its eminent Adaptation to Australia: a Lecture, 8vo, Melbourne, 1862. Selected portions of “Correspondence relating to the Cultivation of Silk in New South Wales”, published by Govt., Sydney, 1870. Series of illustrated articles on the results of an expedition to Queensland in search of fossil mammalia, etc., Sydney Mail, 1872; published as a Trip to Queensland in search of Fossils. “Notes on a Visit to Melbourne, Tasmania, and South Australia.” – Leisure Hour, 1879. Papers in the N.S.W. Med. Gaz., Australasian Med. Gaz., Zoological Proc. and Trans., Jour, of Botany, Gardener’s Chron., Sci. Gossip, Lancet, etc. Among the College Archives is the “General Account of Specimens of Comp. Anatomy and Natural History collected and presented to the Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons by George Bennett”, MS. dated May 17th, 1834.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000824
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Lowry, John Christopher (1942 - 2008)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2010-01-27
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000800-E000899
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373008373008
Occupation Oral and maxillofacial surgeon
Details John Lowry was a distinguished consultant oral and maxillofacial surgeon. He was born on 6 June 1942 in Timperley, Cheshire, the son of Leslie and Betty Lowry. From Altrincham Grammar School, Cheshire, he went to the University of Manchester Turner Dental School and qualified BDS in 1963. He was a house surgeon and then a senior house officer at the Turner Dental School, before becoming a senior house officer in oral surgery at the Manchester Royal Infirmary in 1965 and then a registrar at the regional plastic and maxillofacial unit, Bradford and Wakefield Hospitals. In 1966 he entered Manchester Medical School and qualified MB ChB in 1970. He then undertook his pre-registration year in the University Hospital of South Manchester, followed by a senior house officer surgical rotation from which he passed the FRCS Edinburgh in 1985. He then did four years as a senior registrar in oral and maxillofacial surgery in the Manchester Area Health Authority, rotating through all the major hospitals in Manchester, winning a Leverhulme travelling fellowship in Europe which enabled him to work with Wunderer in Vienna, Hugo Obwegeser in Zurich and Paul Tessier in Paris. Throughout these years, John worked as an associate in general dental practice. In 1976, he was appointed as a consultant in oral and maxillofacial surgery to the Royal Bolton Hospital and from there he launched a remarkable career. He received many honorary degrees and qualifications, including honorary fellowships in dental surgery from the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh, from the American Association of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgeons, the Royal College of Surgeons of England, the Faculty of General Dental Practice and the Royal College of Anaesthetists – a rare accolade for a surgeon. Posthumously he was made an honorary fellow of Manchester Medical Society, having been its past president and treasurer. He was president of the British Association of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgeons in 2000 and dean of the Faculty of Dental Surgery of the Royal College of Surgeons of England from 2001 to 2004. His many prizes included the Down surgical prize of the British Association of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgeons (2003), the John Tomes medal of the British Dental Association (2005) and the Colyer gold medal of the Faculty of Dental Surgery of our College (2006). In 2003 he was appointed CBE. From 1998 until his untimely death, John was secretary general of the European Association for Craniomaxillofacial Surgery. He was also chairman of the standing dental advisory committee to the secretary of state for health from 2000 to 2004. John was chairman of the British Academy of Cosmetic Practice and promoted the cosmetic surgery interface training group. The British Association of Aesthetic Plastic Surgeons (BAAPS) has established a memorial lecture known as the ‘Lowry lecture’ in his honour and his family attended the inaugural lecture at the BAAPS European Conference in Cardiff in September 2009. John published many articles and chapters in textbooks and edited many books and articles himself. He was a pioneer in telemedicine and produced many video and audio presentations. He sat on numerous scientific bodies and editorial boards and was a referee for many journals. He also gave invited lectures all over the world. In 2004 he was appointed as a visiting professor to the University of Central Lancashire and undertook many activities on its behalf. He was an honorary civilian consultant in postgraduate dental education to the Army in 2003. Throughout all his years as a consultant he remained an active clinician in all branches of oral and maxillofacial surgery. John was the most polite, unassuming and cheerful individual one could wish to meet. In his private life, John had many interests, including rallying and traditional jazz. In 1968 he married Valerie Joyce Smethurst. Their daughter, Michelle, is a dentist and their son, Johnny, is a TV film producer in Australia. John Lowry died on 29 September 2008. A memorial service was held by the College at St Clement Danes on 22 January 2009.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000825
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Hamer, John Drew (1936 - 2005)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Edwards, David Henry (1936 - 2008)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2010-01-27
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000800-E000899
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373010373010
Occupation Orthopaedic surgeon
Details David Edwards was a consultant orthopaedic surgeon in Stoke-on-Trent. He was born in Sutton on 27 July 1936, the son of Reginald William Edwards, a managing director, and Irene Bertha Grace née Coad. He was educated at King’s College School, Wimbledon, from which he won the Williams exhibition in natural sciences to Balliol College, Oxford. After qualifying, he did his house appointments at the Radcliffe Infirmary, where he was greatly influenced by A Elliot-Smith, J C Scott and R B Duthie. He went on to become a house surgeon at the Birmingham Accident Hospital and then a surgical registrar in Southampton and subsequently at the accident service at the Radcliffe Infirmary, where he became first assistant in 1971. He was appointed as a consultant orthopaedic surgeon to the North Staffs Royal Infirmary, Stoke-on-Trent, where he set up a children’s orthopaedic clinic and regularly visited schools for disabled children. In 1973 he was appointed as a senior clinical lecturer in the department of traumatic orthopaedic surgery at the University of Keele, where he helped to set up a chair in traumatic orthopaedics and was clinical director of the locomotor directorate across three hospital sites. He married Ann Gurney Bradley in 1966. They had one son, John (who became a consultant thoracic surgeon in Chesterfield), and one daughter. Among his many activities he was a national race officer for the Royal Yacht Association and was appointed as a licensed reader in the Diocese of Lichfield in 1978. He died on 14 July 2008 leaving his widow, Ann, two children and four grandchildren.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000827
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Wilkinson, Francis Owen Wharton (1924 - 2004)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by N Alan Green
Publication Date 2010-01-27
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000800-E000899
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373011373011
Occupation General surgeon
Details Francis Wilkinson was a consultant general surgeon with an interest in urology to the Macclesfield and District Group of Hospitals. He was born in Southampton on 29 November 1924, the son of the Reverend Charles Wilkinson, a Church of England priest, and Jane née Penny. He spent most of his early years in Dorset, and as an only child forged many friendships with local youngsters of his own age with whom he kept in touch throughout the years. Sent to Ravenscroft preparatory school at seven, he then entered Haileybury until it was time to proceed with his medical education. In his youth he was an active sportsman, playing rugby football and squash racquets. When at home in Dorset he ‘worked ferrets’, thus supplementing the family diet, but also helping to increase his own pocket money. He trained at the London Hospital and, before qualifying, first experienced “man’s inhumanity to man”. He was one of a group of students who were asked to go to Belgium for relief work after the Second World War. Instead, they were diverted to Belsen, which had been liberated by the American Army. His abiding memory was the appalling smell that he was always able to recall with horror. After qualifying, he completed several house appointments at the London Hospital and at Wanstead Hospital, where he was a casualty officer. He then entered the Royal Navy for National Service, serving as a surgeon-lieutenant on HMS Mauritius during the Korean War. Francis Wilkinson decided on a surgical career and, after passing the FRCS, he undertook a registrar post with a urological bias in Preston. His higher surgical training was centred on Manchester, where he became an assistant to Michael Boyd on the professorial unit, and was seconded to Salford Royal Infirmary to continue his senior registrar training. In his academic post he researched and published on gastric function before and after portosystemic anastomosis and also idiopathic megacolon. At a later date, his interest in urology led him to do some clinical research on cryosurgery of the prostate gland. He helped the Spembly Company produce the prototype of a cryosurgical apparatus, a rather cumbersome model that eventually led to a larger and more-effective multi-purpose machine. When established in his consultant post, relaxation came from sailing and field sports, including pheasant and partridge shooting, red deer hunting and salmon fishing in Scotland. An animal lover, he enjoyed working with spaniels when out shooting and supported his children’s interests in pets, ranging from horses to snakes. Francis was fond of good food and wine, and enjoyed cooking. This led him to go on several ‘cordon bleu’ courses, much to the benefit of his family and friends. He was a member of the Royal Society of Medicine, and enjoyed the winter skiing meetings of the section of urology. He regularly attended the British Association of Urological Surgeons (BAUS) annual meetings and those of the Manchester Medical Society. Francis enjoyed travel and was able to visit India and Sri Lanka, finding the latter country had changed little since his naval days. He loved the Greek island of Paxos, where he bought a villa and where locals fondly nicknamed him ‘Benny Hill’. For over a quarter of a century he gave informal ‘consultations’, always rewarded by a bottle of ouzo or olive oil, or both. His workload was heavy and when he retired from surgical practice he was replaced by a full-time general surgeon and a urologist. Francis Wilkinson married twice. He married Dorothy Howard in 1952, by whom he had four children – Oonagh Jane, who works in NHS bed management, Roger Geoffrey, who inherited his father’s love of sailing and builds boats, Dorothy Ann, an air hostess, and Annesley Charles, who is an architect and works in Singapore. In 1972, he married Anthea Cameron, with whom he spent 32 happy years. They had a family of two – (Anthea) Keri Jane, who is retail buyer, and Colin Francis, a disc jockey and music maker. Francis Wilkinson died on 30 May 2004 following a stroke. He is survived by his wife, Anthea, his children, and two grandsons, Daniel and Philip Griffiths. A funeral service was held at St Oswald’s Church, Hollington, attended by his family and many friends and was followed by a private cremation.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000828
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Peters, Lenrie Leopold Wilfrid (1932 - 2009)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2010-01-27
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000800-E000899
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373012373012
Occupation General surgeon Poet
Details Lenrie Peters was a distinguished poet and surgeon. He was born in Bathurst (now Banjul), the capital of Gambia. Both his parents, Kezia and Lenrie Peters, had emigrated from Sierra Leone. His father, Lenrie, was editor of the Gambia Echo. His mother Kezia had been brought up in England. Of Lenrie’s four sisters, Bijou became a journalist, Florence, a historian, Ruby, a UN administrator, and Alaba, a movie director. He was educated at the Methodist High School in Bathurst and the Prince of Wales School in Freetown, Sierra Leone, from which he entered Trinity College, Cambridge, where he was elected president of the African Students’ Union. He then went for his clinical training to University College Hospital and qualified in 1959, during which time he was also working for the BBC Africa Programme. After qualifying, Lenrie Peters did junior posts in Guildford and, after passing the FRCS, returned to Banjul in 1969 as surgeon to the government Bansang Hospital. Two years later, in partnership with Samuel J Palmer, he opened the Westfield Clinic, Gambia’s first private hospital. He began to write novels and poetry as an undergraduate. His first collection of poetry was published in Ibadan in 1964, and his first novel *The second round* (London, Heinemann) in London in 1965. His 1981 poetry collection was published to widespread acclaim, despite his criticism of his fellow-countrymen. He played an active part in politics, working for the National Consultative Committee which worked for the reestablishment of constitutional democracy. In addition to his writing and his surgical practice, Peters ran Farato Farms Export Ltd, a company that exported potatoes and mangoes to the United Kingdom. He was a fellow of the West African and the International Colleges of Surgeons, Officer of the Republic of Gambia, and in 1995 nominated as the Gambia News and Report man of the year. He was president of the Historic Commission of Monuments of The Gambia and on the board of directors of the National Library of The Gambia. He married Rosemary and was divorced in 1965. He died in Dakar, Senegal, on 27 May 2009 aged 76.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000829
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Cormick, William (1820 - 1877)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-07-21
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001200-E001299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373459373459
Occupation General surgeon
Details Educated at University College, London. He went to Persia, where he was Physician to the Crown Prince, and died at Tabriz on December 30th, 1877.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001276
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Cornelius, James Connor (1807 - 1876)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-07-21
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001200-E001299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373460373460
Occupation General surgeon
Details Educated at University College and St George's Hospital, and practised in Canonbury, where he was vaccinator to St Mary's, Islington, and Medical Referee to the Age Assurance Society. He died at his residence, 21 Compton Road, Canonbury Square, on February 20th, 1876.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001277
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Cornish, Charles Henry (1807 - 1887)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Cornish, William Robert (1828 - 1897)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-08-19
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001200-E001299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373462373462
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born at Corvill, Butleigh, Somersetshire, in September, 1828, son of William Cornish, and was educated at St George's Hospital, where he obtained the William Brown Scholarship and the Benjamin Brodie Gold Medal for Clinical Surgery. After acting for some time as House Surgeon at the Royal Sea-Bathing Infirmary, Margate, he gained, on April 1st, 1854, after competition, an appointment in the medical service of the East India Company which that body had offered to St George's Hospital. He was posted to the Madras Presidency as Assistant Surgeon in 1854, and proceeded in charge of troops in the Roxburgh Castle. During the first four years of his service he held various civil and military charges, and in 1858 was selected to act as Secretary to the Inspector-General of Hospitals. In addition to his official duties he edited the *Madras Quarterly Journal of Medical Science*, and wrote papers on the treatment of dysentery by large doses of ipecacuanha, on enteric fever in India, on prison dietaries, and on cholera in Madras. He was a member of an important Commission for the reorganization of medical establishments in India in 1865-1866, was Secretary to the Medical Fund from 1864-1870, and in 1870 was appointed first Sanitary Commissioner for the Madras Presidency. In 1871 he drew up the Census Report of the Madras Presidency. In 1877 an immense amount of labour and responsibility devolved upon him in connection with the famine of that year. Sir Richard Temple was sent by the Government of India as Famine Delegate, and advocated a ration which Surgeon General Cornish, from his professional knowledge, considered inadequate for the starving natives. He contended that the Government ration doled out was insufficient properly to support life, and that thereby lives were unnecessarily sacrificed. A long discussion took place between Sir Richard Temple and Surgeon General Cornish, the latter being heartily supported by the Lancet and the press generally. Eventually the authorities had to give way, the diet recommended by Surgeon General Cornish was adopted, and the slow-starvation ration stopped. Further loss of life was thus checked. During this trying period Cornish was strongly supported by the Duke of Buckingham at the head of the Government of Madras. After saving countless lives he received the modest reward of the CIE. In 1880 he was appointed Surgeon General over the heads of many seniors, and retired in April, 1885. He served as member of the Madras Legislative Council from 1888-1885, and in this capacity materially assisted in the framing of the Local Government Bill for the Presidency and in compiling the Famine Code, which has since proved of such service to India. Returning to England, Cornish lived a quietly active life almost to the last. He was appointed Hon Physician to the Queen, and busied himself as a Governor of St George's Hospital. He was a member of the Council of the British Medical Association, of the British Institute of Preventive Medicine, the Sanitary Assurance Association, and attended councils regularly, his advice in matters of tropical hygiene being much sought after. The British Institute of Preventive Medicine had been amalgamated with the College of State Medicine, of which body he was originally Hon Secretary and Treasurer, and he passed from the Council of the College to that of the Institute. He died at his residence - Corvill, Shelley Road, Worthing - on October 19th, 1897, and was buried in Heene Cemetery, Somerset. He married the youngest daughter of Dr George Yeates Hunter, of Margate. His only son, Captain William Hunter Cornish, Assistant Secretary to the Government of India, died at Simla. Lieut-Colonel Crawford gives his promotions as follows: - Assistant Surgeon, Madras (April 1st, 1856), nominated by W H C Plowden, gained Commission as a prize at St George's Hospital; Surgeon (April 1st, 1866); Surgeon Major (July 1st, 1873); Brig-Surgeon (November 1st, 1879); Surgeon General (April 5th, 1880); retired on June 1st, 1885. Never held rank of Deputy Inspector-General, being promoted direct to Surgeon General at the reorganization of 1880. Good Service Pension, Nov 18th, 1885. Publications: *Reports on the Nature of the Food of the Inhabitants of the Madras Presidency, and on the Dietaries of Prisoners in Lillah Jails. Compiled and arranged under the Orders of Government*, 8vo, Madras, 1863. *Report on Cholera in Southern India for the year* 1869, fol, with map, Madras, 1870. Madras Medical and Surgical Regulations, 1870. *Cholera in Southern India*. A record of the progress of cholera in 1870, and résumé of the records of former epidemic invasions of the Madras Presidency, 4 maps, Madras, 1871. *An Inquiry into the Circumstances attending the Outbreak of Cholera in H.M. 18th Hussars at Secunderabad in the month of May*, 1871, map, Madras, 1871. *Memorandum on the Movement of Cholera in Southern India*, 1869-72 : Appendix I, Observations on Professor Pettenkofer's theory of cholera; Appendix II. Observations on the level of subsoil water in selected stations in reference to cholera prevalence, fol, Madras, 1872, bound with Madras Rep San Com, 1871. *Report on the Census of the Madras Presidency*, 1871, with Appendix containing the results of the census arranged in standard forms prescribed by the Government of India: and Supplementary Tables by W R Cornish, 2 vols, fol, Madras, 1874. *A Reply to Sir Richard Temple's Minutes of the 7th and 14th March as to the Sufficiency of a Pound of Grain as the Basis of Famine Wages*, fol, Lawrence Asylum Press, 1877. *The Origin and Diffusion of Cholera*, 8vo, London, 1892.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001279
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Bush, John Dearden ( - 1929)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Buszard, Frank (1839 - 1913)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2010-11-11
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001000-E001099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373275373275
Occupation General surgeon
Details The second son of Dr Marston Buszard, of Lutterworth, who there enjoyed a large practice and was himself the son of a medical man. Frank Buszard entered Rugby School on April 1st, 1854, and received his professional training at Guy's Hospital, where his career was brilliant. It was probably owing to the fact that Buszard entered Guy's in the same year as Hilton Fagge that he missed a chance of getting on to the Staff. At the London University he ran close behind Fagge, who had a phenomenal record. At the 1st MB he was placed third in three of the subjects out of four in honours; at the 2nd MB he was placed third in honours in surgery, and besides gained honours in the three other subjects-medicine, physiology, and midwifery. Buszard became House Surgeon at Guy's Hospital and was regarded by Sir William Gull as one of his most distinguished pupils. From Gull, Buszard probably learnt much of that tact and judgement in treating patients which stood him in such good stead throughout his career. After leaving Guy's, Buszard was elected House Surgeon to the Northampton Infirmary, as it was then named. During the seven years of his tenure of office he enjoyed a reputation for sound work and was almost worshipped by his pupils (of whom there were generally two or more) for the thorough methods of his coaching. He became endeared not only to these practitioners of the future, but also to his patients, and built up a great local reputation. He began to practise in the town as soon as he resigned the House Surgeoncy, but it was eight years before a vacancy occurred on the Hospital Staff and he was elected Surgeon in succession to James Mash (qv). In two years' time he gave up surgery, to the surprise of his friends, and was appointed Physician in succession to Dayrell J T Francis, MD. The latter had been very successful, and it was at first doubted whether a surgeon could fitly take his place, but in the end Buszard was even more sought after than his predecessor had been. His fame locally was great, and in his time he must have been called into consultation to almost every county family, whilst he always kept himself well abreast of all fresh ideas in diagnosis and treatment. His professional brethren for years recognized him as their leader, and called him in for all cases of doubt or difficulty. In the sphere of medical politics Buszard took up a bold position in defence of the just rights and interests of the profession. He was President of the South Midland Branch of the British Medical Association, first Chairman of the Northants Division, and was elected Chairman of the Northampton Medical Committee formed in connection with the Insurance Act. He was Consulting Surgeon to the Market Harborough Dispensary and Physician to the Northampton General Hospital at the time of his death. On his retirement in March, 1912, after fifty years' service to this institution, some two hundred admirers, headed by the Marquis of Northampton, presented him with two portraits of himself by Mr Harris Brown, of which one was retained by the hospital while the other went to his family. Buszard delivered an eloquent speech of thanks in which he reviewed the great progress made in hospital management during his career. Characteristically he did not mention his share-an important one-in the improvement of the Northampton Infirmary. He touched life at many points. A fluent speaker and capable debater, he would have shone in Parliament or at the Bar. He was anxious that medical men should take their share in public life, and always encouraged his younger colleagues in their efforts to do so. From 1881 onwards, for nearly twenty years, he was an Alderman of the Borough, and for the greater part of that period rendered valuable service as Chairman of the Public Health Committee in eradicating the Northampton slums and improving the health of the people. When he left the Town Council his colleague, Dr R A Milligan, declared it lost its most distinguished member. He was an ardent Conservative leader of the Unionists in his own town, a strong partisan, whose keen verbal thrusts were appreciated by his opponents at many meetings. For years he read the Sunday evening lessons at Dallington Church, of which he was Churchwarden. Tall and commanding of presence as well as kindly in manner, he inspired his patients with confidence. He was devoted to outdoor sport and was a fine cricketer and lawn-tennis player, till compelled by the onset of rheumatoid arthritis to become a mere onlooker. He retired finally from medical work in June, 1913, and died at Dallington, Northampton, on Sunday, October 14th, 1913, survived by his widow, two daughters, and one son. Buszard's elder brother, Marston Clarke Buszard, KC, was Recorder of Leicester and leader of the Midland Circuit.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001092
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Butler, Cornelius (1789 - 1871)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Butler, Frederick John (1819 - 1882)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Martin, Kenneth Whittle (1917 - 2009)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Sir Barry Jackson
Publication Date 2010-06-10 2018-05-10
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001000-E001099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373195373195
Occupation General surgeon
Details Kenneth Whittle Martin, known as 'Poppy' to his family, was a general surgeon in Worthing with an interest in urology. He came from a long line of doctors dating back to at least 1774. He was born on 18 July 1917 in Singapore, the son of William Whittle Martin, an army ENT surgeon, and his wife Katie, née Partington, the daughter of a mill owner. When aged three, his family moved from the Far East to Hove in Sussex, a county in which he lived for almost all of the rest of his life. He attended Mowden School in Hove and then Charterhouse, where he was a senior scholar and captain of cricket. Following the family tradition, he decided to read medicine and went to St Thomas' Hospital Medical School, armed with a shilling a day pocket money given to him by his mother. Qualifying in 1940, he was house surgeon to W H C 'Hugo' Romanis and Norman 'Pasty' Barrett, before enlisting in the Royal Navy and serving as a surgeon lieutenant from 1941 to 1946. During his war service he served in hospitals at home and in the Indian Ocean on HMS *Fortune* and in the Far East on HMS *Duke of York*. Three years before his death he wrote an account of his wartime experiences in a privately published book entitled *Poppy's war*. After demobilisation, he returned to St Thomas' as a surgical registrar, during which time he passed the FRCS examination. He was then appointed as a resident assistant surgeon, a particularly busy post but one which gave him extensive operative experience. In 1954 he was appointed as a consultant surgeon at Worthing Hospital, allowing him to return to his Sussex roots, and he remained on the staff of that hospital for 28 years, retiring at the age of 65 in 1982. Although he practised a wide range of general surgery, he developed a particular interest in urology and had an enviable local reputation as *the* waterworks specialist. In retirement he enjoyed fishing and bridge and developed considerable expertise in investment management. He founded the Bosham Investment Club and became adept at tracking the movement of stocks and shares by complicated graphs on his computer. He also enjoyed overseas travel, both with his family and as a longstanding member of the Grey Turner Travelling Surgical Club. Ken married Daphne Esplin Stewart in 1941 and they had two sons and two daughters. He and Daphne were inseparable throughout their 68 years of marriage. Both were notably somewhat non-conformist and idiosyncratic. On one occasion Ken was asked to look after a leg which a colleague had amputated when the hospital incinerator was closed. He put the leg in the boot of his car and drove to a secluded area of the beach where he threw the limb into the sea, resulting in a police investigation after it was later washed up on the beach. He was wonderful company, being a fund of stories and good humour. Apart from increasing deafness, he retained good health throughout his long life until he died of old age on 22 July 2009, four days after his 92nd birthday.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001012
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Butler, Henry ( - 1885)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Butler, James Henry (1813 - 1865)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Byass, Thomas Spry (1807 - 1890)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Byerley, Isaac ( - 1896)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Bynoe, Benjamin (1803 - 1865)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2010-11-11 2018-07-04
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001000-E001099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373282373282
Occupation Botanist General surgeon Naturalist Naval surgeon
Details Entered the Royal Navy and retired with the rank of Staff Surgeon. He died at Old Kent Road, SE, on November 15th, 1865. See below for an expanded version of the published obituary uploaded 4 July 2018: Benjamin Bynoe was a Royal Navy surgeon, botanist and naturalist who served aboard the *Beagle* during Charles Darwin's epic five-year voyage. He was born in Barbados on 25 July 1803, the son of Samuel and Elizabeth Bynoe, and was baptised on 26 December 1803 at Christ Church, Barbados. There are no records of his medical education, but on 20 May 1825 he became a member of the Royal College of Surgeons and on 26 September 1825 joined the Royal Navy as an assistant surgeon. He joined the maiden voyage of HMS *Beagle*, tasked with surveying the coasts of South America south of the Rio Plata. In July 1828, the ship's surgeon Evan Brown was invalided home and Bynoe was made acting surgeon in his place. The *Beagle* surveyed Patagonia, Tierra del Fuego and the channels adjoining the Straits of Magellan and the island of Chiloe. During the voyage, Bynoe collected geological and other specimens, and two landmarks were named after him - Cape Bynoe and Bynoe Island. By October 1830 the *Beagle* had returned to England and Bynoe was living on half-pay in the New Kent Road area, London. He studied through the winter and on 5 July 1831 passed his examination as a surgeon in the Royal Navy, but promotion was slow, and two days later he rejoined the *Beagle* with the rank of assistant surgeon, serving under the surgeon Robert McCormick. Also on board was Charles Darwin, then just 22, a guest of the captain, Robert FitzRoy. The rest of the year 1831 was spent preparing the ship for the voyage; Bynoe made sure the medical supplies included foods to prevent scurvy, including 'pickles, dried apples, and lemon juice - of the best quality'. On 27 December 1831, the *Beagle* set sail and passed via the Canaries to the Cape Verde Islands. Towards the end of April 1832, McCormick invalided himself home, disgruntled that Darwin had in effect been made the ship's naturalist, a role he assumed, as surgeon, was his own. Bynoe was made acting surgeon, in which role he continued for the rest of the long voyage. The ship sailed across the Atlantic and then coasted South America, visiting Bahia, Rio, Monte Video, Buenos Aires, Bahia Blanca and Teirra del Feugo. Bynoe found himself dealing with unknown fevers among the crew (probably yellow fever), together with the more familiar pulmonary tuberculosis. In the autumn of 1834, the *Beagle* had reached Valparaiso, Chile. After visiting Santiago and the Andes, Darwin became ill at the end of September; Bynoe attended him ashore for a month while the ship was being repaired and restocked with supplies. After further cruises off the Chilean coast, they reached Callao, the port of Lima, Peru, then headed to the Galapagos Islands, where Darwin made the observations which led to his theory of natural selection. For nine days Bynoe and Darwin were ashore with just three seamen with them, studying the rocks, lizards, tortoises and vegetation. The *Beagle* then sailed west to Polynesia, Tahiti and New Zealand, before heading home via Sydney, Keeling Island, Mauritius, the Cape, St Helena, Brazil and then the Azores and home, setting anchor at Falmouth on 2 October 1836. Once again, Bynoe returned to London on half-pay. In December 1836, he married Charlotte Ollard and in the same month, after many years as an acting surgeon he was, on the recommendation of FitzRoy, officially confirmed in his post as surgeon. He rejoined the *Beagle*, this time commissioned to survey Australian waters. The ship left Plymouth in July 1837. After investigating western Australia, the *Beagle* continued eastwards, visiting Van Diemen's Land (Tasmania), Sydney and the Great Barrier Reef. They then turned south, to the Adelaide River and then north to the Timor Sea, where a bay in what is now the Northern Territory was named Bynoe Harbour. In August 1841, the ship was in the Gulf of Carpentaria in northern Australia, when one of the officers, Fitzmaurice, who was surveying onshore, was accidentally shot in the foot by a musket. Bynoe attended the injured man and saved his foot; the river Fitzmaurice had been investigating was named Bynoe River in his honour. During the voyage, Bynoe collected numerous specimens and wrote several papers, including one on marsupial gestation and on geological formations in Queensland. The ship eventually sailed back to England via Mauritius and Cape Verde, arriving back in 1843. In February 1844, he was appointed surgeon superintendent of the convict ship *Blundell*, which was sailing to Norfolk Island with prisoners from Millbank prison. The journal he wrote during the first part of the journey has survived, listing the case he treated, including patients with diarrhoea, rheumatism, an injured finger (which required amputation) and a case of pulmonary tuberculosis. On 26 August 1844, Bynoe was made a fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons. Bynoe left the *Blundell* in April 1845. His next appointment was on the *Lord Auckland*, another convict ship, this time bound for Hobart, which left England in March 1846. With him was his long-suffering wife; the couple may have been planning to emigrate to New South Wales. But in July, the ship landed in Simon's Bay, in southern Africa, so Bynoe, who was ill with pneumonia, could be transferred to Cape Town Hospital. Once he recovered, the Bynoes boarded the *Maria Soames* and returned back to England in October 1846. His next appointment was to Ireland, then facing serious famine after the failure of successive potato crops. At the end of February 1847, he was directed to go to Cork 'to aid in carrying out measures for the relief of the Distressed Irish'. A relief centre was set up at Belmullet, which Bynoe joined in April, to help with outbreaks of typhus and dysentery. But the promised medical supplies were slow to arrive and Bynoe himself became sick with dysentery. By September his appointment had ended and in October he was back in London and on half-pay. He then had two short appointments, to the *Ocean* and the *Ganges*, and then in February 1848, joined the *Wellington*, where he remained for nearly three years. He was subsequently appointed to the *Monarch*, on which he served until March 1851. In November 1851, he was appointed to the *Aboukir*, another prison vessel taking convicts to Van Diemen's Land. His journal of the voyage survives and describes treating a prisoner for advanced tuberculosis (and carrying out a post mortem), treating catarrh, constipation and diarrhoea, and directing that the woodwork of the living quarters be washed down with the antiseptic chloride of zinc. On 22 March 1852 Bynoe arrived in Hobart, and a few weeks later sailed homeward. After almost a year on half-pay in London, in the autumn of 1853 he was appointed to the *Madagascar*, a receiving ship at Rio, where he spent almost six gruelling years, returning on the *Industry* in the spring of 1859. In the autumn of 1860, Bynoe was promoted to staff surgeon, but was not appointed to any further voyages and on 23 January 1863 was placed on the retired list by the Admiralty. Benjamin Bynoe died in the Old Kent Road, London on 13 November 1865 and was buried at Norwood Cemetery, Lambeth. Despite taking part in several important surveying voyages, aiding Darwin with his ground-breaking work and collecting a large number of specimens in his own right, his name had been largely forgotten. Even during his lifetime, he arguably failed to get the credit he was due; only one species (of acacia) was named after him - *Acacia bynoeana*. But, perhaps just as importantly, he was remembered as a kind and caring surgeon by his colleagues and crew: Robert FitzRoy, his long-standing captain on board the *Beagle*, noted movingly of the 'affectionate kindness of Mr Bynoe…which…will never be forgotten by any of his shipmates'. Sarah Gillam
Resource Identifier RCS: E001099
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching MacCormac, Sir William (1836 - 1901)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-05-04 2012-03-13
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000200-E000299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372403372403
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born at Belfast on January 17th, 1836, the elder son of Henry MacCormac, a physician at Belfast, and Mary Newsham his wife. The younger son, John, became a director of the Northern Linen Company. His father gained notoriety in the North of Ireland as a strenuous advocate of the fresh-air treatment of phthisis. William was educated at the Belfast Royal Academical Institution and afterwards studied at Dublin and Paris. He entered Queen's College, Belfast, in October, 1851, as a student of engineering, and gained scholarships in engineering during his first and second years. He then turned aside to the arts course, graduated B.A. at the Queen's University in 1855, and proceeded M.A. in 1858. He won the senior scholarship in natural philosophy in 1856 and was admitted M.D. in the following year. The honorary degree of M.Ch. was conferred upon him in 1879, and the D.Sc. in 1882 with the Gold Medal of the University. The honorary degrees of M.D. and M.Ch. were also bestowed upon him by the University of Dublin in June, 1900. After graduation MacCormac studied surgery in Berlin, where he made lasting friendships with Langenbeck, Billroth, and von Esmarch. He practised in Belfast from 1864-1870, becoming successively Surgeon, Lecturer on Clinical Surgery, and Consulting Surgeon to the Belfast General Hospital. MacCormac volunteered for service on the outbreak of the Franco-Prussian War in 1870, undertook hospital duties at Metz, was treated as a spy and was returned to Paris. Here he joined the Anglo-American Association for the care of the wounded, and with others arrived at Sedan on the night of August 30th, 1870, bivouacking in the waiting-room at the station. MacCormac wandered up and down the platform until 2 am, when an engine with a single cattle-truck stopped and Napoleon III stepped out with two attendants. MacCormac followed the party and was the sole spectator of the Emperor's hardly gained admission to the town, which he left soon afterwards as a prisoner. The Battle of Sedan began at 4 a.m. on Sept. 1st, and during the first day more than a thousand soldiers were brought for treatment to the Caserne d'Asfeld, a deserted infantry barracks on the ramparts which MacCormac and his companions had hastily converted into a hospital of 384 beds. Some attempts were made to follow out the new Listerian methods, but for the most part the old rates of mortality prevailed. Returning to London at the end of the war, he settled at 13 Harley Street, where he died more than thirty years afterwards. MacCormac was admitted in 1871 to the rare distinction of an ad eundem Fellowship of the Royal College of Surgeons of England, and in February of the same year was elected, after a sharp contest, Assistant Surgeon to St. Thomas's Hospital, which had just moved to the new buildings on the Albert Embankment. He became full Surgeon in 1873 on the resignation of Frederic le Gros Clerk (q.v.) and lectured on surgery for twenty years. He was elected Consulting Surgeon to the hospital and Emeritus Lecturer on Clinical Surgery after resigning his active posts in 1893. In 1876 MacCormac was present at the Battle of Alexinatz as chief surgeon of the National Aid Society for the Sick and Wounded in the Turco-Servian Campaign. He contributed largely to the success of the brilliant Seventh International Congress of Medicine which was held in London in 1881, when he was General Secretary and Editor of the *Transactions*. For his services in this capacity he received the honour of knighthood on Dec. 7th, 1881. He was President of the Medical Society of London in 1880, and of the Metropolitan Branch of the British Medical Association in 1890. He was Surgeon to the French, Italian, Queen Charlotte's, and the British Lying-in Hospitals, and was an Examiner in Surgery at the University of London and for Her Majesty's Naval, Military, and Indian Medical Services. He was created a baronet in 1897, was appointed Surgeon-in-Ordinary to the Prince of Wales, afterwards King Edward VII, and was decorated K.C.V.O. on September 27th, 1898, in recognition of services rendered to the Prince when he injured his knee. At the Royal College of Surgeons MacCormac was elected a Member of the Council in 1883, and of the Court of Examiners in 1887. He served as President during the years 1896, 1897, 1898, 1899, and 1900, being specially re-elected on the last occasion that he might occupy the Chair at the centenary of the College. He delivered the Bradshaw Lecture in 1893, and was Hunterian Orator in 1899. War claimed him again in 1899-1900, when he was appointed Consulting Surgeon to the South African Field Force, and in this capacity visited military and civil hospitals in Cape Colony and Natal, going to the Front on four occasions. For these services he was created K.C.B. in 1901, and was gazetted Hon. Serjeant Surgeon to King Edward VII. He abducted and married in 1861 Katherine Maria, daughter and heiress of John Charters, of Belfast. She survived him, but there were no children of the marriage. He died at Bath on December 4th, 1901, and was buried at Kensal Green Cemetery. MacCormac was a strikingly handsome man, standing six feet two inches in height and being proportionally well built. He was soft-voiced, singularly courteous in manner, and apparently - but only apparently - inattentive to what was being said to him. His industry, mastery of detail, rapidity of work, and Irish bonhomie made him a first-rate organizer. He was as widely known on the Continent of Europe as he was in England and Ireland, and he did much to break down the insularity which militated so long against the progress of British surgery, for he learned and taught what was done at home and abroad. MacCormac was the best decorated practising surgeon of his generation. He was, in addition to the honours already mentioned, an Hon. Member of the Imperial Academy of St. Petersburg; an Hon. Fellow or Member of the Royal Academy of Medicine in Ireland, Paris, Brussels, Munich, and Rome; a Commander of the Legion of Honour; of the Orders of Dannebrog of Denmark, of the Crown of Italy, and the Takovo of Servia; of the Crown of Prussia, St. Iago of Portugal, North Star of Sweden, Ritter-Kreuz of Bavaria, Merit of Spain, and the Medjidie. An oil painting of MacCormac by H. Harris Brown was presented to Queen's University, Belfast, on March 9th, 1897. There are two oil paintings by the Russian painter, Prince Troubetskoi; the better of these was presented to the College on the death of Lady MacCormac in 1923. Another oil painting hangs in the Medical Committee Room at St. Thomas's Hospital. A marble bust by Alfred Drury, A.R.A., is in the Central Hall at St. Thomas's Hospital; a replica in white marble was presented to the College by subscribers in 1903. A caricature by 'Spy' in *Vanity Fair* in 1906 gives a good idea of MacCormac's height. PUBLICATIONS:- *Notes and Recollections of an Ambulance Surgeon, being an Account of Work done under the Red Cross during the Campaign of 1870*, London, 1871. This was translated into German by Professor Louis Stromeyer, Hanover, 1871, and into Italian by Dr. Eugenio Bellina, Florence, 1872. *Surgical Operations*, Part I, 1885; 2nd ed. 1891. Part II, 1889. *On Abdominal Section for the Treatment of Intraperitoneal Injury*, 1887; translated into German, Leipzig, 1888. The most noteworthy of his occasional publications is "Some Observations on Rupture of the Urinary Bladder, with an Account of Two Cases of Intraperitoneal Rupture Successfully Treated by Abdominal Section and Subsequent Suture of the Hernial Rent." - *Lancet*, 1886, ii, 1118. (The accident is uncommon, attracts little notice at the moment, and is followed by a latent period until fatal peritonitis sets in.) Recovery followed in both instances, the first on record so far as is known. *An Address of Welcome on the Occasion of the Centenary Festival of the Royal College of Surgeons of England,* 1900; with the biographical accounts, often with portraits, of the sixty-one Masters or Presidents. There are two issues of this work, which was presented to the distinguished delegates attending the Centenary Meeting - the first in July (220 pp.); the second, with additional matter and illustrations (232 pp.), at Christmas, 1900. MacCormac was materially helped in its preparation by Victor G. Plarr, M.A., Librarian of the College, and by D'Arcy Power, F.R.C.S. He also published an illustrated Souvenir of the Centenary of the Royal College of Surgeons of England, 4to, London, November, 1900.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000216
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Davies, Peter ( - 2007)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Tina Craig
Publication Date 2011-11-10 2014-03-10
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001500-E001599
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373735373735
Occupation General surgeon
Details Peter Davies was a general surgeon who practised in Belgium throughout his career. He qualified MB, BS from Manchester University in 1974 and passed the fellowship in 1980. In the 1998 Medical Register he is listed as living in the town of Overijuse in Belgium and his wife notified the College of his death on 14 August 2007.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001552
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Davies, Roger Stephen (1942 - 2007)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Sir Miles Irving
Publication Date 2011-11-10 2012-12-21
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001500-E001599
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373736373736
Occupation Orthopaedic surgeon
Details Roger Stephen Davies was a consultant orthopaedic surgeon in Wigan. He was born on 4 February 1942 in north Wales, the eldest son of T Davies, a general practitioner. His early years were spent in Mold. He and his two brothers were left fatherless when his father died prematurely from heart disease. This desperate situation was eased by the devotion of his mother and with the help of the Royal Medical Benevolent Fund, which supported all three boys with scholarships to Epsom College. Roger entered Liverpool Medical School and, following graduation, set upon a career in orthopaedics. As a student he had been a member of the Liverpool University Officer Training Corps attached to 12/13th Battalion of the Parachute Regiment. On qualification he became regimental medical officer of the battalion, a post which gave him great pleasure, as well as the enjoyable experience of jumping out of aeroplanes. In 1973 he gained the degree of master of orthopaedic surgery. He successfully completed his postgraduate training and obtained a consultant post at the Royal Albert Edward Infirmary, Wigan. He was considered to be an excellent general orthopaedic surgeon who was highly regarded by his colleagues. Unfortunately, Roger became dependent on alcohol and his health began to deteriorate. Eventually he had to retire from NHS practice on health grounds. It was to his great credit that he overcame his alcohol dependency and began a second career as an expert in disability tribunals and in providing medico-legal opinions. He married Alison, a nurse, and they had a son, James. He and his wife retired to a beautiful cottage in his beloved Wales. All went well until Alison died suddenly, leaving Roger heartbroken. He died soon after. Roger was a quiet, kindly person who cared deeply for his patients. He loved the Welsh borders, where he had been brought up, and he enjoyed climbing the mountains of his native country.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001553
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Davies, David Graham Leighton (1923 - 2006)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Sarah Gillam
Publication Date 2011-11-10 2015-06-19
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001500-E001599
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373737373737
Occupation General surgeon
Details David Graham Leighton Davies was a consultant general surgeon at East Glamorgan General Hospital, Pontypridd, and an honorary clinical tutor in surgery at the Welsh National School of Medicine. He studied in Cardiff, gaining a BSc degree with a distinction in anatomy, in 1943 and at Guy's Hospital Medical School. He qualified MB BS in 1946. Prior to his consultant appointment, he was a house surgeon and house physician at a Guy's Hospital unit based in Orpington and a senior registrar in surgery at the United Cardiff Hospitals. He also served as a surgeon commander in the Royal Naval Reserves and was awarded the Reserve Decoration (RD) in 1967. He was a tutor in surgery for the Royal College of Surgeons, and a fellow and former member of the council of the Association of Surgeons of Great Britain and Ireland. His widow Felicity informed the College of his death on 15 September 2006.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001554
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Cox, Simon James (1940 - 2009)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Sir Barry Jackson
Publication Date 2011-11-10 2012-09-13
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001500-E001599
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373738373738
Occupation General surgeon
Details Simon Cox was a sportsman, countryman, conversationalist and *bon viveur*, as well as a surgeon. He was the life and soul of any party and was known for his sunny personality, *joie de vivre* and compassion for patients. Born in Malaya, where his father died as a prisoner of war in Changi prison, Simon escaped with his mother back to England and settled in west Mersey. He attended Christ's Hospital School, where he excelled, both academically and in sport. He trained in medicine at St Thomas' Hospital Medical School, qualifying in 1965. As a student he played rugby, squash, croquet and the violin. He also rowed and sailed. His first house officer post was to John B Kinmonth on the surgical unit, and he then went to Watford General Hospital as house physician to Sir John Richardson. A demonstratorship in anatomy back at St Thomas' led to success in the primary fellowship, following which he was appointed registrar to Gordon Loosemore, again at Watford. After passing the final fellowship in 1970, he was appointed as a senior registrar on the St Thomas' circuit, working variously in Kingston Hospital, St Helier Hospital, Carshalton and St Thomas'. He received an all-round general surgical training, but had special experience in peripheral vascular surgery, a subspecialty which he developed at Watford, where he was appointed consultant in 1976. He developed a keen interest in country pursuits and was a frequent visitor to the Scottish highlands, a part of the country which he loved and where he developed a keen appreciation of the various malts. He continued his sailing interest and in 1979 sailed to Rio de Janeiro flying back home by Concorde - he said he didn't wish to be late for his clinic! He took up skiing at the age of 40 and became hugely proficient. Noted for a succession of fast sports cars, he also loved Formula 1 racing and was for a time a track doctor at Silverstone. He retired early at the age of 56 to live in Scotland on the banks of the Findhorn, a river which he had fished for many years. For several years he commuted to see private patients with breast disease at Bushey BUPA Hospital, but in 2003 he retired completely so that he could walk his labradors and his west highland terriers across the moor on a daily basis and devote himself to his beloved country life. In 1966 he married a St Thomas' nurse, Ruth Startin, and they had three children - Hermione, Richard and Nicola. They later divorced and he married for a second time, to Julie. He died in October 2009 of pancreatic cancer, a disease which he bore with fortitude.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001555
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Clark, George Ogilvie ( - 2007)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Tina Craig
Publication Date 2011-11-10 2013-09-30
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001500-E001599
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373739373739
Occupation ENT surgeon
Details George Ogilvie Clark was a consultant ENT surgeon to the Wolverhampton Area Health Authority and the Dudley Guest Hospital. He qualified in medicine in 1946 at Aberdeen University and held early appointments as ENT registrar at Dundee Royal Infirmary and senior ENT registrar at Aberdeen Royal Infirmary. Before taking the fellowship of the college in 1957, he passed the fellowship of the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh in 1953. In the RAMC he had served as a captain. He was living in Wolverhampton when he died on 11 November 2007 survived by his wife, Eileen N Clark.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001556
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Howse, Sir Henry Greenway (1841 - 1914)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-05-04 2012-03-22
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000200-E000299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372404372404
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born at Lyncombe Hall, Lyncombe Vale, Bath, on Dec. 21st, 1841. His father was a landowner and an ardent Unitarian, acting sometimes as a lay preacher. His mother, Isabella Weald, daughter of a London merchant, was married at St. Saviour's, Southwark, now Southwark Cathedral, close to Guy's Hospital. His parents removed to Frenchay, near Bristol, and during boyhood Howse was educated irregularly at home until he entered University College School, London, in 1855. His father had meanwhile moved to Reading, and on leaving school at 16 Howse was apprenticed to J. W. Workman at Reading. In 1859 he passed the Matriculation examination with honours in chemistry, and entered Guy's Hospital in October, 1861. In 1863 he passed the Preliminary Scientific Examination with the Exhibition in Biology. At the 1st M.B. Examination in 1864 he took the Exhibition and Gold Medal in Physiology, Histology, and Comparative Anatomy, and Honours in Anatomy. In 1866 Howse passed the final M.B. with Honours in Medicine and Forensic Medicine and the Gold Medal in Midwifery. In 1867 he passed the B.S. Examination with the Scholarship and Gold Medal, and the M.S. in 1868, qualifying for the Medal, but coming second to Marcus Beck (q.v.). He was dresser to John Hilton, House Surgeon in 1867, Demonstrator of Anatomy in 1868, to which he added for the first time a class in histology. He became Joint Lecturer on Anatomy in 1871 and Lecturer on Surgery in 1888. He was appointed Assistant Surgeon to Guy's Hospital in 1870, and acted as full Surgeon from 1875 until 1901, when he became Consulting Surgeon. In addition to teaching histology Howse improved the methods of injecting cadavers for dissection, using glycerin preliminary to the injection with red wax. From 1874-1883 he was editor of the *Guy's Hospital Reports*, looking after the finance as well as the literary contributions. His full knowledge of anatomy and surgery made him a successful teacher, and he kept the attention of his class by constantly asking questions. He was naturally cautious and deliberate, constitutionally fitted to adopt the methods of Listerism which he had learnt directly by a visit to Lister in Edinburgh. So fortified, he practised freely the excision of tuberculous joints in children. It was common for him to have four to six cases of excision of the knee under him at one time; he superintended the dressing of each case himself. The Evelina Hospital for Sick children opened in 1869, and Howse was appointed Surgeon in 1871; thus he obtained more material of the same kind. From the point of view of mortality his results were splendid; as to the usefulness of the limbs there was more criticism. His results were not well known outside Guy's Hospital until his publication of "130 Cases of Excision of the Knee" in the *Guy's Hospital Reports* (1892, xlix) with an analysis by Newton Pitt occupying 106 pages. He made a striking advance by raising gastrostomy to a relatively safe operation when carried out in two stages; for a time his method was universally adopted. The drawback that, on penetrating the gastric wall and inserting a tube, the stomach might become detached led to his procedure being modified. It had become practicable to operate on varicose veins under Listerian methods without danger from septic thrombosis and pyæmia. Howse introduced the operation into regular practice. He also operated successfully for ovarian cysts and on a case of intussusception in an adult. At the Truss Society, where he was Surgeon, he was conservative as to the radical methods of treating hernia. At the Royal College of Surgeons Howse was appointed on the Board of Examiners in Anatomy and Physiology in 1883, on the Court of Examiners he served from 1887-1897. He was elected to the Council in 1889, was re-elected in 1897 until 1905. He was Vice-President from 1897-1900, and President from 1901-1903, in succession to Sir William MacCormac, and was succeeded by Sir John Tweedy. It was during his Presidency that he was knighted in 1902, and the D.Sc. (Hon.) Victoria University was conferred on him. He was Bradshaw Lecturer in 1899, and Hunterian Orator in 1903. At the University of London he was Examiner in Surgery, and later the representative of the College of Surgeons on the Senate under the older conditions. He was also interested in the higher education of women and sat on the Council of Bedford College. Living close to Guy's Hospital for twenty-five years, in St. Thomas's Street, he was in and out of the building most frequently; in the country he devoted himself to gardening; his holiday was occupied with Alpine climbing. In 1887, having married, he moved to 59 Brook Street until 1903, when he retired to Tower House, Cudham, Kent, situated on high ground over against Darwin's house at Downe. He married Alice, youngest daughter of the Rev. T. Lethbridge Marshall, and had three daughters and one son. In retirement he suffered from osteo-arthritis and kept much at home, gardening and caring for his poultry. He shrank in stature, had intense pain, became exhausted, and died on Sept. 15th, 1914. He was buried at St. Luke's Cemetery, near Bromley. He had followed his father as a Unitarian and attended Stopford Brooke's Chapel. There is a portrait in oils by Lance Calkin in the Court Room of Guy's Hospital, painted in 1903 when he was aged 63.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000217
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Tweedy, Sir John (1849 - 1924)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-05-11 2012-03-09
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000200-E000299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372405372405
Occupation Ophthalmic surgeon
Details Born at Stockton-on-Tees, the son of John Tweedy, a solicitor. He was educated at Elmfield College, York, and at University College, London, from which he went to University College Hospital for his medical course. He qualified in 1872, and in 1873 became a Clinical Assistant at the Royal London Ophthalmic Hospital, Moorfields, thus beginning a long and distinguished association with that institution. Tweedy was never a robust man, and always suffered from an embarrassment of respiration, a wheeziness, the nature of which was obscure. It is said that his frail physique determined Tweedy not to attempt the career of general surgery and led him to become an ophthalmic surgeon. In this line he soon showed himself something above the ordinary, by his work, his early publications and his wide interest in the whole field of medicine. At Moorfields he was appointed Assistant Surgeon in 1877 on the resignation of Sir Jonathan Hutchinson (q.v.), Surgeon in 1878, Consulting Surgeon in 1900, when he was placed upon the Committee of Management in recognition of the "numerous occasions he had pleaded the cause of the Hospital in powerful and most interesting public addresses, endorsing his advocacy with liberal donations to its funds". He was likewise appointed Ophthalmic Surgeon to the Great Northern Hospital in 1878, Assistant Ophthalmic Surgeon to University College Hospital in 1881, and Professor of Ophthalmic Medicine and Surgery in University College. In addition to his professional work, Tweedy was interested in music, politics, books, history, and journalism. He was the editor of the "Mirror of Hospital Practice" in the *Lancet* and became the close friend of Dr. James Wakley, the editor of that journal, for which he was a constant leader-writer. The centenary number of the *Lancet* speaks of his being offered the editorship and refusing it. It is said that he was largely responsible for the utterance of the editorial views of the *Lancet* on the constitution of the Royal College of Surgeons, and it was as a reformer that Tweedy stood for and was elected to a seat on the Council in 1892. Here, however, he expressed moderate views and gained for himself the warm friendship and hearty co-operation of the leaders of the medical profession, so much so that in 1903 he was elected President of the College, and retained office for three years, being succeeded in 1906 by Sir Henry Morris (q.v.); in his final year as President (1906) he received the honour of knighthood. Tweedy was the first surgeon practising purely as an ophthalmologist to obtain the presidency of the College, and during his term of office he gave the presidential badge to the College to be worn by future Presidents when in their robes of office. While President of the College, Tweedy was also President of the Ophthalmological Society of the United Kingdom, President of the Medico-Legal Society, of the Medical Defence Union, and of the Royal Medical Benevolent Fund. He took an active share in King Edward's Hospital Fund, serving on the Distribution Committee, for which his powers of organization peculiarly fitted him. He was admitted to the Livery and Court of the Barbers' Company, where he was chosen Master and thus brought about a *rapprochement* between the Company and the College of Surgeons. The Barbers' Company having founded the Vicary Lectures at the Royal College of Surgeons, he was appointed to deliver the first lecture in December, 1919, when he chose as his subject "Surgical Tradition". Tweedy was an excellent speaker, whether in a set lecture or after dinner. He showed precision, making his points deliberately, and his speeches were always imbued with a kindliness and modesty which were characteristic of the man. In 1905 he was Hunterian Orator, and in his later years one of the Hunterian Trustees. On the occasions when the Hunterian Trustees met at the College, the sound of his horses' hoofs might be heard with measured tat-tat in front of the portico, for Sir John was perhaps the last consulting surgeon in London to keep a brougham instead of a car. Almost immediately afterwards a measured but laboured breathing announced the arrival at the door of the Librarian's room of Sir John himself, who, after making his courteous old-world greetings, would proceed to the discussion, and nearly always the presentation of valuable books, for which benefactions the Library is grateful. He lived at 100 Harley Street, where he had a large library of some 6000 volumes. By his will he bequeathed to the Royal College of Surgeons such of his medical and surgical books and instruments as the College might select, and to University College Hospital Medical School any others to be selected by that body after the College had made its choice. He left over £61,000, ultimate residue as to one-half, after other bequests, to go to the College in case of the failure of his heirs. In 1895 Tweedy married the daughter of Mr. Richard Hillhouse, of Finsbury Place, and left two sons and one daughter. He died on Jan. 4th, 1924, after a short illness following an operation, and his ashes were interred at Holder's Green Crematorium on Jan. 8th. Though Tweedy published no large work he had written a great deal, as the following list of his publications shows. Possibly his best-known original observation was that the physiological 'lens star' could be recognized clinically. He also advanced a theory as to the causation of conical cornea being due to developmental defect and brought the idea before the Ophthalmological Society of the United Kingdom, in whose *Transactions* (xii, 67) it appears. He was also a pioneer in practising the extraction of immature cataracts. There are several portraits of him in the College Library, the largest a photograph from a portrait by Frank B. Salisbury. PUBLICATIONS: "On a Visible Stellation of the Normal and of the Cataractous Crystalline Lens of the Human Eye," - *Royal London Ophthal. Hosp. Rep.*, 1876, viii, 24. This paper, accompanied by drawings, attracted a good deal of attention and was a sequel to one published in the *Lancet*, 1871, ii, 776. "On an Improved Optometer for Estimating the Degree of Abnormal Regular Astigmatism," 8vo, illustrated, London, 1876; reprinted from *Lancet*, 1876, ii, 604. "Treatment of Hardness of the Eyeball by Mydriatics and Myotics." *Practitioner*, 1883, xxxi, 321. "On an Improved Optometer for Estimating the Degree of Astigmatism and other Errors of Refraction." *Lancet*, 1886, i, 777. "On the Meaning of the Words 'Nyctalopia' and 'Hemeralopia' as disclosed by an Examination of the Diseases described under these Terms by the Ancient and Modern Medical Authors," 12mo, London, 1882; reprinted from *Royal London Ophthal. Hosp. Rep*., 1882, x, 413. "On a Case of Large Orbital and Intracranial Ivory Exostosis," 8vo, London, 1882; reprinted from *Royal London Ophthal. Hosp. Rep.,* 1882, x, 303. "An Inaugural Address delivered in University College, London, on October 1st, at the Opening of the Session 1883-4," 8vo, London, 1883; reprinted from *Lancet*, 1883, ii, 577. "Lectures on the Ætiology of Constitutional Diseases of the Eye," 12mo, London, 1887; reprinted from *Lancet*, 1887, i, 57. "Extraction of Immature Cataract." - *Lancet*, 1888, i, 966, "On Some Phases of the Constitutional History of the College of Suregons," 8vo, London, 1889; reprinted from *Lancet*, 1889, i, 957, 1112. "On Cicatricial Ectropion of the Lower Lid following Caries of the Orbit," 8vo, illustrated, London, 1890; reprinted from *Ophthal. Soc. Trans.*, 1890, x, 211. "The Physical Factor in Conical Cornea," 8vo, London, 1892; reprinted from *Ophthal. Soc. Trans*., 1892, xii, 67. "The Relation of Ophthalmology to General Medicine and Surgery and to Public Health" (Presidential Address to the Ophthalmological Society of the United Kingdom), 8vo, London, 1904; reprinted from *Ophthal. Soc. Trans.*, 1904, xxiv, 1. *A Clinical Lecture on the Forms of Conjunctivitis, with Special Reference to the Treatment of Ophtalmia Neonatorum*, 8vo, London, 1895. *An Address delivered by the President of the Royal College of Surgeons of England in Norwich Cathedral on the Occasion of the Unveiling of the William Cadge Memorial Window on the 6th of December,* 1904. *The Hunterian Oration delivered at the Royal College of Surgeons of England on the 14th of February, 1905,* 8vo, London, 1905. *An Address to Medical Students delivered at University College Hospital Medical School on the 1st of October, 1909, on the Occasion of the Opening of the Winter Session,* 8vo, London, 1909. "Presidential Address on the Influence of Social and Legal Restrictions on Medical Practice. Delivered before the Medico-Legal Society on the 25th October, 1910," 8vo, London, 1910; reprinted from *Medical Mag*., 1910, xix, 701. "The Mutual Relations and Influence of Law and Medicine. A Presidential Address," 8vo, London, 1910; reprinted from *Trans. Medico-Legal Soc*., 1910, vii, 1. *The Medical Tradition; being the Annual Oration delivered before the Medical Society of London on May 12th*, 1919, 8vo, London, 1920. *The Surgical Tradition; being the First Thomas Vicary Lecture delivered before the Royal College of Surgeons of England, on December 3rd*, 1919, 8vo, London, 1920. "Eyelids," "Cornea," and "Sclerotic," in Heath's *Dictionary of Practical Surgery*. "Cataract," "Hemeralopia," "Nyctalpoia," and "Pupil," in Quain's *Dictionary of Medicine*, "Diseases of the Skin" in Roberts's *Text-book of Medicine*.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000218
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Cleoburey, William (1793 - 1853)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-06-02
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001100-E001199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373380373380
Occupation General surgeon
Details Son of the Rev John Cleoburey and Margaretta his wife, was baptized at St Helen's Church, Abingdon, on Aug 17th, 1793. He was educated at Abingdon School, for he recited there twice on Speech Day, 1805. He was apprenticed to Mr Short, one of the surgeons of the Bedford Infirmary, and completed his medical education at St Bartholomew's Hospital as dresser to Sir Charles Blicke. He was for a short time House Surgeon to the City Dispensary for Diseases of the Eye, and acted as Demonstrator of Anatomy at St Bartholomew's Hospital. He settled in Oxford in 1814, became 'Chirurgus privilegiatus' of the University on June 16th, 1814, and was elected Surgeon to the Radcliffe Infirmary on May 13th, 1815, a post he held until 1853. During the whole of this time he was present and assisted at nearly all the operations performed in the Infirmary. As he lived in St John's Street close to the hospital he was generally asked by his colleagues to act for them when they were away. In ordinary practice he was favourably known as an oculist, but poor health and a private competence kept him from active competition with other surgeons in Oxford. He was also Consulting Surgeon to the Warneford and the Littlemore Asylums. He married on Nov 14th, 1820, Mary Ann Jones, of High Street, Oxford. He died on Feb 17th, 1853, and was buried in the churchyard of All Saints', Oxford. It is reported of Cleoburey that he was a skilful and beautiful operator, whose diagnosis was seldom wrong. He was wont to observe that "a good diagnosis is the most important element in success". His anatomical knowledge was of a high order, was held in great respect, and was frequently of use to his colleagues. He monopolized the ophthalmic practice both in the city and in the neighbouring counties - indeed, the Oxford Eye Hospital is the descendant of the large Eye Department which was part of Cleoburey's activity at the Radcliffe Infirmary. The two charities are independent, but the clinical relationship between them is cordial and intimate. In private life he lived much retired, but he kept himself abreast of medical knowledge, more especially in morbid anatomy, and he was widely read in subjects other than professional. His manner, especially to his hospital patients, was kind and benevolent, and no harsh or choleric word to them ever passed his lips. Publications: *System of Friction practised by John Grosvenor, Esq.*, Oxford, 1825. Grosvenor has the credit of being one of the earliest surgeons in England to apply massage to stiff joints and injured limbs. He was Surgeon to the Radcliffe Infirmary at Oxford from 1770-1817. He introduced 'a rubber nurse' into the infirmary in 1830, and the practice of massage as an aid to surgery has been carried on there continually since that date. *A Review of the Different Operations on the Eyes*, London, 1826.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001197
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Clerke, (or Clerk) Jonathan ( - 1869)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-06-02 2013-08-07
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001100-E001199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373381373381
Occupation General surgeon
Details Practised first at Rathmines, and then at Castlemartyr, Co Cork, where he died June 29th, 1869.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001198
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Wainwright, Denys (1908 - 2008)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Sarah Gillam
Publication Date 2011-11-29 2014-04-07
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001600-E001699
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373829373829
Occupation Orthopaedic surgeon
Details Denys Wainwright was an orthopaedic surgeon in north Staffordshire. He was born on 5 August 1908 in St Helens, Lancashire, the son of Reginald Wainwright, an architect, and Marion Wainwright née Draper, a general practitioner. He was educated at Prescott Grammar School and then went to Liverpool University to study medicine, qualifying in 1932. He held junior posts in Liverpool and Oswestry, and subsequently became a registrar to Sir Harry Platt and Sir John Charnley, the pioneer of hip replacement surgery. In 1937 he was appointed as a consultant surgeon to what is now the North Staffordshire Royal Infirmary in Stoke-on-Trent. He did much to improve orthopaedic and trauma services in the area. He was president of the orthopaedic section of the Royal Society of Medicine in 1965 and vice president of the British Orthopaedic Association from 1973 to 1974. He published extensively, particularly on the management of trauma and children's orthopaedics, was editor of *The Journal of Bone and Joint Surgery*, and helped establish the journal *Injury*. He retired in 1973, and went to live in north London. He continued to travel and teach, and was a visiting professor in Sudan. Outside medicine, he was interested in golf, sailing, painting, bridge and skiing. In 1937 he married Shelagh, whom he met in Liverpool. They had two sons, Richard and Anthony, and a daughter, Patty. Denys Wainwright died on 27 October 2008, at the age of 100. He was survived by his children: his wife predeceased him.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001646
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Essery, Thomas Aubrey (1818 - 1865)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Este, Michael Lambton (1779 - 1864)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-11-30
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001600-E001699
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373831373831
Occupation General surgeon
Details In addition to a medical education, by which he attained the MD of Pavia and Erfurt, Este acquired a knowledge of the countries and languages around the Mediterranean. His first appointment was that of Assistant Surgeon to the 3rd Foot Guards. He served in Sir Ralph Abercrombie's expedition to Egypt, then under Lord Hutchinson, and next as Secretary and Physician under Charles Lock, Consul-General in Egypt. Lock was sent on a mission to Constantinople, and leaving Egypt, was seized with plague at Naples, where he died in the lazaretto. On Sept 12th, 1804, two of his suite also died: Este placed himself in the lazaretto and assiduously attended upon them. He then came under the notice of Nelson, to whom he acted as a private secretary. In July, 1804, Este had collected letters detained at Gibraltar and Port Mahon and forwarded them to Nelson, then off Toulon, for which he was thanked by Nelson in a letter headed "*Victory*, August 3rd, 1804". In this letter Nelson said, "I hope you left your worthy father well." In letters dated Aug 20th and Sept 16th, Este informed Nelson of Lock's death, to which Nelson replied from the *Victory* under date of Oct 4th, 1804. Este then went on board the *Victory*, and later supplied an important account of Nelson, his diminishing vision in one eye, his precarious health, and his table talk as to his future. On Nov 4th Nelson sent Este home on board the *Termagant* (Captain Pettet) with despatches to the Admiralty, and included a note to H Chamberlain, agent for the packets at Lisbon, to forward Este should the *Termagant* be delayed by quarantine. Este had taken with him to the Victory presents of English porter, tongues, Bayonne hams, India pickles, etc. A large portion of these Nelson sent to the *Termagant*. Nelson had from June 3rd, 1803, when he boarded the *Victory*, watched the French fleet off Toulon, from time to time withdrawing to Maddalena, Sardinia, to refit. The French Admiral, La Touche Tréville, having died, was succeeded by Villeneuve, who was ordered by Napoleon to undertake the union of the whole naval strength of France and Spain. Villeneuve managed to get out of Toulon and pass the Straits of Gibraltar whilst Nelson was away at Maddalena. From May to August, Nelson was on the voyage to the West Indies and back. Nelson had been at Merton from Aug 19th to Sept 2nd, 1805, when he learnt of the concentration of the French and Spanish Fleet in Cadiz harbour and he went at once to the Admiralty. There follows a passage in the Scott Recollections: "At the last Council, the very day previous to Lord Nelson's departure (he hoisted his flag on 14 Sept) for Trafalgar, Dr Scott waited with Mr Este, the mutual friend of the Admiral and himself, in a private room till the Council broke up. On quitting the Council, Lord Nelson came up to them, ordered Dr Scott to get ready to join him that night at Merton, and said to Mr Este, taking leave: 'I have just settled your business with Lord Liverpool [really Baron Hawkesbury, Home Secretary, Leader in the House of Lords, not 2nd Lord Liverpool until 1808] - I am now going to the Admiralty, and I shall order you a passage on board Captain Bolton's frigate. You will join me with Bolton in six weeks.' Besides Dr Scott as private secretary and interpreter, with a salary of £100 per annum, Mr Este was to have been one of six young men, all civilians, with Commissions from the Foreign Office who were to assist in the arduous political negotiations which the Admiral anticipated." After the death of Nelson, Este returned to military duty, was promoted Surgeon to the 1st Life Guards in 1812, and was sent to Lisbon, where he was in medical charge of the Cavalry Brigade under Wellington in Portugal, Spain, the South of France, in the march to Boulogne, the Waterloo Campaign, and in the Army of Occupation up to 1817. He held the Gold Medal for the Egyptian Campaign, the Peninsular Medal, and a foreign decoration. After 1817 Este practised in London, was an active member of the Society of Apothecaries, and of many other societies, including the Royal Institution. He died at 207 Marylebone Road on Jan 26th, 1864. Publications: A number of pamphlets written by Este are preserved in the College Library. He wrote on the use of baths (including the provision of baths for the poor, the drainage of London, asylums for foundlings, infanticide, suicide, and lastly on railways in 1858. His *Reminiscences of an Octogenarian Medical Officer*, 8vo, London, 1858, are interesting.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001648
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Etherington-Smith, Raymond Broadley (1877 - 1913)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-11-30 2012-02-10
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001600-E001699
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373832373832
Occupation General surgeon
Details The second son of J R Etherington-Smith, Recorder of Derby and a bencher of the Inner Temple, his mother being a daughter of Sir Thomas Pears, KCB. He went to Repton in 1890 and left in 1893, without distinguishing himself apparently at work or at games. He entered Trinity College, Cambridge, in 1895, and took his BA degree in 1899. His first two years at Cambridge were comparatively uneventful, but in his third and fourth years he established his reputation as a first-rate oarsman. When he began to row, the University Club was torn by dissension, and it was mainly due to his charming gifts of character and wise guidance that Cambridge was able to come to its own on the river. He rowed three times for Cambridge, and was President of the University Boat Club in 1899 when Cambridge won the boat race for the first time after nine consecutive defeats by Oxford. He captained Leander during four seasons, and in 1908 he was Captain of the United Kingdom Eight which beat the Belgian Crew in the Olympic Regatta. He entered St Bartholomew's Hospital from Cambridge in 1900, with the highest reputation both on account of his athletic prowess and his personal qualities. He was a magnificent specimen of a man, tall, lean, with wavy fair hair, of the type loved by the Grecian sculptors. He had a host of friends who ardently admired him and affectionately called him 'Ethel-Smith'. Not that there was anything feminine about him, for he was eminently virile both in his physique and in his attitude to life and men. He went through his ordinary career as a medical student without special distinction, and graduated MB, BCh at Cambridge in 1903, at the same time taking his MA degree. In 1903 he was appointed Ophthalmic House Surgeon to W H H Jessop and Mr Holmes Spicer, and, on completion of this office in 1904, House Surgeon to Bruce Clarke. In 1905 he became Extern Midwifery Assistant, and later Resident Administrator of Anaesthetics, thus completing a period of two years and three months upon the resident staff. In 1906 he was elected Junior Demonstrator of Anatomy in the Medical School, having Mr C E West and Mr Gordon Watson as his senior colleagues. In 1907 he was admitted FRCS, and in 1908 he was appointed Surgical Registrar to the West London Hospital, and later, in 1910, Assistant Surgeon. In September, 1909, he was chosen Warden of the College at St Bartholomew's Hospital upon the resignation of Mr G E Gask, a post he retained until his death. This office he filled with much advantage to the hospital, for his influence on the students was great and good. In 1910 he was chosen Surgical Registrar with Mr Elmslie, and in 1912 Assistant Surgeon to the hospital. He died on April 19th, 1913, after a two days' illness. He contracted a pneumococcal peritonitis operating on a patient with an abscess of the lung. A laparotomy was performed, but he never rallied. A Memorial Service was held in the Church of St Bartholomew the Great, his coffin being borne from the hospital to the church on the shoulders of intimate friends who had been his colleagues. He was buried at Putney Vale Cemetery. There are two memorials to Etherington-Smith. One is a tablet in the Chapel at Repton School, and the other is a two-bedded ward for the use of the Resident Medical Staff of St Bartholomew's Hospital. On the wall of this ward is a representation of his head in bas-relief, and there is a commemorative tablet in the operating theatre below it. The old operating theatre of the hospital, known as the 'Abernethy Theatre', was also reconstructed in his memory.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001649
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Evans, Alfred ( - 1862)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Evans, Benjamin (1802 - 1872)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Evans, Charles (1816 - 1886)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Evans, Edward ( - 1860)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Evans, Evan (1854 - 1925)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Evans, George Harrison (1845 - 1880)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Evans, Herbert Norman (1802 - 1877)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Evans, Joseph John (1808 - 1875)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Evans, Richard David Jones ( - 1862)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Evans, William ( - 1860)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Evans, William (1809 - 1898)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Evans, William (1816 - 1863)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Evans, William George (1857 - 1927)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Eve, Sir Frederick Samuel (1853 - 1916)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-11-30
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001600-E001699
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373846373846
Occupation Curator General surgeon Ophthalmic surgeon
Details Son of William Eve, The Manor, North Orthendon, Essex; entered St Bartholomew's Hospital in 1872, and was House Surgeon to Luther Holden (qv) in 1876-1877. After that he studied surgery at Leipzig, and becoming FRCS, was appointed Curator of the St Bartholomew's Hospital Museum in 1879. In conjunction with Anthony A Bowlby (qv) he compiled in 1882 a catalogue of the Museum, and meanwhile made several communications to the *St Bartholomew's Hospital Reports*. In 1881, with the support of Paget, Flower, and others, a pathological curatorship in the Museum of the College was instituted, and Eve was appointed; he held the post until 1890. In the *Transactions* of the Pathological Society are some sixty papers by Eve, with descriptions of pathological specimens. As Erasmus Wilson Lecturer (1882-1884) he gave his first description of cystic tumours of the jaw (distinguishing the unilocular from the multilocular) and the connection with disturbed enamel formation. A revised account "On Cystic and Encysted Solid Tumours of the Jaws" appeared in the *Transactions* of the Odontological Society, 1886. Eve dwelt in particular upon tumours and cysts, adding the microscopic appearances to the clinical ones. Among descriptions of museum specimens may be noted: those relating to diseases of animals, rare tumours of the great omentum, renal tumours combining sarcomatous and embryonic muscle tissue, endotheliomata of the brain, cystic tumours of the testis, gigantism of the extremities, psorospermic cysts in the mucous membrane of the ureter; enlargement of lymphatic glands was demonstrated to be tuberculous although caseation was absent, and lupus was identified as a tuberculous disease. An appointment upon the staff of the London Hospital caused Eve to leave St Bartholomew's; he was at first Surgical Registrar, in 1884 Assistant Surgeon, Surgeon in 1888, Consulting Surgeon in 1914. He also acted as Ophthalmic Surgeon before a special department was instituted, and lectured on pathology. He served as Assistant Surgeon to the Royal Free Hospital and was Surgeon to the Evelina Hospital for Children. He published many surgical observations, his surgery being infused with his pathological knowledge, microscopical as well as naked-eye - for example, in his cases of melanotic tumours following injury, and those of tumours at the base of the tongue. He was Secretary of the Section of Surgery at the Nottingham Meeting of the British Medical Association in 1892, Vice-President of the Section of Diseases of Children at Bristol in 1894, and President of the same Section at Cheltenham in 1901. He was a Member of the Court of Examiners of the College from 1902-1911, was elected to the Council in 1904, gave the Bradshaw Lectures on "Acute Hemorrhagic Pancreatitis" in 1914, and was Vice-President at the time of his death. He was knighted in 1911. At the outbreak of the War he became Major RAMC (TF), 2nd London General Hospital, and in December, 1914, he was appointed Surgeon to the Eastern Command with the rank of Lieutenant-Colonel. This post involved him in long journeys. In July, 1915, with the assistance of Dr A S Woods, he organized a special hospital at Croydon for Gunshot Injuries of Nerves. He was attacked by influenza, followed by pneumonia, and he died on December 15th, 1916. There was a memorial service at All Saints', Margaret Street. He was survived by Lady Eve, a daughter of H E Cox, of Jamaica, by a son then serving in France, and by a daughter.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001663
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Carwardine, Henry Holgate ( - 1868)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Cayley, Henry (1834 - 1904)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2010-11-24
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001100-E001199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373291373291
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born on December 20th, 1834, the fourth son of Edward Cayley, JP, banker, of Stamford, Lincolnshire, and Frances, daughter of the Rev Richard Twopeny, MA, Rector of Little Casterton, Rutlandshire. Among his brothers were the late Sir Richard and Dr William Cayley of the Middlesex Hospital. He was collaterally descended from Sir William Cayley, of Brompton, Yorkshire, a loyal Cavalier, knighted by Charles I in 1640 and created a baronet on April 26th, 1661. At an early age Henry Cayley joined the Medical Department at King's College, where he was a painstaking and methodical student. He entered the Indian Medical Service in 1857, passing in at the head of the list. He chose the Bengal side, was gazetted Assistant Surgeon on January 29th, 1857, and landed at Calcutta at the end of April. During the Mutiny he did not see active service, but was on duty with the 53rd Foot, and had medical charge of a detachment of the 37th and 38th Regiments at Benares and Allahabad, and of Major Anderson's troop of Royal Artillery and other details in the Fort of Rajghat. He was awarded the Mutiny Medal and was appointed Civil Surgeon of Gorakpur, on the Nepal frontier, and was placed in charge of the 2nd Sikh Police Corps in March, 1858. He held his post at Gorakpur from 1858-1864, with an interval of thirteen or fourteen months when he was absent on sick furlough in England. He held the Joint Civil Surgeoncy of Simla, a coveted post, from March, 1864, to March, 1866; then he became Civil Surgeon at Burdwan and next at Howrah, an important town and district on the Hugli, facing Calcutta. In May, 1867, he was put on special duty as Joint Commissioner of Ladak, in Tibet. He was the first officer deputed to this post, which involved medical work carried on among the people of the country and among the Nadirs and others coming from Central Asia, combined with political duties. His skill succeeded in making the European system of medicine popular among, and appreciated by, the tribes beyond the Indian frontier. The people of the country sought his services, and he discharged his politico-medical duties so satisfactorily that he was several times thanked by the Governments of the Punjab and of India. His headquarters were at Leh, a town on the Indus river situated at an elevation of 11,000 feet. His duties here were commercial and political. The appointment was the first in this place, and his status was that of Resident and Joint Commissioner. The Punjab Government, recognizing the delicacy and tact which were necessary in dealing with an alien native Government, corrupt and hostile officials, suspicious and turbulent merchants and tradesmen, obtained sanction for the appointment of a British official on condition that he was a medical officer. This tribute to the powers of conciliation and management possessed by members of the Indian Medical Service was justified by repeated experience of the humanizing influence of medicine and the popularity of medical men on the Punjab frontier. The objects of the appointment were to develop the trade to Central Asia and Eastern Turkestan-of which Leh was an emporium and channel -to protect merchants from oppressive imposts, and to report on the commerce and political condition of those regions. The country was only accessible by bad roads and high passes, open during the months of June, July, and August. Cayley resided during the remainder of the year at Simla. He spent four seasons at Leh, and submitted elaborate reports of his observations and proceedings. Immediately on his arrival at Leh he opened a dispensary, which was at first viewed with suspicion, but was soon resorted to by patients of all grades and classes. In an interesting paper on the medical topography and prevalent diseases of Ladak, published in the *Indian Medical Gazette* of November, 1867, and January, 1868, he thus describes the opening of his dispensary:- "I had with me a hospital compounder as an assistant and a small supply of the most necessary medicines and instruments. Two of my small tents were soon converted into a hospital. A grove of poplar trees served as an operating theatre, and for surgical assistants numerous Ladaki amateurs were always at hand, who took great interest in the proceedings." Cayley did his work at Leh with rare tact, energy, and humanity, and relinquished his post in 1871. From March, 1871, to March, 1872, he was on furlough in Europe, attending lectures, hospitals, etc., and he studied especially at Moorfields. On his return to Bengal, after serving as Civil Surgeon of the 24th Pergunnahs, he acted for a short time as Deputy Superintendent of Vaccination, and held posts at Cuttack. In March, 1874, he was appointed to succeed Surgeon Major N C Macnamara (qv), as Superintendent of the Eye Infirmary at Calcutta and Professor of Ophthalmic Surgery in the Calcutta Medical College. He also then became Surgeon Superintendent of the Mayo Hospital for Natives and its affiliated dispensaries. These charges involved service as Presidency Surgeon, and he retained them for over twelve years with the exception of one year's furlough in 1877-8. His practice, both consulting and general, was extensive and lucrative, and he was a hard worker, much appreciated by both natives and Europeans for his skill and kindliness. He was especially successful as an ophthalmologist. He took a prominent part in establishing the Calcutta Medical Society, of which he was President for two years, and wrote frequently for its *Transactions* and for the *Indian Medical Gazette*. He finally left India on April 12th, 1884, and in January, 1885, was appointed a member of the Medical Board at the India and War Offices. While holding these appointments he retired from the Bengal Army in April, 1887, and was unexpectedly called upon, in June, 1889, to complete the course of lectures on Military Medicine at the Army Medical School, Netley, where Professor D B Smith had broken down in health. His lectures were at first not much appreciated, for his two predecessors, Smith and Surgeon General Maclean, had each in his way been admirable, Maclean being famous for his vivid descriptions of tropical diseases. Cayley was small, quiet, and had a poor delivery. However, his work as lecturer was soon recognized to be sound and conscientious, and he began to be followed with appreciative attention by the 'surgeons on probation'. Retiring from the Professorship of Military Medicine in 1897, he went to live at Weybridge, and seemed to have settled down when the South African War broke out. He thereupon volunteered for service, and went out with the rank of Colonel in charge of the Scottish National Red Cross Hospital, stationed at Kroonstadt in the Orange Free State. He performed his duties here with all his old zeal and ability, his services being mentioned in despatches. He was created a CMG and awarded the South African Medal with Clasps. In 1891 he had been appointed Hon Surgeon to the Queen, and he also received the Coronation Medal and was appointed Hon Associate of the Order of the Hospital of St. John of Jerusalem in England. Thus was recognized the value of his services during some forty-three years. Though of slight physique, Cayley was a man of great energy-hunting, riding, shooting, a golfer and a yachtsman. His mental equalled his bodily vivacity. His power of work was prodigious. In Calcutta he was on the move from early morning till late evening, and by way of refreshment he would then take a smart gallop on the racecourse. Everything he did was done with heart and energy, and he never showed signs of flagging or fatigue. In disposition he was even-tempered and kindly, staunch and honourable. In all relations of life he was eminently sound, and in professional life diligent, skilful, and humane. He was accordingly esteemed highly both as friend and physician. Though orthodox, he was tolerant and charitable. His intellectual abilities were of a high order. He was keen in inquiring and sound in judgement. On most questions he was well informed, and his opinions were clear and strong. He had a facile pen, and, thought not eloquent, was fluent in speech, plain, practical, and intelligible. He had studied his profession well, and up to the last continued to familiarize himself with scientific and medical progress. Though he made ophthalmic surgery his speciality, he was an excellent general surgeon and a well-informed physician. His position in Calcutta brought him into close contact with native medical practitioners and students, with whom his relations were always friendly and agreeable. With colleagues and fellow-officers he was most popular. Deputy Surgeon General Cayley was thrown from his horse in South Africa and sustained severe injuries. He married on July 10th, 1862, Letitia Mary, daughter of the Rev Nicholas Walters, and was survived by her, two daughters, and six sons. Of the sons one was then Assistant Health Officer of Bombay. Two others rose to high rank in the Army; one as Major-General Sir Walter de Saumarez Cayley, KCMG, and the second as Major-General Douglas Edward Cayley, CMG. Cayley died at Leavesden Weybridge, the house he had bought on his return from the Boer War, the date of his death being March 19th, 1904. He was buried in Weybridge Cemetery. His estate exceeded £60,000. He was Honorary Surgeon to the King at the time of his death. The Cayley family, of which the present representative is Sir Kenelm Henry Ernest Cayley, tenth baronet, is ancient, known to have been settled at Owmby as early as the thirteenth century. Only four generations had elapsed between the subject of this biography and Sir William of Brompton, the Cavalier. Thus five generations in one family had extended over a period of three hundred years, and this is accounted for by the late marriages of its members. Portraits of Henry Cayley accompany his biographies in the *Calcutta Medical Reporter* and *British Medical Journal*. Publications: Cayley contributed valuable papers to the *Indian Annals of Medical Science* as well as to the journals mentioned in the course of this article.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001108
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Ceely, James Henry (1809 - 1905)

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First Title value, for Searching Ceely, Robert (1797 - 1880)

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by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2010-11-24 2013-08-07
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001100-E001199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373293373293
Occupation General surgeon
Details Robert Ceely, the elder brother of James Henry Ceely (qv), was born in 1797, and received his medical education at Guy's, at the London Hospital, and at Edinburgh. After qualifying he at once settled in practice at Aylesbury. Some years later he had contemplated entering the East India Company's service when, in 1882, Aylesbury became involved in the cholera epidemic, and Ceely displayed notable qualities in contending with the outbreak. It is reported that Lord Hardinge, then Commander-in-Chief, in admiration of Ceely's conduct, gave his nephew a commission in the 42nd Regiment. In 1833 he interested himself in the establishment of the Buckinghamshire County Infirmary at Aylesbury, and served on the staff until his death. Soon afterwards he began his "Observations on the Variolae Vaccinae", which was published in 1840. John Simon said of him that he "has done more to advance the natural history of vaccination than any other individual since the days of Jenner". He thus became the chief authority, and was involved in the various controversies for the rest of his life. Three months before his death, at the Cambridge Meeting of the British Medical Association, in the course of the discussion on August 13th, 1880, on the different methods of collecting, preserving, and employing animal vaccines, Ceely, aged 83, exhibited drawings of: (1) (a) Casual vaccinia on the cow; (b) In the same animal, the pock declining and the secondary after-pock; (c) The secondary or after-pock on the dog and on children. (2) Casual vaccinia on the hands of milkers in various stages. (3) False cow-pox in the cow. (4) Casual transference of false cow-pox to the hands of milkers. (5) Its inoculation on man. (6) Variolation of the cow, then vaccination of the same animal on the 10th day. (7) Variolation only of the cow in all stages. (8) Lymph from the variolated cow, transfer to children exhibiting identity with vaccinia developed in the cow .casually or after vaccination. (9 and 10) Drawings of sheep-pox. Taking into consideration the undeveloped stage of inoculation experiments and the complexities of the vaccination question, Ceely's observations were of extraordinary accuracy. In 1865 he was a member of the Royal Commission on the Cattle Plague, and made contributions to the Royal College of Surgeons Museum. In the College Library are the author's copy both of the 1840 and the 1842 publications with MS notes. He died at Aylesbury on November 28th, 1880, and his funeral took place on December 3rd amid evidences of sincere respect and affection. Publications:- Ceely's authoritative works on vaccination, etc., include the following: "Observations on the Variolae Vaccine as they occasionally appear in the Vale of Aylesbury, with an Account of some Recent Experiments in the Vaccination, Retrovaccination and Variolation of Cows: interspersed with incidental remarks," 8vo, 35 plates, Worcester, 1840; reprinted from *Trans. Prov. Med. and Surg. Assoc.*, viii. (The Library possesses the author's copy with his corrections in MS.) Translated into German, "Beobachtungen uber die Kuhpocken," etc., Stuttgart, 1841. "Further Observations," 8vo, 6 plates, Worcester, 1842 (author's copy). *Account of Contagious Epidemic Puerperal Fever*, 1835. "Health Officers, their Appointment, Duties, and Qualifications: being a Reprint of Official Documents long out of print": with Prefatory Remarks by R C, 8vo, London, 1873.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001110
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Chadwick, Samuel Taylor (1810 - 1876)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Chaffers, Edward (1842 - 1909)

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First Title value, for Searching Challinor, Henry (1814 - 1882)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2010-11-24 2016-04-22
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001100-E001199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373296373296
Occupation General surgeon
Details Was in general practice at Bolton-le-Moors and at Accrington. He emigrated to Queensland about 1861-1862 [1], and practised for some years at Ipswich in that Colony. From 1869-1872 he was Surgeon Superintendent of the Lunatic Asylum, Woogaroo, and was also Medical Officer of St Helena Gaol and the Dunwich Benevolent Asylum. For the last few years of his life Challinor was Health Officer of Brisbane. In honorary capacities Challinor filled important and responsible positions. He was for years a member of the Medical Board, Principal Medical Officer of the Queensland Volunteer Forces, and Visiting Inspector of the Diamantina Orphan Schools. He died of apoplexy at Brisbane on Sept 9th, 1882. [[1] He emigrated to Brisbane, then part of New South Wales, in September 1848 and arrived at Moreton Bay on the ship *Fortitude* from Gravesend on 20 January 1849. Information supplied by Stephen C Due by email, 9 April 2016]
Resource Identifier RCS: E001113
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Ebsworth, Alfred (1821 - 1882)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Ebsworth, Richard Cogswell (1859 - 1922)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-11-09
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001500-E001599
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373721373721
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born at Carlisle, and was educated at Edinburgh University, where he acted as Assistant to the Regius Professor of Medicine, Sir Thomas Fraser, FRS, later as Demonstrator of Anatomy, and also as Resident Physician at the Royal Infirmary. He next became Assistant Physician at Wye House Asylum, Burton. He settled in practice at Swansea, where he was successively Surgeon to the Ear and Throat Department, and Surgeon to the Hospital. He there built up a large surgical practice, and was consulted widely in the country around. During the War, 1914-1918, he served as Major RAMC(T) in charge of the 3rd Western General Hospital, Cardiff. A septic infection of a finger from which he suffered weakened his health, and he died suddenly at 152 St Helen's Place, Swansea, on May 28th, 1922. Publications:- Ebsworth published a number of communications on the surgery of Intestinal Obstruction, Prostatic Enlargement, and other subjects.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001538
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Eccles, Alfred (1822 - 1904)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Eccles, William (1801 - 1846)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Eddison, Booth (1809 - 1859)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-11-09
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001500-E001599
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373724373724
Occupation General surgeon
Details The fifth son of John Eddison, of Gateford, Notts, who died in 1812. His father belonged to the Society of Friends. His mother, niece of Abraham Booth, Baptist minister, was left a widow with eight children under eleven years of age, but with remarkable energy she fitted them all to fill responsible positions, one of them, Edwin, becoming Town Clerk of Leeds. Booth Eddison became an apprentice at the General Hospital, Nottingham, and after two years he continued his education at St George's and Westminster Hospitals. After qualifying he was elected Resident Surgeon at the General Hospital, Nottingham, and held the post for five years. After further study at the Lying-in Hospital, Dublin, and in Paris, he started practice in Leeds, then joined John Higginbottom, senr (qv), in partnership at Nottingham until 1842, after which he practised by himself. In 1850 he was elected Surgeon to the General Hospital, Nottingham, and became proprietor of the Broom House Private Ladies' Asylum at Mansfield. He was President at the Nottingham Meeting of the British Medical Association in 1857. He began to suffer from pulmonary tuberculosis and went to live in Devonshire, then in Italy, and finally in January, 1859, in Madeira, accompanied by his wife and two daughters. He died at Funchal on March 7th, 1859, and the post-mortem examination disclosed tuberculous disease with cavities in both lungs. He was buried as a Quaker in the English Cemetery.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001541
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Cockle, John (1813 - 1900)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-06-07
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001200-E001299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373394373394
Occupation General surgeon
Details Became a member of the Staff of the Royal Free Hospital early in life, but in the absence of a medical school there, he joined the Grosvenor Place School of Medicine, where for a time he held the post of Lecturer on the Principles and Practice of Medicine. His colleagues here were Spencer Wells, B Ward Richardson, and William Adams. He then specialized in diseases of the chest, and was appointed Physician to the Margaret Street Infirmary for Consumption and to the City Dispensary. At the Royal Free Hospital he was for many years Senior Physician. He had numerous valuable drawings made of patients suffering from aneurysm of the root of the neck, and in his researches found the record of two cases of apparent cure of aneurysm of the arch due to obliteration of the left carotid. When Christopher Heath (qv) used distal ligature in 1865, Cockle became still more convinced that this method offered relief in aortic aneurysm, and in 1872, a suitable case presenting itself in his practice, he induced Heath to tie the left carotid in the neck. The patient made a complete recovery and lived for four years. The specimen is in the College of Surgeons' Museum. Cockle was one of the few physicians in his day who also held the RCS Fellowship. His practice at 63 Brook Street was extensive, and he afterwards moved, before his final retirement, to 8 Suffolk Street, Pall Mall, where he practised in the eighties of the nineteenth century. He came up daily to his practice from his country residence at West Molesey, Surrey. Increasing deafness caused him to retire finally about the year 1860, and he lived quietly with his daughter at Molesey till his death on November 14th, 1900. At the time of his death Cockle was Consulting Physician to the Royal Free Hospital and Examining Physician to the Royal National Hospital for Consumption, and had been Hon Physician to the Warehousemen, Clerks and Drapers' Schools. He was President of the Medical Society of London in 1879; a corresponding member of the Society of Science and Medicine, Berlin; corresponding member of the Philosophical Society of Queensland; a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries and of the Linnean Society. Publications: *An Essay on the Poison of the Cobra di Capello*, 8vo, London, 1852. Translation of Georg Weber's *Clinical Handbook of Auscultation and Percussion*, 8vo, London, 1854. *Lectures upon the Historic Literature of the Pathology of the Heart and Great Vessels*, Part I: From the earliest authentic records to the close of the Arabian epoch, 12mo, London, 1860. *On Insufficiency of the Aortic Valves in Connection with Sudden Death*: with notes historical and critical, 8vo, London, 1861; 2nd ed., 1880. *On Intrathoracic Cancer*: Part I, Introductory, and Historic Sketch; Part II, Contributions to the Pathology of the Disease, 8vo, London, 1865. *Thoughts on the Present Theories of the Algide Stage of Cholera*, 8vo, London, 1866. *The Oration on the Occasion of the Centenary of the Medical Society of London, being a Review of some recent Doctrines concerning the Mind*, 8vo, London, 1874. *Contributions to Cardiac Pathology*, 12mo, London, 1880. "The Influence of the Discharges and Nervous Shock on the Collapse of Cholera," 12mo, London, 1867; reprinted from *Med. Press and Circular*. "On Clinical Method." Introductory Address at the Royal Free Hospital, London, 1877. *Notes on the Surgical Treatment of Aortic Aneurysm*, being in part a reprint of some papers in the *Lancet* on the same subject, published in the years 1869 and 1872, 8vo, London, 1877. "Past and Present Phases of Physic." Introductory Address at the Grosvenor Place School of Medicine, London, 1859. "On Spontaneous Gangrene connected with Disease of the Heart and Great Vessels." - *Med. Mirror*, 1864, i, 821, 400. "On Mammary Abscess during Lactation." - *Med. Circular*, 1853, iii, 91.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001211
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Codd, Arthur Frederick Gambell (1857 - 1917)

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First Title value, for Searching Bowlby, Sir Anthony Alfred (1855 - 1929)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-05-18 2012-03-22
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000200-E000299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372411372411
Occupation General surgeon Military surgeon
Details Anthony Alfred Bowlby was born on May 10th, 1855, in Namur, the third son of Thomas William Bowlby, of Durham and Darlington, by his wife, Frances Marion, the youngest daughter of Pulteney Mein, of Canonbie, Dumfriesshire, formerly Surgeon in the 73rd Regiment, and his wife, Anne Harrington (*née* Hawes). Thomas William Bowlby was the eldest son of Thomas Bowlby, Captain R.A., by his wife, Wilhelmina Martha Arnold, second daughter of Major-General William Balfour, 57th Regiment, President of New Brunswick. Thomas William Bowlby became a solicitor, but subsequently ceased to practise and undertook numerous missions to foreign countries, many of them on behalf of *The Times* newspaper, to which he was a frequent contributor. In April, 1860, he accepted the appointment of Special Correspondent to *The Times* with the British Expedition to China. While acting in that capacity he was, with others, taken prisoner by the Chinese on September 18th, 1860, and about a week later died in captivity after much suffering. His body was brought to the English camp, and buried in the Russian cemetery at Pekin on October 17th, 1870. Anthony Bowlby, who was five years old at the time of his father's death, was brought up by his mother and educated at Durham School. From there he proceeded to St. Bartholomew's Hospital, which he entered in 1876, and qualified MRCS and LSA, as was then the custom, in 1879. As a student he gained the Brackenbury Scholarship in Surgery in 1880, and he played with zest Rugby football, in which he remained interested all his life. In 1880 he served as House Surgeon to Luther Holdern (q.v.), who retired in the same year and was succeeded by Thomas Smith (q.v.). In 1881 he became F.R.C.S, and in the same year was appointed Curator of the Museum at St. Bartholomew's Hospital, where he completed the catalogue which had been begun by Frederick Eve (q.v.). This work gave Bowlby the idea of writing his successful book, *Surgical Pathology and Morbid Anatomy*, which appeared in 1887 and ran into many editions. In 1882 he won the Jacksonian Prize at the Royal College of Surgeons with a dissertation on "Wounds and Other Injuries of Nerves". In 1884 he became Surgical Registrar to the Hospital and Demonstrator of Practical Surgery, and in 1886 won the Astley Cooper Triennial Prize for his essay on "The Surgical Treatment of Diseases and Injuries of Nerves". In 1891, after serving seven years as Surgical Registrar and developing his distinguishing characteristics, he was elected Assistant Surgeon to St. Bartholomew's Hospital on the retirement of Sir William Savory (q.v.), and in 1903 he became full Surgeon. During this time he became also Surgeon to the Alexandra Hip Hospital and to the Foundling Hospital, and built up his reputation as a sound surgeon and sagacious counsellor. Soon after the start of the South African War in 1899, Bowlby went out as Senior Surgeon to the Portland Hospital, where he was associated with Sir Cuthbert Wallace. Here it was that he acquired the knowledge of military surgery and organization which stood him in such good stead during the Great War, and where he displayed that capacity for dealing with difficult situations and smoothing out differences which was one of his marked characteristics. He was mentioned in despatches and awarded the C.M.G. In 1901 he published *A Civilian War Hospital*, in which he gave an account of his experiences. In 1904 he was appointed Surgeon to the Household of King Edward VII, and in 1910 Surgeon in Ordinary to King George V, and was knighted the following year. In 1905 Bowlby was one of the three surgeons chosen by Queen Alexandra to act on the Council of the newly formed British Red Cross Society, and from that day till his death he took a prominent share in all its activities. In 1908, in common with other members of the staff of St. Bartholomew's Hospital, he joined the newly formed Territorial Medical Service and was given a commission as Major, being attached on mobilization to the First London General Hospital. On the outbreak of war in 1914, Bowlby joined his unit, which was located at Camberwell, but he offered his services to General Head Quarters, was accepted, and sent to France on Sept. 23rd, 1914, as Consulting Surgeon to the Forces, with the rank of Major-General. Bowlby thus received the opportunity of work for which he was peculiarly fitted, and now embarked on a period of nearly five years which proved to be the hardest and best spent of his life. At first he was the only consultant, but in May, 1915, the increase in the size of the British Expeditionary Force and the formation of two Armies gave too much work for one man; Sir Cuthbert Wallace was appointed Consulting Surgeon to the First Army, while Bowlby did the work of the Second Army. Later, with the establishment of additional armies, new consultants were appointed, and Bowlby became a super-consultant and general adviser at the Front to the Director-General, Army Medical Service, and towards the end of the War, after Sir George Makins had retired, he became Adviser on Surgery for the whole of the British area, Front and Base. During these four years and seven months of active service, Bowlby rose to his greatest height. In his own estimate he had never spent years better. He was intensely interested in all aspects of military life, passionately desirous of beating the enemy, and peculiarly fitted to carry out this task. His great work was his insistence that surgery should be done at the Front and now at the Base. Casualty Clearing Stations, which were conceived after the Boer War, were small units capable of doing but little surgery. Bowlby turned them into large hospitals where surgery of the most advanced order was regularly practised. This early surgery, for which he was responsible, saved the lives and limbs of thousands of wounded, and was no doubt one of the chief reasons for the commendation earned by the medical services during the War. Amongst his contemporaries at the hospitals he had the sobriquet of 'The Baron', to which during the War was added the territorial title of 'Bapaume'. To Sir William Osler, and to many others, he was 'The Consoler-General', for he had often to report the deaths of the sons of many of his friends. His connection with the College of Surgeons was long and honourable. He became a Councillor in 1904 and served without a break till 1920, when he became President in succession to Sir George Makins and served for three years. He delivered the Bradshaw Lecture in 1915 upon "Wounds in War", in which he summarized the first year's surgical work of the British Expeditionary Force in France, and was Hunterian Orator in 1919, when he reviewed military surgery from the time of Hunter to the date of the Oration. When Bowlby retuned to England at the end of the War he did not resume active work at St. Bartholomew's Hospital, though he retained the greatest interest in it, constantly attended the weekly 'Consultations' of the Staff, and as a Governor and Consulting Surgeon gave the benefit of his counsel and experience. Though retired from practice, he lived an active life. He was Chairman of the Radium Institute and took a keen interest in its activities. He was Chairman of the Board of Management of King Edward VII Convalescent Home for Officers at Osborne, and was instrumental in carrying out many improvements which added materially to the well-being of the inmates, and he remained till his death an active member of the Executive Committee of the British Red Cross Society. Bowlby was a man of keen intellect and strong character, with a quiet determination which enabled him to carry out what he believed to be right. His teaching was practical, and he had a knack of conveying a lesson in a way which could not be forgotten. The following is an instance: he was going round the wards with some students when he came to a patient suffering from extravasation of urine. After demonstrating the lesion, he said, in his characteristic, slightly guttural voice - he had a little difficulty rolling his r's - "The right thing to do is to make a cut into it, even if you have only got a bit of rusty hoop-iron to do it with." He spoke well and to the point with a curious jerking of the whole body, but he wrote his books and articles with difficulty. The above is a fine record a man's work. It is not so easy to describe the nature of the man who did it. Bowlby was of medium height, sparely built, but of an active frame. In his youth he played games and was always interested in them. For many years he was a keen Alpine climber, doing many of the great ascents, though he never became a member of the Alpine Club. He had a talent for friendship, and hundreds of his old students retained a love for him which approached veneration. His surgery was influenced most by that of Sir T. Smith (q.v.) and Howard Marsh (q.v.), both of whom he assisted for a long time, and through there have been finer technicians and greater researchers, his undoubted success as a surgeon and in private practice lay in his sound judgement. It was this that made his advice and help sought for. He was possessed of that sound common sense and cool practical judgement which characterized him both in surgical practice and in military surgery. In 1898 he married Maria Bridget, the daughter of Canon the Hon. Hugh Wynne Mostyn, by whom he had three sons and three daughters, all of whom survive him. His eldest son, Anthony Hugh Mostyn, who succeeded to the baronetcy, was born in 1906. Sir Anthony Bowlby lived for many years at 4 Manchester Square, and later at 25 Manchester Square. He died while on holiday at Stoney Cross, Lyndhurst, after a short illness, on April 7th, 1929, was cremated at Brookwood, and was buried at Brooklands Cemetery. Bowlby's portrait, in uniform, painted by Sir William Llewellyn, K.C.V.O., R.A., and presented by his past students and colleagues, hangs in the Great Hall at St. Bartholomew's Hospital. His portrait also appears in a panel in the Royal Exchange, painted by Frank O. Salisbury, R.A., which shows their Majesties the King and Queen visiting the battle districts of France, 1917: the lower panel representing the Queen visiting the wounded soldiers, accompanied by Dame Maud MacCarthy, Matron-in-Chief, Lieut.-General Sir Arthur Slogget, Director-General Army Medical Services, and Major-General Sir Anthony Bowlby. He also appears in Moussa Ayoub's portrait group of the Council of the Royal College of Surgeons of England, 1928. PUBLICATIONS: - *Surgical Pathology and Morbid Anatomy*, 16mo, London, 1887. The 5th edition was edited with the assistance of F. W. ANDREWES (1907); 7th edition published in 1920. *Injuries and Diseases of Nerves and their Surgical Treatment*, 8vo, 20 plates. London, 1889; Philadelphia, 1890. "Injuries and Diseases of Nerves" in Treves' *System of Surgery*, i, 681. *A Civilian War Hospital*, being an account of the work of the Portland Hospital and of experience of wounds and sickness in South Africa, 1900 (etc), 8vo, 50 plates, London, 1901. "The Bradshaw Lecture on Wounds in War." - *Brit. Jour. Surg.*, 1916, iii, 451;* Jour. R.A.M.C.*, 1916, xxvi, 125. "Application of War Methods to Civil Practice." - *Lancet*, 1920, i, 131. "Results of Fracture of Femur caused by Gunshot Wounds." - *N.Y. Med. Jour.*, 1920, iii, 133. "Care of the Wounded Man in War." - *Surg. Gynecol. and Obst*., 1920, xxx, 13. "Surgical Experiences in South Africa." - *Monthly Rev.*, 1900, Oct., 52. "An Address on 900 cases of Tuberculous Disease of the Hip, treated at the Alexandra Hospital, with a Mortality of less than 4 per cent." - *Brit. Med. Jour*., 1908, i, 1465. "A Clinical Lecture on some Surgical Complications of Tabes Dorsalis." - *Ibid.*, 1906, i, 1021. "A Sketch of the Growth of the Surgery of the Front in France." - *St. Bart's Hosp. Jour.*, 1919, xxvi, 127; *Brit. Med., Jour.*, 1919, ii, 127. "Reminiscences of the War in South Africa." - *St. Bart's Hosp. Jour.*, 1900, Oct. "Abdominal Wounds." - *Lancet*, 1917, i, 207. "British Surgery at the Front." - *Brit. Med. Jour.*, 1917, i, 705. "Wounds of Brain." - *Arch. de Med. et Pharm. mil.*, 1917, lxvii, 427. "Wounds of Spinal Cord." - *Ibid.*, 1917, lxvii, 463. "Traumatic Shock." - *Ibid*., 1917, lxvii, 123. "Wounds of Joints." - *Ibid.*, 1917, lxvii, 302. "Penetrating Wounds of Abdomen." - *Ibid.*, 1917, lxvii, 486. "Wounds at Front." - *Ibid.*, 1917, lxvii, 25. "Traumatic Shock." - *Ibid.*, 1918, xlix, 80. "Thoracic-abdominal Wounds." -* Ibid.*, 1918, lxix, 34. "Primary Suture of Wounds." - *Brit. Med. Jour.*, 1918, i, 333. "British Military Surgery in the Time of Hunter and in the Great War" (Hunterian Oration.) - *Lancet*, 1919, i, 285; *Brit. Med. Jour.*, 1919, i, 205. "Gunshot Fracture of Femur." - *Brit. Med. Jour.*, 1920, i, 1; *Surg. Gynecol. and Obst*., 1920, xxx, 135. "Fractures of the Femur at the Casualty Clearing Station." - *Brit. Jour. Surg*., 1916, iii, 626. "A Clinical Lecture on Strangulated Hernia." -* Clin. Jour.*, 1908, xxxi, 385. Joint editor of the *History of the Great War Medical Services: Surgery of the War*, 2 vols., H.M.S.O., 1922. Contributed "Development of Casualty Clearing Stations, etc.," vol. i. Introduction to *Atlas of Pathological Anatomy. - Brit. Jour. Surg.*, 1925, July. Introduction to Carrell and Dehelly's *Treatment of Infected Wounds,* London, 1917.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000224
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Dunning, Mervyn Walter Frank (1917 - 2010)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Sir Miles Irving
Publication Date 2011-12-14 2013-07-11
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001700-E001799
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373939373939
Occupation General surgeon
Details Mervyn Dunning was a consultant general surgeon in Shrewsbury. He was educated at Hampton Grammar School, London. He initially trained as a dentist at the Royal Dental Hospital, qualifying in 1941. He held junior posts, as a house surgeon and then senior house surgeon in maxillofacial surgery. He then took up a commission in the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve. The allied invasion of Europe was looming, and when D-Day occurred Mervyn was stationed at the Royal Naval Hospital in Plymouth charged with dealing with war injuries from the front line. This experience convinced him that he should gain a medical qualification so, in 1946, after serving as a surgeon lieutenant in a combined services hospital in Trincomalee (in what was then Ceylon), he went to the Middlesex Hospital Medical School. He qualified in 1950 and served as house surgeon to Rupert Vaughan Hudson, the senior surgeon at Middlesex. Mervyn subsequently held a surgical appointment at the Royal Naval Hospital in Malta. He returned to Middlesex Hospital in 1952 as a demonstrator in anatomy and then proceeded to hold appointments at senior house officer and registrar level. He obtained his FRCS in 1957. After a number of senior registrar appointments in the north of England, he was appointed in 1963 as a consultant general surgeon to the Royal Shrewsbury Hospital. Mervyn was a courteous and attentive surgeon well-liked by his patients. He was widely read, fond of classical music, and an accomplished artist. He and his wife Elizabeth lived in a beautiful town house dating from the 1660s, where they were welcoming and generous hosts. Towards the end of his life he was in poor health and eventually needed bilateral leg amputations. He died in August 2010 aged 93, and was survived by his wife and his daughter Penny from his first marriage.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001756
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Khan, Mohammad Zafar Ullah ( - 2009)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Tina Craig
Publication Date 2011-12-15 2015-09-11
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001700-E001799
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373940373940
Occupation General surgeon
Details Mohammad Khan was a consultant general surgeon at East Reach Hospital, Taunton Somerset. He qualified in the Punjab in 1957 and gained the fellowship of both the College and the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Glasgow in 1975. He died on 21 August 2009, survived by a daughter.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001757
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Griffin, Peter John Anthony (1946 - 2009)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Sarah Gillam
Publication Date 2011-12-15 2015-03-06
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001700-E001799
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373941373941
Occupation Transplant surgeon
Details Peter John Anthony Griffin was a transplant surgeon at Cardiff Royal Infirmary. He was born on 19 July 1946 and studied medicine in Cardiff, gaining his MB BCh in 1970. He was a house surgeon at Musgrove Park Hospital, Taunton, and a senior house officer in the accident department at Radcliffe Infirmary, Oxford. He then became a surgical registrar in Cardiff and was later a specialist there in transplant surgery. He was involved in the World Transplant Games Federation and, after his death on 31 May 2009 at the age of 62, the Peter Griffin award was introduced for the winning team of the men's swimming freestyle relay.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001758
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Lam, Sorab Jamshed Sorabsha (1934 - 2010)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Sarah Gillam
Publication Date 2011-12-15 2014-10-24
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001700-E001799
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373942373942
Occupation Orthopaedic surgeon Trauma surgeon
Details Sorab Jamshed Sorabsha Lam, known as 'Soli', was a senior consultant orthopaedic and trauma surgeon in Bromley and Tunbridge Wells. He was born in Bombay, India, on 22 October 1934, the son of two distinguished lawyers, Jamshed Sorabsha Lam, a solicitor, and Mithan Lam née Tata, a barrister and one of the first women to be called to the British bar (in 1923). In 1950 Lam went to the UK, where he attended Dulwich College and then Guy's Hospital Medical School. He gained his MB BS and MRCS LRCP in 1957. He was a house officer at Guy's and then a senior house officer at Birmingham Accident Hospital. From June 1960 he was a senior house officer in surgery at Manchester Royal Infirmary. In 1961 he gained his FRCS and became a registrar in orthopaedic and general surgery at St Olave's Hospital, then annexed to Guy's. From 1962 to 1963 he was a registrar in vascular surgery at St Mary's Hospital, London. He was then a registrar in surgery at Lewisham General Hospital, and a registrar in orthopaedic surgery at Birkenhead General Hospital and Guy's. From 1965 to 1969, he was a senior registrar in orthopaedic surgery at Guy's, during which time he spent a year on a Fulbright travelling fellowship as an instructor in orthopaedic surgery at the University of Minnesota, Minneapolis. In 1968 he was a Hunterian Professor at the Royal College of Surgeons. In June 1969 he was appointed as a consultant to the Cray Valley and Sevenoaks Hospital Group, based at Orpington and Sevenoaks hospitals. In 1974, as a result of boundary and hospital reorganisations, he became a senior consultant orthopaedic and trauma surgeon to the Bromley Hospitals Trust (including Bromley, Orpington and Farnborough hospitals) and consultant orthopaedic surgeon to Tunbridge Wells Health Authority (Sevenoaks Hospital). For many years he was completely single-handed. He was particularly interested in spinal surgery, including correction of scoliosis, and in the reconstruction of knee and ankle joints. He was a fellow of the British Orthopaedic Association and the British Scoliosis Society, a member of the European Spine Society, the Société Internationale de Chirurgie Orthopédique et de Traumatologie, the British Association for Surgery of the Knee and the British Elbow and Shoulder Society, and an associate member of the British Society of Surgery of the Hand and the Scoliosis Research Society. He was also a visiting surgeon in America, Tunisia, Australia and Cyprus. He was a founder member of the British Fulbright Scholars Association and on the executive committee for five years. In his younger days he was a very active sportsman; he was ranked number four in the world at squash and was a cricketer for the minor counties. He won numerous trophies for squash, swimming and table tennis. His first marriage ended in divorce, and he had no further contact with his children. In 1980 he married Margaret. Soli Lam died suddenly on 30 November 2010, aged 75. He was survived by his stepsons, Stephen and Tim. Two British Orthopaedic Association fellowships have been set up in his memory.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001759
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Gregory, Irene Dorothy Rosalie (1922 - 2003)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Sarah Gillam
Publication Date 2011-12-15 2015-04-24
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001700-E001799
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373943373943
Occupation Ophthalmologist
Details Irene Gregory was a consultant ophthalmologist at Queen Mary's Hospital, Sidcup. She was born on 8 October 1922 and studied medicine at Bristol University, qualifying MB ChB in 1944. She was a house surgeon at Bristol Royal Infirmary and Bristol Eye Hospital, and went on to a senior registrar post at Guy's Hospital, London. She gained her diploma in ophthalmic medicine and surgery (DOMS) in 1946 and her FRCS in 1953. She became a part-time consultant ophthalmologist in Sidcup and to the Inner London Education Authority. She was a member of the Christian Medical Fellowship. Irene Gregory died on 8 December 2003. She was 81.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001760
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Cameron, Duncan Stewart (1940 - 2010)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Neil Weir
Publication Date 2011-12-15 2013-09-02
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001700-E001799
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373944373944
Occupation Otolaryngologist ENT surgeon
Details Stewart Cameron was a much respected otolaryngologist at the Freeman Hospital, Newcastle-upon-Tyne, with a special interest in skull-based surgery. He was born in Newcastle on 3 July 1940 and was head boy at Dame Allan's School. A keen rugby player at school, he went on to play scrum half for the Northern Football Club. Stewart Cameron qualified from the University of Durham, having completed his clinical course on the new curriculum at the University of Newcastle. His house appointments were in and around Newcastle, after which he became an assistant lecturer in the department of anatomy at the University of Glasgow (from 1965 to 1968). After gaining his Edinburgh FRCS, he decided to start training in ENT and undertook a clinical tutorship in Edinburgh. Drawn back to Newcastle, he was successively a registrar and a senior registrar at the Royal Victoria Infirmary, before being appointed as a consultant to the Freeman Hospital. Here he developed his special interest in skull-based surgery, in particular the establishment, with his neurosurgical colleagues, of a regional acoustic neuroma service. It was perhaps as an examiner that Stewart Cameron was most admired. He served on the examining boards of both the Royal Colleges of Surgeons of Edinburgh and of England for 25 years, and was awarded the FRCS *ad eundem* by our English College. He was also regional surgical adviser for the Edinburgh College. Stewart Cameron was a person who was always positive and upbeat, and who treated everyone with the same courtesy. His decision to undergo orthopaedic surgery to ease his increasing discomfort whilst playing golf regretfully resulted in a fatal post-operative pulmonary embolus. He died on 23 January 2010, aged 69, and was survived by his wife, Gladys, and his two sons, Alasdair and Iain.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001761
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Creed, George (1798 - 1868)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-09-02 2022-10-03
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001300-E001399
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373504373504
Occupation General surgeon
Details Educated at St George's Hospital. He was Surgeon to the West Suffolk Militia in 1824 and at one time Surgeon to the Suffolk General Hospital. He died at Bury St Edmunds, where he had practised, in 1868. **See below for an expanded version of the original obituary which was printed in volume 1 of Plarr’s Lives of the Fellows. Please contact the library if you would like more information lives@rcseng.ac.uk** George Creed was a general surgeon in Bury St Edmunds, Suffolk. He was born in Bury St Edmunds, the son of John Stephens Creed, a surgeon, and Emilia Creed née Herring on 18 December 1798. Creed’s twin brother Henry went on to become the rector of Mellis in Suffolk. He attended King Edward VI Free Grammar School in Bury, left before 1817 and became apprenticed to his father. He later studied at St George’s Hospital in London. He gained his MRCS in 1821 and the licentiate of the Society of Apothecaries in 1822. He went on to become a fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons of England in 1844. He was a surgeon at Suffolk General Hospital in Bury St Edmunds from 1825 to 1847 and a surgeon in the West Suffolk Militia for 44 years. In 1828 he used the skin of the notorious murderer William Corder to bind an account of his trial. The book includes an inscription: ‘The binding of this book is the skin of the murderer William Corder taken from his body and tanned by myself in the year 1828. George Creed Surgeon to the Suffolk Hospital.’ Creed was also a farmer, first at Boarhunt Farm, Fareham, Hampshire, where he farmed 472 acres and employed 24 labourers, and later at Hall Farm, Great Whelnetham, Suffolk. He was a magistrate, a trustee of the Guildhall Feoffment, which provided almshouses, and a free burgess of Bury St Edmunds. He was mayor of Bury St Edmunds in 1839. He was married to Louisa (née Powell). They had no children. He died at his home in Albert Street, Bury St Edmunds, on 28 November 1868 just before his 70th birthday. Sarah Gillam
Resource Identifier RCS: E001321
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Crellin, Frederick (1801 - 1860)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Cresswell, Alfred (1837 - 1876)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Cretin, Eugene (1851 - 1908)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-09-02 2013-08-07
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001300-E001399
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373507373507
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born in Mauritius on January 6th, 1851, and was educated at St Bartholomew's Hospital, where he gained the Senior Scholarship in Anatomy, Physiology, and Chemistry in 1872-1878; the Brackenbury Scholarship in Surgery in 1873-1874; and the Lawrence Scholarship and Gold Medal in the same session. He acted for a year as House Surgeon and then proceeded to Netley, where he won the Martin Memorial Gold Medal. His determination to enter the Indian Medical Service was perhaps fostered by a eulogistic communication by M C Furnell (qv) which appeared in the *St Bartholomew's Hospital Reports* (1870, vi, 138) soon after he entered the hospital. He entered the Bengal Army as Surgeon on March 30th, 1878; was promoted Surgeon Major on March 30th, 1890, and Lieutenant-Colonel on March 30th, 1898. He saw active service in the Afghanistan campaign of 1880 and was present at the action on Gara Heights and at the operations in the Hisarak District (Medal). He served in Burma (1885-1887), being in the operations of the 2nd and 5th Brigades (Medal and Clasp). He also took part in the Dongola Expedition (Sudan), for which he received a medal and the Khedive's medal, and on the North-West Frontier at Tochi in 1897-1898 (Medal with Clasp). He retired on December 31st, 1905, and died at Felstead in Essex on September 10th, 1908.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001324
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Crew, William Thomas (1854 - 1892)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-09-02
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001300-E001399
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373508373508
Occupation General surgeon
Details Educated at Guy's Hospital, where he was House Surgeon and Resident Obstetrician. He was also Prosector at Guy's and at the Royal College of Surgeons. He held a number of posts during his short life, and was, at various times, Assistant Medical Officer of the East Cheshire County Lunatic Asylum, House Surgeon to the Macclesfield Infirmary (at which time-1883 - he resided at Park Lane, Macclesfield), Surgeon on the Donald Currie s.s. *Hawarden Castle*, and Resident Medical Officer of the Parish Infirmary, Liverpool. At the time of his death he had settled in practice at 51 North Sherwood Street, Nottingham, where he died on August 4th, 1892.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001325
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Cridland, Arthur John ( - 1860)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Burton-Brown, Jean Rosemary Campbell (1908 - 2009)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-02-10
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001100-E001199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373312373312
Occupation Gynaecologist, Obstetrician
Details Jean Burton-Brown was a consultant gynaecologist to the east Kent group of hospitals. She was born in Rothsay on the Isle of Bute, Scotland, on 13 July 1908, the only daughter of Alexander Burton-Brown, a colonel in the Royal Horse Artillery and a fellow of the Royal Astronomical Society, and Ethel Augusta Burton-Brown née Dixon, the daughter of a major general in the Old India Company. She was educated at Hastings and St Leonard’s Ladies College and St Margaret’s School, Westgate-on-Sea. She later studied medicine at the London School of Medicine, Royal Free Hospital and qualified in 1940 at the age of 32. She held a number of posts in and around London during the Second World War – as a house surgeon at the Elizabeth Garrett Anderson Base Hospital at St Albans, a house physician and blood transfusion officer at the National Temperance Hospital, a resident medical officer at the Mothers’ Hospital, an obstetric officer at the West Middlesex County Hospital, a house surgeon and then resident registrar at the Samaritan Hospital, a clinical assistant to the gynaecological outpatient department, Royal Free Hospital, and as an assistant surgical officer back at the West Middlesex. From 1944 to 1946 she was a surgical and gynaecological registrar at the Elizabeth Garrett Anderson Hospital and a part-time demonstrator in anatomy at the London School of Medicine. In 1946 she was temporarily in charge of the gynaecology department at Mildmay Hospital. She gained an MD with a gold medal in the same year for her work on placental function. She was subsequently an assistant in the Nuffield department of obstetrics and gynaecology at Oxford, where she worked with John Chassar Moir. In 1950 she described her duties in this post: ‘Since 1947 I have conducted my own ante-natal and post-natal clinics, and have taken part in conducting the gynaecological clinics. I have taken full share of the obstetric admissions either from my own clinic or as emergency admissions, and also in performing obstetrical and gynaecological operations. In addition I have also taken part in the Emergency Obstetric Service, when summoned by general practitioners to outlying districts.’ She also taught pupil midwives, nurses, medical students and postgraduates. In 1950 she was appointed as a consultant gynaecologist to the east Kent group, remaining there until she retired in 1973. She was an early pioneer in the production of medical films for the public, including *My first baby* (1955) and *Toxaemia of pregnancy* (1958). She wrote papers on, among other topics, rupture of the liver associated with parturition, the physiology of the third stage of labour and abnormalities of the foetus and mother. She was active as secretary to the scientific section of obstetrics and gynaecology of the British Medical Association, an examiner for the Central Midwives Board and the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, and as a member of the medical advisory committee of the South East Metropolitan Hospital Board. She enjoyed gardening, golf, painting and collecting antiques. She celebrated her 100th birthday in 2008 by taking a flight in a glider. Burton-Brown died on 17 September 2009 at the age of 101. She was unmarried. Sarah Gillam
Resource Identifier RCS: E001129
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Cahill, Christopher Joseph (1952 - 2009)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Daws, Reginald Alex (1922 - 2009)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by T T King
Publication Date 2011-02-10
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001100-E001199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373314373314
Occupation Neurosurgeon
Details Alec Daws, neurosurgeon at Royal Preston Hospital, was born on 26 July 1922 at Goadby Marwood, Melton Mowbray, Leicestershire, the son of Walter Arthur Daws, a severely disabled Canadian war pensioner, and his wife, Ruth Anne. His early school days were spent at the Victoria School, Montreal, but he returned to England with his parents in 1934 and attended the Church of England School, Ashford, Middlesex, and Kingston Technical College. He entered King's College, University of London, in 1941 and the medical faculty in 1942. His medical school was St George's Hospital, London, where he won the Brackenbury prize for medicine. He qualified in 1946, doing his house appointments at St George's and its country branch in Wimbledon. In 1947 he was a resident medical officer at Atkinson Morley's Hospital, Wimbledon, under Sir Wylie McKissock and Valentine Logue, and became a registrar, and later acting first assistant, in the same unit in 1948. His National Service, starting in 1949, was in the Army at the neurosurgical centre at Wheatley, Oxfordshire, under Sir Hugh Cairns and J B Pennybacker. He obtained the fellowship of both the English and Edinburgh Royal Colleges of Surgeons in 1953, before being appointed as a senior neurosurgical registrar to Charles Langmaid at the Cardiff Royal Infirmary and also at Swansea, with Norman Whalley. He was appointed as a consultant neurosurgeon to the Royal Preston Hospital in 1958, at a time when it had neither beds nor operating theatre of its own. With his colleague, Kenneth Tutton, he developed the department into a subregional neurosurgical unit. He had a special interest in the treatment of subarachnoid haemorrhage and intracranial aneurysms and wrote on this subject, as well as on intraspinal dermoid cysts, hypopituitarism due to sarcoidosis and carotid thrombosis in head injury. He was a member of the Society of British Neurological Surgeons, a founding member of the North of England Neurological Association, an active member of the BMA, and was involved in administrative committees in the National Health Service. He married, in 1954, June Hawkins, a nurse. They had two sons, Christopher Mark and Andrew Peter. His outside interests included music and he was a keen yachtsman. He died on 29 September 2009, having suffered from Alzheimer's disease for some time.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001131
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Croft, Charles Percy (1816 - 1873)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-09-02
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001300-E001399
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373513373513
Occupation General surgeon
Details Educated at Edinburgh and at University College, London, where he was in close relation with Liston, whose House Surgeon he was. His hospital career was distinguished, as he obtained several gold and other medals, including the Fellowes Gold Medal of University College in 1838-1889, and was also Resident Medical Officer. He spent some years in London practice and was among the promoters of the Great Northern Hospital, in the success of which he took much interest. He also held the appointment of Surgeon to the Victoria Rifles until his death. For a time he went out to Brazil, and at Rio had medical charge of some 4000 workmen engaged on improvements in that city. During the last four years of his life he practised at Newark-on-Trent. He died on April 7th, 1873, after a long and painful illness, and was buried in Newark Cemetery.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001330
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Thomas, William Robert Griffith (1935 - 2009)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Sarah Gillam
Publication Date 2012-01-13 2014-04-09
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001800-E001899
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/374041374041
Occupation General surgeon
Details William Robert Griffith Thomas was a consultant general surgeon at Glangwili General Hospital, Carmathen, Wales. He studied medicine in Wales, qualifying in 1957, and gained his FRCS in 1965. He died on 30 January 2009, aged 73. He was survived by his wife Jenny and children Ruth, Edward, Kate and Casper.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001858
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Thomson, Henry Harron ( - 2006)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Michael Pugh
Publication Date 2012-01-13 2015-05-22
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001800-E001899
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/374042374042
Occupation Gynaecologist
Details Henry Harron Thomson was a consultant gynaecologist at Central Middlesex Hospital and Willesden General Hospital, London. He studied medicine at St George's Hospital Medical School, London, qualifying MB BS and MRCS LRCP in 1952. Prior to his consultant appointments he was a house surgeon at St George's, an obstetric registrar at Hillingdon Hospital and then chief assistant in the department of obstetrics and gynaecology at St Bartholomew's Hospital, London. He gained his FRCS in 1966 and his fellowship of the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists in 1980. He was a member of the Chelsea Clinical Society and the Hunterian Society. Outside medicine his great interest was horse racing. He had two horses, King's College Boy and Champagne Charlie; on his sideboard was a cup won at Cheltenham. Henry Harron Thomson died on 14 December 2006 after a long illness. He married Sybil and they had three children - Stephanie, Toby and Tim. The marriage was dissolved.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001859
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Reece, Michael William (1925 - 2008)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by John Blandy
Publication Date 2011-06-09
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001200-E001299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373427373427
Occupation General surgeon
Details Michael Reece was a consultant surgeon in Plymouth. He was born in Romford, Essex, on 16 March 1925, the son of Leslie Norman Reece, a general practitioner, and Mabel née Walker, a doctor's daughter. He was educated at Canford School and St Thomas' Hospital. After junior posts at St Thomas' and the Central Middlesex Hospital, he entered the medical branch of the RAF. On demobilisation he resolved to specialise in surgery. He won the Hallett prize in 1951 and went on to do registrar posts at Leicester Royal Infirmary, Sheffield Royal Infirmary and Bristol Royal Infirmary, working at different times for Illtyd James, J D Fergusson, Norman Barratt, Milnes Walker and R V Cooke. He was appointed as a consultant surgeon in Plymouth, where he continued to work until his retirement in 1989. He worked hard to bring the various Plymouth hospitals together under one new roof at Derriford. He was a true all-round general surgeon, notorious for his irascibility in the theatre, but always primarily concerned for the welfare of his patients. He married Patricia (Paddy) Edna Gibson in 1951. They had one son and one daughter, Louise. In retirement he devoted himself to the care of Paddy. He died on 29 August 2008 from carcinoma of the prostate.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001244
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Slesser, Elizabeth Vivien (1918 - 2010)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by N Alan Green
Publication Date 2011-06-09
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001200-E001299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373428373428
Occupation Cardiothoracic surgeon
Details Elizabeth Vivien Slesser, known as 'Betty', worked as a surgeon in Leicester from 1951 to 1978 and expanded the cardio-thoracic unit at Groby Road Hospital. She had an interesting life at a time when women in surgery had to fight hard to be recognised, and later lectured on this topic at the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh. She was born in India on 23 August 1918, the elder daughter of William Slesser, a military policeman, and Alice née Hardy, who was a graduate of Aberdeen University. Betty's sister, Margaret Phillip, died in her early twenties but had a son who lives in Thunder Bay, Canada. Her brother, Malcolm, a professor of energy studies at Strathclyde University, had two children, Morag and Calum. Morag Slesser, Betty's niece, is a clinical psychologist. Qualifying from Edinburgh University in 1941, Betty obtained a house surgeon post in the ear, nose and throat department at the Royal Infirmary and worked with Ewart Martin. In those days it was most unusual for female doctors to get junior house jobs in general surgery and medicine in Edinburgh, and most had to apply to the specialist departments, such as eyes, skin and VD. One exception among her contemporaries was Dame Sheila Sherlock, who won the Ettes scholarship, got general house appointments, and later became the first woman professor of medicine in England at the Royal Free Hospital, London. In March 1942, Betty applied for a post as house surgeon to the Prince of Wales Hospital, Greenbank, Plymouth. The town had been heavily bombed by the Luftwaffe and she wished to contribute to the war effort. The interviews took place during heavy snowfall that prevented her from travelling. She sent a telegram to this effect, but received one in return indicating that she had been appointed. She gained valuable experience at this busy general hospital in emergency work, including many casualties from 'hit and run raids'. The following year Betty was made resident surgical officer to the Prince of Wales Hospital in Devonport, a smaller hospital with fewer junior staff, but gained good clinical experience. The medical registrar gave anaesthetics for emergencies, and on one occasion held up a copy of *Romanis and Mitchiner*, which gave Betty the confidence she needed to operate on an empyema of the gallbladder, found instead of the acutely inflamed appendix she had initially diagnosed. Of her early experiences she wrote at a later date: "We worked extremely long hours, including Saturdays and Sundays, without feeling tired or badly done by. To us it was all valuable experience. My salary was £100 per year plus board and room. Initially I had one half day off a week, 3pm to 10pm, covered by the junior consultant, but when I got back I found all the emergencies from the late afternoon onwards had piled up and were awaiting me: I soon gave up my half day!" In 1943, feeling she should do more for the war effort, she was interviewed and accepted for the Royal Air Force medical service. This decision was reversed by the central committee who controlled all civilian hospital appointments. Betty was told that the RAF did not need more women doctors and she should find another surgical post. Unsuccessful in many applications to hospitals along the south coast, in desperation she applied for a job at a miners convalescent home near Sheffield. The interviews were held at the Royal Infirmary and Betty was pleasantly surprised to be offered a post as first assistant there to the surgical professorial unit with Sir Ernest Finch, doyen of surgery in the city at the time. Like many cities less vulnerable to German bombing, Sheffield received its fair share of second front service casualties who had received emergency treatment in field hospitals and hospitals on the south coast of England. The junior consultant, Alan Fawcett, a good general surgeon with superb technical ability, was developing an interest in thoracic surgery and passed his enthusiasm on to Betty Slesser as she helped him with his early thoracic operations, many performed under local anaesthesia. Clearly destined for a career in surgery, she sat and passed the Edinburgh FRCS in January 1945. Rather than attempt to obtain a post in a teaching hospital with many men returning from war service, she returned to the West Country as a surgical registrar. By September 1946 Alan Fawcett was specialising entirely in thoracic surgery and offered Betty a senior registrar post in Sheffield at the Royal Infirmary. She also worked with J T Chesterman at the Northern General Hospital. He was a pioneer in open heart surgery and the development of the heart lung machine. The workload in Sheffield was enormous, but Betty developed her interest in surgery of the oesophagus. In August 1951 she was appointed consultant surgeon to the thoracic unit in Leicester, based at the old tuberculosis and isolation hospital, a unit was started before the Second World War by Sir Thomas Holmes Sellors and expanded by her senior colleague, Gordon Cruickshank. On achieving regional status, the name was changed to Groby Road Hospital. Betty knew she was not the favoured candidate and had to overcome this obstacle with the Leicester consultant staff. She recalled one amusing episode whilst waiting for the interview. Females were expected to wear hats for these formal occasions. Her chief, Mr Fawcett, who was on the interviewing committee, made a remark likely to depress any lady before experiencing the ordeal: "Where did you get that bloody awful hat?" In addition to her work in Leicestershire, Betty had to look after south Derbyshire. Initially 50 per cent of the work was in the surgery of pulmonary tuberculosis, bronchiectasis and lung cancer, but she also engaged in oesophageal surgery. It was necessary to travel many miles at all hours to cope with chest injuries in Derby. Cardiac surgery on the unit expanded from closed mitral valvotomy and correction of congenital abnormalities, to closure of septal defects under hypothermia. During the period when cardio-pulmonary bypass was in its infancy in the UK, her senior colleague died at the age of 47. The setting up of an open-heart unit was discussed at regional level for some 10 months, and no replacement was made for her colleague. Any senior registrar acting as a locum would expect to obtain the definitive post, so Betty Slesser decided to work on her own until the correct decision could be made at regional level. In order to keep her waiting list down, some patients were transferred to Harefield hospital and a general surgeon shared the oesophageal workload in Leicester. In 1965 Philip Slade was appointed, trained in the techniques of cardio-pulmonary by-pass by Sir Russell Brock and Oswald Tubbs: a cardiologist and cardiac radiologist were also appointed in order to provide better overall care for patients. Slade trained the existing staff in Leicester, including Betty Slesser, in the various techniques, and she was then able to take her fair share of the cardiac workload. Pulmonary work continued as the expertise in coronary surgery was developed in the area. Morale in the operating theatres during these long procedures and in intensive care units was essential, and Betty gave much of the necessary support. She was a prominent and much respected member of the Society for Cardiothoracic Surgery of Great Britain and Ireland, and of the local Leicester Medical Society. Her major contribution over many years was recognised in 1974 when Betty was awarded the FRCS of our College *ad eundem* by the president, Sir Thomas Holmes Sellors. In her later years Betty married John Chatterton, clerk to the County Council of Leicester, and inherited two children, Jill and James. She and her husband were mutually supportive and in 1978 Betty decided to retire at the age of 60 so that she could spend more time with her husband who had retired four years previously. She felt he was having a raw deal, meals at all hours and little companionship, and she herself was getting a little tired of late night calls and the daily stress, admitting she had enjoyed her working life enormously. Betty spent two happy and peaceful years with John before he died in 1980 at their home in Rothley, Leicestershire. She had many interests outside medicine including fly fishing and walking in the Highlands. She was a great traveller, particularly after retirement, and went on many cruises with friends. On her husband's death she was befriended by Frank Doleman, a Leicester GP. Although they never shared a home, they continued to live near each other for 12 years until Frank died at the age of 92. She moved back to Scotland at the turn of the century to spend her remaining years in Netherbridge. She and John had a retreat there for many years and after he died she sold this and moved to 'Dornie', Netherbridge. Betty Slesser died peacefully on 13 February 2010 at her home at the age of 91. She is survived by her two step-children, Jill and James, and is much missed by a close-knit family.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001245
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching McDonald, Hugh Alexander (1914 - 2009)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by N Alan Green
Publication Date 2011-02-10 2013-09-27
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001100-E001199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373317373317
Occupation General surgeon
Details Hugh McDonald was the first consultant general surgeon with the FRCS appointed to Great Yarmouth Hospital, Norfolk, who did not also engage in general practice. He was born in London on 29 May 1914 and went to Guy's Hospital after schooling at Bishop's Stortford. House appointments at St Andrew's Hospital, Bow, followed qualification and he later worked as a resident surgical officer to the women and the children's part of St Mary Hospital, Plaistow. He then had a spell in general practice in the London area, before applying for surgical postings with the Emergency Medical Service. The Great Yarmouth appointment was advertised as: 'Resident surgical officer with a salary of £750 per annum and with residential emoluments'. The hospital management committee stipulated that he should deal with all surgical cases including orthopaedics and gynaecology, but on the understanding that the GPs performing these tasks would retire by degrees. Complex orthopaedic patients were to be referred to the Norfolk and Norwich Hospital, where the all-powerful 'Tommy' Brittain ruled the specialty. As the title 'resident surgical officer' did not quite 'fit the bill', he was called 'surgeon to the Great Yarmouth Hospital'. McDonald's request in 1946 that his title be changed to 'honorary consultant surgeon' was turned down and he had to recognise that local general practitioners used the hospital as a 'club' for coffee and a chat! Obtaining beds and the use of outpatient facilities proved an uphill struggle for many years. In 1948 he was given full status of 'consulting surgeon' and was allowed to see private patients, admitting them to the small number of beds allocated in Great Yarmouth when the NHS was introduced. McDonald practised every surgical specialty except otolaryngology and ophthalmology. Some specialties were covered by Norwich consultants in those early days, including complex gynaecology and obstetrics. McDonald, however, was experienced in both and was able to guide the hands of the first full-time gynaecologist appointed to the 'coast' with great sensitivity. Norfolk's 'cottage hospitals' had many GP surgeons of good quality who operated with the help of GP anaesthetists. From the 1940s and for 25 years, family doctors routinely visited their patients in hospital, checking their progress and helping with surgery whenever possible. McDonald replaced four GP-surgeons who had done all cold and emergency cases that did not require transferring some 20 miles to Norwich. On one occasion a GP referred and assisted with the surgery on a fit young male with peritonitis after being knocked off his bicycle. Theatre staff were intrigued to see peas floating in the peritoneal fluid, but the patient made a good recovery. A year or so after his appointment, McDonald raised a few eyebrows by his early mobilisation of patients after surgery. A local GP's daughter had an emergency appendicectomy, and recalled: 'He was quite young and up-to-date. In those days it was normal for post-operative patients to be bed-bound for a fortnight and to take a long convalescence. He had me out of bed two days after the operation and walking on the third day. I was discharged within a week and was swimming in a fortnight!' Hugh McDonald excelled in all forms of gastric surgery necessary in those days in duodenal and gastric ulcers. In his hands total gastrectomy was a safe procedure. To add to this huge workload he performed post-mortems at the hospital well into the 1970s, including those for HM Coroner. The only trained pathologist was based in Norwich and journalists reporting on 'coroner's court' cases in the local press nicknamed him 'Mac the knife'. The decline of the fishing industry in Yarmouth led to widespread poverty and many people became seriously ill or died after eating putrescent fish. In his work as a pathologist, McDonald found that 'toxic' oesophageal rupture was caused by decaying fish, mainly mackerel. This inspired him to resort to open oesophageal removal and not oesophagoscopy to evacuate the 'debris' from the friable 'tube', and with considerable success. Fascinated by human anatomy as a student, McDonald 'drew much and wrote little' when answering questions in anatomy examinations. He retained an excellent knowledge of relevant clinical anatomy throughout his career. He was a gifted pianist and artist, and Hugh McDonald confessed that, had he not entered medicine, he would have liked to have become an orchestra conductor. Many of his paintings were exhibited in shops along Gorleston High Street and sold well. In retirement his hairstyle became a little 'Bohemian', to say the least He married first Bettina Symons, by whom he had two daughters and a son. His daughter Sarah McCoy trained in catering, is married and has two daughters. The second, Dinah Greaney, has a son, and McDonald's only son works in the entertainment world in Dubai and is married with three children. Bettina died of cancer at 48 and Hugh later married Vera Taylor, who predeceased him. Hugh McDonald died on 28 March 2009 in the James Paget Hospital (which replaced both Great Yarmouth and Lowestoft hospitals in 1981), of cardiac problems one year after he had undergone a successful hip replacement.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001134
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Salter, Robert Bruce (1924 - 2010)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-02-10
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001100-E001199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373318373318
Occupation Orthopaedic surgeon
Details Robert Bruce Salter, known as 'Bob', a sixth generation Canadian, was a pioneer in orthopaedic surgery in children. He was born in Stratford, Ontario, on 15 December 1924 and graduated from the University of Toronto. He then worked for two years at the Grenfell Medical Mission in Newfoundland, and spent a year as a McLaughlin fellow in 1954, during which time he worked for Watson-Jones and Osmond Clarke at the London Hospital. He returned to the Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto in 1955, where he was to become surgeon-in-chief and professor of surgery at the University of Toronto. His life's work was based on thoughtful and careful animal research. Among his many contributions to orthopaedic surgery were his eponymous procedure for congenital dislocation of the hip - innominate osteotomy. He was in universal demand as a guest lecturer and visiting professor. His *Textbook of disorders and injuries of the musculoskeletal system* (Baltimore USA, E & S Livingstone, Williams & Wilkins Co., 1970) was used all over the world. He received many honours: an Officer of the Order of Canada in 1977 (promoted to Companion in 1997), the Order of Ontario (in 1988), fellow of the Academy of Science of the Royal Society of Canada, the Gairdner Foundation international award for medical science, the FNG Starr medal of the Canadian Medical Association, the Bristol-Myers Squibb-Zimmer award for distinguished achievement in orthopaedic research and the Nicolas Andry award. He was the Sims travelling professor of our College in 1973, during which time he gave the Colles lecture in the Irish College. He was president of the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada and an honorary fellow of our College, the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland and of four other surgical colleges. He was married to Robbie. They had five children. His many interests included heraldry and medical history. He died on 10 May 2010.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001135
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Shires, Peter Rodney (1930 - 2010)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

First Title value, for Searching Arnott, Eric John (1929 - 2011)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Enid Taylor
Publication Date 2012-02-02 2012-11-15
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001900-E001999
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/374132374132
Occupation Ophthalmologist
Details Eric John Arnott was an ophthalmologist and a pioneer of modern cataract surgery. He was born on 12 June 1929 in Sunningdale. His father, Sir Robert John Arnott, was chairman of Arnott Trust, Dublin, and director of *The Irish Times*. His mother was Emita Emelia James. He attended St Peter's Court Preparatory School and Harrow. His medical education was at Trinity College, Dublin, where he gained honours in obstetrics and the surgical prize in 1953. After house jobs, his first ophthalmic appointment was at the Royal Adelaide Hospital and Royal Victoria Eye and Ear Hospital, followed by postgraduate training at Moorfields Eye Hospital and University College Hospital, London. Here he worked under Sir Stewart Duke-Elder, Henry Stallard and Sir Harold Ridley, and subsequently became a senior lecturer to the Institute of Ophthalmology, London. He was appointed as a consultant ophthalmic surgeon to the Royal Eye, Charing Cross and Royal Masonic hospitals, and was consultant emeritus to Cromwell Hospital. He was an innovative surgeon and was especially known for pioneering changes in cataract surgery. In 1966 he was one of the first surgeons to follow Dermot Pearce's use of the surgical microscope, and in 1971 was the first surgeon outside the United States to perform phacoemulsification, a technique he taught and championed against stiff opposition throughout the 1970s and 1980s. In 1974 he designed the Little-Arnott lens to be positioned behind the iris after removing the cataract and in 1978 designed and patented the first one piece polymethyl methacrylate (PMMA) intraocular lens. He was the first person to describe the use of a poly-HEMA foldable implant (in 1981), inserted into the eye through a small incision. In 1988 he was the first surgeon in Europe to insert a bifocal lens. But his work was not limited to cataract surgery - in 1967 he used the first silicone implant for retinal detachment surgery, and in 1968 developed a modified operation for glaucoma surgery. He bought one of the first excimer lasers and in 1992 was the first person in the UK to perform LASIK laser refractive surgery. In 1982 he reduced his NHS work and to concentrate on establishing Arnott Eye Associates, the UK's first independent multidisciplinary ophthalmic centre, and international teaching and charitable work, especially the promotion of modern cataract surgery in India and Africa. He was one of the first surgeons to perform phaco-surgery and lens implantation in India, and in 1991 received a special award from the Asian branch of the Royal National Institute for the Blind for 'outstanding support' to blind Asians in London and India. He was made an honorary professor at Indore University. With his wife and son, he raised funds to equip a mobile operating theatre to perform eye surgery in remote Indian villages, and in 2007, with G Chandra, he established the charity 'Balrampur Hospital Foundation UK'. He wrote over 40 published scientific articles and books and contributed specialist chapters to other medical books. He was a member of many international societies - president of the European Society for Phaco and Laser Surgery, secretary of the Ophthalmic Society of the UK, president of the Chelsea Clinical Society, president of the International Association of Ocular Surgeons, president of the Asian Blind Association, fellow of the American Academy of Ophthalmology and a founder member of the American Society of Cataract and Refractive Surgery, from whom in 2007 he received the honoured guest award for services to ophthalmology. On 19 November 1960 he married a ballerina, Veronica Mary Langué von der Seedeck. They had three children, Stephen John, Tatiana Amelia and Robert Lauriston John. He was a very fit man and his hobbies reflected this - gardening, tennis, cycling and swimming - swimming a mile every morning and once from Alcatraz Island to the shore of California. He retired aged 70 and bought a retirement cottage in Cornwall, where he wrote his memoirs *A new beginning in sight* (London, Royal Society of Medicine Press, c2007). Predeceased by his wife, he died aged 82 on 1 December 2011.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001949
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Bates, Peter Francis (1934 - 2011)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by P E A Savage
Publication Date 2012-02-02 2012-09-12
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001900-E001999
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/374133374133
Occupation General surgeon
Details Peter Bates was a consultant surgeon for Dartford and Gravesham Health Authority. He was born in Belfast on 12 August 1934. His father, Charles Donald Bates, retired from the Army and became a company director. His mother, Gladys Elizabeth Wilson, qualified in medicine from Queen's University, Belfast, as did her brother Robert Belshaw Wilson. In the 1940s Peter's mother and uncle were in general practice together at Morecombe and Heysham, Lancashire. Educated initially in Belfast, Peter attended the Royal Grammar School, Lancaster, from 1946 until 1953. He was already showing his sporting prowess, being captain of rugby and *victor ludorum* (from 1951 to 1953) and also played on the wing for Lancashire schoolboys. He won the Wewell prize as the outstanding boy in the fifth form. In 1953 Peter went up to Gonville and Caius, Cambridge, where he was awarded his BA degree. Already interested in the theatre, he would persuade his mother to send bouquets of flowers to the stage door at the theatre in Morecombe if a favourite actress was playing there! He went to St Mary's Hospital Medical School in 1956 for his clinical training. At medical school Peter's company was sought after for his friendly and jovial personality. A great socialiser and party-goer, he was an active member of the Film Artists Association, members of which were in great demand as film extras at the time. During the late 1950s many Mary's men appeared in British film classics such as Sink the Bismark!, A Night to Remember, Battle of the River Plate, Suddenly, Last Summer and Carve Her Name With Pride. Peter played on the wing for Mary's with great enthusiasm on many occasions and, while not always the first choice for the first XV, he captained the A team regularly. It was in 1959 that disaster struck. While returning from a party the car in which he was a passenger skidded off the road and hit a bank. Peter fractured his skull and lost the sight of one eye. He made a remarkable recovery, but close friends recognised that his personality had changed. He became more 'edgy' and could take offence easily. He qualified MB BChir in 1961. Peter's house jobs were at the West Middlesex Hospital (with J Scholefield and D E Bolt), where he stayed on for senior house officer appointments in casualty, orthopaedics and general surgery. It was while at the West Middlesex that Peter married Cynthia Joan Trace, a radiographer at the hospital, in 1964. The marriage was dissolved in 1970. Surgical training continued with a registrar rotation in general surgery and urology at Hillingdon Hospital (with G W Duncan and H G Hanley). He was awarded his fellowship of the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland in 1967 and became a fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons of England in 1970. Peter married again in 1971, this time to an actress, Margaret Joan Wright, who as Maggie Wright, in September 1968, had become the first person to appear fully naked on the legitimate British stage as Helen of Troy in a Royal Shakespeare production of Marlowe's *Faustus*. This marriage was dissolved in 1980. There were no children of either marriage. Although never obtaining a substantive senior registrar post, Peter soon became a regular face at St Mary's Hospital as a lecturer and an honorary senior registrar working with W T Irvine, L L Bromley, H H G Eastcott and J L Stephen. He was in considerable demand as a locum consultant surgeon during the late 1960s, working at Mount Vernon, East Ham and Queen Mary's Hospital, Stratford. In January 1974 Peter was appointed as a consultant general surgeon to Dartford and Gravesham Health Authority, a position he held until his retirement in 1991. During these 17 years the sociable aspects of his personality flourished, with membership of many learned societies including the Royal Society of Medicine, the British Society of Gastroenterology, the British Association of Surgical Oncology, the European Society of Surgical Oncology and the Association of Coloproctology. He was a member of the British Medical Association, the World Medical Association, the Anglo-American Medical Society and the Association of Surgeons of Great Britain and Ireland. He also found time to be a member of the Hunterian Society, was on the livery committee of the Worshipful Society of Apothecaries and a Freemason. While at Dartford Peter was always available to give an opinion and was respected by his colleagues. He was particularly good with children and operated skilfully on many cases of congenital pyloric stenosis. He was always a willing contributor to lunchtime educational sessions for junior staff. Peter chaired a number of hospital committees and became adept at dealing with 'difficult' colleagues. From 1974 until 1983 he was the Royal College surgical tutor. Outside surgery, Peter had many interests, all of which he was able to enjoy during his retirement. Although he had hung up his rugby boots, he was a regular visitor to Twickenham, easily recognised in his duffel coat and Mary's scarf. Always interested in the theatre, he supported, often financially, many fringe events in small halls and rooms above pubs, as well as more major productions in the West End. The sociable aspects of the professional organisations he had enjoyed so much while a surgeon were soon replaced by freemasonry. With his typical enthusiasm he embraced it in its various forms. A great joiner, and always ready to subscribe to be a founder, he was well known on the masonic circuit. He retained a great affection for his old Cambridge college and assisted in the foundation of the Harold Gillies fund to provide financial assistance for medical students at Gonville and Caius, and continued to be its generous benefactor. In 1981 Peter arranged a memorial service for a friend at St Paul's Church in Covent Garden and subsequently became a regular worshipper there. For 16 years he was a churchwarden. Although a very clubbable man, Peter continued to live alone, sharing his Pimlico flat with a number of cats. Sadly, the onset of progressive dementia forced him into a nursing home in 2005, where he died on 28 November 2011.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001950
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Brewin, Ernest Garside (1920 - 2010)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Sarah Gillam
Publication Date 2012-02-02 2014-01-24
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001900-E001999
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/374134374134
Occupation Cardiothoracic surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details Ernest Garside Brewin was a consultant thoracic and cardiovascular surgeon in Stoke-on-Trent and Stafford. He was born in Batley, Yorkshire, on 22 February 1930, the son of Willie Beaumont Brewin, a warehouse manager. His mother's maiden name was Garside. He was educated at Carlinghow Elementary School and then Batley Grammar School. He went on to study medicine in Leeds. He was a house surgeon at the General Infirmary in Leeds, and then a demonstrator in physiology at the University of Leeds. He subsequently became a research fellow in cardiovascular surgery at Guy's Hospital, a lecturer in surgery at the University of Glasgow, and assistant director on the surgical unit and a surgeon at St Thomas' Hospital, London. He was then appointed to his consultant post at Stoke-on-Trent and Stafford. He listed E R Flint in Leeds, P R Allison, Sir Charles Illingworth and Lord Brock as the surgeons who had most influenced him. He was interested in music and the history of mathematics and science. In 1950 he married Rhoda Eleanor Taylor. They had one daughter. Ernest Garside Brewin died on 26 September 2010, aged 80.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001951
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Barclay, Robert Christopher (1916 - 2009)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Tina Craig
Publication Date 2012-02-06 2013-09-03
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001900-E001999
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/374150374150
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Robert Christopher Barclay was a consultant thoracic surgeon. Born on 2 April 1916 in Chippenham, he trained at St George's Hospital and qualified from Cambridge University in 1942. Passing the fellowship in 1946 he was house surgeon at St George's and then resident medical officer at the Royal Cancer Hospital. He moved to Oxford to become registrar at the Radcliff Infirmary before ending his medial career as consultant thoracic surgeon to the Nottingham City Hospital and associated Sanatoria. He was a fellow of the Association of Surgeons of Great Britain and a member of the Society of Thoracic Surgeons. He died at his home in Thurgarton, Notts on Friday 2 January 2009, aged 92 years, survived by a Robert E. Barclay who may have been his son. His wife, Gwendoline E. Barclay, was living at the same address in 2004 but it is not known if she survived him. Publications:- Operations for hernia: nylon darn technique. *Lancet* 1948 Solid sarcomatous pulmonary artery (jointly) *Brit j dis chest* 1960
Resource Identifier RCS: E001967
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Griffith, Walter (1798 - 1875)

2026-04-05T15:56:33Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2012-02-22
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E002000-E002999/E002000-E002099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/374244374244
Occupation General surgeon
Details Practised at 1 Bloomsbury Place, Bloomsbury Square, and afterwards at 25 Guilford Street, London, WC. He was at one time Surgeon-Accoucheur to the Royal Maternity and Great Queen Street Lying-in Charities, Surgeon to the London Female Penitentiary and to the Hon Society of Ancient Britons. He died at 25 Guilford Street on November 18th, 1875.
Resource Identifier RCS: E002061
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset