Search Results for Medical Obituaries

First Title value, for Searching Adams, Rosemary Helen MacNaughton (1926 - 2018)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2019-05-02
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E009000-E009999/E009500-E009599
Occupation Accident and emergency specialist
Details Rosemary Helen MacNaughton Adams was a consultant in the accident and emergency department at the Norfolk and Norwich Hospital. She was born in Edinburgh on 26 April 1926, the second child and eldest daughter of Thomas MacNaughton Davie and Lilias Tweedie Davie née Henderson. She was brought up in Beverley, Yorkshire, where her father was medical superintendent at the East Riding County Asylum. She attended the High School in Beverley and then studied medicine at Edinburgh University, where she was an outstanding student, achieving four medals, including the most distinguished graduate of the year award; she qualified in 1948. She held house posts in Edinburgh and then initially specialised in ear, nose and throat medicine, as a registrar at Hull Royal Infirmary. In 1954 she married another doctor, John Campbell Strathie Adams. His specialist posts took them from Yorkshire to Birmingham and finally to Norwich, where he was appointed as a consultant geriatrician. She was an associate specialist in the casualty department at the Norfolk and Norwich Hospital and became a consultant in 1975. She helped found the Norfolk branch of what became the British Association of Immediate Care Schemes (BASICS). She taught, spoke at conferences on immediate care and wrote papers on the emergency treatment of poisoning. She retired in 1990. She was appointed as a magistrate in 1965 and served on the north Norfolk bench until 1994. She enjoyed music, and played the piano and viola. With her husband, she organised a concert series at the local church at Salle in north Norfolk, where she was a churchwarden. In 1994 she and John moved back to Beverley. Sadly, her husband died the following year. She had age-related macular degeneration for many years and died from Alzheimer’s disease on 16 October 2018 at the age of 92. She was survived by her two daughters, son and three grandchildren.
Resource Identifier RCS: E009566
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset
Publication Date 1948

First Title value, for Searching Bharucha, Pesi Beramsha (1920 - 2018)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Sarah Gillam
Publication Date 2019-03-04
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E009000-E009999/E009500-E009599
Occupation General surgeon
Details Pesi Bharucha was chief of surgery at the Tata Main Hospital, Jamshedpur, Bihar, India. He studied medicine at Grant Medical College, Bombay and qualified in 1944. He initially trained as an obstetrician and gynaecologist, but then went to the UK shortly after Indian Independence to train in general surgery. He worked at Walton General Hospital in Liverpool for eight years and gained his fellowship of the Royal College of Surgeons of England in 1954. In 1955 he returned to India, where he became a consultant surgeon at the Tata Main Hospital. He was chief of surgery and superintendent before retiring in 1980. He initially carried out all the general surgery, orthopaedics and trauma, but gradually developed the hospital into a multispecialty facility. He also worked with the World Health Organization, particularly arranging trips into remote areas of Bihar to vaccinate people against smallpox. After retiring from the Tata Main Hospital, he became the medical director of Breach Candy Hospital and Research Centre in Mumbai (from 1982 to 1996). He died on 28 November 2018 and was survived by his wife Gool, two children and three grandchildren.
Resource Identifier RCS: E009578
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset
Publication Date 1954 1952

First Title value, for Searching Alexander, Albert Geoffrey (1932 - 2010)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by SIM
Publication Date 2023-07-19
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E010000-E010999/E010300-E010399
Occupation Specialist in conservation dentistry
Details Albert Geoffrey Alexander (1932-2010), known to all as Geoff or AGA, was a caring clinician, a compassionate teacher and a meticulous research worker. Geoff was born in Hull and obtained a scholarship at Bridlington School, where he became Head Boy. He was the first member of his family to attend university when he entered University College Hospital Dental School, University of London, where he collected the Sinclair Medal for the best student in his cohort. He obtained LDS in 1955, BDS in 1956, FDSRCS in 1961 and MDS in 1968. After graduating he held House Surgeon posts at The National Dental Hospital, did National Service in The Royal Army Dental Corp, ran the Student Dental Service at University College and had a year in private practice in Kent. In 1960 he became a full-time Lecturer in Conservative Dentistry, a Senior Lecturer in 1962, and an Honorary Consultant in 1967. He became Vice Dean of Dental Studies in 1974 and Dean, UCL Dental School and Vice Dean (Dental) of the Faculty of Clinical Sciences in 1977, a position he continued to hold until 1992. Geoff, with his wife Connie, then went to Hong Kong for two years as Head of Conservative Dentistry and Associate Dean of the Faculty of Dentistry. As well as working, they enjoyed showing visiting friends and colleagues the highlights of Hong Kong, especially the sky-scape of Hong Kong Island as seen, over a cup of tea, from the Terrace of the Peninsular Hotel on Kowloon. Geoff and Connie found time to go walking in Switzerland and Austria and later visited 'long haul' destinations such as Canada and Japan. When he retired, despite his long standing ill health, bravely borne, he developed an interest in computing and photography and continued his long standing enjoyment of music. Geoff had a significant impact on a whole generation of dental students who went through UCH Dental School. He was a kindly man who raised students' standards by professionalism, persuasion and example. He is survived by his wife Connie, his daughter Susan and two granddaughters, Christine and Elizabeth.
Resource Identifier E010358
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset
Publication Date 1956

First Title value, for Searching Kolb, Thomas Axel Thor (1935 - 2022)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2023-06-27
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E010000-E010999/E010200-E010299
Occupation Dental surgeon Community Dentist
Details Tom Kolb was a dentist in Cirencester with a particular interest in children’s dentistry. This is a draft obituary. If you have any information about this surgeon or are interested in writing this obituary, please email lives@rcseng.ac.uk
Resource Identifier RCS: E010246
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset
Publication Date 1959

First Title value, for Searching Lynch, James Brendan (1921 - 2018)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Sarah Gillam
Publication Date 2019-03-04
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E009000-E009999/E009500-E009599
Occupation Pathologist
Details James Brendan Lynch was a consultant pathologist at St James’ Hospital, Leeds and formerly professor of pathology at the University of Khartoum, Sudan. He was born on 9 May 1921 in Wallasey, Cheshire, the third child and second son of Thomas Patrick Lynch, a teacher and headmaster, and Margaret Lynch née Pierce. He attended local schools in Wallasey and St Francis Xavier Grammar School in Liverpool and then went to the University of Liverpool to study medicine, qualifying in 1944. He was a house surgeon and senior casualty officer at Liverpool Royal Infirmary, lectured in anatomy at the University of Leeds, and then served in the Army. He was a registrar in general surgery at the Royal Southern Hospital, Liverpool and gained his FRCS in 1950. During his training he was influenced by Henry Clarence Wardleworth Nuttall and Richard Webster Doyle, both surgeons in Liverpool. He was subsequently a lecturer in pathology at the University of Leeds. Lynch then went to the University of Khartoum, where he founded the department of pathology. By the mid 1960s, he had returned to the UK: in March 1964 he gave a Hunterian Lecture at the Royal College of Surgeons of England on ‘Mycetoma in the Sudan’ (*Ann R Coll Surg Engl*. 1964 Dec;35[6]:319-40). He was appointed as a consultant pathologist in Leeds, where he was also dean for postgraduate medical education. He was the co-author of *Pathology of toxaemia in pregnancy* Edinburgh, Churchill Livingstone, 1973. Outside medicine he enjoyed golf, reading, DIY and silver craftmanship. In 1957 he married Jacqueline Fitzgerald. They had two sons. James Lynch died on 24 August 2018 at the age of 97.
Resource Identifier RCS: E009583
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset
Publication Date 1969

First Title value, for Searching Iyer, Sennaporatti Sivashankar Viswa ( - 2020)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Tina Craig
Publication Date 2020-11-02
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E009000-E009999/E009800-E009899
Occupation Trauma surgeon Orthopaedic surgeon
Details Sennaporatti Sivashankar Viswanath Iyer was born in India. He studied medicine at Bangalore Medical College and Research Institute and qualified MB,BS in 1963. Initially he worked as a general surgeon and passed his MS in 1970. He was a lecturer in surgery at Mysore Medical College from 1971 to the end of 1972. In February 1973 he travelled to the UK and began his training in orthopaedics. He passed the fellowship of the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh in 1975 and the college fellowship the following year. Following what he described as a *tortuous route*, he worked at the Royal National Orthopaedic Hospital in Stanmore, the Hammersmith Hospital, the Princess Margaret Rose Orthopaedic Hospital and the Royal Infirmary in Edinburgh doing various locum posts. In 1994 he was appointed consultant orthopaedic surgeon at King George Hospital in Ilford and finally he became consultant at St George’s Hospital in Tooting. Throughout his career he very much enjoyed teaching, especially his work on the inaugural *Training the trainers* course in Edinburgh. When young he was a keen sportsman and excelled in cricket, badminton and table tennis. He described himself as a very aggressive batsman and, when he came to the UK, played cricket for a local first division team from 1973 to 1981. In table tennis he also reached a reasonably high standard. He died on 23 July 2020.
Resource Identifier RCS: E009862
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset
Publication Date 1975 1970

First Title value, for Searching Webb, Anthony John (1929 - 2024)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Jason Webb
Publication Date 2024-11-08
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E010000-E010999/E010600-E010699
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/388455388455
Occupation General surgeon Endocrine surgeon Breast surgeon Cytologist
Details John Webb, a consultant general and endocrine surgeon for the Bristol United Hospitals, was a masterly technical surgeon and pioneer cytologist. In an era when a lump in the breast presaged uncertain frozen section biopsy and mastectomy, Webb mastered fine needle aspiration and accurate diagnosis, saving countless patients from avoidable surgery, achieved through single-handed endeavour and a microscope in his own home. His work forms the basis of the routine investigation of suspected breast cancer in modern practice. He was born in Clifton, Bristol on 29 December 1929, the son of Charles Reginald Webb, who worked in the corn trade, and Gwendoline (‘Queenie’) Webb née Moon. He was educated at Sefton Park Junior School and Cotham Grammar School, where he was head of the school from 1947 to 1948. He then entered the University of Bristol Medical School, graduating MB ChB in 1953, when he won the silver medal. He was a house officer at the Bristol Royal Infirmary between 1953 and 1955, and then carried out his National Service as a captain in the Royal Army Medical Corps from 1955 until 1957. He was a surgical registrar at Frenchay Hospital, from 1957 to 1960 and then spent seven years in Birmingham and Coventry as a registrar and senior registrar. He returned to Bristol in 1967, when he was appointed as a consultant surgeon to Bristol Royal Infirmary, a post he held until he retired in December 1994. Following his retirement, he became a senior research fellow in the department of surgery at the University of Bristol. As a general surgeon, he retained broad general skills in all disciplines owing to his exhaustive training experience, but his research and clinical specialty interests focused on breast, endocrine and salivary gland disease. Central to this was his conviction that cytology, which formed the focus of his life’s research, could hold a key to investigating and thereby treating these diseases better. He undertook a higher degree, a ChM, awarded in 1974, with his thesis entitled ‘A cytological study of mammary disease’. This entailed studying with a leading cytologist, Paul Lopes Cardozo, in Leiden. He was a Hunterian professor at the Royal College of Surgeons of England in 1975. His fascination with cytology did not stop with gaining his ChM; he became expert in all aspects of it, and this led to him being awarded the fellowship of the International Association of Cytologists – extremely rare for a surgeon. In 1993, he was also awarded the Erica Wachtel medal of the British Association of Cytopathology for his long service to the subject. His research changed the modern surgical practice of the treatment of breast cancer, heralding the concept of the one-stop clinic where a breast lump was examined and its nature ascertained through fine needle aspiration cytology at the initial consultation. Owing to his own cytological expertise, he was able to diagnose varied conditions and was called upon by colleagues around the city when a diagnosis was elusive. One memorable case involved a request from the physicians to identify the primary in a patient with metastatic disease. Noticing a bony metastasis in the vertebral body of C3, he performed fine-needle aspiration via an open mouth technique through the oropharynx. This was performed on the ward with minimal fuss or disruption, the diagnosis of a colonic primary being provided the following morning. He was the surgeon of choice to fellow consultants in need of help and a studious trainer of junior surgeons, from whom he demanded as near to his own meticulous surgical technique as they could achieve. He was president of the British Association of Endocrine Surgeons from 1992 to 1994. In his youth, John Webb was a fine rugby player, appearing at fly half for Bristol. He sang in the choir at Clifton College and was an ardent student of history. A keen observer of human traits, he had a wry sense of humour, put to use in nicknames for colleagues whose aspirations may have exceeded their abilities. Predeceased by his wife Audrie (née Bowen), whom he married in 1955, he died from old age and frailty on 21 September 2024 at the age of 94. He was survived by their four children, Mark, Dominque, Charlotte and Jason, most of whom have followed their father into either surgery or professions allied to medicine, eight grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.
Resource Identifier RCS: E010681
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset
Publication Date 1980 1974

First Title value, for Searching Hase, Michael Paul (1946 - 2018)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Sarah Gillam
Publication Date 2023-07-04
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E010000-E010999/E010200-E010299
Occupation Oral and maxillofacial surgeon
Details Michael Paul Hase was a consultant oral and maxillofacial surgeon in Melbourne, Victoria. He was born on 16 May 1946 and studied dentistry at the University of Melbourne, gaining an LDS and MDSc. He became a fellow of the Faculty of Dental Surgery of the Royal College of Surgeons of England in 1976 and was also a fellow of the Royal Australasian College of Dental Surgeons. He was appointed to the staff of the Western General and Prince Henry’s hospitals in Melbourne and had a special interest in the surgical management of TMJ degenerative joint disease. Hase died on 15 July 2018 in Melbourne at the age of 72. He was survived by his wife Tania and children Dylan, Kyle, Tim, Chris and Melinda.
Resource Identifier RCS: E010279
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset
Publication Date 1976

First Title value, for Searching Arthur, Ian Hugh (1957 - 2018)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Tina Craig
Publication Date 2019-02-05
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E009000-E009999/E009500-E009599
Occupation General surgeon
Details Ian Hugh Arthur was a registrar in general surgery and orthopaedics at St. Albans City Hospital. He was born on 29 December 1957 and trained in medicine at London University and the Royal Free Hospital, graduating MB, BS in 1981. Initially a house physician and surgeon at the Royal Free, he joined the staff of the surgical rotation at the Basingstoke District Hospital. After passing the fellowship of the college in 1990, he began work at St. Albans City Hospital. He lived in Uxbridge and died on 18 December 2018 aged 60.
Resource Identifier RCS: E009567
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset
Publication Date 1981

First Title value, for Searching Gilmour, Andrew Graham (1955 - 2016)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by M Cassidy
Publication Date 2023-07-06
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E010000-E010999/E010300-E010399
Occupation Specialist in restorative dentistry
Details Dr Andrew Graham Gilmour died peacefully on 8 January 2016 after a short illness, at the untimely age of 60. Graham was born on Good Friday, 1955. He qualified at Glasgow Dental School in 1978, then joined the SHO/Registrar rotation in Glasgow and passed the FDSRCPS in 1982. He became a lecturer in prosthodontics shortly afterwards and in 1988 was appointed consultant in restorative dentistry at Mayday Hospital, Croydon. A member of the appointments committee later told me that Graham was the most outstanding applicant for the post among the candidates. Graham quickly developed the service in Croydon and established outreach clinics around the southeast of England, including Bournemouth, Portsmouth and Southampton, which soon attracted the attention of the dental teaching hospitals in London who wanted to get their higher trainees in restorative dentistry and orthodontics into attachments at Graham’s unit in Croydon. Most of these trainees were later appointed consultants and professors up and down the UK. Graham was particularly skilled as a diagnostic clinician, a first class teacher, an educator, who was invited to lecture locally, nationally and internationally, where his clinical skills and natural humour endeared him to every audience. He had a very sharp political touch. He understood how NHS committees worked and developed the philosophy that one should be either a committee member or chairman, but never the treasurer or secretary! He was appointed Associate Postgraduate Dental Dean for the KSS Region in 2003, and was asked to organise the training of clinical dental technicians which attracted applicants from all around the UK, every one of whom successfully completed the course and held Graham in the highest esteem. One of his most endearing attributes was his unique sense of humour and fun, for which his trainees will testify. He organised educational programmes with the Cunard shipping line, crossing the Atlantic to New York on the QE2 twice, and cruising with Cunard in the Caribbean in 1994 which proved to be very popular. He had a particularly mischievous sense of humour; in 1982 Pope John Paul II came to Glasgow to say mass. On the same day, in Glasgow Dental Hospital, the oral surgery registrar received a phone call from a Cardinal, who was the Pope’s personal secretary, reporting that the Holy Father had toothache and wanted to see the Professor of Oral Surgery, at 4 pm that day! It was of course, a joke, played by ‘Cardinal’ Graham Gilmour! Graham was hugely loved by his colleagues at Mayday Hospital in Croydon, and will be sadly missed by all of those who worked with him, his brother Rowland, but most of all by his wife Virginia, and his daughters Ginny and Ally.
Resource Identifier RCS: E010313
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset
Publication Date 1982

First Title value, for Searching Fordyce, Gordon Lindsay (1925 - 2018)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Andrew Sadler
Publication Date 2023-07-05
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E010000-E010999/E010200-E010299
Occupation Oral surgeon, Dental surgeon
Details Gordon Fordyce trained in dentistry at the University of St Andrews in Dundee from 1942 to 1946. After a few months of practice he was called up for national service where he treated army recruits and, after a year, was posted to Austria where he worked at the 31st British General Hospital as No 2 dentist and subsequently Senior Dental Officer. There he became responsible for trauma. After demobilisation he wanted to practise hospital oral surgery and back in Dundee he was advised by the Professor of Anatomy that a medical qualification would not be necessary if he passed the new Fellowship in Dental Surgery examination. Thus he worked as an anatomy demonstrator while studying for part one of the exam and was then appointed as Registrar at Hill End Hospital near St Albans, and a year later promoted to senior registrar. After his four years as a senior registrar Gordon was too young for a consultant post so he was appointed as a senior hospital dental officer. After the age of 32 he was appointed as a consultant at the Royal Free Hospital for two sessions a week and the North West Thames Health Authority agreed to upgrade him to consultant at Mount Vernon Hospital (to where the Hill End department had moved in March 1953). Gordon Fordyce published papers relating to oral pathology, facial trauma and orthognathic surgery. He became involved in local and national dental politics; he was a section chairman and a member of the representative board of the BDA, President of the Institute of Maxillofacial Technology and President of the British Association of Oral Surgeons. However, his major legacy to the dental profession was the introduction of vocational training for dentists. He became an elected member of the GDC and Dental Dean of the British Postgraduate Medical Federation. He found the GDC hostile and resistant to change. It took 15 years to persuade them, many of whom were deans of dental schools, that their undergraduate training was inadequate preparation for independent practice and to persuade the government to provide funding. The first vocational training pilot started in Guildford in 1977 and it became mandatory in 1988. Gordon Fordyce retired from clinical work at Mount Vernon in 1988 but remained Chairman of the Department of Health Vocational Training Committee until 1992. He was awarded the Queen's Silver Jubilee Medal in 1977, OBE in 1988 and the John Tomes Medal by the BDA in 1990.
Resource Identifier RCS: E010289
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset
Publication Date 1999 1988

First Title value, for Searching Rice, Noel Stephen Cracroft (1931 - 2017)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2017-12-13
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E009000-E009999/E009400-E009499
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/381806381806
Occupation Ophthalmic surgeon
Details Noel Rice was a consultant ophthalmologist and medical director at Moorfields Eye Hospital, London and a pioneer in the development of microscope-assisted eye surgery. He was born on 26 December 1931 in Norwich, the son of Raymond Arthur Cracroft Rice, an anaesthetist, and Doris Ivy Rice née Slater, a nurse. His brother, John Cracroft Rice, also became a surgeon. Rice was educated at Haileybury and then went up to Clare College, Cambridge and St Bartholomew’s Hospital for his clinical studies. At Barts he was a house physician to Sir Ronald Bodley Scott and a house surgeon to Alec Badenoch. In 1957 he began his career in ophthalmology under Hyla (Henry) Stallard and continued his training as a junior specialist in the RAF as a flight lieutenant. On his return to civilian life, he joined the staff of Moorfields, where he remained for the rest of his career, becoming a consultant in 1967. At the Institute of Ophthalmology he was a senior lecturer, clinical teacher and, from 1991, dean. He was made a fellow of the Institute of Ophthalmology in 1996. As ophthalmology became more specialised, he was one of the first corneal specialists in Europe and helped open the era of microsurgery for eye conditions. He also specialised in the care of children with congenital glaucoma. He helped establish the corneal service at Moorfields and also the congenital glaucoma service, which became one of the largest in the world. He pioneered the use of anti-scarring therapy in the form of a focal dose of beta radiation, a precursor of modern anti-scarring regimens. He retired in 1996, but continued in ophthalmology as a consultant at the St John Eye Hospital in Jerusalem until 2002. He was made a Knight of the Order of St John in recognition of his service to the hospital. In 1989 he became a member of the international organisation Academia Ophthalmologica Internationalis. For his contribution to ophthalmology in Iceland, he was awarded the Order of the Falcon by the Icelandic government. He was also a visiting professor at the National University of Singapore. He enjoyed fly fishing and music and sung in various choirs. He was married twice. In 1957 he married Karin Elsa Brita Linell (Brita). They had three children, Andrew, Karin and David, two of whom followed their father into medicine. After Brita’s death in 1992, he married Countess Ulla Mörner, in 1997. Rice died on 5 November 2017 from motor neurone disease. He was 85.
Resource Identifier RCS: E009402
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset
Publication Date 1996

First Title value, for Searching Jones, Barry Justin (1935 - 2025)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Kate Jones
Publication Date 2025-09-03
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E010000-E010999/E010700-E010799
Occupation Oral surgeon
Details Barry Jones was a consultant oral surgeon at Stoke Mandeville and High Wycombe hospitals. He was born on 3 April 1935 to John Jones, a dentist, and Olga Jones née Cowan, in Hartlepool. He used to tell how his father would recruit him and his brother to administer anaesthetic gases at his surgery. After education at Perse School, Cambridge, he studied dentistry at King’s College, University of Durham, based in Newcastle. Whilst there, he was a prominent member of the drama society, acting, directing and even performing at the Edinburgh Fringe. After qualification in 1960, he moved to London to train in oral surgery, beginning at St George’s Hospital, Hyde Park Corner. He gained his fellowship of the Faculty of Dental Surgery of the Royal College of Surgeons of England in 1964 and subsequently took up a consultant post in High Wycombe and Stoke Mandeville hospitals, where he worked until retirement. He was a kind and gentle family man, who enjoyed the theatre, opera, music, travel and rugby. He died on 10 July 2025 at the age of 90 and was survived by his wife Brenda (née Porter) and three children, Aaron, Kate, an anaesthetist, and Oliver.
Resource Identifier RCS: E010789
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset
Publication Date 2026

First Title value, for Searching Aikin, Charles Arthur (1821 - 1908)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Alderson, John Septimus ( - 1858)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Anderson, William (1842 - 1900)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2009-10-02 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/372868372868
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born in London, Dec 18th, 1842, and educated at the City of London School. Studied for a time at Aberdeen and afterwards at the Lambeth School of Art, where he won a medal for artistic anatomy. Entered St Thomas's Hospital in 1864, when Sir John Simon (qv) and Le Gros Clark (qv) were surgeons. There he won the first College Prize, the Physical Society's Prize, and the Cheselden Medal. After acting as House Surgeon at the Derbyshire Royal Infirmary, he returned to St Thomas's Hospital on the opening of the new buildings in 1871, to fill the offices of Surgical Registrar and Assistant Demonstrator of Anatomy. In 1873 he was appointed Professor of Anatomy and Surgery at the Imperial Naval Medical College in Tokio, where he lectured on anatomy, surgery, medicine, and physiology. He remained in Japan until 1880, when he returned to London and was appointed Assistant Surgeon to St Thomas's Hospital and Senior Lecturer on Anatomy in the medical school. He became full Surgeon in 1891. At the Royal College of Surgeons he was elected a Member of the Board of Examiners in Anatomy and Physiology for the Fellowship in 1884, and served as a Member of the Court of Examiners from 1894-1900. In 1891 he was Hunterian Professor of Surgery and Pathology, and in the same year was elected Professor of Anatomy at the Royal Academy in succession to John Marshall (qv). He died suddenly on Oct 27th, 1900, the result of the rupture of a cord of the mitral valve without any other morbid condition of the heart or other organs. He married: (1) In 1873, Margaret Hall, by whom he had a son and a daughter; (2) Louisa, daughter of F W Tetley, of Leeds, who survived him. Anderson may be said to have been steeped in art; [1] form and colour appealed equally to him, and his residence in Japan, when the old world there was changing into the new, gave full scope to his love of art. It enabled him to form a superb collection of Japanese paintings and engravings, most of which are preserved in the British Museum. Between 1882 and 1886 Anderson prepared a *Descriptive and Historical Account of a Collection of Japanese and Chinese Paintings in the British Museum* (London, 1886), which contains a very complete account of the general history of the subject. In 1886 he also published in portfolios to make two volumes, *Pictorial Arts of Japan, with some Account of the Development of the Allied Arts, and a Brief History and Criticism of Chinese Painting*. Many of the plates are reproduced in colour. Anderson was Chairman of the Japan Society from its constitution in January, 1892, until his death eight years later. In 1880 he was decorated by the Emperor of Japan a Companion of the Order of the Rising Sun. Anderson was a good surgeon and a competent operator, but except for a small book issued in 1897 (*The Deformities of the Fingers and Toes*) he published no surgical work. The book was based on his Hunterian Lectures given in 1891, and in it he advised excision in preference to notching of the fibrous bands in Dupuytren's contraction. He was an excellent teacher for art and medical students, his lectures being made especially attractive by the facility with which he sketched on the blackboard. Personally he was a handsome man of distinguished appearance, quiet in voice and manner, highly cultivated but very retiring. Dr Frank Payne says: "To speak of Anderson we must first observe that he was notable for the thoroughness of his work. He continued to give lectures and demonstrations on anatomy at a stage of his career when most surgeons prefer to reserve their mornings for the consulting-room. In operations he was indefatigable. He would go straight through a long list, and at the end of it was quite willing to take two or three cases from the medical ward in addition. All this would be done with unruffled composure and without any outward signs of fatigue. In his intercourse with colleagues, students, and nurses he showed the unaffected sweetness of his nature; it would be difficult to remember an instance of his being impatient or out of temper. Though his retiring disposition prevented him from becoming a prominent personality in the eyes of the public, no one was more highly esteemed or, by those who knew him well, more warmly loved, while all his abilities and attainments were recommended by the conciliatory grace of modesty." Portraits of him appear in the *Transactions of the Japan Society*, iv; in the *Lancet*, 1900, ii, 1869; and in the *St Thomas's Hospital Gazette* 1900, November. [Amendments from the annotated edition of *Plarr's Lives* at the Royal College of Surgeons: [1] An outline of the history of art in its relation to medical science. Introductory address, Medical and physical society, St. Thomas's Hospital 1885- St. Thos. Hosp. Repts. 1886, 15, 151-181]
Resource Identifier RCS: E000685
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Anderton, Henry (1790 - 1870)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Andrew, Edwyn (1832 - 1887)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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/372872372872
Occupation General surgeon
Details Educated at University College Hospital. Held the offices of Resident Medical Officer, House Surgeon, and Physician’s Assistant, as well as President of the University College Medical Society. Practised in Shrewsbury, devoting himself especially to the treatment of diseases of the eye and the ear. He was appointed Surgeon to the Shropshire and North Wales Eye and Throat Infirmary. At that time the building was very small and inadequate, “but under his exertion, and with the aid of others, he lived to see a new hospital erected and completed in 1881, replete with every comfort and with ample accommodation”. The hospital cost £10,000 to erect. It is a fine building and may be regarded as his monument. Andrew was President of the Shropshire and Mid-Wales branch of the British Medical Association, 1883-1884; Hon Local Secretary and Treasurer to the Royal Medical Benevolent College; Surgeon to the Shropshire Eye, Ear, and Throat Hospital; Consulting Surgeon to the Montgomeryshire Infirmary; Certificated Factory Inspector; and Surgeon to Shrewsbury Royal Grammar School. He died at his residence, 12 St John’s Hill, Shrewsbury, on Jan 10th, 1887. Publications: “Extirpation of Lachrymal Gland in Obstruction of Nasal Duct.” – *Brit. Med Jour.*, 1877, ii, 256, 623. “Intestinal Obstruction.” – Ibid., 1878 ii, 470. “On the Extraction of Senile Cataract and its Capsule.” – Ibid., 1883, i, 41.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000689
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

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

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Angus, Henry Brunton (1867 - 1927)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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 Armstrong, Robert ( - 1855)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2009-10-02 2016-10-13
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/372883372883
Occupation General surgeon
Details At one time he was Physician to the Royal Naval Hospital, Plymouth, and at the time of his death (1), which occurred before 1860, was Inspector of Hospitals and Fleets. He was residing at Hills Court, Exeter, when he died. Publication: *The Influence of Climate and Other Agents on the Human Constitution, with Reference to the Causes and Prevention of Disease among Seamen; with Observations on Fever in general, and an Account of the Epidemic Fever of Jamaica*, 8vo, London, 1843. [(1) Date of death 28 June 1855 - details on gravestone. Notified by Alan Taylor by email 11 October 2016.]
Resource Identifier RCS: E000700
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Arnold, James (1819 - 1866)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Arrowsmith, James Yerrow ( - 1866)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Arthur, John (1806 - 1876)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Ashley, William Henry (1819 - 1874)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Agnis, John Crown (1828 - 1866)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2009-08-21
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/372834372834
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born at Langford, Malden, Essex, on Nov 11th, 1828, and dying unmarried was the last representative of an ancient Cambridgeshire family. He was a very promising lad, and at the age of 16 entered University College, London, and soon carried off the Senior Greek Prize, “being a mere boy in comparison with his competitors” (*Lancet*). He received his medical education at University College Hospital, became House Surgeon, and was gazetted to the 3rd Light Dragoons on Aug 11th, 1854. He afterwards became Assistant Surgeon to the Horse Guards Blue in 1860 (Sept 18th), holding this post to the end of his life. As an operator he was “bold and skilful”, “notably endowed”, as his *Lancet* biographer remarks, “with that special surgical acumen which is logic in action”. His talents were such that his friends urged him to bring himself into greater evidence. Accordingly he began to study deformities and “energetically followed out a series of special researches into their general surgical pathology.” In 1864 the Examiners for the Jacksonian Essay Prize awarded an Honorarium to Agnis for his essay on “Club-foot, its Causes, Pathology and Treatment”. The many illustrations to the Essay were drawn by the author, but the paper has not been published. Agnis was a skilful artist, “an enthusiastic entomologist, and versed in almost every branch of natural science”. He died in London on June 28th, 1866, after a brief illness. He had previously suffered from the effects of a severe hunting accident.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000651
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Allen (or Allan), James (1821 - 1892)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2009-09-18 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/372853372853
Occupation General surgeon
Details Joined the Bengal Army as an Assistant Surgeon on July 3rd, 1848, and was promoted Surgeon on March 10th, 1858. Retired on Sept 5th, 1862, and died at St Leonards on Jan 2nd, 1892.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000670
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Allen, Robert Marshall (1818 - 1893)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Allen, William Edward (1834 - 1885)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Ainger, Major (1820 - 1861)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Ashe, Evelyn Oliver (1864 - 1925)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2009-10-07 2013-08-06
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/372888372888
Occupation General surgeon
Details Educated at Owens College, Manchester, and at the London Hospital, where he was Scholar in Anatomy and Physiology (1883-1884), and in Anatomy, Physiology, and Chemistry (1884-1885). He was also Surgical Scholar, and obtained an Honours Certificate in Obstetrics in 1886-1887. After qualification he was House Physician, House Surgeon, Dental Assistant, and Resident Accoucheur at the London Hospital. In 1892 he went out to Kimberley, Cape Colony, as Senior House Surgeon to the Kimberley Hospital. Started practice in Kimberley in 1894, and became Surgeon to the De Beer's Consolidated Mines and Surgeon to the Kimberley Hospital, where he was Senior Surgeon at the time of his death on April 27th, 1925. His qualities were such that he was accorded a public funeral. Publications: *Besieged by the Boers: a Diary of Life and Events in Kimberley during the Siege*. 8vo, New York, 1900. "Galyl in Malta Fever." - *Brit. Med. Jour.*, 1918, i, 454. "Cæsarean Section for Eclampsia - Survival of Mother and Child." - *S. Afric. Med. Record*, 1919.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000705
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Ashton, Thomas Mather (1812 - 1878)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Ashworth, Percy (1865 - 1929)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Aspland, Alfred (1816 - 1880)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Allgöwer, Martin (1917 - 2007)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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/372894372894
Occupation General surgeon
Details Martin Allgöwer was chair and professor of surgery at the University of Basle, Switzerland. He was born in St Gallen, Switzerland, on 5 May 1917. He received his education at St Gallen and studied medicine at Geneva, Zürich and Basle. After qualifying, he was resident in the department of surgery at Basle under Carl Henschen and Otto Schürch, a distinguished orthopaedic surgeon who encouraged Allgöwer to set up a research institute of experimental surgery in Davos, where his first studies were on sulphonamide antagonists in tissue fluid, work carried out before penicillin was introduced. There he continued to work on tissue biology and wound healing, work which he continued as a visiting fellow in Galveston, Texas, under Pomerat and Blocker. He published the result of his research as *The cellular basis of wound repair* (Springfield, Illinois, Thomas) in 1956. In the same year he was appointed surgeon in chief in the Rätische Kantonsspital at Chur, Switzerland, later moving to be professor of surgery in Basle. He was the recipient of numerous honours, among which was the honorary fellowship of our College. He died on 27 October 2007 in Chur.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000711
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Amen, Amer Abdul Aziz (1944 - 2008)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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/372895372895
Occupation ENT surgeon
Details Amer Amen was a consultant ENT surgeon in Essex. He qualified in Baghdad and worked there and in Kut, Iraq. In 1976, he went to the UK and held registrar posts in otolaryngology at Wexham Park Hospital, Slough, and at St Bartholomew’s Hospital, London. He became a senior ENT registrar at the Royal Victoria Eye and Ear Hospital, Dublin, before being appointed consultant ENT surgeon to St Margaret’s Hospital, Epping, Essex. He was a naturally gifted surgeon and teacher, who was able to perform a wide range of ENT operations. In 1989 he established a charity to purchase a carbon dioxide laser and endoscopic sinus surgery instruments, which he put to good use. Ahead of his time, Amen established electronic records for all his patients early in his consultant career. He was interested in literature, poetry, politics and the stock market. He also enjoyed travelling and horse racing. The last four years of his life were marred by ill health and he died from metastatic adenocarcinoma on 17 September 2008. He leaves his wife, Bushra, two sons, a daughter and a grandson (born a few weeks before his death).
Resource Identifier RCS: E000712
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Ballantyne, John Chalmers (1917 - 2008)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Neil Weir
Publication Date 2009-10-21
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000700-E000799
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372896372896
Occupation Otolaryngologist ENT surgeon
Details John Ballantyne, a genial, kindly, hard-working man who gave much to British and world otolaryngology, was a consultant otolaryngologist at the Royal Free Hospital, London. He was born during a Zeppelin raid on Nottingham on 26 September 1917. He was a triplet – preceded by his sister, Jeannie, and followed by his identical twin brother, Rollo. His father, the Reverend John Charles Ballantyne, was a Unitarian minister. His mother, Muriel, née Taylor, was ethereal, artistic and musical. All her children, including the triplets’ older brother David, skilfully played the piano. Ballantyne was raised in Liverpool and attended St Christopher’s preparatory school. On the recommendation of their uncle Arthur Ballantyne (professor of ophthalmology at Glasgow), John and Rollo, who had decided to read medicine, took their first MB at St Mary’s Hospital Medical School, London. This was during the deanship of Charles Wilson (later Sir Charles and Lord Moran), who positively encouraged students to take the MB (as opposed to qualifying with the conjoint board examination only). He must have welcomed the versatile Ballantyne twins who enjoyed athletics and swimming and founded the St Mary’s Music Society. They followed an accelerated course to enable them to qualify early, in 1942, in order to join the Services during the Second World War. The captains Ballantyne joined the RAMC and were posted to Gibraltar. John was attached to the Royal Scots and began training as an otolaryngologist with R Scott Stevenson, whose interest in deafness and ease in writing left a marked impression. John’s first paper to be published in the *Journal of Laryngology and Otology* (JLO) was co-authored with his mentor, Scott Stevenson, and was entitled ‘The conservative treatment of chronic suppurative otitis media’. After the war, he completed his Army service in Hamburg and Oxford, before, in 1947, becoming registrar to Jack Angell-James in Bristol. From 1949 to 1950 he combined the posts of registrar to the Royal Cancer Hospital, London, with a research registrar post in the audiology unit at Golden Square Hospital, working with Edith Whetnall. This post stimulated John’s interest in deafness and the structure and function of the inner ear. After three successful years as senior registrar to John Simpson and Ian Robin at St Mary’s he gained his first part-time consultant post at the Royal Northern Hospital in 1953. At the same time he became assistant director to the audiology unit at the Royal National Throat, Nose and Ear Hospital and also otologist to the London County Council (LCC). This experience led to the publication of his first book, *Deafness* (London, J & A Churchill, 1960). It was written to help parents of deaf children and the adult deaf and has been used by generations of audiologists in training. John’s second daughter Deborah, an audiological scientist, translated the book into Italian. After five years at the audiology unit and the LCC, John moved on to a consultant post at the Royal Free Hospital. His senior colleague, W G Scott-Brown, introduced him to private practice in Harley Street and to his textbook *Diseases of the ear, nose and throat* (London, Butterworth), first published in 1952. The two Johns, John Ballantyne and John Groves, helped Scott-Brown with the second (1965), third (1971) and fourth (1979) editions, with each succeeding edition becoming a volume larger. John Ballantyne edited the second and third editions of *A synopsis of otolaryngology* (Bristol, J Wright) in 1967 and 1978 with his former chiefs from St Mary’s. He edited both the ear volume and the nose and throat volume for the third edition of Rob and Smith’s *Operative surgery* (London, Butterworth) in 1976, contributing chapters on stapedectomy and nasal surgery. In 1986, he repeated the exercise for the fourth edition, this time with Andrew Morrison and D F N Harrison as his co-editors of the ear, nose and throat volumes, respectively. Experience gained from a sabbatical with Hans Engstrom resulted in the joint publication of a paper on the morphology of the ‘vestibular ganglion cells’. This work stimulated his collaboration with Imrich Friedmann (who was for many years the JLO’s adviser in pathology) in co-editing a book in 1984 entitled *Ultrastructural atlas of the inner ear* (London, Butterworth). John Ballantyne was much in demand as a teacher, examiner and committee member. He never refused these duties, although in 1971 he is minuted as having seriously questioned the value of the repetitious work of the British Medical Association (BMA) otolaryngology group. It ceased to function the same year. And yet, if he could help to lessen deafness no task was too small. (He agreed, for example, to represent the BMA otolaryngology group on a British Standards Committee studying noise from toys.) At the Royal Society of Medicine (RSM) John chose as the title of his 1976 section of otology presidential address, ‘The hearing ear; variations on a theme of Helmholtz’, which enabled him to utilise his knowledge and love of music. He memorably played the passage in Smetana’s first string quartet (from ‘My life’), in which the composer described his own tinnitus. During his time as honorary secretary of the British Association of Otolaryngologists (from 1972 to 1977), he also represented the association on the council of the Royal College of Surgeons. He examined for the FRCS in England and Ireland, and was a civilian consultant in otolaryngology to the Army. As a distinguished editor of the JLO (from 1978 to 1988), John Ballantyne, with only the help of his tireless secretary, performed all the tasks of sub-editing and proofreading himself, including hand-writing letters to each author. He co-authored with Ted Evans and Andrew Morrison an influential report (published as the first JLO supplement in 1978) on cochlear implantation (CI), which paved the way for further work by the Medical Research Council and then the later adoption of CI by the Department of Health and Social Security (DHSS). As chairman of the DHSS advisory committee on services for hearing impaired people (ACSHIP) from 1974 to 1980, he introduced hearing therapists and contributed to the establishment of specialist audiological physicians. For the British Academic Conference in Otolaryngology, he served as honorary secretary and later chairman of the general committee for the conferences in Edinburgh and London respectively, and was invested as master of the seventh conference in Glasgow in 1987. In the same year, he was elected as an honorary fellow of the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Glasgow. John Ballantyne delivered the 16th James Yearsley lecture in 1970 on the subject of ototoxicity, the Sir William Wilde lecture in 1975 and the Toynbee lecture in 1984. He was awarded the Harrison prize in otology of the Royal Society of Medicine in 1971, and the Jobson Horne prize of the British Medical Association in 1982, and was a member of the Collegium Oto-Rhino-Laryngologicum Amicitiae Sacrum. For 20 years he was a most supportive director of the Britain Nepal Otology Service. John Ballantyne was honoured with a CBE for services for the deaf in 1984 and received the honorary fellowship of the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland, the College of Surgeons of South Africa and the Royal Society of Medicine. In retirement he was a founder member of the RSM’s Retired Fellows’ Society. The last meeting he was able to attend at the RSM was in December 2006, when fittingly he chaired a lecture given by his daughter, Jane. He for many years was administrator of the RSM Music Society, ending up as president. He never lost his youthful curiosity or humour, and was always reading, learning and wanting to know more. While in Gibraltar in 1942 he met Barbara Green, a Wren from Bristol. They married in 1949 and she survives him with their two daughters, Jane, an anaesthetist and professor of pain control, University of Philadelphia, USA, and Deborah, chief audiological scientist at ‘La Sapienza’ University in Rome. John Ballantyne died on 25 June 2008, aged 90.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000713
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Bateman, Patricia Jane (1943 - 2008)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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/372897372897
Occupation Ophthalmologist
Details Pat Bateman was a consultant ophthalmologist in Cambridgeshire. She was born in Bristol on 11 May 1943, the daughter of Sam Roylance, headmaster of Cottam Grammar School in Bristol, and Emily Grace, a consultant paediatrician. She received her medical education at St Bartholomew’s and, after qualifying, completed junior posts at Bart’s and at Redhill General Hospital, before specialising in ophthalmology. From 1980 to 1998 she was a locum consultant ophthalmic surgeon at Doddington and, from 1992 to 2003, an associate specialist at Hinchingbrooke Hospital, Huntingdon. A modest person with great talents, she lived for serving others, and family, friends and patients were never disappointed. Her incisive mind and endless patience made her a good medical ophthalmologist: her calligraphic hand and clear notes were legendary. Her courage and sense of humour were valued, though she was never afraid to give her moral view when necessary. Her early surgical work ran into conflict with her wish to be a present and supportive mother, and the winners were the many consultants who knew they had a conscientious colleague who would always stay to the end of the clinic and complete what was in front of her. Pat was on her local parish council for 11 years and during her time as chairman made great improvements to the village, turning its clay pit into a nature reserve, where a commemorative stone has now been placed. Pat was a churchwarden at Little Shelford for a time, but in her latter days found her spiritual home and comfort at the Unitarian Memorial Church, Cambridge. She obtained an MSc in medical anthropology before she retired, which was the spring board into her archaeological, anthropological and biographical interests in retirement. She was also a proficient watercolour artist with an excellent sense of colour. She married Anthony Malcolm Bateman, a general practitioner at Great Shelford. Pat was adored by her family: her daughter Wigs works in international public health in Sydney, Australia, where she is married to Zac, an academic psychologist. Pat’s son, David, is a design engineer in London. Her courage in the last weeks of her life was inspiring, after her stage four glioma had been diagnosed. She died on 7 July 2008.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000714
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Connolly, Rainer Campbell (1919 - 2009)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by T T King
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/372898372898
Occupation Neurosurgeon
Details Campbell Connolly was a consultant neurosurgeon at St Bartholomew’s Hospital, London. He was born on 15 July 1919, the elder son of George Connolly, a solicitor who had served in the First World War, and his wife, Margaret, née Edgell, of Brighton. His grandfather, Colonel Benjamin Bloomfield Connolly was a distinguished military surgeon who had been principal medical officer of the Cavalry Brigade at El Teb (Sudan) and was commander of the Camel Bearer Company on the expedition to relieve General Gordon. Connolly’s education was at Lancing College, Bedford School and St Bartholomew’s Hospital, from which he graduated in 1941. Owing to the shortage of junior medical staff, he was immediately employed as a locum anaesthetic houseman and gave a number of anaesthetics for Sir James Paterson Ross who had, at the start of his career, an interest in neurosurgery. This position led to Connolly’s appointment as a house officer at the wartime hospital, Hill End, St Alban’s, to which the professorial surgical department of St Bartholomew’s had been evacuated. Though Paterson Ross was nominally in charge of neurosurgery, J E A O’Connell was the neurosurgeon within the professorial unit. While working at Hill End, Connolly was seconded to Sir Hugh Cairn’s head injury hospital at St Hugh’s, Oxford, to learn about electroencephalography, which it was thought might be useful in neurosurgical diagnosis. Oxford was one of the few places in the country where this new technique was being explored. This experience put him in contact with Cairns, who was responsible for the organisation of neurosurgery in the Army. Connolly eventually spent almost a year at St Hugh’s. Early in 1943 he found himself posted to an anti-aircraft battery in south London, where he had little to do until his commanding officer told him that he was to accompany the battery to a destination in West Africa. Alarmed, he wrote to Cairns and was almost immediately removed and placed in a holding post at Lancing. Connolly was one of the last survivors of the young neurosurgeons who staffed the mobile neurosurgical units that had been established by Hugh Cairns at the beginning of the Second World War. These saw action in France and Belgium in 1940, and the first one was captured at Dunkirk. Subsequently another six were formed and deployed in the Western Desert, Italy, Northern Europe and Burma. Through the influence of Cairns, Connolly was posted to mobile neurosurgical unit No 4 in Bari, Italy, when the senior neurosurgeon of the unit, Kenneth Eden died suddenly of poliomyelitis in October 1943. With its head, John Gilllingham, and John Potter, he accompanied the unit in the campaign up the east coast of Italy, ending at Ancona with the rank of major and with a mention in despatches. This unit treated over 900 head injuries from the battles at the Gothic Line and the Po Valley, as well as those from partisan activities in Yugoslavia. Many of the Yugoslavian patients had open head wounds for which treatment had been delayed by difficulties in transport, a subject on which Connolly contributed a paper to *War supplement No.1 on wounds of the head* published by the *British Journal of Surgery* in 1947 (*Br J Surg* 1947;55(suppl1):168-172). The results were surprisingly good, the mortality being 20 per cent. The use of penicillin, first clinically tested by Florey and Cairns, and then by Cairns in mobile neurosurgical unit No 4 in North Africa, was considered to be an important factor in these results. After VE day, Connolly returned to England in July. He was posted to the Far East, spending six unproductive months in India following the ending of the war in August. After demobilisation, he returned to Bart’s to a post created to accommodate ex-servicemen such as himself whose training and careers had been affected by war service. He obtained the FRCS in 1947. Cairns had plans for an organised training scheme for neurosurgeons, something not achieved until many years later, and he offered Connolly an appointment at Oxford to a training programme of some years’ duration, beginning as a house surgeon. At the same time Cecil Calvert, in Belfast, who had done much of the surgery at St Hugh’s during the war, invited him to the Royal Victoria Hospital as a consultant. The rigours of being a houseman at Oxford under Cairns were known to Connolly: he took the offer in Belfast and stayed there for four years. In 1952 he moved to the Midland Centre for Neurosurgery in Birmingham. In 1958 he was appointed as the second neurosurgeon to O’Connell at St Bartholomew’s Hospital and remained there until his retirement as senior neurosurgeon in 1984. He was also in private practice and established a reputation especially for judgement and skill in intervertebral disc surgery. He was on the staff of the Royal National Orthopaedic Hospital and the King Edward VII Hospital for Officers and was a civilian consultant to the Royal Navy from 1971 to 1984. In the College he was Hunterian Professor in 1961, speaking on cerebral ischaemia in subarachnoid haemorrhage. He was president of the section of neurology of the Royal Society of Medicine from 1980 to 1981, a Freeman of the City of London and a liveryman of the Worshipful Society of Apothecaries. He married Elisabeth Fowler née Cullis, who was an anaesthetist at St Hugh’s. He died of cancer of the prostate on 14 August 2009, survived by his wife, two daughters and a son.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000715
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Dahrendorf, Ralf (1929 - 2009)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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/372899372899
Occupation Politician sociologist
Details Ralf Dahrendorf was a German sociologist and politician who became director of the London School of Economics (LSE). He was born in Hamburg on 1 May 1929, the son of Lina and Gustav Dahrendorf, a member of the Social Democrat party in the Reichstag of 1932, where the Nazis had a majority. Just months later, in 1933, when Hitler gained power, Gustav was arrested. On his release he took his family to Berlin, but continued to work against the Nazis and was sentenced to seven years hard labour in 1944 for his part in a plot against Hitler. Meanwhile Ralf was printing pamphlets against the SS and, at the age of 16, was sent to Buchenwald concentration camp, until he was released, starving, in 1945. Ralf entered Hamburg University to study classics, philosophy and social science, gaining his PhD in 1952. He was then awarded a Leverhulme scholarship to study at the LSE and gained his second PhD in 1956. In 1958 he returned to Hamburg as professor of sociology, and then went from one distinguished chair to another, at Columbia University, New York, Tübingen, University of British Columbia in Vancouver, Harvard and Konstanz. He was elected to the Bundestag in 1969 when Brandt formed his first coalition government, and became a commissioner in the European Union in Brussels in 1970, which did not inhibit him from becoming one of its sharpest critics. In 1973 he was offered the chance to become director of the LSE. A year later he was invited by the BBC to give the Reith lecture, which he gave on the topic of liberty, survival and justice in a changing world. He was insistent that governments should plan for a period longer than the usual length of a parliament. After ten years at the LSE, he returned to his chair at Konstanz and then in 1986 spent a year in New York on a research grant. From 1988 to 1997 he was warden of St Antony’s College in Oxford. After becoming a naturalised British citizen in 1988 he joined the Liberal Democratic party and in 1993 received a life peerage. He was married three times, his first two marriages ending in divorce. By his first wife, Vera, he had three daughters – Nicola, Alexandra and Daphne. His second wife was Ellen and his third wife, Christine. He died on 17 June 2009.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000716
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Fisk, Geoffrey Raymond (1916 - 2007)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Brown, John Andrew Carron (1925 - 2008)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by N Alan Green
Publication Date 2008-08-28
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/372734372734
Occupation Obstetric and gynaecological surgeon Obstetrician and gynaecologist
Details John Carron Brown, known to his colleagues as ‘JCB’, was a consultant obstetrician and gynaecologist in Norwich. He was born in Sutton, Surrey, on 29 June 1925, the older son of Cecil Carron Brown, a general practitioner, and Jessamy Harper, a solicitor. Educated first at Homefield Preparatory School in Sutton, in 1939 he went to Oundle School for four years, before entering the Middlesex Hospital Medical School for his medical training, where he captained the cricket team. He felt fortunate to have as basic science teachers John Kirk in anatomy, Sampson Wright in physiology and Robert Scarff in pathology. He was greatly influenced in his clinical training by Richard Handley and Charles Lakin. Qualifying in 1949, he became house surgeon to Sir Gordon Gordon-Taylor and then to the obstetric and gynaecology unit, before becoming house physician at the Royal Sussex County Hospital in 1952. General surgical training continued at St John and Elizabeth’s Hospital and at Redhill and Reigate Hospital, and at the Middlesex Hospital under David Patey and L P LeQuesne, colo-rectal experience being obtained with O Lloyd Davies. His training in gynaecology and obstetrics was at the Chelsea Hospital for Women under Sir Charles Read, John Blakeley and R M Feroze, at the Middlesex Hospital under W R Winterton and as a senior registrar at Addenbrooke’s Hospital, Cambridge. Following his appointment as consultant in Norwich in 1963 he led a busy life in clinical practice. He led the development of maternity services and specialised in gynaecological malignancy. He was a great supporter of Cromer and District Cottage Hospital, where he held weekly clinics and operating sessions until he retired in 1990. Described as “a superb clinician and teacher of medical students, midwives and doctors”, his enthusiastic approach led many into careers in obstetrics and gynaecology. He also worked with physiotherapists in the prevention and treatment of stress incontinence. He examined for the universities of Cambridge and Birmingham in obstetrics and gynaecology, the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists (RCOG) and the Central Midwives Board. In East Anglia he was a member of the regional advisory committee for eight years, being chairman for two years, and a member of the subcommittee making a confidential enquiry into maternal deaths. For RCOG he was elected member’s representative on council for six years, and served on the finance and executive and the hospital recognition committees. He was made an honorary fellow of the Chartered Society of Physiotherapists in 1995. He served on the Council for Professions Supplementary to Medicine (CPSM) and the Physiotherapy Board, and was vice chairman of CPSM. In Norwich he became chairman of the consultant staff committee and was very involved with the planning of the new hospital. Throughout his schooldays and in medical school he played cricket, tennis and soccer. Carron Brown started playing golf at the early age of six and resumed this once he became established in his chosen career. He enjoyed shooting and in retirement took up fly fishing. He was interested in history, especially of Napoleon and the Indian Empire. Gardening was an abiding passion, particularly the cultivation of roses. He married Marie Mansfield Pinkham, a Middlesex nurse, in 1952. They had three daughters (Susan Margaret, Elizabeth and Jane) and one son (Charles). Following his wife’s death in 1970, he married Susan Mary Mellor, sister of the special care nursery in Norwich, and they had two daughters (Helen Mary and Sarah Louise). He died on 27 May 2008 in the Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital after a ruptured aortic aneurysm. A thanksgiving service was held at Norwich Cathedral, where he worshipped. Sue survives him, as do the children and 16 grandchildren.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000550
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Shaw, Henry Jagoe (1922 - 2007)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Neil Weir
Publication Date 2008-08-28
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/372735372735
Occupation Head and neck surgeon Otolaryngologist ENT surgeon
Details Henry Shaw was a pre-eminent otolaryngologist and head and neck surgeon. He was born in Stafford on 16 March 1922, the son of Benjamin Henry Shaw, a physician, psychiatrist, artist and fisherman, and Adelaide née Hardy, who became a JP and Staffordshire County councillor. His father came from a distinguished Anglo-Irish family with one relative an army surgeon at Waterloo, another in the 32nd Foot in the same campaign; George Bernard Shaw was an ancestor. Educated at Summer Fields School, Oxford, and Eton College, Henry Shaw read medicine at Oxford University and the Radcliffe Infirmary, where he held junior appointments. Perhaps influenced by R G Macbeth and G Livingstone, otolaryngologists at Oxford, he became registrar and senior registrar at the Royal National Throat, Nose and Ear (RNTNE) Hospital and Guy’s Hospital, London. He was appointed to a Hunterian professorship at the College (1951). After a fellowship and residency at the Sloan Memorial Hospital, New York (1953 to 1954), Henry Shaw was appointed assistant director of the professorial unit and senior lecturer at the RNTNE Hospital and the Institute of Laryngology and Otology. During this time he spent a further year in New York as senior resident at the Bellvue Hospital. In 1962 he was appointed consultant ENT surgeon to the RNTNE Hospital. This appointment was combined with a consultancy at the Royal Marsden Hospital, an honorary consultancy to St Mary’s Hospital and the post of ENT surgeon to the Civil Government and St Bernard’s Hospital, Gibraltar. In addition he was civilian consultant ENT surgeon to the Royal Navy. He retired in 1988. Henry Shaw’s professional life was devoted to the care of those suffering from cancer of the head and neck. His appointments at the Royal Marsden and RNTNE Hospital enabled him to lead the field in this aspect of otolaryngology. He wrote many publications, lectured nationally and internationally, and became a founder member and treasurer of the Association of Head and Neck Oncologists of Great Britain, president of the section of laryngology, Royal Society of Medicine, member of council, executive committee and professional care committee of the Marie Curie Cancer Care Foundation and a member of the Armed Services Consultant Appointment board. During the Second World War Henry Shaw served as a surgeon lieutenant in the RNVR. He continued in the Royal Naval Reserve, advancing to surgeon lieutenant commander. He was awarded the Volunteer Reserve Decoration in 1970. Henry Shaw was a gentlemanly person who achieved a great deal in a quiet way. He was never happier than when sailing boats of any kind. His long family association with St Mawes in Cornwall (where he eventually retired) enabled him to indulge fully in this hobby. He married Susan Patricia Head (née Ramsey) in 1967. They had no children of their own, but he gained a stepson and stepdaughter. The marriage was dissolved in 1984 and he married Daphne Joan Hayes (née Charney) in 1988, from whom he gained a further two stepdaughters. He died on 1 August 2007.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000552
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Langstaff, Joseph (1778 - 1856)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Pitcairn, Sir James (1776 - 1859)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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/372637372637
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born on July 18th, 1776, the eldest son of the Rev Robert Pitcairn, of Brasenose College, Oxford, Vicar of English Combe, Somerset, and Incumbent of Spring Chapel, London. The family originated in Pitcairn, Fifeshire, and to it belonged the two well-known physicians – William Pitcairn, MD (1711-1791), Physician and Treasurer to St Bartholomew’s Hospital, and President of the College of Physicians; and his nephew, David Pitcairn, MD (1749-1800), his successor as Physician to St Bartholomew’s. James Pitcairn went to school in London, and then was a pupil of Sir Everard Home at St George’s Hospital at the same time as Benjamin Brodie. Having graduated MD at Edinburgh, he returned to become house surgeon at St George’s Hospital. He was thereupon selected by Sir Everard Home for special service at the request of the Commander-in-Chief, was gazetted at once a Staff Surgeon on Aug 30th, 1799, and was sent in 1814 to Holland, where he served to the end of the campaign, and then with the Russian Contingent at Guernsey. In 1800 he went to Ireland to the charge of the 56th Regiment, which was soon dispatched to the Mediterranean under Sir Charles Stewart, and joined the Army under Sir Ralph Abercrombie on the expedition to Egypt where he served to the close of the campaign. He returned to Dublin in 1802 in charge of the Recruiting Staff, and organized arrangements in view of the threatened invasion of England by Napoleon. From 1804-1815 he supervised the encampments formed at the Curragh and in the Connaught District of Ireland. In 1816 his services were transferred to Munster, and at Cork during thirty-one years he personally superintended the arrangements for foreign service and the embarkation. The position was full of difficulties and obstacles which his good sense and affable nature tended to lessen and remove. He was knighted by Lord Normandy in 1837 for professional services. In 1847 he succeeded Dr George Renny as Director-General of the Medical Department for Ireland until 1852, when he retired with the rank of Inspector of Hospitals. The Medical Officers of the Army presented him with a service of plate and an address. It was said of him that he discouraged criticism of the absent with such interruptions as: “Never let your mouth be opened unless for good; if you cannot speak to the credit of a man, keep it shut. This has been my rule through life and I have never had cause to regret it.” He died at 3 Haddington Road, Dublin, on Jan 12th, 1859.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000453
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Carr, George Raymond (1922 - 2003)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Horton, Robert Elmer (1917 - 2003)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-09-28 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/372263372263
Occupation General surgeon
Details Bob Horton was a consultant surgeon at the United Bristol Hospitals. He was born in south London on 5 July 1917, the son of Arthur John Budd Horton, a schoolteacher, and Isabel Horton née Cotton, the daughter of a master mariner. He was educated at the Haberdashers’ Aske’s School, and studied medicine at Guy’s Hospital. He volunteered for the RAMC after completing his house posts. During the London Blitz he showed outstanding courage in rescuing casualties from a bombed building, which earned him the MBE. He was sent to India and Burma, to the Arakan campaign, where he initially commanded a frontline surgical unit, subsequently leading a surgical division at the General Hospital, Rangoon. He served for six years and was raised to the rank of colonel. He returned to Guy’s to complete his surgical training under Sir Russell Brock, and was then appointed senior lecturer and consultant at Bristol Royal Infirmary under Robert Milnes Walker. At Bristol he pioneered vascular surgery at a time when it was an uncertain specialty to pursue. He had a special interest in post-traumatic vascular injuries resulting from industrial and motorcycle accidents, publishing surgical articles and a textbook on the subject. On Milnes Walker’s retirement he joined Bill Capper to create a very popular firm. He also worked at the Bristol Homeopathic surgical unit. A pioneer of day case surgery, he was for a time clinical dean. His writings brought him international recognition. In 1977 he held a one-year appointment as foundation professor of surgery at King Abdulaziz University, Jeddah. He found the post challenging (the hospital building was not even completed when he arrived), but he did establish undergraduate teaching, regular conferences and a Primary FRCS course. In January 1980 he was asked by the Minister of Health in Libya to carry out a cholecystectomy on the wife of Colonel Gaddafi. He was encouraged to go by the British ambassador in Tripoli, who was concerned that the colonel would call in a surgeon from Eastern Europe if he declined. Horton carried out the operation in Benghazi and returned home in five days. Horton was a loyal member of the Surgical Travellers and travelled widely with them. He was an examiner for the Primary and Final FRCS and became chairman of the Court of Examiners in 1972. He was a Hunterian Professor in 1974, and was a valuable member of the Annals editorial team, in association with the then editors, his longstanding friend Tony Rains and R M (Jerry) Kirk. Apart from his surgical career, he studied painting in oils and frequently exhibited at the Royal West of England Academy. He was a member of the Bristol Shakespeare Club, the Hawk and Owl Trust, and was a member of council and later president of the Bristol Zoo. He married Pip Naylor in 1945 and they had two sons, John and Tim. His wife predeceased him in 1985. He died on 2 January 2003.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000076
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Golding-Bird, Cuthbert Hilton (1848 - 1939)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2008-03-07
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/372642372642
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born in Myddleton Square, Pentonville, London on 7 July 1848, the fourth child and second son of Golding Bird, MD, FRS, and his wife, Mary Brett. His father (1814-1854) was appointed assistant physician to Guy's Hospital in 1843 on the retirement of Richard Bright; his uncle, Frederic Bird, was obstetric physician to Westminster Hospital. His mother founded the Golding Bird gold medal and scholarship for bacteriology at Guy's Hospital. Golding-Bird was educated at Tonbridge School 1856-62, and afterwards at King's College School in the Strand and at King's College. He graduated BA at the University of London in 1867, and won the gold medal in forensic medicine at the MB examination in 1873. Entering the medical school of Guy's Hospital in October 1868 he received the first prize for first year students in 1869, the first prize for third year students and the Treasurer's medals for surgery and for medicine in 1873. For a short time he acted as demonstrator of anatomy at Guy's, but on his return from a visit to Paris he was elected assistant surgeon in 1875 and demonstrator of physiology, Dr P H Pye-Smith being lecturer. He held the office of surgeon until 1908, when he resigned on attaining the age of 60, was made consulting surgeon, and spent the rest of his life at Meopham, near Rochester, in Kent as a country gentleman interested in the life of the village, in gardening, and in collecting clocks. At the Royal College of Surgeons Golding-Bird was an examiner in elementary physiology 1884-86, in physiology 1886-91, in anatomy and physiology for the Fellowship 1884-90 and 1892-95. He was on the Dental Board as Examiner in surgery in 1902, a member of the Court of Examiners 1897-1907, and a member of the Council 1905-13. He married in 1870 Florence Marion, daughter of Dr John Baber, MRCS, of Thurlow Square, Kensington, and of Meopham. She died on 23 March 1919, and there were no children. He died at Pitfield, Meopham, Kent, of angina with asthma after much painful dyspnoea, on 6 March 1939, being then the oldest living FRCS. Golding-Bird was an exceedingly neat operator and a delicate manipulator. His training in histology, at a time when all section-cutting of tissues was done by hand with an ordinary razor, enabled him to make sections of the retina, drawings of which afterwards appeared in many editions of Quain's *Anatomy*. He did much useful work during his long period of retirement, for he was surgeon to the Gravesend Hospital and the Royal Deaf and Dumb School at Margate, chairman of the Kent County Nursing Association, a member of the Central Midwives Board, and churchwarden of St John's Church, Meopham. He was interested in local archaeology and wrote a history of Meopham which reached a second edition. He also published a history of the United Hospital Club and contributed many papers to the medical journals. He long retained his youthful appearance and it is recorded that when he had been assistant surgeon for some years, a question of amputation having arisen, the patient said she would not have her “leg took off by that boy”, but if it had to be done, pointing to the house surgeon, he should do it. He left his residence, Pitfield, to Guy's Hospital, £1,000 towards the maintenance of Meopham Church and churchyard, £1,000 upon trust for the Village Hall, Meopham, £300 to Kent County Nursing Association, £300 to Meopham and Nursted Local Nursing Association, £100 to the National Refuges for Homeless and Destitute Children, £50 each to the Mothers' Union Central Fund, the SPG, the YMCA, the YWCA and the Church of England Zenana Missionary Society, and the residue, subject to life interest, between Gravesend Hospital, Epsom Medical College, and the Village Hall, Meopham.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000458
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Howkins, John (1907 - 2003)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-09-28 2007-08-09
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/372265372265
Occupation Gynaecologist
Details John Howkins was a gynaecological surgeon at St Bartholomew’s Hospital, London. He was born in Hartlepool, County Durham, on 17 December 1907, the son of John Drysdale Howkins, a civil engineer, and Helen Louise née Greenwood, the daughter of a bank manager. He was educated at Cargilfield Preparatory School and was then a scholar at Shrewsbury, where he was a prefect, and developed a lifelong interest in fast cars. This led to a temporary set-back: he was spotted driving a girl in his Frazer-Nash, reported to the headmaster, and expelled. This did not prevent him winning an arts entrance scholarship to the Middlesex Hospital, where he fell under the spell of Victor Bonney. After qualifying, he did junior jobs at the Middlesex and the Chelsea Hospital for Women, and then became resident assistant physician-accoucheur at Bart’s. He also gained his masters in surgery, his MD (with a gold medal) and his FRCS. At the outbreak of war he joined the RAF, rising to Wing-Commander and senior surgical specialist, eventually becoming deputy chief consultant to the WAAF. At the end of the war he returned to Bart’s, where a post was created for him. He was subsequently appointed to the Hampstead General and the Royal Masonic Hospitals. He was a prolific writer, talking over *Bonney’s Textbook of gynaecology* as well as Shaw’s textbooks of *Gynaecology* and *Operative gynaecology*. He was Hunterian Professor of the College in 1947 and was awarded the Meredith Fletcher Shaw memorial lectureship of the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists in 1975. Small in stature, he was an accomplished skier, and chairman of the Ski Club of Great Britain, and had a memorable sense of humour. He enjoyed salmon fishing and renovating old houses. In retirement he took up sheep farming in Wales. He married Lena Brown in 1940. They had one son and two daughters. He died on 6 May 2003.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000078
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Keane, Brendan (1926 - 2005)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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 Hulbert, Kenneth Frederick (1912 - 2003)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Jayasekera, Kodituwakku Gnanapala ( - 2001)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Johnson-Gilbert, Ronald Stuart (1925 - 2003)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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 Cheng, Koon-Sung (1966 - 2003)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Gordon-Taylor, Sir Gordon (1878 - 1960)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2008-03-07
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/372643372643
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born on 18 March 1878 at Streatham Hill, London, the only son of John Taylor, wine merchant of Dean Street, Tooley Street, London Bridge and Alice Miller Gordon daughter of William Gordon, stockbroker of Union Street, Aberdeen; he and his sister were taken by their mother to Aberdeen when their father died in 1885. Educated at Gordon College and Aberdeen University, as a student he would retire at eight in the evening and would be called by his mother at midnight in order that he might continue his studies. As a result, he passed in English in March 1896, in logic and geology in March 1897, in botany in July 1897 and obtained the degree of MA with third-class honours in classics in April 1898. On the family returning to London, he entered the school of the Middlesex Hospital, being awarded a gold medal in anatomy in the intermediate examination for the London MB. Qualifying in May 1903 with the conjoint diploma and passing the final MB London also, he became, in addition to his other duties, a demonstrator of anatomy under Peter Thompson, working together with Victor Bonney to obtain first-class honours in anatomy in the BSc in 1904. In 1905 he took the BS examination and in 1906 the MS, at the same time passing the Fellowship examination. His first consultant appointment was that of surgeon to out-patients at the Royal Northern Hospital but, when a vacancy occurred at the Middlesex, he applied and was appointed to that hospital in 1907 at the age of 29, becoming assistant surgeon to (Sir Alfred) Pearce Gould and (Sir John) Bland Sutton. He also became attached as consultant to a number of smaller hospitals, St Saviours, the West Herts, Potters Bar, Welwyn, Kettering, Teddington and Hampton Wick Hospitals, and to the Ross Institute for Tropical Diseases. During the war of 1914-18 he was gazetted Captain in the RAMC in March 1915 and, serving first at home, proceeded to France being involved in the battles of the Somme and Passchendaele. He was promoted Major, later acted as consulting surgeon to the 4th Army, and was awarded the OBE, returning to England in December 1918. By his experiences in France he had proved the value of prompt and fearless surgery in wounds of the abdomen, which often necessitated multiple resections of the intestine. After the war he built up a great reputation as an intrepid general surgeon, whose profound knowledge of anatomy and whose operative skill enabled him to undertake the most formidable operations. As a result of his war experience, he was a pioneer in the use of blood transfusion, using the Kimpton Tube technique as he distrusted the addition to blood of anti-coagulants, and so he was one of the first in the field in performing immediate gastrectomy for bleeding peptic ulcer. A truly general surgeon, it was however particularly in the field of the surgery of malignant disease affecting the breast, mouth and pharynx that his interest lay. His enthusiasm for anatomy led him to become an examiner in the Primary Fellowship examination in London for many years 1913, 1919, 1940-4 and 1950-3, and in 1934 he was the first surgeon anatomist to go to Melbourne, Australia, to participate in the second Primary examination to be held in that country as at the first only one anatomist, William Wright of the London, had taken part. He made five subsequent visits to Australia as an examiner, and conducted the examination in Calcutta and Colombo in 1935 and 1949. In 1932 he was elected to the Council of the College and thus began another of his life interests. In 1938 he spent some time as lecturer in surgery at the University of Toronto, where he delivered the Balfour lecture. On the outbreak of war in 1939 he offered his services to the Army, and, being rejected on grounds of age, he crossed Whitehall to be received enthusiastically by the Royal Navy, being gazetted Surgeon-Lieutenant and, very rapidly, promoted Surgeon Rear-Admiral, a very fruitful association which led him all over the world. He was, at some time, an examiner in surgery to the Universities of Cambridge, London, Leeds, Belfast, Durham and Edinburgh. At the College he was elected to the Council in 1932, was Vice-President 1941-3, Bradshaw lecturer in 1942 and a Hunterian professor in 1929, 1942 and 1944. In 1945 he delivered the Vicary lecture, and again in 1954. In 1950 he was appointed Sub-Dean of the Institute of Basic Medical Sciences in recognition of his great assistance to overseas students. In 1952 when a memorial plaque to John Hunter was unveiled in St Martins in the Fields, he delivered the address, and in 1955 he was appointed a Hunterian Trustee. In 1941 he acted for a time as exchange Professor at the Peter Bent Brigham Hospital, Boston and again in 1946, when he was also postgraduate Professor in Cairo. In 1943 he was a member of a mission to Russia sponsored by the British Council and, while there, he conferred the Honorary Fellowship on the Russian Surgeons Yudin and Burdenko. For the remainder of his life he acted as surgical adviser to the British Council in their choice of representatives to undertake missions abroad and to areas where British surgery could be of assistance. After his theoretical retirement during the war, distinctions were showered upon him. An outstanding orator, the result of punctilious care, effort and his upbringing in the classics, he gave the first Moynihan memorial lecture in Leeds in 1940, the oration to the Medical Society of London in 1940, the Syme oration to the Royal Australasian College in 1947, the Lettsomian lectures to the Medical Society of London in 1944, the Sheen memorial lecture to the University of Wales in 1949, the Rutherford Morison memorial lecture in Newcastle in 1953, the Hunterian oration to the Hunterian Society in 1954, the John Fraser memorial lecture in Edinburgh in 1957, the Diamond Jubilee oration to the Royal Army Medical Corps in 1958, the Mitchell Banks memorial lecture in Liverpool in 1958, the Cavendish lecture to the West London Medico-Chirurgical Society in 1958, the Harveian lecture to the Harveian Society in 1949, and the Founder's Day oration to the Robert Gordon College, Aberdeen. All his life he maintained his contact with Scotland and with the classics, introducing Latin and Greek quotations in his addresses without any suspicion of pomposity. He was elected a member of the Highland Society of London in 1955, was Vice-President of, and honorary surgeon to, the Royal Scottish Corporation, was chairman of the Horatian Society and a member of the Classical Association. His very infrequent holidays were spent in the Highlands. He was President of the Medical Society of London in 1941-2, President of the Association of Surgeons of Great Britain and Ireland in 1944-5, and President of the Royal Society of Medicine in 1944-5, being elected an Honorary Fellow in 1949. In 1956 he was awarded the gold medal of the Royal Society of Medicine, and on his eightieth birthday the *British Journal of Surgery* published a special edition in his honour. The Australasian College honoured him in 1949 by founding the Gordon Taylor prize for the best candidate in their Primary examination, on the suggestion of six of their Fellows all holders of the Hallett Prize, and that College commissioned his portrait by James Gunn in August 1960. He himself presented the portrait of his wife, painted in 1922 by Cowper, to the Australasian College. His own portrait by Anna Zinkeisen was commissioned by the Middlesex Hospital, where it now hangs. He was made consultant surgeon to the Alfred and St Vincent Hospitals in Melbourne and was an honorary member of surgical societies in Belgium, Norway, Greece, France and Germany, although his feelings for the last were antipathetic. A keen cricketer and member of the MCC, he was a regular attender at Lords, and it was one evening on leaving the ground that he was struck down by a motor car, sustaining injuries from which he died. A touch of irony, as he was an inveterate walker and detested motor cars, and never had any desire to drive one; having sold his Rolls at the outbreak of war in 1939, he never subsequently owned a car. It must be obvious to any reader of this tale of achievement that this was no ordinary man: indeed he was rightly regarded as the doyen of surgery of his generation. Few men, if indeed any others have inspired such universal respect, admiration and affection. Pre-eminent as a surgeon himself, he performed over one hundred hind-quarter amputations, his joy was to educate, instruct and help young surgeons from all over the world. In Australia his was a name to conjure with, and at the Middlesex out of his forty house surgeons twenty-five achieved consultant status, and of these, twelve at the Middlesex itself. He never forgot a face and, more important, the name that went with it. Christmas cards, penned in his own florid handwriting, were sent every year to surgeons all over the world. He lived for surgery and to keep himself fit always walked and became an expert ballroom dancer. He delighted to entertain visiting surgeons in the Oriental Club or his beloved Ritz, and, although abstemious himself, he was a connoisseur of food and wine. His dapper, trim figure in double-breasted jacket, hatless and with bowtie and wing collar, complete with the pink carnation in the button hole, brought a thrill of excitement to any surgeon lucky enough to encounter him and to be recognised immediately and addressed by name. He was indeed, as Sir Arthur Porritt, the President, described him in his funeral oration quoting Chaucer's words, “a very parfit gentil knight”. He married Florence Mary FRSA, FZS, eldest daughter of John Pegrume, who died in 1949. He died in the Middlesex Hospital following an accident on 3 September 1960. He was cremated at Golder's Green on 8 September, D H Patey reading the lesson. A memorial service was held in All Souls, Langham Place on Thursday 13 October 1960, conducted by the Vicar and by the Chaplain of the Middlesex Hospital. The oration was delivered by Sir Arthur Porritt, who was supported by the Council of the College. The lesson was read by T Holmes Sellors, and the church was filled by representatives of many learned societies and Sir Gordon's colleagues, friends and patients A bibliography of his publications, compiled by A M Shadrake, was appended to the memorial pamphlet published by the Middlesex Hospital, and his principal writings are listed at the end of Sir Eric Riches's Gordon-Taylor memorial lecture *Ann. Roy. Coll. Surg. Engl.* 1968, 42, 91-92; they included: Books 1930. *The Dramatic in Surgery*. Bristol, Wright. 1939. *The Abdominal Injuries of Warfare*. Bristol, Wright. 1958. *Sir Charles Bell, his life and times*, with E A Walls. Edinburgh, Livingstone. On Cancer Statistics and Prognosis 1904. *Arch. Middlesex Hosp.* 3, 128, with W S Lazarus-Barlow. 1959. *Brit. med. J.* 1, 455. Mitchell Banks Lecture. On Cancer of the Breast 1948. *Ann. Roy. Coll. Surg. Engl.* 2, 60. 1948. *Proc. Roy. Soc. Med.* 41, 118. On Malignant Disease of the Testis 1918. *Clin. J.* 47, 26. 1938. *Brit. J. Urol.* 10, 1, with A S Till. 1947. *Brit. J. Surg.* 35, 6, with N R Wyndham. On the Oro-pharynx 1933. *Proc. Roy. Soc. Med.* 26, 889. On Retroperitoneal and Mesenteric Tumours 1930. *Proc. Roy. Soc. Med.* 24, 782. 1930. *Brit. J. Surg.* 17, 551. 1948. *Roy. Melb. Hosp. clin. Rep.* Centenary Volume, p. 189. On the Hindquarter Amputation 1935. *Brit. J. Surg.* 22, 671, with Philip Wiles. 1940. *Brit. J. Surg.* 27, 643. 1949. *J. Bone Jt. Surg.* 31 B, 410, with Philip Wiles. 1952. *J. Bone Jt. Surg.* 34 B, 14, with Philip Wiles, D H Patey, W Turner-Warwick and R S Monro. 1952. *Brit. J. Surg.* 39, 3, with R S Monro. 1955. *British Surgical Progress,* p. 81. London, Butterworth. 1959. *J. Roy. Coll. Surg. Edin.* 5, 1, John Fraser Memorial Lecture. On War Surgery 1955. War injuries of the chest and abdomen. *Brit. J. Surg.,* Supplement 3. On Tradition Moynihan (1940) *Univ. Leeds med. Mag.* 10, 126. Rutherford Morison (1954) *Newcastle med. J.* 24, 248. Cavendish Lecture (1958) *Proc. W. Lond. Med.-Chir. Soc.* p. 12. Fergusson (1961) *Medical History,* 5, 1. The surgery of the "Forty-five" rebellion. (Vicary Lecture 1945). *Brit. J. Surg.* 33, 1.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000459
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Birbara, George (1928 - 2006)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2008-09-11
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/372739372739
Occupation General surgeon
Details George Birbara was a general surgeon in Leeton, New South Wales. He was born in Sydney on 16 August 1928. His parents, Anis, a tailor, and Amanda (née Diab) had emigrated from Lebanon. George went to Sydney Boys’ High School and Sydney University. After house appointments, he went to England in 1954 to specialize in surgery, working at the Royal Masonic, Whipps Cross, St James’s Balham, St Cross Rugby, St Luke’s Bradford and Southampton Chest hospitals. Having passed the FRCS, he returned to Leeton, New South Wales in 1959. He married Hazel, a school teacher, in 1956. They had two sons (Nicholas and Andrew) and two daughters (Rosemary and Helen), none of whom followed him into medicine. He died on 17 January 2006.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000556
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Cobb, Richard Alan (1953 - 2004)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Coffin, Frank Robert (1915 - 2004)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Ball, John Robert (1934 - 2008)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Sir Barry Jackson
Publication Date 2008-09-18
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/372742372742
Occupation General surgeon
Details John Ball was a true general surgeon, having spent his entire consultant career in practice on the isolated Scottish island of Skye, where he established a first-class surgical reputation, as well as becoming a much loved and hugely respected local figure. His reputation on the island was such that in 1995 he received the rare distinction of being made a Freeman of Skye and Lochalsh; less than half-a-dozen individuals have been so honoured. John Ball was born on 28 October 1934 Port Talbot, south Wales, the second son of William James Ball, a grocer, and Eleanor née Lewis. He was educated at Aberafan Grammar School, Port Talbot, and at St Mary’s Hospital Medical School in London, where he won two prizes. He also excelled at sport, especially rugby and cricket, and was a member of the cricket and rugby sides that won the London Hospitals Cup in 1958, the year he qualified. After house jobs at St Mary’s, he spent two years National Service in the RAMC in Hong Kong. He then returned to become a senior house officer at St George’s Hospital, London, and then St James’ Hospital, Balham. From 1966 he was a surgical registrar at Paddington General Hospital. In these training posts he was greatly influenced by Norman Tanner, Rodney Smith, Victor Riddell and Sir Arthur Porritt. In 1970 he became a locum consultant at the Central Middlesex Hospital, but this appointment was short-lived as the following year he moved to the Dr Mackinnon Memorial Hospital in Broadford, Skye, where he practised for the rest of his career. This was the island where Ball and his wife had spent their honeymoon. There he carried out a broad range of surgery, but was especially interested in biliary disease. He was a founder member the Viking Surgical Club, which consisted of single-handed surgeons who practised throughout the United Kingdom and beyond. He was a very successful host of the third annual meeting of the Club. He was also an outstanding fundraiser especially from grateful American tourists who became his patients. By this means he was able to acquire up-to-date scanning equipment for the hospital. After his retirement in 1999 he worked as a ship’s surgeon on the Fred Olsen Cruise Line, before moving to live in Inverness. In private life John Ball was hugely knowledgeable about music and possessed a fine baritone voice. He was a member of the Broadford Church choir and an elder of that church. He also enjoyed sailing, hill walking and golf. Happily married to Adrianne since 1965, herself medically qualified, and with three children, Helen, Joanna and Jonathan, and eight grandchildren, John Ball was a man of enthusiasm, humanity, loyalty and deep Christian faith. He died on 9 February 2008 after a short illness, aged 73, in Inverness.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000559
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Bainbrigge, William Henry (1806 - 1884)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Baker, Alfred (1815 - 1893)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2009-11-04 2016-02-05
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000700-E000799
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372920372920
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born at Birmingham on Jan 23rd, 1815, one of seven distinguished sons, including the Mayor of Manchester, a well-known Unitarian Minister, and a well-known teacher of the deaf and dumb. Educated at King Edward's School, where he showed promise of becoming an artist, being early thrown into the company of Henshaw, Thomas Creswick, ARA, and Thomas Baker, who all distinguished themselves in the world of art. His family, however, destined him for the medical profession, and in 1882 apprenticed him to J J Ledsam, Senior Surgeon to the Eye Infirmary, Birmingham. He also became a pupil of the Old School of Medicine in Snowhill, which was the precursor of Queen's College, itself again the precursor of Mason College. He won silver medals in the classes of anatomy, surgery, materia medica, and therapeutics - a range of subjects which foreshadowed the comprehensive ability which made him one of the most accomplished practitioners that Birmingham has ever known. Baker's facility in the use of the pencil and brush led to his early introduction by Joseph Hodgson (qv) into the wards of the General Hospital for the purpose of making for him pathological drawings and sketches. In this pursuit a frequent fellow-worker was his friend Sir William Bowman (qv), who was apprenticed to the hospital and who was also, as was Mr Hodgson himself, an artist of no mean skill. Baker subsequently acted as one of Hodgson's dressers and remained his friend during the latter's Presidency of the Royal College of Surgeons. After completing his curriculum of study at Birmingham, Alfred Baker, in 1886, entered as a student at St Bartholomew's Hospital, where he attended Lawrence's lectures on surgery as well as Partridge's anatomical demonstrations at King's College. He returned to Birmingham in 1837, and, having declined a partnership with J J Ledsam, his former master, went to Coventry and for a year was associated with the leading surgeon there, John Bury (qv). He then secured the appointment of House Surgeon at the Birmingham General Hospital, where he effected considerable improvements, especially in the pathological examinations and in the statistical records. He became Surgeon to the hospital in succession to Bowyer Vaux (qv), in June, 1848, and here his administrative faculties, not less than his operative skill, acquired full play. In 1846 Baker was thrown from his gig when on his rounds and fractured his femur and arm. He made a slow recovery, but this accident seriously affected him to his life's end. In 1850 he married the eldest daughter of Mr. George Armitage, manufacturing chemist, and was associated with Dr Bell Fletcher, the Elkingtons, and other leading physicians in the foundation of a new medical school, Sydenham College. There had been for some time a considerable amount of misunderstanding between the authorities of the General Hospital and Queen's College, and the object of the new school was to provide more efficient teaching, to combine in a greater degree theoretical training with practical demonstration under the same teachers, and thus to increase the value of the hospital practice. Sydenham College was eventually amalgamated with Queen's College after seventeen years of useful activity, and during the whole of its existence Baker held the post of Lecturer on the Principles and Practice of Surgery. As such and as Surgeon to the General Hospital he had necessarily to keep abreast of innovations in surgical practice, and thus he was the first to perform ovariotomy in Birmingham (1851). The case was unsuccessful, for the patient died, and Baker was assailed by a colleague possessed of a facile pen. Charges of recklessness and cruelty were brought against him, but after an exhaustive inquiry before the Hospital Committee he was completely cleared of the charge of malpraxis. Baker took an important part in the management of the Birmingham General Hospital and was warmly interested in the welfare of the institution. On his retirement from the Hon Surgeoncy in 1881, after thirty-three years' tenure of office, he was presented with a testimonial by the Committee, which consisted of his portrait by Frank Holl, RA, together with a service of silver plate. The portrait was hung in the board room, and the students at the same time presented him with an illuminated address expressive of their admiration for his skill as an operator and teacher. His surgical skill was, indeed, of a high order. He was learned, dexterous, of sound judgement, and careful in arriving at conclusions. As Chairman of the General Hospital Committee in 1885, he received the Prince of Wales when he came to Birmingham to open the Suburban Branch Hospital for Chronic Diseases. This institution was built, furnished, and presented to the General Hospital by a prominent Birmingham citizen - Sir John Jaffray, Bart - but its inception was due to Baker's fertile brain. Baker was one of the founders of the Birmingham Medical Institute and at various times President of each of the local medical societies of Birmingham. He served for eight years on the Council of the Royal College of Surgeons (1852-1860). At the time of his death he was Senior Vice-President of the British Medical Association, and had been intimately associated with its reorganization after it changed its name from 'Provincial' to 'British' and removed the editorial offices of the Journal to London. He was President of the Association at its meeting in Birmingham in 1872, and exhibited an admirable collection of his pathological drawings in the 'Museum'. In addition to his other offices he was Surgeon to the Asylum for Deaf and Dumb at Edgbaston, and, at the time of his death, was Consulting Surgeon to the General Hospital and the General Dispensary, Birmingham. His death occurred at Birmingham on Jan 12th or 13th, 1898. His funeral service would have been taken, but for his absence on the Continent, by his nephew, Dr Benson, then Archbishop of Canterbury, whose mother was a sister of the deceased and of Sir Thomas Baker, Mayor of Manchester. He was survived by a widow, four daughters, [1] and three sons [2]. A good portrait of him accompanies his biography in the British Medical Journal. His Birmingham addresses were 3 Waterloo Street and The Bracken, Augustus Road, Edgbaston. He was both a general practitioner and a consulting surgeon. [3] Publications:- "A Case of Intestinal Obstruction from Disease of the Rectum treated successfully by opening the Descending Colon in the Left Loin." - Med.-Chic. Trans., 1852, xxxiv, 226. "Case of Transposition of Colon." - Brit. Med. Jour., 1880, ii, 803. "On the Difficulties of Hernia." - Assoc. Med. Jour., 1856, 599. "On Pyaemia" - Brit. Med. Jour., 1866, ii, 629. "President's Address delivered at the Annual Meeting of the British Medical Association held in Birmingham in August, 1872." 8vo, London, 1872; Brit. Med. Jour., 1872, ii, 141. [Amendments from the annotated edition of *Plarr's Lives* at the Royal College of Surgeons: [1] *The Times* 4 May 1940 "HEATON. - On May 1, 1940, at St Godwald's Finstall, CHARLOTTE ELLEN, daughter of the late Alfred Baker, F.R.C.S., and widow of HARRY HEATON, jun., of Birmingham and Manchester, aged 81 years."; *The Times* 24 Sept 1952 "ADAMS. - On Sept. 22, 1952, at St Godwald's, Finstall, HARRIET ISABEL, wife of the late PERCY CROFTON DE LACY ADAMS (PADDY) in her 90th year, youngest and last remaining child of Alfred Baker, F.R.C.S., of Birmingham and his wife Emmeline Bethune. Cremation at Lodge Hill, 12 noon Friday, Sept. 26"; [2] *The Times* 4 Dec 1944 "BETHUNE-BAKER. - On Dec 1, 1944, at 6, Compton Place Road, Eastbourne, GEORGE THOMAS BETHUNE-BAKER, F.Z.S., F.R.E.S., late of Birmingham, beloved husband of Berthe, second son of the late Alfred Baker, F.R.C.S, of Birmingham, in his 88th year"; *The Times* 15 January 1951 p.1A & (above) p.69 "BETHUNE-BAKER. - On Jan. 13. 1951, JAMES FRANKLIN BETHUNE-BAKER, D.D., F.B.A. of 7, Chaucer Road, Cambridge, Fellow of Pembroke College, sometime Lady Margaret's Professor of Divinity in the University of Cambridge, youngest son of the late Alfred Baker, F.R.C.S., of Birmingham, in his 90th year. Funeral service at Pembroke College Chapel on Wednesday, Jan. 17, at 2.45 p.m."; [3] Portrait (1) by Frank Holl RA in the General Hospital (ii) in "Edgbastonia" for May 1891 From 18th Birmingham Houses by Benj. Walker *Trans. Birm. Archaeol. Soc.* ? 1932, p.6]
Resource Identifier RCS: E000737
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

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

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Baker, William Morrant (1839 - 1896)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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/372923372923
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born on Oct 20th, 1839, the son of B Russell Baker, a solicitor of Andover. Educated at the Andover Grammar School, and then apprenticed to George Speke Payne, a local surgeon. In 1858 he entered St Bartholomew’s Hospital, and qualifying in 1861 he was appointed Midwifery Assistant. In 1867 he was made Demonstrator of Anatomy and became associate editor of the 6th edition of Kirkes’ *Physiology*. He was Warden of the College from 1867-1874, when he showed himself to be a kind and wise friend to many students. In 1869 he succeeded Sir William Savory (q.v.) as Lecturer in Physiology, and held that post for sixteen years. In 1870 he was elected Casualty Surgeon, in 1871 Assistant Surgeon, and full Surgeon in 1882. He was also Surgeon to the Skin Department at St Bartholomew’s Hospital, Surgeon to the Evelina Hospital for Sick Children, a Member of the Court of Examiners at the Royal College of Surgeons, and Examiner at the Universities of London and Durham. He retired from the staff of St Bartholomew’s Hospital in 1892 on account of ill health. He then left his house in 26 Wimpole Street, removing to Woburn Square, and later in 1896 to his country house, Nutbourne Manor, Pulborough, where he died on Oct 3rd, 1896. He was buried at West Chiltington, and a tablet to his memory by his house surgeons is on the west wall of the church of St Bartholomew-the-Less. He married Annie Mills, of Andover, the sister of Joseph Mills, the anaesthetist, and had six children, two sons and four daughters. His eldest son was a student at St Bartholomew’s Hospital at the time of his father’s death, and some years ago presented to the hospital the collection of prints dealing with St Bartholomew’s which his father had delighted to collect. This collection is now in the Library of St Bartholomew’s Hospital Medical College. Baker’s works, which were numerous, may be seen in his biographies. He was a hard-working, capable surgeon of the period immediately preceding the aseptic era of surgery, who was more especially interested in diseases of skin and of the tongue, an organ he removed with an écraseur. He is best remembered at his own hospital by his paper on “Synovial Cysts in Leg in Connection with Diseases of the Knee-joint”, published in the *St Bartholomew’s Hospital Reports*. The result of this paper was that Baker had his name given to this disease, and ‘Baker’s cysts’ were well known in this country. It remained for D’Arcy Power to show that these ‘Baker's cysts’ were really part of a tuberculous affection of joints, which had not been recognized by Morrant Baker. He also invented a useful tracheotomy tube made of red rubber. Publications: “Synovial Cysts in Leg in Connection with Diseases of the Knee-joint.” *St Bart.’s Hosp. Rep.*, 1877, xiii, 245. “On the Use of Flexible Tracheotomy Tubes.” *Med.-Chir. Trans.*, 1877, lx, 71.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000740
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Ainley, Roger Gwynne (1932 - 2006)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Enid Taylor
Publication Date 2008-10-24
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/372751372751
Occupation Ophthalmic surgeon
Details Roger Gwynne Ainley was an ophthalmic surgeon in the Merseyside area. He was born in Fringford, Oxfordshire, on 8 September 1932. His father, Joe Ainley, was a headmaster and his mother, Dora (née Carter), was a music teacher, both in schools and freelance. The family are related to the Shakespearian actor Henry Ainley. Roger Ainley attended Lord Williams’ Grammar School, Thame, and then the Old Grammar School, Bicester, from 1943 to 1950. His studies were then interrupted by National Service in the Royal Air Force for two years. In 1952 he went to Keble College, Oxford, to read zoology, but a year later changed to medicine. His clinical training was also in Oxford. His medical and surgical house jobs were at the Radcliffe Infirmary and then he began his formal ophthalmological training as senior house officer and registrar at Oxford Eye Hospital from 1961 to 1963. From 1965 to 1969 he was a lecturer and then senior lecturer at the Manchester Royal Eye Hospital. During this period, in 1968, he was awarded the George Herbert Hunt travelling scholarship and visited ophthalmic departments in New York, Philadelphia, Boston and Ohio State University. In 1969 he was appointed consultant ophthalmic surgeon to Merseyside Regional Health Authority and was postgraduate medical tutor to the Wirral Group from 1974 to 1976. He was a member of the Oxford Ophthalmological Congress, a charter member of the International Association of Ocular Surgeons and a member of Wallasey Medical Society, becoming president in 1989. He wrote quite widely on ocular subjects, but was particularly interested in vitamin B12 levels in ocular fluids and tobacco amblyopia. His other interests were diverse – music, playing the clarinet, sailing, squash and particularly a lifelong interest in butterflies and moths. Initially he collected specimens and his collection covered all European countries, USA, Thailand, Morocco, Costa Rica, Kenya, the Gambia and Mediera. Later he became more interested in conservation and was a member of the Lancashire and Cheshire Entomological Society, Butterfly Conservation and Cheshire Wildlife Trust. Between 1963 and 1991 he had six papers on butterflies and moths published in *The Entomologist* and *The Entomologist’s Record*. In December 1959 he married Jean Burrows, a nurse at St Bartholomew’s Hospital. They had two children, Elizabeth Anne, born in 1965, who is a chartered accountant, and Timothy Charles, born in 1967, a linguist. Roger Ainley died in 2006.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000568
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Laird, Martin (1917 - 2004)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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/372481372481
Occupation General Practitioner
Details Martin Laird was a general practitioner in Richmond, South Australia. He qualified from Sheffield University in 1941 and then demonstrated anatomy for two years. In 1943 he became a resident medical officer at the Royal Hospital, Sheffield. He then served in the RAMC in Burma, returning after the war to Sheffield, to specialise in surgery and take the FRCS. He was resident surgical officer to the Sheffield Royal Infirmary and then went on to the Westminster Hospital as registrar. In 1952 he went to Nottingham General Hospital as a senior registrar and remained there for the next three years. He then retrained in general practice in Cleethorpes. In 1956 he emigrated to South Australia, where he was in general practice in Richmond. He died in Adelaide on 13 November 2004. He was predeceased by his wife Joan. He leaves three daughters, Fiona, Alison and Isobel.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000294
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Ball, Daniel (1799 - 1895)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Bally, William Ford ( - 1859)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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 Plaut, Gustav Siegmund (1921 - 2006)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Banister, George (1819 - 1884)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Murthy, Subbayan Keshava (1931 - 2003)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-12-19 2007-08-02
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/372508372508
Occupation General Practitioner
Details Subbayan Keshava Murthy was a general practitioner in Swindon. He was born on 9 April 1931 at Channaraya Patna, in Mysore (now called Karnataka). His father, Venkatajubbiah Murthy, was a government state doctor. His mother was Subbalakhamma Murthy. He was educated at various government schools, finishing at Maharaja’s High School, Mysore. In 1946 he went on to Mysore Medical College, graduating in 1953. He then worked in various hospital posts in Karnataka State. In 1956 he went to the UK to specialise in surgery. His first post was at Swansea Hospital, from which he successfully took the Edinburgh and English fellowships. He then went on to a series of registrar jobs in general and thoracic surgery, including St John’s Hospital, London, and Sully Hospital, Glamorgan. He spent a year in Chicago, and was offered a permanent job in a surgical clinic, but declined, having found the mercenary aspects difficult to accept after his experience of the NHS. He returned to India to work in various positions, including a post at the Missionary Hospital in Karnataka, where he carried out reparative surgery on patients with leprosy. Finally, he was appointed as a pool officer in the All India Institute of Medical Sciences in Delhi, where he was joined by his colleague from Swansea, Helen Parker. They married on 4 April 1963 in New Delhi. In 1964 they returned to the UK, when he found it necessary to pass the conjoint to obtain full registration. His next posts were in cardiothoracic surgery at Sully and Broad Green hospitals. In 1971 he decided to enter general practice in Swindon, where he worked until he was obliged to take early retirement after cardiac by-pass surgery in 1987. He continued to work part-time until November 1991. He had many outside interests. He was passionately interested in cricket and loved cooking, at which he excelled. He enjoyed classical music, both Western and Indian, and also travelling, especially motoring in Europe, particularly Spain and France. On his retirement he and his wife joined the University of the Third Age, and, before his health failed, he had completed the first year of an Open University Spanish course. He died on 13 May 2003.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000321
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

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

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Barclay, Wilfred Martin (1863 - 1903)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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/372933372933
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born in India on May 15th, 1863, the youngest son of Deputy Surgeon General George Barclay, of the Madras Army. Educated at Clifton College and Bristol Medical School, where he took prizes. After qualification he remained at the Bristol General Hospital, filling the posts of Assistant House Surgeon, Physician’s Assistant, Assistant Surgeon, and Surgeon (1893), and where at the time of his early death on May 9th, 1903, he was Senior Surgeon. It may be noted that he had not obtained his FRCS when he was elected Assistant Surgeon to the General Hospital in 1888, and the appointment was made conditional on his obtaining the diploma within a year. In addition to his surgical attainments, which were of no mean order, he was a scholar, widely read in English literature, particularly in the drama and poetry; and according to Canon Ainger the foundations of his literary culture were laid at Clifton College, where he showed a marked taste for good writing. Barclay was a good but slow operator; somewhat reticent and retiring, and a shade oversensitive to grievances real or imaginary. Canon Ainger writes of him: “During the thirteen years that I knew him he had suffered many grievous family bereavements and lived through years of much loneliness and anxiety; and when at last he made the most congenial and happy of marriages his friends hoped that a long future of domestic happiness lay before him, but *Deo aliter visum*.” His health failing some months before his death, he took up his residence in an open-air sanatorium and died of phthisis at Amberley, Gloucestershire, on May 9th, 1903. He was survived by his widow. Publications: Various contributions to the *Bristol Med.-Chir. Jour.* and *Brit. Med. Jour.* in 1898.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000750
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Ryan, Peter John (1925 - 2002)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-10-19 2016-05-12
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/372311372311
Occupation Colorectal surgeon
Details Peter John Ryan was a pioneer in colorectal surgery. He was born, the eldest of four boys, on 25 November 1925 in Dookie, Victoria, Australia, to farming parents. He was dux of Assumption College, Kilmore, and then went on to study medicine at Melbourne University. He graduated in 1948 and was a resident medical officer at St Vincent's Hospital. From 1953 to 1954 he served as a Major in the Royal Australian Army Medical Corps in Japan and Korea, and then worked for a number of years in England. After obtaining his Fellowship of the College, he spent three years at Leicester General Hospital. Following his return to Australia in 1960, he joined the surgical staff at St Vincent's Hospital, Melbourne. In 1972, the Ryan unit was established, with Ryan as the inpatient surgeon. It later became the department of colon and rectal surgery, with Ryan as its first director. He retired from St Vincent's in 1990. His laboratory work included studies of the effects of a proximal colostomy on bowel anastomoses. In 1986, his Hunterian address to the College was on diverticular disease. He was the first to advocate immediate resection (with anastomosis) in selected cases of diverticular perforation. He was keen to share Australian surgical expertise with medical colleagues in Asia. From 1965 to 1966 he led a St Vincent's surgical team to Long Xuyen, in Vietnam. He also established a programme of visiting fellows from Japan and Indonesia, and lectured in Kuala Lumpur and Jakarta. He was the first honorary fellow of the Indonesian Surgical Association. Ryan was President of the International Society of University Colon and Rectal Surgeons from 1986 to 1988, and an original member of the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons' road trauma committee, which was responsible for the introduction of compulsory car seatbelts. His knowledge of anatomy and ability to sketch clearly made him a popular teacher. He was proud of his small red book entitled *A very short textbook of surgery* (third edition, London, Chapman & Hall Medical, 1994), which ran to several editions and was translated and widely used in China. He was an author of over 50 journal articles. In 1950 he married Margery Manly. They had 10 children, three of whom - Rowena, Jeremy and Roderick - followed him into medicine. He was awarded the medal of the Order of Australia in 2002, shortly before his death on 3 June 2002. The following is an amended version of this obituary, based on updated information. Peter Ryan was a consultant surgeon in Melbourne. He was born on 25 November 1925, in Shepparton, Victoria, the eldest of a farming family: his father was also Peter Ryan, his mother was Mona née McGuinness, a secretary and aspiring actress. From the Dookie State School, Peter went on to Assumption College in Kilmore, where he was *dux* in 1941. He studied medicine at Melbourne University, where he met Margery Manly, an arts student, whom he married in 1950. He was involved in theatre, writing, and the Newman and Campion societies, at one stage considering joining the Catholic commune, Whitlands. During his studies he contracted tuberculosis from a patient and took a year to recover. After qualifying, he did resident posts at St Vincent's Hospital. He passed the MS in 1953 and, partly to fund his future studies, joined the RAAMC and served in a field ambulance unit in Korea, where he averaged six operations a day, seven days a week. At the end of the Korean war he moved to London in 1954, passed the FRCS, and became registrar at Leicester General Hospital. On returning to Melbourne in 1957, he was appointed to St Vincent's, where he was a general surgeon, but gradually became more interested in colorectal surgery, receiving the Sir Alan Newton essay prize for a paper on diverticular disease. In 1965 St Vincent's asked Peter to organise civilian surgical teams to work in Vietnam. He led the first of these to Long Xuyen. He later learned that the cook and several of the other staff were Viet Cong. From then on he pioneered a programme for trainee surgeons from Indonesia and Japan, many of whom became firm friends. For this work he was honoured by being made the first honorary Fellow of the Indonesian Surgeons Association. In 1978 he set up a colorectal unit at St Vincent's and a few years later his own successful private service. He was one of the first to learn laparoscopic techniques, and to advocate resection and anastomosis in selected cases of perforation, for which he was awarded an Hunterian Professorship in 1986. He was President of the International Society of University Colon and Rectal Surgeons from 1987 to 1988. A prolific author of more than 50 research papers, Peter was a gifted teacher and produced a popular work *A very small textbook of surgery* (London, Chapman & Hall Medical, 1988) which was translated into Mandarin and Indonesian. In 1996, the Peter Ryan prize in surgery for final year students was established in his honour. He and his wife had 10 children, 3 of whom - Rowena, Jeremy and Roderick - followed him into medicine. He was awarded the medal of the Order of Australia in 2002, shortly before his death on 3 June 2002.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000124
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Gleave, John Reginald Wallace (1925 - 2006)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2007-03-15 2011-12-20
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/372524372524
Occupation Neurosurgeon
Details John Gleave was a consultant neurosurgeon at Addenbrooke's Hospital, Cambridge, and an accomplished oarsman. He was born in Walsall, Staffordshire (now West Midlands), on 6 April 1925, the son of John Wallace Gleave, a priest, and his wife, Dorothy (née Littlefair). He was educated at Uppingham School, to which he won a scholarship in 1938. He then went to Magdalen College, Oxford, with an exhibition and took an honours degree in natural sciences, before completing his clinical studies at the Radcliffe Infirmary, where he won the Gask clinical prize in 1947. His house jobs were at the Radcliffe Infirmary with A Cooke, A Elliott- Smith and Sir Hugh Cairns (with whom he had done an elective period as a student). Cairns, Nuffield Professor of Surgery at Oxford, had established the neurosurgical department at Oxford before the war. Gleave completed his National Service in the neurological unit at Wheatley Military Hospital. There he worked under the neurologist Ritchie Russell, Honor Smith (who had done important research on the treatment of meningitis with Cairns) and the neurosurgeon Walpole Lewin. After his National Service, he became a registrar to the professorial surgical unit in Liverpool and then senior registrar in neurosurgery at Oxford. In 1962 he was appointed second consultant neurosurgeon at Addenbrooke's Hospital, Cambridge, in the unit set up by Walpole Lewin. He remained there until his retirement in 1990. The department at Adenbrooke's became a large regional centre. When Lewin died in 1980, Gleave became the senior consultant and the department expanded with new appointments and the establishment of the Bayer chair of neurosurgery. Gleave was a skilful general neurosurgeon with a special interest stereotaxic neurosurgery, which he advocated for the accurate diagnostic biopsy of intracranial lesions. In 1990, together with R Macfarlane, he wrote a paper, which suggested that, while urgent surgery for acute central disc protrusion with cauda equina compression was wise, the unfavourable prognosis of the condition was determined so early in the course of the disease that unless delay was shorter than was ordinarily possible, it did not greatly influence the outcome. This suggestion, which had clear medico-legal implications, was resisted in the United States, where the paper was rejected on principle. It was, however, published in this country. Gleave was a fellow of St Edmund's College, Cambridge, from 1976 until 1990, praelector from 1982 to 2002, a tutor in neuroanatomy at Magdalene College between 1974 and 1992, and an examiner in surgery to the University of London from 1985 to 1991. He was a notable sportsman. He represented Oxford University in fives and squash, and played rugby for Oxfordshire and the Royal Army Medical Corps, but his great sporting interest was rowing. He was in the Oxford VIII for three successive years, and was invited to try for the Olympic crew in 1948, but his father vetoed this. He then rowed for Leander in crews that were beaten only in the final at Henley of the Stewarts' cup and the Silver Goblets in 1948, but in 1949 won the Grand Challenge cup in record time. In 1979 he won a gold medal in the veteran coxed fours at the World Championships. He coached Lady Margaret crews at Cambridge for a number of years with enthusiasm and success. Gleave was a classical scholar, accomplished in Latin and Greek. In retirement he undertook the translation of his own copy of Willis's *Cerebri anatome*, though he was unable to finish the last chapter because of illness. He married Anne Newbolt in 1953. There were six children. He died on 6 August 2006 from the effects of a carcinoma of the kidney.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000338
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Silva, Joseph Francis (1915 - 2004)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-10-19
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/372314372314
Occupation Orthopaedic surgeon
Details Joseph Francis Silva was a distinguished orthopaedic surgeon who developed the Silva replacement elbow. He was born on 12 September 1915 in Moratuwa, Ceylon (now Sri Lanka). He was educated at St Peter’s College, Colombo, and then at Ceylon Medical College in the same city. He qualified in 1941 with first class honours. From 1941 to 1943 he was a house surgeon at the General Hospital, Colombo. He then entered the Ceylon Volunteer Naval Reserve as a Surgeon Lieutenant. In October 1946 he became an assistant in the orthopaedic department of the General Hospital. In 1948 he went to England, where he spent three years at the Nuffield orthopaedic department in Oxford as a registrar. On his return to Sri Lanka in 1951 he was appointed as a lecturer in the faculty of medicine at the University of Ceylon and as an orthopaedic surgeon in the General Hospital, Colombo. From 1954 he was in charge of the orthopaedic department at the General Hospital. In 1966 he moved to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, where he was professor and head of the department of orthorpaedic surgery. He gave many lectures overseas, including at Northwestern University, the Mayo Clinic, the University of Tokyo and Oxford University. He was a Hunterian Professor at the College in 1956 and a Commonwealth foundation adviser to the South Pacific Islands in 1974. He was a member of the editorial boards of several academic journals, including the *Indian Journal of Orthopaedics* and the *Asian Journal of Rehabilitation*. He was a corresponding editor of *Clinical Orthopaedics*. He died on 29 June 2004.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000127
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Smiddy, Francis Geoffrey (1922 - 2003)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-10-19
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/372315372315
Occupation General surgeon
Details Geoff Smiddy was a senior surgeon at Leeds General Infirmary and a prolific author. He was born in Kendal on 4 January 1922. His father was a hotelier and his mother looked after a haberdashery shop. His was not an easy childhood – his father left the family home shortly after he was born and his mother had difficulties making ends meet. He entered Leeds Medical School in 1939, where he won the Brotherton senior award, was President of the union, and served on the medical school council. He was a house surgeon to George Armitage, whom he regarded as his surgical mentor. He spent three years in the RAMC, mostly in India. During this time he developed rheumatic endocarditis, which damaged his aortic valve. On his return from India, he became a surgical registrar, then a senior registrar and later a tutor at Leeds Infirmary. In 1957, he won a research fellowship to Harvard Medical School, where he worked under Jacob Fine, a pioneer in the care of the critically ill, carrying out research into the significance of enteric bacteria as a cause of mortality in haemorrhagic shock, which led to his ChM. On his return from America, he was senior lecturer to J C Goligher, and in 1961 was appointed consultant surgeon at Leeds General Infirmary, as well as to Seacroft and Clayton Hospitals. He was deeply committed to teaching and training. He was a true general surgeon and an excellent and enthusiastic clinical teacher, preferring the bedside to the lecture theatre. He was elected to the Court of Examiners in 1967 and became a fine ambassador for the College. He was the first regional adviser for surgery in Yorkshire and in 1978 became an examiner in pathology for the primary. He was the author of several surgical textbooks, including *The medical management of the surgical patient*t (London, Edward Arnold, 1976) and a series of books entitled Tutorials in surgery. He retired in 1987, but remained active in local surgical circles, regularly attended weekly surgical meetings and was a staunch supporter of the Leeds Regional Surgical Club. He was a keen golfer, bridge player, and a student of needlework, silver-smithing and computing. He married Thelma (‘Penny’) Penfold, a radiographer at Leeds Infirmary, in 1951. They had a son (Paul) and a daughter (Clare), and four grandchildren. He underwent an aortic valve replacement in 1975. He died on 8 March 2003.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000128
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Smillie, Gavin Douglas (1926 - 2003)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-10-26 2022-09-14
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/372316372316
Occupation General surgeon Vascular surgeon
Details Gavin Smillie (formerly Smellie) was a consultant general and vascular surgeon and honorary clinical lecturer at the Victoria Infirmary, Glasgow. He was born in Glasgow in 1926, the son of William Smellie, a geologist, and Janet Smellie née Douglas, a school teacher. He spent his early years in Argentina, where his father was helping to develop an oilfield, but returned to Scotland at the age of seven to live in Cove on the Clyde coast. He was educated at Greenock Academy and Glasgow University, qualifying in 1949. After junior posts, he did his National Service in the Royal Air Force and then returned to specialise in surgery. He was a surgical registrar at the Victoria Infirmary in 1961 and a senior registrar in 1963. Interested in vascular surgery, he was awarded a travelling fellowship to the United States, where he trained in the vascular units of Michael DeBakey and Denton Cooley. In 1966 he was the first to describe adding a gold weight to the eyelid of someone who could not blink naturally to reduce corneal exposure secondary to facial nerve paralysis (‘Restoration of the blinking reflex in facial palsy by a simple lid-loading operation’ *Br J Plast Surg*. 1966;19:279-83). In 1968, he was appointed to the Victoria Infirmary as their first vascular surgeon. He set up their intensive care unit, at a time when such units were in their infancy. His inventive streak led him to introduce, among other things, the use of a Fogarty catheter to clear biliary and salivary duct obstruction, and a rubber ring tourniquet for use in operations on the digits. He also worked with the regional neurosurgical unit on refining techniques of carotid endarterectomy. He was a respected clinical teacher and examiner, and a regional tutor for the Edinburgh College. He had a calm presence and enormous patience, which he combined with a pawky sense of humour. He had the unique ability of being able to create vivid pictures using concise but humorous prose, but few knew that he wrote short stories for the Glasgow Herald and the *Scots Magazine* under the nom-de-plume of Gavin Douglas. For years he was the editor of the hospital quarterly magazine *Viewsbeat*. He was also an accomplished painter and often used his artistic talents to illustrate his operative notes. He was interested in music and – in his younger days – a keen skier. He retired in 1987 and died on 6 November 2003, from Alzheimer’s disease. He married twice, firstly to Muriel (née Dawson), by whom he had two daughters, Valerie and Claire and, secondly, to Elizabeth (née Smith). He had one granddaughter.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000129
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Radley Smith, Eric John (1910 - 2003)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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/372317372317
Occupation General surgeon
Details Eric John Smith was a consultant surgeon at the Royal Free Hospital, London. He was born on 31 March 1910 in Norwood, Surrey, the second son of Robert Percy and Edith Smith. His early life was overshadowed by the death from Hodgkin’s disease of his elder brother who had been a child prodigy, and Eric spent his schooldays trying to fulfill the promise of his brother. In this he was far from unsuccessful, winning prizes and commendations at all his schools – Paston’s in Norfolk, Haverford West Grammar and Sutton County Grammar (the moves being occasioned by his father’s work as a construction engineer). He went up to King’s College Hospital at the age of 17 and again distinguished himself, being rewarded with the Jelf medal and Huxley prize, as well as gaining four distinctions in his finals. A keen sportsman, he represented the college at cricket and rugby. He was proud of being the last house surgeon of Lord Lister’s last house surgeon (Arthur Edmunds) and was appointed as a surgical registrar at King’s, and later house surgeon at the National Hospital for Nervous Diseases. At the age of 29 he was appointed to consultant sessions at Brentford Hospital, thereby beginning an association with Brentford Football Club, one that lasted for the rest of his life, as he became in turn medical adviser, director and President. At the outbreak of the second world war he was appointed consultant general surgeon in the Emergency Medical Service at Horton Hospital, Epsom, in which over 60,000 patients were treated during the war. His special contribution was to act as triage officer at Epsom station when trainloads of casualties arrived, and with his quick assessment and remarkable memory he directed each one to the appropriate ward in the hospital. At the same time he was working at Hurstwood Park Neurological Hospital. When in 1946 he joined the Royal Air Force as a surgical specialist, he undertook further neurosurgical specialist duties. In 1948 he spent a year with Olivecrona in his neurosurgical unit in Sweden, one of the world’s pre-eminent centres. He was appointed as a consultant general surgeon at the Royal Free Hospital, continuing his interest in neurosurgery by undertaking some of the earliest prefrontal leucotomies in the UK. He also pioneered hypophysectomy in the treatment of breast cancer. It is curious that this most conservative of men should have made his special contribution in two of its most radical fields. He was also surgeon to the Royal Ear Nose and Throat Hospital, and much valued the work he was called upon to undertake in close association with his colleagues there, especially in the area of intracranial sepsis. During his active years, and indeed long into retirement, his expert opinion was much sought in legal cases, due to his clarity of thought and expression. In 1937 he married a King’s sister, Eileen Radley, not only incorporating her name with his as ‘Radley Smith’, but being called ‘Radley’ thereafter by all his colleagues and acquaintances. They had a son, Nigel, and three daughters, of whom the eldest, Rosemary, qualified in medicine and had a distinguished career as a paediatric cardiologist. Sadly his son predeceased him as a result of lung cancer. Despite the time he gave to football, almost never missing a Brentford match, Radley took a great interest in farming, specialising in raising dairy cattle. He died on 19 January 2003.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000130
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Starr, Philip Alan John (1933 - 2003)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Stell, Philip Michael (1934 - 2004)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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/372319372319
Occupation Otolaryngologist ENT surgeon
Details Philip Stell had an outstanding career as a reconstructive surgeon, dealing with head and neck cancers, and went on to a successful second career in mediaeval history. He was born in Dewsbury, Yorkshire, on 14 August 1934, the son of Frank Law Stell, a tailor’s manager, and Ada née Davies. He was educated at Archbishop Holgate Grammar School, York, and Edinburgh University. After junior posts in Edinburgh and Liverpool, he won a fellowship to Washington University, St Louis, in 1956. He returned to Liverpool as a senior lecturer. In 1976 he wrote his masters thesis on skin grafting techniques, and in 1979 he became a professor. He dealt with all aspects of head and neck malignancies, and developed exceptional expertise in reconstruction, keeping detailed outcomes of his operations using a computerised database. He published some 346 articles in scientific journals, edited 12 books and contributed to a further 39. In 1975 he founded the journal *Clinical Otolaryngology* and set up the Otorhinolaryngological Research Society in 1978 (he was President from 1983 to 1986). He was President of the laryngological section of the Royal Society of Medicine, the Association of Head and Neck Oncologists of Great Britain and the Liverpool Medical Institution. He was Hunterian Professor of our College in 1976 and a regional adviser in ENT for the Mersey region. He was the recipient of numerous awards and medals, including the Yearsley gold medal, the Semon prize of the Royal Society of Medicine, the Harrison and the George Davey Howells prizes of the University of London, the Sir William Wilde gold medal of the Irish Otorhinolaryngolical Society in 1988, the Walter Jobson Horne prize of the British Medical Society in 1989, the gold medal of the Maria Sklodowska-Curie Memorial Cancer Center and the Institute of Oncology, 1989, and the gold medal of the German ENT Society in 1991. An associate member of the Institute of Linguists, he was fluent in Dutch, German, French and Spanish, and made it his practise to deliver overseas lectures in the local language, though his size (he was 6 feet 7 inches) made air travel uncomfortable. He translated 11 foreign language textbooks into English. In 1992, when he was only 57, he took early retirement due to ill health. He moved to York, the city he had grown up in, and began a second career in mediaeval history. He enrolled for an MA at York University, writing a thesis on medical care in late mediaeval York. He taught a speech recognition computer programme to recognise Latin, and set up unique databases for mediaeval Yorkshire wills and other documents, some going back to the 13th century, more than 300 years before parish registers began. For his contribution to history he was made a fellow of both the Society of Antiquaries and the Royal Historical Society. He married Shirley Kathleen Mills in 1959, by whom he had four sons and a daughter. Shirley predeceased him in April 2004. He died on 29 May 2004.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000132
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Carter, James Francis (1933 - 2008)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Patrick G Alley
Publication Date 2009-08-14
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/372829372829
Occupation General surgeon
Details James Francis ‘Jim’ Carter was a general surgeon in Auckland, New Zealand. He was born on 17 March 1933 in Rawene Northland, New Zealand, one of six children of hardworking share milkers and agricultural labourers who frequently had to move to seek work in those days of depression. He was educated at Kawa Kawa High School and Kaitaia College, before studying medicine in Otago. He did his junior posts in Wellington and then spent two years in Blackball, on the west coast, serving the mining community. In 1959 he married Dorothy Rees, a staff nurse at Wellington Hospital, and in 1962 they went to England, where he passed the FRCS and worked as a registrar in London, ending as senior registrar at St Mark’s Hospital. He returned to New Zealand in 1968 as a surgical tutor and specialist in general surgery at Green Lane Hospital in Auckland. He introduced the resection and immediate anastomosis for acute left colonic conditions, which was at that time regarded as revolutionary. Two years later he founded the northern regional training scheme for surgical registrars, whereby registrars would rotate outside the main teaching centres, then a novelty in New Zealand. From 1972 he entered and developed a successful private practice, but at the same time was given an honorary academic appointment at the Auckland Medical School by Eric Nanson, who recognised his ability in clinical research. There he set up a unit for the investigation of disorders of oesophageal motility. The North Shore Hospital was opened in 1984, with Jim Carter, P G Alley, John Gillman and Kerry Clark running the general surgical service, which soon became sought-after by trainees studying for the FRACS. He was active in the Australasian College, serving on the court of examiners and its New Zealand committee, which was to become the New Zealand board of surgery and was a founder member of the New Zealand Association of General Surgeons. He was a truly general surgeon, excelling in endocrine, head and neck, colorectal and upper GI surgery. He established breast clinics at the North Shore and Mercy hospitals. A keen athlete, he was a member of the Owairaka Running Club, with several marathons to his credit, always doing his training in the early mornings. He died on 19 September 2008, leaving his widow, Dorothy, a daughter Rosemary and son Richard.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000646
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Adams, Josiah Oake (1842 - 1925)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Adams, Matthew Algernon (1836 - 1913)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2009-08-21
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/372831372831
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born in 1836 and received his professional training at Guy's Hospital. He practised at Leeds, where he was for a time Senior Resident Surgeon at the Public Dispensary; he was also Assistant Surgeon to the 9th Herefordshire Rifle Volunteers. Before 1871 he had removed to Ashford Road, Maidstone, where he was Surgeon to the Kent County Ophthalmic Hospital. Later he was appointed Public Analyst for the County of Kent and for Maidstone, and was a Member of Council and then President of the Society of Public Analysts, as well as a Member of the Society of Medical Officers of Health. He was also for a time Medical Officer of Health and Gas Analyst for the Borough of Maidstone. In 1870 he had been appointed a Certificated Teacher in the Science and Art Department. He resided and practised for many years at Trinity House, Maidstone, and then moved to The Kulm, Bearsted, Kent, where he died during April, 1913. At the time of his death he was still Public Analyst for Kent and Maidstone, and was Vice-President of the Society of Public Analysts and a Fellow of the Society of Medical Officers of Health, as well as Consulting Surgeon to the Kent County Ophthalmic Hospital. He was the inventor and author of “The Hormagraph, an Instrument for Investigating the Field of Vision”. Publications: *Pocket Memoranda relating to Infectious Zymotic Diseases*, 24mo, London, 1885. “Contribution to the Etiology of Diphtheria.” *Public Health*, 1890. “The Relationship between the Occurrence of Diphtheria and the Movement of the Sub-soil Water.” * 7th and 8th internat. Congr. of Hygiene and Demography*, 1891 and 1894. “On the Estimation of Dissolved Oxygen in Water.” *Trans. Chem. Soc.*, 1892. *Annual Reports of the Medical Officer of Health for the Borough of Maidstone, to the Local Board, for the years* 1879-81, 8vo, Maidstone, 1880-82. *Report to the Local Board on the Outbreaks of Small-pox in Maidstone*, 8vo, 2 diagrams, Maidstone, 1881.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000648
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Adams, William ( - 1892)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Adams, William ( [1] - 1900)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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/372833372833
Occupation General surgeon
Details [2] Studied anatomy and physiology at the Webb Street School, which was then under the management of Richard Grainger (1798-1861), the younger brother of the talented but ill-used founder. In 1838 he entered as a medical student at St Thomas's Hospital, where he came under the influence of Joseph Henry Green (qv) (1791-1863), the philosophical surgeon whose memory he always held in the highest esteem. [3] In August, 1842, he was appointed Curator of the Museum and Demonstrator of Morbid Anatomy in the Medical School of St Thomas's Hospital, then situated in the Borough. These posts were held until 1854, when he joined the Grosvenor Place or Lane's Medical School in Kinnerton Street [4] near St George's Hospital. Here he lectured on Surgery and Hospital Practice, having Thomas Spencer Wells (qv) as a colleague. About this time Adams began to devote his attention more particularly to orthopaedic surgery, of which he became one of the leading exponents and most successful practitioners in this country. He was appointed Surgeon to the Royal Orthopaedic Hospital, Surgeon to the Great Northern Hospital, and Surgeon to the National Hospital for the Paralysed and Epileptic before it had specialized in brain surgery. At the Great Northern (now the Royal Northern) Hospital he devised the operation which became known by his name - osteotomy of the neck of the femur within the capsule of the hip-joint. For this purpose he invented a saw with a short cutting surface and a long blunt shank - "my little thaw," as he always called it - by which the bone could be divided through a minute incision in the skin. He also brought into prominence the treatment of Dupuytren's contraction by subcutaneous division of the fibrous bands. In 1864 he was awarded the Jacksonian Prize for "Club-foot, its Causes, Pathology and Treatment". The essay is a classic, for it is an epitome of the knowledge of the time. In 1872 he severed his connection with the Royal Orthopaedic Hospital in consequence of a quarrel between the staff and the management, in which it was thought by his contemporaries that the staff was in the right. In 1876 he was President of the Medical Society of London, and in that capacity visited the United States and Canada as a delegate to the International Medical Congress held in September at Philadelphia. He was accompanied by Dr Lauder Brunton and Richard Davy (qv). With Lister (qv) he watched Professor Sayre excise the hip-joint in a boy. He lived and practised until 1896 at 5 Henrietta Street, Cavendish Square, where is now the College of Nursing. He retired to 7 Loudon Road, St John's Wood, and died there on Feb 3rd, 1900, the morning of his ninetieth birthday. [5] He never married. [6] Adams was a careful but slow operator who maintained his interest in general surgery and pathology to the end of his life. He had been one of the promoters and first members of the Pathological Society of London as early as 1846. He was a good but prolix talker, with a soft voice and well-marked lisp. Sir James Paget used to complain of him that he never finished his sentences, and when one of us (D'A P) was curator of the Museum at St Bartholomew's Hospital, he would often come in later days and waste two or three hours of valuable time, having himself nothing to do. His talk, however, was interesting, for he would tell of his reminiscences of 'resurrection days' and the snatching of bodies for the purposes of anatomy. He took with him from Grainger's School Tom Parker as his dead-house assistant at St Thomas's Hospital. Tom Parker was a notorious resurrectionist, and there is good reason to suppose that he was the executioner who cut off the heads of the four men sentenced for high treason after the Cato Street Conspiracy in 1820. Publications:- "Observations on Transverse Fracture of the Patella." *Trans. Pathol. Soc.*, ii, 254. "The Enlargement of the Articular Extremities of Bone in Chronic Rheumatic Arthritis." - *Ibid*., iii, 156. (He refuted in this paper the teaching of Rokitansky.) Lectures on Orthopaedic Surgery, 1855-8. "Presidential Address on Subcutaneous Surgery." - *Proc. Med. Soc. Lond.*, 1857. *On the Reparative Process in Human Tendons after Subcutaneous Division for the Cure of Deformities, with a Series of Experiments on Rabbits and a Résumé of the Literature of the Subject,* 8vo, plates, London, 1860. (A piece of good pathological work illustrating the method of repair of divided tendons.) *Lectures on the Pathology and Treatment of Lateral and other Forms of Curvature of the Spine*, 8vo, 5 plates, London 1865; 2nd ed., 1882. *Club-Foot, its Causes, Pathology and Treatment* (Jacksonian Prize Essay), 8vo, illustrated, London, 1866; 2nd ed, 8vo, 6 plates, London, 1873. (The original manuscript is in the Library of the Royal College of Surgeons.) "Congenital Dislocation of Hip-Joint." - *Brit. Med. Jour.*, 1885, ii, 859; 1887, i, 866; 1889, i, 243; and *Trans. Amer. Orthop. Cong.*, 1895. "Congenital Wry-Neck" - *Trans. Amer. Orthop. Assoc.*, 1896. "Rotation of the Spine in the so-called Lateral Curvature." - *Ibid.*, 1899, etc. The following are in the Library of the Royal College of Surgeons:- *A New Operation for Bony Anchylosis of the Hip Joint by Subcutaneous Division of the Neck of the Thigh Bone*, 8vo, 4 plates, London 1871. "On the Successful Treatment of Hammer-Toe by the Subcutaneous Division of the Lateral Ligaments", 8vo, plate, London, 1868, from *Proc. Med. Soc. Lond*., ii; 2nd ed., 1892. "On the Successful Treatment of Cases of Congenital Displacement of the Hip-Joint", 8vo, 2 illustrations, London, 1890, from *Brit. Med. Jour*. "Subcutaneous Surgery: its Principles, and its Recent Extension in Practice" (Sixth Toner Lecture), 1876, in *Smithsonian Miscell. Collections*, xv, 8vo, Washington, 1877. *Observations on Contractions of the Fingers (Dupuytren's Contraction), and its Successful Treatment by Subcutaneous Divisions of the Palmar Fascia and Immediate Extension; also on the Obliteration of Depressed Cicatrices after Glandular Abscesses or Exfoliation of Bone by a Subcutanous Operation*, 8vo, 4 Plates, Washington, 1879. The 2nd edition appeared with the title, *On Contractions of the Fingers (Dupuytren's and Congenital Contractions) and on 'Hammer-toe'*, etc., 8vo, 8 plates, Washington, 1892. "The International Medical Congress in Philadelphia" (Presidential Address before the Medical Society of London). - *Proc. Med. Soc. Lond.*, 1875-7, iii, 97; printed as an 8vo volume, London 1876. *Royal Orthopaedic Hospital. Letters and Documents in reference to the recent Arbitration by a Committee appointed by the Council of the Metropolitan Branch of the British Medical Association to investigate Certain Charges made by Mr W Adams against Mr Brodhurst, in connection with the Events which have lately occurred at the Royal Orthopaedic Hospital*, 8vo, London, 1872. *Principles of Treatment applicable to Contractions and Deformities*, 1893. Special section contributed to the 2nd edition of William Spencer Watson's *Diseases of the Nose and the Accessory Cavities*, 8vo, London, 1890. Adams delivered the Lettsomian Lectures before the Medical Society of London in 1869, his subject being the "Rheumatic and Strumous Diseases of the Joints and the Treatment for the Restoration of Motion in Partial Ankylosis." In the same year he cut through the neck of the thigh bone, but Mr Brodhurst had already performed this operation several times. [Amendments from the annotated edition of *Plarr's Lives* at the Royal College of Surgeons: [1] 1820 (1st February); [2] Son of James Adams L.S.A. of 39 Finsbury Square, a Governor of S. Thomas's Hospital.; [3] His eldest brother, James, was also a pupil of J.H. Green, became an ophthalmic surgeon & died aged 31.; [4] 'Kinnerton Street' is deleted and 'Grosvenor Place' added; [5] 'the morning of' is deleted and '2 days after' is added, and 'ninetieth' is deleted and '80th' added; [6] 'He never married.' is deleted, and the following added 'He married 21 August 1847, Mary Anne MILLS, who died in 1897, and had 2 sons & 1 daughter - all now (1931) dead without descendants (information from P.E. Adams MRCS, nephew). the last surviving son died in 1920. He is also reported to have had "two harems(?)"'; Portrait (No.1) in Small Photographic Album (Moira & Haigh).]
Resource Identifier RCS: E000650
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

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

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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 Aldridge, John Petty (1813 - 1884)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Ambler, Edward Holland (1821 - 1879)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2009-09-25 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/372859372859
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born at Starcross, South Devon, the second son of the Rev Richard Ambler, of Hardwick, in the parish of Norbury, Shropshire, which had been in the Ambler family for upwards of four centuries. Educated at Middlesex Hospital, and was for some years an assistant in a practice at Stalbridge, Dorset. He was greatly appreciated by his patients, who presented him with a handsome testimonial in 1852, when he left to practise at Hemel Hempstead, Herts, on his appointment as Surgeon to the West Herts Infirmary. In this position he succeeded Sir Astley Cooper. In 1876 he became High Bailiff of Hemel Hempstead, and served the district as Medical Officer and as Surgeon to the Old Manor Lodge, the Society of Foresters, and other clubs. In the course of his practice, but at different times, he sustained a fracture of the base of his skull, of the femur, the clavicle, and the nasal bones, and he was seriously wounded in the thigh by the kick of a horse. He died of apoplexy on Jan 11th, 1879, and was buried in the cemetery at Hemel Hempstead in the presence of two thousand persons. There is a portrait of him as a bluff Englishman in the Fellows Album at the Royal College of Surgeons. [Amendments from the annotated edition of *Plarr's Lives* at the Royal College of Surgeons: WOLFE. - On 15th November, 1959, peacefully in her 89th year, MABEL FRANCES, widow of HENRY JOHN WOLFE, of Harpenden, and daughter of the late Edward Holland Ambler, F.R.C.S., of Hemel Hempstead. Funeral, Harpenden Parish Church, at 2.30 p.m., Wednesday, 18th November.]
Resource Identifier RCS: E000676
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Amphlett, Edward (1848 - 1880)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2009-09-25
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/372860372860
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born on Oct 20th, 1848, the second son of Samuel Holmden Amphlett (qv), by Mary Georgiana, his wife. He was nephew of Sir Richard Amphlett, of Wychbold Hall, near Droitwich, at one time Lord Justice of Appeal. Edward Amphlett was the grandson of George Edward Male, an early nineteenth century authority on medical jurisprudence. He was educated for the sea, and served as midshipman in the Royal Navy for several years, seeing many parts of the world and acquiring great interest in nautical matters. At the time of his death he was Surgeon to the Naval Artillery Volunteers, with whom he had recently been a cruise on board HMS *Esk*. He suffered so severely from asthma that he was invalided out of the service. Determining to enter the medical profession, he first graduated at Cambridge from Peterhouse as a Junior Optime in the Mathematical Tripos (his uncle, Sir Richard Amphlett, who died in 1883, had been Sixth Wrangler). He is thus one of the first Cambridge man on our record. Entering at Guy’s Hospital, he was House Surgeon and Resident Obstetrician. After qualifying and passing the Fellowship examination he was appointed Assistant Surgeon to Charing Cross Hospital, and began to devote himself to practice and more particularly to diseases of the eye, which he had studied at Vienna. At the time of his death, besides being Assistant Surgeon, he was also Demonstrator of Surgical Pathology in Charing Cross Hospital Medical School and Assistant Surgeon at the Central London Ophthalmic Hospital. He practised at 40 Weymouth Street, Portland Place, W, and died there on Sept 9th, 1880. His elder brother was Richard Holmden Amphlett, QC, Recorder of Worcester.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000677
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Amphlett, Samuel Holmden (1813 - 1857)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Amyot, Thomas Edward (1817 - 1895)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2009-09-25
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/372862372862
Occupation General surgeon
Details Eldest son of Thomas Amyot, FRS, Treasurer of the Society of Antiquaries and sometime Private Secretary to the Right Honourable William Wyndham. His mother was Jane, daughter of Edward Colman, of Norwich, surgeon. Thomas Amyot was born on Jan 28th, 1817, and was admitted to Westminster School on Jan 12th, 1829. Educated professionally at the Hunterian School of Medicine and at St Thomas’s Hospital. Married on Oct 28th, 1847, Elizabeth, daughter of the Rev Francis Howes, Minor Canon of Norwich Cathedral, and had issue one son and a daughter. He practised at Diss in Norfolk, and died there on Dec 15th, 1895. Amyot appears to have inherited the versatility of his father, for his leisure hours were spent in microscopy, astronomy, geology, and botany. He is also said to have had musical and literary tastes. He was President of the Norfolk and Norwich Medico-Chirurgical Society and of the East Anglian Branch of the British Medical Association. Publications: “Diabetes: Saccharine Treatment – Death – Autopsy.” – *Med. Times and Gaz.*, 1861, i, 327. “A Case of Spina Bifida and Hydrocephalus with Bursting of the Head.” – *Ibid.*, 1869, i, 330. “Foot and Mouth Disease in the Human Subject.” – *Ibid*, 1871, ii, 555.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000679
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Ancrum (or Ancrum), William Rutherford (1816 - 1898)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2009-09-25 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/372863372863
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born at the Manor House, Weston, near Bath, on Feb 5th, 1816. Educated at private schools, and apprenticed at the age of 15 to T Taylor Griffith (qv) at Wrexham, where he is said to have had Sir William Bowman (qv) as a fellow-apprentice. Three years later he entered as a student at University College, had a brilliant career, and was elected House Surgeon, with such success that Robert Liston (qv) invited him to become his private assistant. He accepted and acted in this capacity for three years. In 1843 he left England and practised in the City of Mexico. In 1848 he was appointed Surgeon to the Naval Hospital at Valparaiso, a post he held for eleven years, during which he built up a large and lucrative practice. Returning to England, he took the FRCS on Dec 12th, 1850, having been admitted MRCS on Oct 11th, 1839. During this visit he also became a member of the Royal College of Physicians of London. He resigned his practice in Mexico in 1859, returned to London and took a house, 75 Inverness Terrace, Bayswater. He retired from all practice in 1863 and bought St Leonard's Court, Gloucester. From 1863 until his death in 1898 Ancrum took an active part in the public life of Gloucester. He served for twenty-seven years as Chairman of the County Infirmary, bringing method, order, and financial soundness into the working of the institution. A ward in the infirmary is named in his memory "The Ancrum Ward." He was appointed Chairman of the Committee of the Wotton County Asylum in 1878, and was mainly instrumental in founding and financing the second County Asylum in 1882. In 1878 he was also elected Chairman of the Barnwood House Private Asylum, which was much enlarged during his tenure of office. He was an active magistrate and was at one time Chairman of the Gloucester County Bench, a member of important Committees of the old Court of Quarter Sessions, and an Alderman of the County Council, where he was Chairman of the Prison Visiting Committee. He married in 1852 the youngest daughter of Arthur Lewis, of Brighton, and by her had three sons and two daughters. He was an invalid during the last three years of his life, died at St Leonard's Court, Gloucester, on Oct 9th, 1898, and was buried in the neighbouring churchyard of Upton St Leonard's.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000680
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Anderson, Alexander (1804 - 1880)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Anderson, Alexander Dunlop (1794 - 1871)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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/372865372865
Occupation General surgeon
Details Son of Andrew Anderson, merchant, of Greenock, and nephew of Professor John Anderson, founder of the Andersonian University, Glasgow. Born in Greenock, he pursued his preliminary studies in Glasgow, and completed his medical training in Edinburgh and London. He was appointed a Surgeon's Mate (General Service) in 1813, and on March 13th was Hospital Assistant to the Forces. On May 12th, 1814, he joined the 49th Foot as Assistant Surgeon, but was afterwards placed on half pay, was re-employed by exchange on full pay, was again placed on half pay, and finally commuted on Sept 3rd, 1830. He served in Canada for a part of the time. He practised in Glasgow in 1820 and was elected Surgeon to the Glasgow Royal Infirmary in 1823, being appointed Physician to the Institution in 1838. Also served as Physician to the Deaf and Dumb Asylum, and from 1852-1855 was President of the Faculty of Physicians and Surgeons. He married in 1829 a daughter of Thomas McCall, of Craighead, Lanarkshire, and had by her four sons and two daughters. Of the sons one, Dr T McCall Anderson, became Professor of Medicine in the Andersonian University. A D Anderson died at 159 St Vincent Street, Glasgow, on May 13th, 1871. He wrote only a few articles for professional papers, and is best remembered by that "On the Treatment of Burns by Cotton," published in the *Glasgow Medical Journal* for 1828. He is said to have enjoyed an extensive share of what is called "the best practice". He had a delicate sense of honour, and always showed himself acutely sensitive in regard to the feelings of others. His portrait by Sir Daniel Macnee, painted in 1870, hangs in the Faculty Hall at Glasgow.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000682
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Anderson, Henry Graeme (1882 - 1925)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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/372866372866
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born Aug 1st, 1882, the younger son of Nicol Anderson, of Barrhead, Renfrewshire. Educated at Glasgow, King’s College, London, and the London Hospital. Graduated at the University of Glasgow, and was admitted a Member and a Fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons of England on the same day. He filled various minor posts at the London, St Mark’s, the Royal Orthopaedic, the Metropolitan, and the Cancer Hospitals before he was elected Assistant Surgeon at St Mark’s Hospital, where he devoted himself to the surgery of the rectum. He joined the Royal Navy on the outbreak of War in 1914 and was posted to the Royal Naval Air Service Expeditionary Force, serving at Antwerp, Ypres, and on the Belgian and Northern French coasts. Appointed Surgeon to the British Flying School at Vendôme in 1917, and from 1918-1919 was Surgeon to the Central RAF Hospital, and was afterwards transferred from the Royal Navy to the Royal Air Force as Surgical Consultant to the RAF, with the rank of Major. He returned to civil practice at the end of the war, living at 75 Harley Street, and died suddenly whilst playing in a lawn tennis tournament on June 28th, 1925. He was married and left a widow and one daughter. Anderson was one of the small number of Air Medical Officers who obtained a pilot’s certificate when flying was in its infancy. He gave much thought and research to the physical fitness of airmen, the prevention and treatment of aerial injuries, and the selection of aviators from the surgical point of view. He was a keen sportsman and was particularly interested in boxing. Publication: *The Medical and Surgical Aspects of Aviation*, Oxford Medical Publications, 1919.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000683
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

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

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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 Darné, Francois Xavier ( - 2003)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Davey, William Wilkin (1912 - 2004)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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/372234372234
Occupation General surgeon
Details Will Davey wrote the first textbook on surgery in tropical countries. He was born on 28 February 1912 in Dunmurry, near Belfast, in Northern Ireland. His father, Robert, was a minister of religion. His mother was Charlotte née Higginson. One of a family of five, he studied medicine at Queens University, graduating in 1935. During his studies his mother gave him a copy of *For sinners only*, which led to his involvement in Moral Rearmament, an international movement for moral and spiritual renewal. During the second world war he joined up, but was given time to complete his exams, and became a fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons of Ireland. He was then assigned to the RAF as a medical officer to a number of operational squadrons. In early 1944 he was part of a medical team assisting the Normandy landings. After the war he trained in gastroenterology at St James's Hospital, Balham, and subsequently became a consultant at the Whittington Hospital, where he ran a gastroenterological unit covering the whole northern area of London. In 1958 he was a Hunterian professor at the College. He ran courses to prepare students for the FRCS. His skills as a teacher led to an invitation from London University to go to Nigeria to become professor of surgery at University College, Ibadan, an offshoot of the British University. The first 14 doctors ever to graduate in Nigeria were among his students. Returning to London, Will wrote *Companion to surgery in Africa, etc*, (Edinburgh and London, E & S Livingstone, 1968), the first textbook on surgery for tropical countries. In 1969 he decided to settle in Australia, and set up as a surgeon in general practice in Portland, where he was also the port and quarantine officer, and medical officer to the town's large meatworks. In his later years he made several visits to India and four to Papua New Guinea, where he was pleased to find his book on tropical surgery being used. He was a past President of the Australian Provincial Surgeons Association. He retired in 1984. He played tennis into his 80s, took on computers at 90 and, latterly, the intricacies of digital cameras. He married Gill née Taylor in Reading, in 1950, after meeting her in the hospital laboratory where she worked. They had five children, ten grandchildren and a great grandson. He died on 30 May 2004 in Altona in Melbourne, Australia.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000047
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

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

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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 Brennan, Thomas Gabriel (1937 - 2005)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Keast-Butler, John (1937 - 2005)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Lange, Meyer John (1912 - 2005)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Byrne, Henry (1932 - 2003)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-06-21 2012-03-22
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/372433372433
Occupation Orthopaedic surgeon
Details Henry Byrne was an orthopaedic surgeon in Melbourne, Australia. He was born in Ballarat, Victoria, on 15 August 1932, the eldest of five children of Henry Byrne, a grazier, and his wife Martha. He was educated at Ballarat State School and Ballarat College, before studying medicine at the University of Melbourne and Prince Henry's Hospital. After graduating in 1956 he spent two resident years at Prince Henry's, followed by a year as a surgical registrar, part of which time was spent in the orthopaedic department with W G Doig. He then spent a year as a demonstrator in the anatomy department of the University, combined with a clinical attachment in surgery at Prince Henry's. He went to England in 1961 to work at St Olave's Hospital and as resident surgical officer at the Bolingbroke Hospital, both in south London. In 1963 he was a casualty and orthopaedic registrar at Guy's Hospital with Stamm, Batchelor and Patrick Clarkson, plastic surgeon, with whom he wrote a paper on 'The burnt child in London'. He passed his fellowship during this time. On his return to Melbourne, he was appointed second assistant to the orthopaedic department at Prince Henry's Hospital and also held an appointment at the Western General Hospital, Footscray. He relinquished both posts when he was appointed orthopaedic surgeon to the district hospital at Box Hill, a suburb of Melbourne. He also had a successful private practice. He married Elizabeth Penman, the daughter of Frank Penman, head of the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation, in 1959. There were four children of the marriage (Andrew, Timothy, Vanessa and Simon) and seven grandchildren (Beatrice, Henry, Charlotte, Eliza, Sam, Amelie and Kate). His eldest son, Andrew, studied medicine and became an orthopaedic surgeon in Ballarat. Henry Byrne was cheerful, enthusiastic personality and a notably rapid operator. He had many interests, including music, astronomy, collecting antiques and Australian paintings. He was also keen traveller and visited places as remote as Tibet and the Antarctic. He died suddenly, on 4 August 2003 from a dissecting aneurysm of the thoracic aorta.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000246
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching MacFarlane, Campbell (1941 - 2006)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2007-05-10 2008-12-12
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/372533372533
Occupation Trauma surgeon
Details Campbell MacFarlane was a trauma surgeon who served with distinction in the Royal Army Medical Corps, before emigrating to South Africa, where he became the foundation professor of emergency medicine at the University of Witwatersrand, South Africa. He was born on 16 October 1941 in Kirriemuir, Angus, Scotland, the son of George MacFarlane and Anne Christessen Gove Lowe, and was educated at Webster’s High School, Kirriemuir. He gained a Kitchener scholarship and attended the University of St Andrews, graduating with commendation in 1965. While at university he gained several distinctions and medals, including a student scholarship to Yale University for the summer term of 1964. After house jobs he joined the RAMC, where he won medals for military studies, military surgery, tropical medicine, army health and military psychiatry from the Royal Army Medical College. He was then posted to Singapore, where, in 1971, he was the first westerner to obtain the MMed in surgery from the University of Singapore. He passed the FRCS Edinburgh in the same year. Over the next decade he worked in civilian and military hospitals in Catterick, Eastern General Hospital (Edinburgh), Musgrave Park Hospital (Belfast), Cambridge Military Hospital (Aldershot), Birmingham Accident Hospital, Guy’s Hospital (London), Queen Alexandra Military Hospital (Millbank), Queen Elizabeth Military Hospital (Woolwich), Westminster Hospital, St Mark’s Hospital (London), as well as the British military hospitals in Rinteln, Berlin, Hannover and Iserlohn in Germany. He saw active service in Oman, Belize and Belfast while commanding a parachute field surgical team. In Northern Ireland he performed life-saving surgery not only on soldiers but also on members of the Irish Republican Army (IRA). The parachute unit was also deployed on NATO exercises in the UK, Germany, Norway, Denmark and Turkey. Finally, he was appointed senior lecturer in military surgery at the Royal Army Medical College, Millbank, where his lectures were avidly attended. He was a contributor to the *Field surgery pocket book* (London, HMSO, 1981) and carried out research at the Porton Down Research Establishment, which benefitted from his extensive battle surgery experience. He retired as a lieutenant colonel after 16 years active service. He was appointed chief of surgery at the Al Zahra Hospital in the United Arab Emirates in 1981 and there proceeded to set up its first private hospital. In 1984 he accepted the position of chief of surgery and director of emergency room services at the Royal Commission Hospital in Saudi Arabia. Two years later, in 1986, he moved to Johannesburg to become senior specialist in the trauma unit at Johannesburg Hospital and senior lecturer at the University of the Witwatersrand, as well as principal of the Transvaal Provincial Administration Ambulance Training College. A decade later he became head of emergency medical services training for the Gauteng Provincial Government, South Africa, and in 2004 he was appointed to the founding Netcare chair of emergency medicine at the University of the Witwatersrand. Campbell maintained his international contacts and visited the UK regularly. After gaining the diploma with distinction in the medical care of catastrophes from the Worshipful Society of Apothecaries of London, he lectured on their course and became an examiner. Campbell was a member of the editorial boards of *Trauma*, *Emergency Medicine* and the *Journal of the Royal Army Medical Corps*. In 1999 he was the Mitchiner lecturer to the Royal Army Medical Corps and in 2000 gave the Hunterian lecture at the College on the management of gunshot wounds. He was a founder member and chairman of the Emergency Medicine Society of South Africa. He was elected as a fellow of the Australasian College of Emergency Medicine, a fellow of the Faculty of Emergency Medicine (UK) and a founding fellow of the Faculty of Pre-hospital Care at the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh. His many outside interests included scuba diving, military history, languages (Afrikaans, French and Spanish), martial arts and sailing. He married Jane Fretwell in 1966, by whom he had two daughters (Catriona and Alexina) and a son (Robert). They were divorced in 1986. He died unexpectedly at JFK Airport in New York on 7 June 2006 while returning from representing South Africa at a meeting of the International Federation for Emergency Medicine in Halifax, Canada.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000347
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching McNeill, John Fletcher (1926 - 2006)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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/372534372534
Occupation General surgeon
Details John Fletcher McNeill, always known as ‘Ian’, was a surgeon at the Royal Victoria Infirmary, Newcastle. He was born on 15 March 1926 in Yoker, near Glasgow, the youngest of the five children of John Henry Fletcher McNeill, a teacher, and Annie McLachlan, a housewife. The family moved from Glasgow to Newcastle when he was a baby and there he attended Lemington Grammar School. He entered King’s College Medical School, Durham University, a year younger than he should in 1943. There, in addition to serving in the Home Guard, he won the Tulloch scholarship for preclinical studies, the Outterson Wood prize for psychological medicine and the Philipson scholarship in surgery. He qualified in 1949 with honours. After house posts at the Royal Victoria Infirmary, Newcastle-upon-Tyne, he did his National Service in the RAF with Fighter Command. In 1952 he returned to the professorial unit at the Royal Victoria Infirmary as a senior house officer. A year later he was demonstrator of anatomy and then completed a series of registrar posts at the Royal Victoria Infirmary and Shotley Bridge, before returning to the surgical unit as a senior registrar. From this position he was seconded as Harvey Cushing fellow to the Peter Bent Brigham Hospital, Boston, from 1961 to 1962, where he carried out research on the effects of haemorrhage and cortical suprarenal hormones on the partition of body water, which led to his MS thesis. He returned to Newcastle as first assistant, until he was appointed lecturer (with consultant status) at the Royal Victoria Infirmary in 1963, as well as honorary consultant in vascular surgery, consultant in charge of the casualty department and honorary consultant to the Princess Mary Maternity Hospital. He was one of the first to restore a severed arm, and he developed a g-suit to control bleeding from a ruptured aorta. He wrote extensively, mainly on vascular and metabolic disorders. In 1957 he married Alma Mary Robson, a theatre sister at the Royal Victoria Hospital. He had many interests, including Egyptology, art, swimming, cricket, woodwork and travel. He died on 8 March 2006 from cancer of the lung, and is survived by his daughter Jane.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000348
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Nixon, John Moylett Gerrard (1913 - 2005)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Rowntree, Thomas Whitworth (1916 - 2006)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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/372536372536
Occupation General surgeon
Details Tom Rowntree was a consultant surgeon in Southampton. He was born at 9, Upper Brook Street, London, W1 on 10 July 1916. His father, Cecil Rowntree, was a consultant surgeon at the Cancer (now Royal Marsden) Hospital, London, and held several other honorary posts in and around the city. His mother was Katherine Aylmer Whitworth Jones, the daughter of an opera singer. After his preparatory education, Tom went to Radley, where he passed the Higher School Certificate and matriculated for St John’s College, Cambridge, in 1933. He went up in the autumn of 1934 after an agreeable intervening six months in Rome – where he became fluent in Italian and attended anatomy classes at the university. He graduated from Cambridge in 1937 with a 2:1 degree in the natural sciences tripos (gaining a first in anatomy). He then went to St Bartholomew’s Hospital for his clinical training, where he also joined the Territorial Army (as a second lieutenant). At Bart’s he won the Matthews Duncan prize and qualified in 1941. At the outbreak of the Second World War Bart’s was moved to Hill End Hospital and there Tom was appointed house surgeon to James (later Professor Sir James) Paterson Ross, and then to John O’Connell, neurosurgeon. He then got a job demonstrating anatomy at Cambridge and passed the final FRCS in 1942. He returned to Hill End as chief assistant and was commissioned as a full lieutenant in the Royal Army Medical Corps. 1942 was a landmark year for Tom for another very particular reason; it was while back at Cambridge that he met his future wife, Barbara – Dr Barbara Sibbald as she then was. They became engaged that year and married the next. They had four children, a boy and three girls. Their son became an orthopaedic surgeon and one of their daughters qualified at Bart’s, like her father, and became a general practitioner. In 1944 Tom was posted to India as a captain in the RAMC. He was released from the Army with the rank of major in 1947. After various jobs, including accident room surgeon at Reading, a registrarship at the Royal National Orthopaedic Hospital and an honorary post at the Italian Hospital in London, he successfully applied for a consultant general surgical job in Southampton and started there in 1951. Tom was the quintessential general surgeon, the very embodiment of the best. He emphasised the importance of a detailed history, taken patiently, claiming it made up some 80 per cent of a diagnosis. He advocated, for instance, that the clinician sit at the bed/couch-side when examining the abdomen, the better to ensure, through the examiner’s bodily ease, that the examination is both gentle and unhurried; just one valuable lesson amongst many others. He independently discovered the curious phenomenon of abdominal wall tenderness in patients with non-specific abdominal pain, an immensely valuable physical sign. Tom’s clinical honesty demanded a searching but always kind and constructive analysis of any complication. His surgical technique was superb, always anatomical and scrupulously protective of vital structures. This manual felicity transferred readily to a long-time recreational interest, cabinet making, at which he excelled. He worked extraordinarily long hours at the hospital. His, too, was a most intelligent and enquiring mind. Its rigour – a notable characteristic – found expression in his concern that words, the vehicles of thought, be appropriate and joined in clear, simple, sentences. His intelligence, too, dominated the newly formed Southampton medical executive committee, of which he was the first Chairman, and through it deftly managed the birth of the Southampton Medical School. Tom’s surgical standing was recognised in his presidency of the surgical section of the Royal Society of Medicine. His presidential address was constructed from his large personal series of parathyroidectomies. He retired in 1981 to fish, make beautiful desks for each of his grandchildren and to interest himself in almost anything; it seemed, as with Dr Samuel Johnson, that there was no fact so trivial that he would rather not be in possession of it. Two weeks before he died he won the *Times Literary Supplement* crossword puzzle. On top of all this it should be added that Tom was a fair man, a good companion and had a lovely sense of humour. In short, he was quite a chap. He died on 26 February 2006.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000350
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Stanley, Edward (1793 - 1862)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-08-10 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/372208372208
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born on July 3rd, 1793, the son of Edward Stanley, who was in business in the City; his mother was sister to Thomas Blizard. He entered Merchant Taylors' School in April, 1802, and remained there until 1808, when he was apprenticed to Thomas Ramsden, Surgeon to St. Bartholomew's Hospital, who died in February, 1813; Stanley was then turned over to John Abernethy for the rest of his term. He was awarded the Jacksonian Prize for his essay "On Diseases of Bone", and was elected Assistant Surgeon to St. Bartholomew's Hospital on Jan. 29th, 1816, at the early age of 24. Even during his apprenticeship he had rendered important services to the Medical School, for his love of morbid anatomy led him, with Abernethy's assistance and approval, to enlarge the Museum so greatly that he practically created it. He subsequently compiled a valuable catalogue of the collection. He acted as Demonstrator of Anatomy until 1826, when he was appointed Lecturer on Anatomy and Physiology in place of Abernethy and held the post without distinction until 1848, when he was succeeded by F. C. Skey (q.v.). He was elected full Surgeon in 1838, and then became famous as a clinical teacher. He was elected F.R.S. in 1830 for his pathological work, became President of the Royal Medico-Chirurgical Society in 1843, and was appointed Surgeon Extraordinary to Queen Victoria in 1858. At the Royal College of Surgeons Stanley was a Member of Council from 1835-1862, Professor Human Anatomy from 1835-1838, and Hunterian Orator in 1839, the Oration being published in London as an octavo volume in 1839. He was a Member of the Court of Examiners from 1844-1862, Chairman of the Midwifery Board in 1856, Vice-President in 1846, 1847, 1855, and 1856, and President in 1848 and 1857. He resigned the post of Surgeon to St. Bartholomew's Hospital in 1861, but continued to attend the weekly operations on Saturdays until May 24th, 1862. On that day, after witnessing the operations, being in his usual health and good spirits, he went with the other Surgeons, on the invitation of Sir William Lawrence, to see a patient in Henry Ward who was suffering from a swelling of the knee. Stanley bent over the patient for a short time, then drew himself up and said, "I think, Mr. Lawrence, this is a case of knee-joint disease, and that if all remedies have failed for many months in your hands the case would be one favourable for resection." He spoke clearly and evidently in full possession of all his faculties: a moment later he staggered against a bed and sank to the floor supported by those around him. He was at once raised and place on the 'state bed' in the front ward. Momentarily he seemed to regain consciousness, and when Mr. Wormald asked if he could do anything, Stanley replied: "I am quite well, Wormald; I never felt better in my life, it's only stomach." Tradition says that Lawrence, looking round, said to his House Surgeon, "Wrong again. Head." However this may be, Stanley quickly became unconscious, passing into a state of coma and died within an hour. He married a highly educated, talented and sympathetic lady by whom he had one son, the Rev. Rainey Stanley, and several daughters. He lived at first in Lincoln's Inn fields, afterwards at 66 Brook Street, the house afterwards occupied by Sir William Savory (q.v.). Stanley is described as being one of the most sagacious teachers and judicious practitioners of his day. He was vivacious in conversation, but solemn and impressive, and his language was clear and empathic when teaching in the wards, where the students knew him as 'the inspired butterman' because he was short and 'podgy'. His unattractive features were redeemed by large intellectual eyes, a genial smile and a face honest, earnest, and good-tempered. He was an eager inquirer after pathological knowledge, a patient, accurate, and intelligent investigator and collector, but was wanting in culture of the higher kind and was without any appreciation of the arts. He always took immense pains in studying his hospital cases, and as the result of this and his innate sagacity he was seldom wrong in the opinions he arrived at. He was never a brilliant operator, yet he shone in the operating theatre, because when grave or unexpected incidents arose he never lost his self-possession, and his courage rose with the emergency. His anatomical knowledge and quiet insistence carried him through all difficulties, and he was fortunate in having James Paget (q.v.) as his Assistant Surgeon. He was, too, a man of peace, and did much to compose the bitter quarrels in which the hospital staff engaged. To this end he was instrumental in arranging the Christmas Dinner which is still a feature in the life of the Hospital, where the members of the Staff and all teachers in the Medical School meet together and, if they are so disposed, play cards until a late hour. Stanley's writings and the specimens he added to the Museum show how extensive was his knowledge of diseases of bone. He had prepared specimens of the arthritis which occurs in locomotor ataxy and has since been called Charcot's disease. There are portraits of him in the College Collection. PUBLICATIONS: - *An Account of the Mode of Performing the Lateral Operation of Lithotomy*, 4to, London, 1829. *Illustrations of the Effects of Disease and Injury of the Bones with Descriptive and Explanatory Statements*, fol., 24 plates, London, 1849. The coloured plates are splendidly executed and are drawn from original preparations, many of which are still preserved in the Museum of St. Bartholomew's Hospital. *A Treatise on Diseases of the Bones*, 8vo, London and Philadelphia, 1849. These two books are classics. *A Manual of Practical Anatomy*, 12mo, London, 1818; 3rd ed., 1826.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000021
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Bastable, John Ralph Graham (1923 - 2003)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-09-07 2007-06-14
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/372209372209
Occupation Urologist
Details John Bastable was a consultant urologist at York. Born in 1923, he spent his childhood in Cornwall and studied medicine at Birmingham. He qualified in 1945. After National Service, he was a registrar to Alan Perry at Poplar Hospital and then at the London Hospital, where he became senior lecturer on the surgical unit under Victor Dix, and where David Ritchie supervised his MCh thesis on the effect of vagotomy on the oesophago-gastric junction. He specialised in urology, spending a year as resident surgical officer at St Paul’s Hospital and then at the London. In 1966, he was appointed consultant urologist at York, and remained there until he retired in 1988. At York, he developed a department of urology, introduced day surgery facilities, and also undertook parathyroid surgery, and was involved in the planning committee for the new district general hospital. He married Morag Millar, an anaesthetist. They had three children. In his retirement he found time for music, travelling, walking and history of art. He died after a stroke on 28 May 2003.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000022
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Fussey, Ivor ( - 2003)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-09-22 2007-08-15
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/372442372442
Occupation General surgeon
Details After qualifying from St James’s Hospital, Leeds, Ivor Fussey studied neurophysiology for nine years, gaining his PhD in 1972, during which time he devised platinum microelectrodes that could be implanted in the brain and used to locate vagal afferent impulses. After this experience he decided to specialise in surgery and did registrar jobs with George Harrison in Derby and Duthie in Sheffield, where he met his future wife Kate, a medical student. He was appointed as a consultant general surgeon to Lincoln County Hospital in 1980, where he developed a special interest in surgery of the breast and, together with Jenny Eremin, established the breast unit in the 1990s. After he retired in 1996 he went to Leicester, where he was a mentor to preclinical staff and students, with whom he was very popular. He died suddenly on 30 November 2003, leaving his wife, Kate, and two daughters, Tamsin and Miekes.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000255
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Bigelow, Wilfred Gordon (1913 - 2005)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-09-07
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/372210372210
Occupation Cardiac surgeon
Details Wilfred Gordon ‘Bill’ Bigelow, who helped develop the first electronic pacemaker, was a professor of cardiac surgery at the University of Toronto and a pioneering heart surgeon. He was born in Brandon, Manitoba, in 1913. His father, Wilfred Bigelow, had founded the first medical clinic in Canada. Bill trained in medicine at the University of Toronto and did his internship at the Toronto General Hospital, during which time he had to amputate a young man’s fingers because of frostbite, leading Bill to research the condition. During the second world war, he served with the Royal Canadian Army Medical Corps, in a field transfusion unit and then as a battle surgeon with the 6th Canadian Casualty Clearing Station in England and Europe, where he saw many more soldiers with frostbitten limbs. After the war, he returned to a surgical residency in Toronto, followed by a graduate fellowship at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore. He returned to Toronto in 1947 as a staff general surgeon. In 1950 he became a research fellow in the university department of surgery. He was made an assistant professor in 1953 and a full professor in 1970. He researched into hypothermia in a cold-storage room in the basement of the Banting Institute. He theorised that cooling patients before an operation would reduce the amount of oxygen the body required and slow the circulation, allowing longer and safer access to the heart. This work led to the development of a cooling technique for use during heart operations. He also discovered that he could restart the heart by stimulating it with a probe at regular intervals, work which led him on to develop the first electronic pacemaker, in collaboration with John Callaghan and the electrical engineer John Hopps. He published extensively and received many awards, including the Order of Canada and the honorary Fellowship of our College. He was President of the American Association for Thoracic Surgery and the Society for Vascular Surgery. He was predeceased by his wife, Margaret Ruth Jennings, and is survived by his daughter, three sons and three grandchildren. He died from congestive heart failure on 27 March 2005.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000023
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Bond, Alec Graeme (1926 - 2004)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Boustany, Wa'el Seifeddin (1931 - 2004)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Bowsher, Winsor Graham (1957 - 2004)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Bradfield, William John Dickson (1924 - 2003)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Brand, Paul Wilson (1914 - 2003)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-09-14
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/372215372215
Occupation Orthopaedic surgeon
Details Paul Brand, a celebrated orthopaedic surgeon, devoted his life to the care of patients with leprosy. He was born in a remote mountain district in south east India, 150 miles from Mysore, on 17 July 1914, the son of Jesse Brand and his wife, Evelyn, both Baptist missionaries. Paul was sent away to England at the age of nine to attend the University College School, Hampstead, and for the next six years did not see his parents. After leaving school, he first decided on a career in building and construction, and in 1930 began a five-year building apprenticeship. In 1936 he began training to become a missionary at Norwood, Surrey. The following year he changed direction, and entered University College Medical School in London. There he met his future wife, Margaret Berry (they were married in 1943). During the second world war, he and his fellow students were on constant call during the Blitz. It was while treating these patients that Brand first began to develop an interest in hand surgery. The medical school was later evacuated to Watford, where he became interested in physiology and the control of pain. In 1944 he was appointed as a surgical officer at the Hospital for Sick Children in Great Ormond Street, and then became assistant in the surgical unit at University College Hospital. In 1946 Brand and his wife were invited by Robert Cochrane, the foremost authority on leprosy, to join him at the Christian Medical College Hospital at Vellore, Tamil Nadu, southern India. Cochrane challenged Brand to use his skills as an orthopaedic surgeon to research and treat the disabilities associated with leprosy. Through his subsequent research Brand changed the world’s perceptions and treatments of leprosy-affected people. Firstly, he pioneered the idea that the loss of fingers and toes in leprosy was due to the patient losing the feeling of pain, and was not due to inherent decay brought on by the disease. Secondly, as a skilled and inventive hand surgeon, he pioneered tendon transfer techniques with leprosy patients, opening up a new world of disability prevention and rehabilitation. His original tendon transplantation, using a good muscle from the patient’s forearm, became known as the ‘Brand operation’. In 1953 the Brands joined the staff of the Leprosy Mission International and continued to develop their research and training work at Vellore and the newly founded Schieffelin Leprosy Research and Training Centre, Karigiri. In 1964 Brand was appointed as the International Leprosy Mission’s director of surgery and rehabilitation. Two years later, the Brands were seconded to the US Public Health Service Hospital in Carville, Louisiana, a renowned centre for leprosy research. He became chief of rehabilitation and for more than 20 years taught surgery and orthopaedics at the Medical College at Louisiana State University. He served on the expert panel for leprosy of the World Health Organization. He was medical consultant and then international president of the Leprosy Mission, from 1992 to 1999, co-founded the All-Africa Leprosy and Rehabilitation Training Centre (ALERT) in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, and served on the board of the American Leprosy Missions. After retiring in the mid-1980s, Brand moved to Seattle to become emeritus clinical professor of orthopaedics at the University of Washington. He authored more than 100 clinical papers, as well as the textbook *Clinical mechanics of the hand* (St Louis, Missouri, Mosby, 1985), and two books on religion and medicine (*Fearfully and wonderfully made* [Grand Rapids, Michigan, Zondervan Publishing House, c.1980] and *The forever feast: letting God satisfy your deepest hunger* [Crowborough, Monarch, 1994]). He was appointed CBE in 1961, and was awarded the Damian Dutton award in 1977. He was Hunterian Professor at the College in 1952 and received the Albert Lasker award in 1960. He died on 8 July 2003 from complications related to a subdural haematoma. He is survived by his wife, an expert on the ophthalmic effects of leprosy, his children (Estelle, Chris, Jean, Mary, Patricia and Pauline) and 12 grandchildren.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000028
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Brough, Michael David (1942 - 2004)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Graves, Frederick Thomas (1919 - 2003)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Green, James Patrick (1930 - 2004)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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/372252372252
Occupation Orthopaedic surgeon
Details Jim Green was a consultant orthopaedic surgeon at Pilgrim Hospital, Boston, Lincolnshire. He was born on 17 March 1930 in Sheffield and attended High Storrs Grammar School, before going to Sheffield University in 1947. He had a great interest in anything to do with science, particularly physics and mathematics, often wondering whether he should have followed that particular path. Neither of his parents were medical. His father, Leonard Green, was a sergeant in the police force, and his mother, Edna Winifred Maxfield, was a teacher. His sister, Valerie White, also trained in medicine and entered general practice. After qualifying and following house appointments, he joined the RAMC for National Service in 1954 and reached the rank of major. A degree of boredom led him to study German, passing O-level in that subject. This stimulated a love of languages, particularly Russian, and he attended classes virtually up until the time of his death. Returning to Sheffield for two years as a demonstrator of anatomy from 1956, he was a general surgical registrar at the Royal Infirmary, Sheffield, from 1961 to 1963. He decided to specialise in orthopaedics, first as a registrar from 1963 to 1964, and then as a senior registrar at Harlow Wood Orthopaedic Hospital, Mansfield, until 1968. On obtaining the Alan Malkin travelling fellowship in 1967, he spent six weeks gaining further experience in western Europe. He was appointed consultant orthopaedic surgeon to Pilgrim Hospital, Boston, in 1968 and remained there until he retired in 1996. Never one to take centre stage, he preferred to work away quietly in his own surroundings in the company of local colleagues, friends and family. After retirement he continued with medico-legal work. A quiet, modest man who was devoted to the care of his patients, he was recognised for a meticulous approach in all his work. He was a ‘direct’ Yorkshire man, whose love for patients was only matched by a greater one for his family. He had many hobbies. He loved astronomy, sailing and maritime navigation, and he gained qualifications in radio-communication. A member of the Witham Sailing Club, he loved to escape to the Wash in his 27-foot yacht. He was prominent in masonic lodges in Sheffield and Boston, a keen gardener, and a member of the Boston Preservation Society. He had played the violin in his school orchestra, and his love of music never failed. He married Pamela née Scott (known as ‘Frankie’) in 1968. She had been a district midwife and then did a full-time secretarial course, which proved a great asset to Jim in his work. They had four children, the eldest, Deborah, trained at Sheffield and is a part-time general practitioner in Leeds. In January 2001 Jim developed non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, and over the next three years underwent repeated courses of chemotherapy, ultimately requiring dialysis for renal failure. He died from multiple organ failure in St James’s Hospital, Leeds, on 29 January 2004.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000065
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Vaughan-Jackson, Oliver James (1907 - 2003)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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/372346372346
Occupation Orthopaedic surgeon
Details Oliver Vaughan-Jackson was a consultant orthopaedic surgeon at the London Hospital and a specialist in hand surgery. He was born in Berkhamstead on 6 July 1907, the eldest son of Surgeon-Captain P Vaughan-Jackson RN. He was educated at Berkhamstead and Balliol College, Oxford, where he played for the winning rugby XV, before going on to the London Hospital for his clinical studies. After completing his house jobs he specialised in surgery and passed the FRCS in 1936. Realising war was on the horizon, he joined the RNVR in 1938 and by 1939 found himself a surgeon in the Royal Naval Hospital at Chatham, where he remained for the next four years, until in 1944 he was posted to the RN Hospital, Sydney. At the end of the war, he returned to the London Hospital as consultant orthopaedic surgeon, joining the energetic new team led by Sir Reginald Watson-Jones and Sir Henry Osmond-Clarke. He was also on the consultant staff of St Bartholomew’s Hospital, Rochester. At the London his particular interest was in the surgery of the hand, and especially the treatment of the complications of rheumatoid arthritis. In 1948 he published an account of a hitherto undescribed syndrome whereby extensor tendons, frayed by underlying arthritic osteophytes, rupture – a syndrome to which his name is eponymously attached. A gentle and genial man, Oliver was a popular teacher and much admired by his juniors for his patient and painstaking surgical technique. Towards the end of his career he spent a good deal of his spare time in Newfoundland, Canada, at the Memorial Hospital, where a new multidisciplinary department for rheumatology had been set up. He was appointed professor of orthopaedic surgery there. After retirement he went to live in Newfoundland, but returned towards the evening of his life to live in Cerne Abbas, Dorset, where he died on 7 November 2003. He married Joan Madeline née Bowring in 1939. They had two sons.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000159
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Burgess, Charles Terence Anthony (1913 - 2004)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-09-14 2015-09-04
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/372217372217
Occupation General surgeon
Details Charles Burgess, known as Terence, was born in Hoylake, the Wirral, Cheshire, on 10 January 1913, into a medical family. His father, Charles Herbert Burgess, was a general practitioner, as was his grandfather, Robert Burgess. His mother was Meta Jeanette née Leitch. Terence was educated at Haileybury, and then in 1931 went on to Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge. He completed his clinical training in Liverpool. After junior posts, he served in the RAMC and was awarded an MBE for his part in the rescue of wounded servicemen from a hospital transport ship when it was mined and sunk off the Normandy beaches shortly after D-day. He returned to Liverpool to specialise in surgery, training at the David Lewis Northern Hospital. In 1950, he was appointed as a consultant surgeon at Ormskirk District General Hospital and, the following year, to Southport Infirmary. He retired from both positions in 1978. He kept up his links with the RAMC, retiring from the 8th Liverpool Unit in 1963 with the rank of Colonel. He served on the Southport bench as a magistrate from 1971 to 1983, and after retirement became involved with the movement to found the Queenscourt Hospice in Southport, of which he was first chairman of the committee. The hospice education centre is named after him. He wished to be remembered for the good quality, compassionate care he gave to patients and as an enthusiastic educator of medical and nursing staff. Outside medicine, he was involved with his church, St Cuthbert's in Southport, serving as a churchwarden. He played golf, and was interested in cartography and local history. He was a lifelong supporter of Everton Football Club. He married Stella née Smith in 1951 and they had two daughters, Catherine and Priscilla, an ophthalmologist. There are two grandchildren. He died on 29 January 2004, following a stroke.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000030
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Burkitt, Robert Townsend (1912 - 2005)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Robin Burkitt
Publication Date 2005-09-14 2014-07-18
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/372218372218
Occupation General surgeon
Details Robert Townsend Burkitt, known as 'Robin', was a highly respected consultant general surgeon at Ashford Hospital. He was born in Enniskillen, County Fermanagh, Northern Ireland, on 28 September 1912. His father, James Parsons Burkitt, was an engineer and County Surveyor, and also a distinguished ornithologist, an interest which Robin inherited from his father. His mother was Gwendolyn Burkitt née Hill. Robin and his elder brother Denis, were educated at Dean Close School in Cheltenham and he followed his brother to Trinity College, Dublin (TCD), in 1930. At TCD he studied modern languages, anticipating a career as a diplomat, then decided to change to medicine. Denis also decided on a career in medicine and he carried out pioneering research into the cause of a particular form of cancer ('Burkitt's lymphoma'), work for which he achieved world-wide recognition. After qualifying as a doctor, Robin took up a post as a senior house officer at the Royal Cornwall Infirmary, where he met his future wife, Violet, a nurse. They were married shortly after the Second World War broke out. He joined the Army at the end of 1939 and was sent to France, where he was stationed on the Normandy coast until the German advance forced them to retreat in haste. Robin managed to reach Boulogne and take passage back to England. He was then posted as a battalion medical officer to the 9th Battalion, the Seaforth Highlanders. After a period of training in Scotland, he was sent to West Africa, where he worked in hospitals and outlying stations in the Gambia and Nigeria. He returned to England in October 1944 to qualify as a surgical specialist. Early in the following year he was sent to India to join a beach medical unit that was preparing for a planned invasion of Malaya. Returning to England at the end of the war, he joined Ashford Hospital as a surgical registrar and during his time there gained his FRCS. Due to the post-war backlog, there were few opportunities to obtain a consultant post in the UK, and he was persuaded by an old colleague to join his medical practice in Nairobi, Kenya. In 1951, he and his wife sold the family home and most of their possessions and took passage to Africa with their three young children. However, their time in Kenya was not a great success: the medical practice did not grow as anticipated and various other aspects of life, particularly the Mau Mau rebellion, meant it proved an insecure environment for his wife and young children. In 1954 they returned to the UK and Robin took up a post as a senior registrar at Upton Hospital, Slough, which he always considered the most rewarding part of his professional career. During this time he was proud to have played a major role in transforming the reputation of the hospital. When he joined no GP would think of referring a patient to the hospital: when he left they would not consider any other. In 1963 Robin took up a consultant post at Ashford Hospital, which became vacant on the retirement of Norman Matheson. He worked at various hospitals in the area and also treated patients in London. He was highly regarded, not only because of professional skills as a surgeon, but also for his great gifts of communication, which he used to reassure and comfort patients and their families. He worked tirelessly for the Slough branch of the Multiple Sclerosis Society, acting as treasurer for nearly 20 years and then as welfare officer. He did much to help and improve the quality of those suffering from the disease. Robin's own wife died in 1997, having suffered poor health since the early 1970s. Right to the end he continued to visit local people, offering sympathies, advice and comfort, drawing from his great knowledge and experience. Robin was a devout Christian with a very strong faith. He worshipped at the United Reform Church in Beaconsfield for many years and his death was a great loss to the members of the congregation. He died on 19 April 2005, aged 92, and was survived by his three children, Robin, Andrew and Beth, their families, as well as the many people who had enjoyed his friendship.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000031
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Calvert, Paul Thornton (1949 - 2004)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-09-14 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/372219372219
Occupation Orthopaedic surgeon
Details Paul Calvert was a consultant orthopaedic surgeon at St George's Hospital, London, and at the Royal National Orthopaedic Hospital. He was born on 17 March 1949, the son of John Calvert, a civil engineer, and Barbara, a barrister. He was educated at the Dragon School and Rugby, where he excelled in all court games, especially rackets. He later went up to Trinity College, Cambridge, to read natural sciences. After his first year, when he played hockey, rackets and real tennis (for which he was later awarded a blue), he changed courses to read medicine. He later went on to Guy's to do his clinical studies. After qualification and house jobs, he and Deborah, whom he married as a student, went to Vancouver, Canada, where he spent a year on rotation as a surgical resident. On his return to the UK, he worked for a while as a general surgical registrar, before specialising in orthopaedics. He was then a senior house officer at the Royal National Orthopaedic Hospital, subsequently becoming a registrar and then senior registrar. He became interested in the shoulder after working with Lipman Kessel and later with Ian Bayley. After serving as senior surgical officer at the Royal National Orthopaedic Hospital and as lecturer to the professorial unit, he was appointed consultant orthopaedic surgeon to the Hinchingbooke Hospital in 1985. But, finding he missed the excitement of a teaching department, he transferred to a consultant post at St George's Hospital in 1986. The shoulder firm at St George's rapidly expanded under his leadership, with the development of arthroscopic surgery and shoulder replacement. Reluctantly, he dropped his paediatric orthopaedic commitment, but he continued to be involved with trauma and covered general orthopaedic emergencies. He was the lead surgeon at St George's dealing with the aftermath of the Clapham rail crash in 1988. In 1993, he took on sessions at the Royal National Orthopaedic Hospital to work with Ian Bayley. He published a number of important papers, particularly on shoulder topics, including papers on habitual instability and on the consequences of the Clapham rail crash. He maintained his interest in teaching and was Chairman of the regional specialist training committee. He was appointed trainer of the year by the British Orthopaedic Trainees' Association. He negotiated with the Department of Health on behalf of the British Orthopaedic Association to increase the number of orthopaedic surgeons in training. In 1999, he was found to have an ocular melanoma. Despite the effect it had on his eyesight, he continued to work to enlarge the orthopaedic department at St George's. He also built up a successful private practice, both in Wimbledon and at the Hospital of St John and St Elizabeth in St John's Wood, to whose hospice ward he asked to be admitted shortly before he died. He took early retirement at Christmas 2003, and died on 7 May 2004 of secondary melanoma. He left his wife, Deborah, and two children. His sister, Sandra Calvert, is also a consultant at St George's. The new orthopaedic operating theatres at St George's have been named after him.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000032
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Cameron, Alexander (1933 - 2004)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-09-14 2006-12-21
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/372220372220
Occupation General surgeon
Details Alexander Cameron, known as ‘Alistair’, was a consultant surgeon at Norfolk and Norwich Hospital. He was born in Tranent, East Lothian, on 1 August 1933, the son of Alexander Cameron, a miner who became vice-president of the National Union of Mineworkers for the Scottish area, and Margaret née Hogg, a shop assistant. He was educated at Tranent Public Primary School and then Preston Lodge School, where he gained a distinction in literature and was *dux* of his class. He studied medicine in Edinburgh and then did house jobs at the Edinburgh Royal Infirmary. From 1957 to 1959, he served as a surgeon lieutenant, first in Portsmouth, and then as a medical officer aboard HMS *Torquay* and then HMS *Scarborough*, part of the Fifth Frigate Squadron of the Mediterranean fleet, visiting Malta and Syracuse. In July 1958, he was present at the nuclear test explosions on Christmas Island. His meticulous medical records of this and his formal instructions for decontamination and cleansing remain intact for safe keeping with his wife. He then sailed back to the UK via Samoa, Auckland, Sydney, Perth, Sri Lanka and the Suez Canal. Returning to civilian life south of the border as senior house officer at the North Middlesex Hospital, he gained his FRCS in 1962. An appointment as research assistant to Leslie Le Quesne and Michael Hobsley from 1964 to 1967 was followed by a rotating registrar post to the Middlesex and Central Middlesex hospitals, where he fell under the influence of Sir Rodney Sweetman, P Newman, Sir Thomas Holmes Sellors and Peter Gummer. He became senior registrar to O V Lloyd Davies from 1967 to 1970, followed by his appointment as senior lecturer with honorary consultant status in 1970. Gaining his masters degree in 1973, he went to Sweden and Germany to learn the techniques of the Koch continent ileostomy, which he went on to popularise in the UK. Appointed consultant surgeon to the Norfolk and Norwich Hospital in 1973, he was the first person with a specialist colo-proctological interest: the unit is now much expanded. It was usual in those days for the ‘junior’ surgeon in Norwich to have a paediatric interest, so Alistair spent some time at Great Ormond Street to help him in his new venture. He was surgical tutor from 1976 to 1979, and was a popular and outstanding teacher at undergraduate and postgraduate levels. A series of myocardial infarcts obliged him to retire early in 1988. He was operated on at Papworth in 1981 and 1989 by J Wallwork, using a procedure pioneered by his own boss, Sir Thomas Holmes Sellors. Distancing himself from medicine, he was able to continue his interests in astronomy, botany, microscopy, modern languages (French, German, Spanish and Italian), together with his passion for philosophy, poetry, history and politics. It was in these areas he was a formidable opponent in debate. An earlier interest in classical Greek and Latin was rekindled and, with an outstanding knowledge of computer technology, he managed to fill his life restricted by cardiac disability. An article on his experiences as a cardiac patient ‘Reflections in a glass box’, showed true and amusingly thoughtful insight into the NHS, its staff and his own condition. He met Elizabeth (‘Widdy’) neé Padfield when she was a surgical ward sister at the Middlesex. They married in 1970 and had four sons, Duncan, Angus, Hamish and Dougal. Alistair died on 20 February 2004.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000033
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Campbell, Sir Donald (1930 - 2004)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-09-14
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/372221372221
Occupation Anaesthetist
Details Sir Donald Campbell was a former professor of anaesthesia at the University of Glasgow and President of the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Glasgow from 1992 to 1994. He was born on 8 March 1930 at Rutherglen, near Glasgow, the son of Archibald Peter and Mary Campbell. He attended Hutcheson’s Boys’ Grammar School and then went on to the University of Glasgow, where he studied medicine. After completing resident posts, he left for Canada to begin his training in anaesthesia, working in Edmonton and in Lethbridge, Alberta. In 1956 he returned to Glasgow to complete his training at the Royal Infirmary and Stobhill. From 1959 to 1960, he was a lecturer in anaesthetics at Glasgow Royal Infirmary. In 1960 he transferred to the health service department as a consultant anaesthetist, a post he held for the next 16 years. While training in Canada he had developed an interest in anaesthesia for heart surgery and also noted the early development of intensive care units. Using his diplomatic skills, he succeeded in persuading his colleagues that this was the way forward for their patients. The respiratory intensive care unit was opened in 1966, with Campbell as its first director. His research interests covered the development of ventilators, the pharmacology of new analgesic drugs, and the effects of smoke inhalation on the lungs. His published works included over 100 papers on anaesthesia, intensive care, and related subjects in peer-reviewed journals. He was the author of two textbooks. In 1976 he was appointed to the chair of anaesthesia in Glasgow. In this post he was able to develop his interest in medical education. For a period of four years from 1987 he was dean of the medical school. From 1985 to 1990 he was Chairman of the Scottish Council for Postgraduate Medical Education. As a member of the medical advisory committee of the British Council he was involved in arranging attachments to UK departments for many young trainee anaesthetists from overseas and also from the Royal Navy. On the national stage, he was vice-president of the Association of Anaesthetists of Great Britain and Ireland in 1977, and President of the Scottish Society of Anaesthetists in 1979. He was an examiner and board member of the Faculty of Anaesthetists (the forerunner of the Royal College of Anaesthetists), and was elected dean of the faculty for three years from 1982. He went on to become vice-president of the Royal College of Surgeons from 1985 to 1987. Before he retired, he was elected President of the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Glasgow, the first anaesthetist to hold this post. He was awarded the CBE in 1987 and he received his knighthood in 1994, in recognition of his contribution to medicine. He suffered a stroke soon after his retirement, and this limited his ability to enjoy his favourite sports of fishing, curling and shooting. It did not, however, suppress his enjoyment of people and his skill as a raconteur. He married twice. His first wife was Nancy Rebecca McKintosh, ‘Nan’. They married in 1954 and had a son and a daughter. After her death in 1974 he married Catherine Conway Braeburn. They had two daughters. He died on 14 September 2004.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000034
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Anikwe, Raymond Maduchem (1935 - 2008)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by John Blandy
Publication Date 2008-09-11
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/372736372736
Occupation Urological surgeon Urologist
Details Raymond Anikwe was a leading urological surgeon in Nigeria. He was born on 5 June 1935, the son of Chief Lawrence Akunwanne and Helen Oyeigwe Anikwenze in Nnobi, Anambra State, Nigeria. He was educated at St Mary Primary School, Umulu, and St Joseph Primary School, Onitsha. In 1951 he entered the Government College, Umuahia, where he excelled at sports, as well as his studies, winning a Nigerian Central Government scholarship to the Nigerian College of Technology, Ibadan. After two years there he won a scholarship from the Government of Italy to study medicine at the University of Rome. He learnt Italian, and obtained the degree of MD in July 1964. After qualifying he served as a pre-registration house officer and senior house officer in general surgery in Turin, and then went to the UK as a senior house officer at Dudley Guest Hospital. He was later a registrar in surgery (urology) at the Central Middlesex Hospital. From there he went to Aberdeen Royal Infirmary as a research fellow, studying urodynamics with a special interest in urethral resistance. In 1973 he returned to Nigeria as a lecturer at the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, and consultant surgeon at the University of Nigeria Teaching Hospital, Enugu. He rose through the academic ranks to become professor of surgery (urology) in 1978. He served on numerous committees: he was chairman of the medical advisory committee, director of clinical services and training at Enugu (from 1978 to 1980), chief executive and medical director (from 1982 to 1985), provost of the college of medicine and medical sciences and deputy vice chancellor of the University of Nigeria Enugu campus in 1986. In 1987 he went to Saudi Arabia as professor of urology and consultant urologist at the King Faisal University and King Fahd Hospital. In 1999 he returned to Nigeria to the University of Nigeria Teaching Hospital, until he established his own private hospital, the Galaxy Urology Specialist Hospital, Enugu, which was equipped with the latest endoscopic facilities. He published extensively and was a member of numerous learned societies. In 2007 he received the prestigious D’Linga gold award by Corporate and Media Africa Communications Ltd for his contribution to nation building through the medical profession. In 1974 he married Gladys Ngozi (née Ojukwu) and they had six children, of whom two became doctors. He died on 17 May 2008.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000553
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Travers, Benjamin junior (1808 - 1868)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Bond, Charles John (1856 - 1939)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching O'Keeffe, Declan (1922 - 2005)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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/372479372479
Occupation General surgeon
Details Declan O’Keeffe was a surgeon in Kenya. He was born in London on 18 February 1922, the son of Edmond, a furniture salesman, and Jessica Edith née Riches. From St Dominic’s Preparatory School, West Hampstead, he won a ‘free place’ to the Regent Street Polytechnic Secondary School. He later went to Guy’s Hospital on a senior county exhibition and scholarship. At Guy’s he won prizes in haematology and bacteriology and completed house jobs. He then joined the RAF medical service. On demobilisation he was a junior and then senior surgical registrar at Guy’s, before joining the Colonial Medical Service in Kenya as a provincial surgical specialist. After he retired he remained in Mombasa in private surgical practice. He married Isabella McNeill in 1947, by whom he had three sons and a daughter. His eldest son studied medicine at Guy’s. O’Keeffe died on 1 December 2005.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000292
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Lewis, Thomas Loftus Townshend (1918 - 2004)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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/372280372280
Occupation Obstetric and gynaecological surgeon Obstetrician and gynaecologist
Details Tom Lewis was a respected London obstetrician and gynaecologist. He was born in Hampstead on 27 May 1918, but regarded himself as a South African of Welsh origin. His great-grandfather, Charles Lewis, had run away to sea from Milford Haven and settled in Cape Town in about 1850, where he established a sail-making business that was profitable until the coming of steam. His son, A J S Lewis, was a civil servant who became mayor of Cape Town and was ordained into the Anglican Church on retirement. In turn, A J S’s son, Tom’s father, Neville went to London to study art at the Slade School, where he met and married a fellow art student from Dublin, Theodosia Townshend. When the marriage broke up, Neville was left with three children under five, including Tom. They were sent to Cape Town, where they were brought up by their grandparents, A J S and Annie Solomon. Tom was educated at the Diocesan College, Rondebosch, where he had a good education, boxed and played rugby. Every two or three years their father would arrive unannounced from England, and they would go off by car all over South Africa to paint portraits. On one occasion a spear was thrown through a painting, which was feared to be taking part of the soul of its subject. In 1933, Neville and his second wife, Vera Player, bought a house in Chelsea and sent for them. Tom then went to St Paul’s School, from which he went to Jesus College, Cambridge, and Guy’s Hospital. As a student he won the gold medal in obstetrics. In 1943, he travelled by ship to Cape Town and enlisted in the South African Air Force as a doctor, but was then seconded to the RAMC, with whom he served in Egypt, Italy and Greece. After the war, he returned to Guy’s to take the FRCS and specialised in obstetrics and gynaecology. He captained the Guy’s rugby XV from 1946 to 1948, and was only prevented from playing for England against France by hepatitis. He played his last game for the first XV when he was aged 46. He was appointed as a consultant at Guy’s just before his 30th birthday, and to Queen Charlotte’s Maternity Hospital and the Chelsea Hospital for Women two years later. A meticulous surgeon, he was a very distinguished teacher. He wrote three textbooks of obstetrics and gynaecology and his book *Progress in clinical obstetrics and gynaecology* (London, Joe A Churchill, 1956) became a classic. He served three times on the council of the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, was its honorary secretary from 1961 to 1968, senior vice-president from 1975 to 1978 and Sims Black travelling professor in 1970. He was President of the obstetric section of the Royal Society of Medicine. He was a consultant gynaecologist to the Army and an examiner to the Universities of Cambridge, London and St Andrews, the Society of Apothecaries and the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists. As a student, Tom had fallen in love with a Guy’s student nurse, Alexandra (‘Bunty’) Moore. They married in 1946 and had five sons. The eldest, John, became a doctor. In retirement, they built a holiday home on the island of Elba. A superb host, Tom was an authority on wine, fungi and astronomy. He died after a difficult last illness on 9 April 2004.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000093
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Latto, Conrad (1915 - 2008)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Marshall Barr
Publication Date 2008-11-14
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/372753372753
Occupation General surgeon
Details Conrad Latto was a consultant surgeon at the Royal Berkshire Hospital, Reading. He was born on 3 March 1915, the son of David and Christina Latto. His father was the town clerk of Dundee, his mother a frugal Scot who scrupulously saved towards the education of their three sons. Conrad, Gordon and Douglas all went from Dundee High School to study medicine at St Andrews. A younger brother, Kenneth, died in childhood of a Wilms’ tumour, which may have influenced Conrad’s future career. In 1937 he qualified with first class honours and a gold medal from St Andrews University. He held junior hospital appointments at Cornelia & East Dorset Hospital, Poole, the Prince of Wales Hospital, Plymouth, and Rochdale Infirmary. He became a fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh in 1940. For 18 months, from 1940 to 1942, he was a resident surgical officer at the Prince of Wales Hospital, Plymouth. It was during the Blitz on Plymouth in 1941 that his surgical reputation was established. Ironically, Latto was a conscientious objector on religious grounds. Eric Holburn, assistant superintendent at the Prince of Wales Hospital, sent this testimonial to his tribunal: “Soon after the devastation of Plymouth by enemy savagery in the early part of 1941, Mr Latto informed me that his views concerning the destruction of life had become so strongly crystallized that he could not honestly serve, even in a medical capacity, with the Armed Forces…This objection is the outcome of his earnest and overruling desire to put into practice his conception of a Christ-like life…I know of no individual who has served his country so magnificently and in such a quietly heroic and unassuming way as Mr Latto…The direction of the hospital emergency service was left entirely in his hands …With bombs falling all round and the hospital services being disrupted he carried on with imperturbable fortitude…” H F Vellacott, honorary surgeon wrote: “During the Plymouth blitzes…It was he who arranged which cases should go to theatre, which cases should have blood transfusions…Throughout these trying times he proved invaluable, and I cannot speak too highly of his conduct and of his administrative qualities. When each actual blitz was on his example of courage and calmness helped to hold the whole hospital organization together. He was outstanding in this respect and a special note of thanks was sent him by the Honorary Staff before he left.” The tribunal excused him from military service, with the condition that he continued to serve as a doctor. In 1943 he went to the Liverpool Royal Infirmary as surgical registrar for 12 months, followed by a year as an accident service officer at King Edward VII Hospital, Windsor. Now in Berkshire, and in his words “liking the look of the Royal Berks”, he became resident surgical officer in 1945. He was to remain closely attached to the Royal Berkshire Hospital for the rest of his life. With glowing testimonials from honorary surgeons Aitken Walker and Gordon Bohn, he became honorary assistant surgeon in December 1947, one of the last appointments to the voluntary hospital staff before the arrival of the NHS. Aitken Walker, the senior surgeon, suggested they all have a specialty. Walker chose thyroid and sympathectomy for himself, Bohn was given gall bladder and stomach, Robert Reid the colon and rectum. Latto had done some urology at Liverpool and therefore got urology. He took up the challenge with characteristic enthusiasm. Now a consultant in the NHS, he visited Terrence Millin and Alec Badenoch at St Bartholomew’s and St Peter’s hospitals to bring Reading up to date with the latest in the specialty. In 1961, sponsored by Badenoch and Sir James Paterson Ross (Sir James’s son Harvey was at that time Latto’s surgical registrar), he undertook a two-month study tour in the USA of the major centres for urology and general surgery. Latto was an excellent general surgeon who became a skilled urologist. He served on the council of the urology section of the Royal Society of Medicine and was an important influence in establishing the specialty in the Oxford region. In 1961 he jointly founded, with Joe Smith, the Oxford Regional Urology Club. His endoscopic and surgical skills, together with the length of his operating lists, were legendary. In the 1970s he assisted the GU Manufacturing Company in testing their prototype rod lens urology instruments. Harold Hopkins of the University of Reading, who had developed the rod lens and fibre-optic systems used in endoscopy, became both a patient and a very good friend. Another close friend was Denis Burkitt, whom he met when they were together at Poole. They were both Christian vegetarians: Latto became a member of the Order of the Cross and was president of VEGA (Vegetarian Economy and Green Agriculture). The two friends’ common interest in the effects of dietary fibre led to combined study and lecture tours in Africa, India, the Persian Gulf and behind the Iron Curtain. In 1971 Latto crusaded successfully for the introduction of dietary bran in Reading hospitals. He was a leading figure in British Association of Urological Surgeons (BAUS), at whose urging the College offered him the FRCS *ad eundem* in 1977. A tall, imposing figure with a shock of silver-grey hair, Conrad Latto had an enormous influence on the Royal Berks and on the medical and nursing staff in training. Although teetotal as well as vegetarian, he was the very opposite of the dour Scot. He never preached his beliefs (other than the importance of fibre). He published few papers, but was a passionate teacher, speaking eloquently and amusingly in a delightful soft Scottish accent. When in 1980 he had to retire from his beloved hospital, he took over the general practice in Caversham of his sister-in-law Monica Latto. He attended refresher courses and out-patient teaching sessions to update his knowledge and for seven years was a highly respected and much loved GP. In final retirement, he remained an active member of the local medical society, the Reading Pathological Society, of which he had been arguably its most effective post-war president. He died at his Caversham home on 6 July 2008, leaving a wife Anne, daughters Rosalind and Sharon, and five grandchildren.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000570
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Lumb, Geoffrey Norman (1925 - 2005)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-10-12 2012-03-14
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/372283372283
Occupation Urologist
Details Geoffrey Lumb was a consultant urologist in Taunton, Somerset. He was born in Crewkerne, Somerset, on 1 January 1925, the son of Norman Lumb, a urologist in Portsmouth. He was educated at Marlborough and St Thomas's Hospital. After junior posts he did his National Service in the RAFVR, reaching the rank of Squadron Leader as an anaesthetist. On demobilisation he went to Bristol to work under Milnes Walker and John Mitchell, the latter kindling his interest in surgical diathermy, upon which he became an expert, writing many articles and a textbook in collaboration with Mitchell. After a sabbatical year in Boston and Richmond, Virginia, he was appointed as a consultant surgeon in Taunton in 1965. There he worked hard to set up an independent department of urology, achieving that aim in 1979. Taunton became the first district general hospital training department in the south west. Under his guidance research programmes flourished, and he set up a pioneer teaching programme using video endoscopy and laser surgery. He was also an enthusiastic proponent of transrectal ultrasound examination of the prostate. It was sadly ironic that he should die from the complications of cancer of the prostate. A talented and compassionate surgeon, he had a mischievous sense of humour. His many interests included model railway engineering, and he was an excellent craftsman, photographer, gardener, fisherman and golfer. He married Alison Duncan, a staff nurse at St Thomas's. They had a daughter, Christine (who became a theatre sister) and two sons, Hugh and Roger. He died on 25 April 2003.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000096
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Mackie, David Bonar (1936 - 2005)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-10-19 2006-11-30
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/372284372284
Occupation General surgeon
Details David Bonar Mackie was a consultant general surgeon in Salisbury, Wiltshire. His parents David Taylor Mackie and Mary Gray née Chittick were Scottish. His father was a GP in Aberdour, Fife, and then moved to a general practice in Exeter, where Bonar was born in 1936. Bonar was educated at Sherborne School and Pembroke College, Cambridge, going on to the Middlesex Hospital for his clinical studies. After house appointments he completed surgical registrar jobs at the Middlesex and Central Middlesex Hospitals, working for, among others, Cecil Murray, Leslie LeQuesne and Peter Riddle. In 1969 he won a Fulbright scholarship to the University of Mississippi. He was appointed as a consultant to the Salisbury District Hospitals in 1972. There he developed a short stay ward, and breast surgery and specialised urology services. In 1964 he married Jennifer Bland. They had three children, one of whom is a dental surgeon. A keen sportsman, Bonar particularly enjoyed golf and racing. He was medical officer to the Salisbury race course and owned, with friends, several more or less successful horses. He died on 25 January 2005, after a prolonged and slowly deteriorating Pick’s disease.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000097
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Bancks, Thomas ( - 1880)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2009-11-04 2013-08-06
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/372928372928
Occupation General surgeon
Details Educated at St Bartholomew's Hospital; practised at Stourbridge, where he was Surgeon to the Iron and Coal Works. He died before 1880, but for ten years before this date his address was unknown to the *Medical Directory*. Publications: "On Fracture of Cranium." - *Lancet*, 1846, ii, 581. "Imperforate Vagina." - *Prov. Med. Jour.*, 1843, v, 450. "Strangulated Hernia." - *Ibid.*, 1844, 493. "Poisoning by Lead." - *Lancet*, 1849, i, 478.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000745
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Peel, Sir John Harold (1904 - 2005)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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/372490372490
Occupation Obstetrician and gynaecologist
Details Sir John Peel was perhaps the most celebrated obstetrician and gynaecologist of his era. Born in Bradford on 10 December 1904, he was the son of the Rev J E Peel. From Manchester Grammar School he went to Queen’s College, Oxford, going on to his clinical studies at King’s College Hospital where, after junior posts in surgery and obstetrics and gynaecology, he was appointed to the consultant staff in 1936, and to Princess Beatrice Hospital the following year. During the Second World War he was surgeon to the Emergency Medical Service, and in 1942 was put on the staff of Queen Victoria Hospital, East Grinstead. Together with Wilfred Oakley, he studied the management of women with diabetes, research that led to a reduction in maternal and infant mortality. A council member of the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists in 1955, he was president in 1966, when he chaired a debate on reform of the abortion law, driven by his anxiety to reduce the morbidity of illegal abortion. In 1971 he was the author of a report that recommended that all women should give birth in hospital and remain there for several days, a report which wrought a great change in maternity practice, though it did not go unchallenged. Peel assisted at the birth of Prince Charles and Princess Anne, and in time succeeded Sir William Gilliatt as surgeon-gynaecologist to the Queen, in which capacity he delivered Prince Andrew and Prince Edward (all these, paradoxically, being home deliveries). A quiet, unflappable Yorkshireman, Peel was unfazed by media interest in his royal patients. He married Muriel Pellow in 1936, and divorced her in 1947, to marry Freda Mellish, a ward sister. Their long and happy marriage was terminated by her death in 1993. He married for the third time in 1995, to an old family friend, Sally Barton. He died on 31 December 2005, leaving her and a daughter by his first marriage.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000303
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Rennie, Christopher Douglas (1948 - 2005)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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/372491372491
Occupation Urologist
Details Christopher Rennie was a consultant urologist at Bromsgrove. He was born in Port Dixon, Malaysia, on 10 April 1948, the first son of Douglas David and Kathleen Mary (Dinah) Rennie. Douglas was an insurance underwriter for Manufacturers Life for the majority of his working life and Dinah was a GP in the same practice as her father, James Alexander Brown. She later worked in family planning in the Birmingham area. Chris was educated at Edgbaston Preparatory School and at King’s School in Canterbury. Influenced by his grandfather, whom he frequently accompanied on rounds from the age of five, he decided on a medical career. He went to medical school in Birmingham, obtained a BSc in anatomy in 1969 and graduated in 1972. He gained his FRCS in 1977, and initially trained as a general surgeon in the West Midlands, switching to urology as his chosen specialty in the early eighties. Chris became the sole urologist in Bromsgrove in 1985 and, before his early death, was instrumental in the transition to an amalgamated unit of five consultants. He was programme director for the West Midlands training programme in urology and was keen on expanding all aspects of training. Chris married twice, to Bridget (née Main) and Yvette (née Downing). He leaves a partner, Helen Kingdon, and a son, Alexander Harry James. Chris died suddenly from a heart attack on 14 September 2005.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000304
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Taylor, John Gibson (1918 - 2005)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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/372492372492
Occupation Orthopaedic surgeon
Details John Gibson Taylor, known as ‘Ian’, was a consultant orthopaedic surgeon at Norfolk and Norwich Hospital. He was born on 8 June 1918, three months before the end of the First World War, the only child of Scottish parents Kate and William Taylor. Ian’s father was an engineer employed at the Royal Aeronautical Establishment, Hampshire. Brought up in Fleet, Ian went to the local grammar school. Deciding on a medical career, he entered St Mary’s Hospital Medical School. Much of his time was spent at Amersham, where the medical school was evacuated during the Second World War. After a year on the house, during which time he was house physician to Sir George Pickering, he joined the RNVR. His first posting was to the destroyer HMS Zetland, which hunted U-boats. After a year he served on HMS Vindex, an escort carrier. Through many hard winters over the next four years on the treacherous North Sea, the ship escorted convoys to Russia. He was discharged as a surgeon lieutenant commander in June 1946. On demobilisation he returned to St Mary’s as a registrar to V H Ellis, the orthopaedic surgeon, who was soon joined by John Crawford Adams, with whom Ian retained a lifelong friendship. After passing the FRCS Ian became first assistant to the accident service at the John Radcliffe Hospital, being greatly influenced by Edgar Somerville, Robert Taylor and Joe Pennybacker, who taught Ian spinal surgery. In 1954 he was appointed consultant orthopaedic surgeon in Norwich, joining Ken McKee and Richard Howard. The unit served not only Norwich but was also responsible for most of the orthopaedic and trauma services in Yarmouth and Lowestoft. Ian embraced the introduction of new methods of joint replacement, holding clinics with Neil Cardoe and Gilson Wenley for rheumatoid and other arthritic problems, at first in an old workhouse, St Michael’s Hospital in Aylsham. Later a stable block was converted into an operating theatre – much of the money raised by voluntary donations from the Norfolk community. In this unlikely setting Ian performed knee and metacarpo-phalangeal joint replacements. Much sought-after as a teacher, he was involved with the rotation between Bart’s, Norwich and the Royal National Orthopaedic Hospital, and encouraged many of his trainees to publish their first papers. In 1965 Sir Herbert Seddon asked him to help out in Nigera, where he spent several months. In 1956 he met Fodhla Burnell, an anaesthetist. They were married a year later in Norwich Cathedral. They had many shared interests – sailing in the North Sea was one, a cottage in the Perthshire hills another. He was an accomplished skier, using this method of transport to get him to hospital during the hard winter of 1979. He was a keen member of the Percivall Pott Club and regularly attended meetings of the British Orthopaedic Association (BOA). One of his last major trips abroad was to Murmansk in 2001. This commemorated the arrival of the first Russian convoy sent from the UK during the Second World War. Ian and others who had survived were welcomed by the Russians and given a medal of honour for the enormous risks taken 60 years previously. Over his last few years he developed progressive muscle disease, and died on 24 August 2005.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000305
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Rang, Mercer Charles (1933 - 2003)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-10-19
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/372300372300
Occupation Orthopaedic surgeon
Details Mercer Rang was an eminent paediatric orthopaedic surgeon. He was born in London in 1933 and studied medicine at University College London. He was a house officer in London and then a resident at Rochester. He went on to complete two years National Service, as a command surgical specialist in Northern Ireland. He then undertook postgraduate orthopaedic training, and was inspired by Lipmann Kessel to pursue an academic career. He enrolled in the programme of the Royal Northern Orthopaedic Hospital. In 1965 he was seconded to Jamaica, where he served for two years as a senior lecturer in orthopaedic surgery at the University of West Indies under Sir John Golding. In 1967 he went to the Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto as a basic research fellow and, with R B Salter, undertook research on the pathogenesis of deformity of the femoral head in an animal model of Legg-Perthes’ disease. He was appointed to the staff of the division of orthopaedic surgery at the end of the year, where he continued undertaking research until his retirement from the hospital in 1999. He then practised and taught orthopaedics in Saudi Arabia for one year, until he became ill and returned to Canada. Mercer had many clinical interests in paediatric orthopaedic surgery, but his most important contributions were in the fields of children’s fractures and neuromuscular disorders, especially in cerebral palsy, as well as the history of orthopaedics. He wrote 12 book chapters, and published 61 articles and six books, including *The growth plate and its disorders* (1969, Edinburgh/London, E & S Livingstone), *Children’s fractures* (c1983, Philadelphia, Lippincott) and *The story of orthopaedics* (2000, Philadelphia/London, W B Saunders). He received many honours and awards, including an honorary fellowship of the American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons in 1990, honorary fellowship of the British Orthopaedic Association in 1996 and the Alan Graham Apley gold medal of that Association in 1999. He was married to Helen and they had three daughters (Caroline, Sarah and Louise) and six grandchildren. He died on 6 October 2003 after a long illness.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000113
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Rees, Neville Clark (1922 - 2003)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Raffle, Philip Andrew Banks (1918 - 2004)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-10-19 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/372302372302
Occupation Occupational physician
Details Andrew Raffle, former chief medical officer of London Transport Executive, was an expert on medical standards for driving. He was born on 3 September 1918 in Newcastle upon Tyne, where his father, Andrew Banks Raffle, a barrister and a doctor, was medical officer for health for South Shields (he was later divisional medical officer to the London County Council). His mother was Daisy née Jarvis, the daughter of a farmer. His two uncles were both doctors. He studied medicine at Middlesex Hospital, qualifying in 1941, and was subsequently a house surgeon at Cheltenham. He then spent five years with the RAMC, becoming a specialist in venereology in Egypt during the North African campaign with the rank of Major. After demobilisation, he was a medical registrar in Bristol and then took the diploma in public health at the London School of Hygiene. In 1948 he joined London Transport under the aegis of Leslie Norman, whom he succeeded in 1969 as chief medical officer. There he carried out research to find evidence of the relationship between exercise and heart disease, by comparing the health of drivers and conductors. He also worked on the medical aspects of fitness to drive, becoming an acknowledged expert in this field. He advised the Department of Transport and other organisations on safe levels of alcohol in the blood, and the effects of diabetes and various medications on the ability to drive. He edited *Medical aspects of fitness to drive: a guide for medical practitioners* (London, Medical Commission on Accident Prevention, 1976), which became a key text for doctors to use when assessing patients. He was a member of the Blennerhasset committee on drinking and driving legislation. He continued to write papers on health standards for drivers up to 1992. He gave the BMA McKenzie industrial health lecture in 1974 and the Joseph Henry lecture at the College in 1988. He wrote many chapters in textbooks and was co-editor of *Hunter's diseases of occupations* (London, Hodder and Stoughton, 1987). He taught occupational medicine to postgraduates and was an examiner, and later convenor, for the diploma in industrial health at the Society of Apothecaries. He became chief medical officer of the St John Association and masterminded the Save-a-Life campaign, to teach resuscitation to a wider public. He was a fellow of the BMA and deputy Chairman of the occupational health committee. He was President of the Society of Occupational Medicine in 1967, and treasurer and subsequently vice-president of the Royal Society of Medicine. He was a member of the standing committee which led to the establishment of the new Faculty of Occupational Medicine in 1978. He was a founder fellow and served on the first board of the new faculty. He married Jill, the daughter of Major V H Sharp of the Royal Horse Artillery, in 1941. They had no children. In 1982 they retired to an isolated Oxfordshire village, where he took up gardening. He died of heart failure on 23 January 2004 and is survived by his widow.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000115
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching McMullin, Joseph Patrick O'Byrne (1921 - 2003)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-12-19
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/372502372502
Occupation General surgeon
Details Joseph Patrick O’Byrne McMullin (initially known as ‘Shos’) was a general surgeon at St Vincent’s Hospital, St Stephen’s Green/Elm Park, Dublin. He was born in 1921, the eldest son of Joseph Columba McMullin, a surgeon at the Shiel Hospital, Ballyshannon, and later county surgeon in Cavan, and Mary Frances O’Byrne. He was educated at Clongowes Wood College, for which he played scrum half, and University College Dublin. After qualifying he was a house officer at St Vincent’s, St Stephen’s Green. He then went to London, where he was casualty officer at the Westminster Hospital and surgical registrar at St John and Elizabeth’s Hospital. In 1956 he was appointed surgeon to St Vincent’s Hospital, St Stephen’s Green, Dublin, from which he won a travelling scholarship to the Lahey Clinic in 1957. He was also general surgeon to St Luke’s and St Anne’s hospitals. He was president of the Irish Society of Gastroenterology from 1983 to 1984. In Dublin he was generally known to his colleagues as ‘Joe Mac’. After he retired he went to Baghdad as medical director and general/transplant surgeon at the Ibn Al Bitar Hospital until 1990. There he carried out more than 300 live donor renal transplants, as well as a large range of complicated general surgery, especially of the thyroid and biliary tree. Apart from surgery, his passion was his home, ‘Hawthorn’ in Blackrock. There he designed and built a tennis court and swimming pool, and re-roofed and redecorated the entire house with his own hands. An avid skier, he continued into his seventies, and was devoted to classical music and opera. He married Raphael Aglaia Devlin in 1949. They had two daughters, Daireen and Raphael (both nurses), and three sons, one of whom, Liam, is a general surgeon at the County Hospital, Roscommon. McMullin died on 10 May 2003.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000315
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Innes, Alexander James (1912 - 2005)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-12-19
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/372503372503
Occupation Orthopaedic surgeon
Details Alexander James Innes was a consultant orthopaedic surgeon at Stirling Royal and Falkirk and District Royal infirmaries. His father, James Innes, of Fochabers in Moray, was a farmhand who enlisted in the Seaforth Highlanders at the age of 16 and rose to the rank of sergeant. His mother was Jessie Tulloch, a domestic servant. In 1912 the regiment was posted to Agra, in India, and Alexander was born en route in Folkestone on 5 April, the day the *Titanic* was sunk. At the outbreak of the First World War James Innes was sent to France, where he was killed in action in 1915 at Neuve Chapelle. Alexander and his mother returned to Nairn, near Inverness, where Alexander lived for the next 15 years, being educated at Rose’s Academy, where he was *dux* in 1929. He also learned to play the clarinet, flute and bagpipes. Assisted by a Kitchener scholarship, Alexander went to medical school in Edinburgh, where he graduated with honours in 1934. He then spent a short time as anatomy demonstrator before going to London to study for the FRCS, working first at the Royal Marsden and later at the Middlesex hospitals. Having passed the FRCS, he went to Leeds. He then volunteered for the RNVR and at the outbreak of the Second World War he was seconded to the Royal Marine Commando. His first active service was in Crete in 1941, when he worked in a forward tented hospital throughout the German airborne attack, and was evacuated to Egypt. In 1942 his unit was sent to the Maldives, where he dealt with an outbreak of typhus, and then on to Burma with Force Viper, working behind enemy lines sabotaging communications and oil depots. Having scuttled their boats, the unit made their way overland to Assam. On returning to the UK in 1943 he married his favourite theatre sister, Nora Louise Jenkinson, whom he had met in Leeds. On his demobilisation in 1946 he returned to Nairn, working as an orthopaedic registrar at Raigmore Hospital, Inverness. He then went on to Glasgow Royal Infirmary, where he worked as a senior registrar. In 1947 he was appointed consultant orthopaedic surgeon to Stirling Royal Infirmary and Falkirk and District Royal Infirmary, where he remained until he retired in 1977. By then he could not walk down the street without being greeted by ex-patients. A modest man with simple interests, he travelled extensively, read widely and was a brilliant conversationalist. He died in Stirling Royal Infirmay on 9 September 2005 at the age of 93, having been predeceased by his wife. He had three children.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000316
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Robertson, Douglas James (1919 - 2005)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-12-19
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/372504372504
Occupation General surgeon
Details Douglas Robertson was a consultant general surgeon at the Royal Hospital, Sheffield. He was born in London in 1919 of Scottish parents. His father, Falconer Robertson, was a banker, and his mother, Jane Mary Duff, was a teacher. Douglas was educated at the Stationers’ Company School. He entered St Bartholomew’s Hospital at the age of 17 in 1936, being interviewed by Sir William Girling Ball. He passed the Primary at the age of 20 and qualified in 1942, winning the gold medal in obstetrics and the Brackenbury prize in surgery. He was invited by Sir James Patterson Ross to be his house surgeon on the professorial unit, but Douglas had already joined the Royal Navy and soon found himself as a surgeon lieutenant on Arctic convoys. Later he was posted to Ceylon with the Fleet Air Arm. He returned to Bart’s in 1946 and at once became interested in the new specialty of vascular surgery. He was appointed second assistant to Sir Edward Tuckwell in 1947 and chief assistant to the surgical unit under Ross in 1950. Having won a travelling fellowship, he took the opportunity to visit the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, Eric Hüsfeldt in Copenhagen and Sir James Learmonth in Edinburgh. He was a Hunterian Professor at the College in 1954. He was finally appointed consultant surgeon to the Royal Hospital, Sheffield in 1955. At the Royal Hospital he continued to practise a wide range of general surgery and to build up a large practice. He was secretary and later president of the Moynihan Club, and was a moving figure in establishing St Luke’s Hospice, under the aegis of Dame Cicely Saunders, the first such hospice to be set up in the provinces. He married Alison Duncombe, née Bateman, a medical social worker and had two daughters, Joanna and Fiona. He was a popular figure, clever, quick-witted, funny, mercurial and very effective. A contemporary recorded that ‘there was never any hurry or worry about his surgery’. He enjoyed driving fast cars, music, reading and walking in the hills of Galloway, where they had a second home. He died on 7 December 2005.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000317
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Turk, John Leslie (1930 - 2006)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-12-19
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/372505372505
Occupation Pathologist
Details John Turk was a former professor of pathology at the Institute of Basic Medical Sciences at the College. He was born on 2 October 1930 in Farnborough, Hampshire, where his father was a solicitor. From Malvern, where he specialised in classics, John went up to Guy’s Hospital to read medicine, qualifying with honours and two gold medals in 1953. He did house jobs at Lewisham, where he met his future wife, Terry, and then did his National Service in the RAMC in Egypt and Cyprus, where he developed his interest in pathology. On demobilisation he was appointed senior lecturer at the Institute of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, working at the Medical Research Council research unit at Mill Hill, going on to be reader at the Institute of Dermatology in the University of London. He was one of the pioneers in clinical and experimental immunology, building on the work of Medawar and Humphreys, and was a founder of the British Society of Immunology. John Turk made important links with deprived and developing nations, where he was able to use his linguistic skills, and became in time an international authority on leprosy. He was appointed Sir William Collins professor of pathology at the Institute of Basic Medical Sciences in our College. The author of many articles, he wrote two classic textbooks, *Delayed hypersensitivity* (Amsterdam, North-Holland Publishing Co., 1967) and *Immunology in clinical medicine* (London, William Heinemann Medical Books, 1969), which became very popular and was translated into many different languages, including Bulgarian and Japanese. In addition he and Sir Reginald Murley edited the collected case books of John Hunter. He was curator of the Hunterian Museum for many years. He was editor of *Clinical and Experimental Immunology* and *Leprosy Review*, was president of the British Society for Immunology and of the section of immunology of the Royal Society of Medicine, and adviser to the World Health Organization on leprosy. His wife Terry was a general practitioner; they had two sons, Simon and Jeremy (a psychiatrist), and three grandchildren. A delightful companion, John Turk was a kind and sensitive man, and a devoted servant of the College, who made him FRCS by election. He suffered from diabetes and died from renal failure and small vessel cerebral disease on 4 June 2006.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000318
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Chapman, Sir John (1773 - 1849)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Raine, John Wellesley Evan (1919 - 2006)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-12-19 2014-12-16
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/372507372507
Occupation General surgeon
Details John Raine, one of New Zealand's most distinguished surgeons, was born on 12 March 1919 in Wellington. His father John was an importer of china and glassware. His mother was Harriet Eva née Cox. John was educated at Scots College, Wellington, where he was *dux* in 1933, winnng the Pattie cup for the best all-rounder in the school. He went on to Victoria University, Wellington, where he won his hockey blue, and then to Otago University to study medicine, qualifying in 1941. He was house surgeon at the Wellington Hospital, before joining the RNZAF in 1943, serving as a flight lieutenant in Guadalcanal and Bougainville. After the war he returned to Wellington, where he was assistant to E H M Luke, before going to Guy's Hospital as a Dominion student registrar under Sammy Wass, Hedley Atkins, Grant Massie and Lord Brock, during which time he attended St Mark's under Gabriel and Naunton Morgan. After passing the FRCS he was resident surgeon at Barnet General Hospital in 1949. In 1950 he returned to Wellington as visiting surgeon and clinical lecturer in surgery, a post he held until he retired in 1980. After retirement he continued as an honorary postgraduate tutor in surgery and director of medical services for the Justice Department for another ten years. His main interests were abdominal and head and neck surgery. At the Royal Australasian College he was elected to council in 1963, served for 12 years on the court of examiners, was vice president for two years from 1972 and president from 1974 to 1975. As president he conferred an honorary FRCS on his friend, Rodney, Lord Smith of Marlow. In the New Zealand branch of the BMA he was honorary general secretary from 1958 to 1963. He married Eleanor Luke in 1943, by whom he had a daughter, Rosalind Frances, who became a doctor in Christchurch, and three sons, one of whom, John Kenneth, became professor of mechanical engineering, the second, Anthony Evan Gerald, a Rhodes scholar, became professor of renal medicine at St Bartholomew's Hospital, but died in 1996. His third son, Christopher Taylor, became a paramedic in St John, Southland. His first wife died in 1978 and he married Patricia Mary Cryer, in 1980. A keen sportsman he achieved two holes in one at golf, continued to ski until he required a knee replacement, played fiercely competitive bridge and was a keen gardener. He died on 12 July 2006.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000320
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Attree, William ( - 1846)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Campbell, George Gunning ( - 1858)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Amdrup, Erik (1923 - 1998)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2007-05-10 2014-08-07
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/372527372527
Occupation Gastroenterological surgeon
Details Erik Amdrup was director of surgical gastro-enterology and professor of surgery at Aarus Kommune Hospital, Denmark. He was born on 21 February 1923. His PhD thesis in 1960 was on the dumping syndrome. Later he developed a method of 'precise antrectomy' to avoid that complication and carried out research into the effect of vagotomy on parietal cell function, work which led to the Arhus county vagotomy trial. This won him international fame, the Novo Nordisk prize in 1977 and the *Scandinavian Journal of Gastroenterology* Prize for 1987. As a supervisor of research he was an unpretentious and highly regarded teacher, and published (together with J F Rehfeld) *Gastrins and the vagus* (London, Academic Press, 1979). In addition he had another career as an author of detective novels, several of which were made into films. Some of his short stories made their way into anthologies alongside Agatha Christie and Dorothy L Sayers. Erik Amdrup died on 22 February 1998, the day after his 75th birthday.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000341
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Challis, Margaret Thornton (1934 - 2005)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Dawson, James (1779 - 1875)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2008-04-03
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/372672372672
Occupation General surgeon
Details At one time was busily engaged in practice in Liverpool, but for the last thirty years of his life lived in Wray Castle, near Ambleside, on Windermere, where he was long gratefully remembered for the ready help he was always willing to give to the poor of the district when in search of sympathy and advice. The least curious of medical men would be dissatisfied till he learned more of one so honourable to his profession - and the more he learned, the more he would wish to know of the Squire of Wray Castle. Perhaps he ventured on a visit of respect only to find a venerable man of ninety years, of dignified appearance, of extreme courtesy, of well-judged liberality, of high culture, and in thorough sympathy with all his neighbours. Neither weather nor the weight of ninety years kept him from visits of charity or courtesy. He died at Wray Castle on Jan 17th, 1875.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000488
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Rideout, John (1784 - 1855)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Knipe, John Augustus (1778 - 1850)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2008-04-03
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/372674372674
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born on Aug 1st, 1778, and entered the service of the HEIC. He was appointed Regimental Mate to the 89th Foot on April 1st, 1797, and a month later, May 1st, became Assistant Surgeon to the same regiment. He was transferred to the 5th Dragoon Guards on Aug 10th, 1799, and was gazetted Surgeon to the 95th Foot on Oct 3rd, 1805, being again transferred to the 15th Dragoons on July 20th, 1809. On May 28th, 1812, he was put on the Staff. He was appointed Deputy Inspector of Hospitals (Brevet) on July 17th, 1817. He retired on half pay on April 25th, 1819, and on Oct 20th, 1826, was gazetted full Deputy Inspector of Hospitals. He had been present at the Battle of Copenhagen, when the forts were bombarded by the English fleet in 1807, and had served in the Peninsular War, in 1809. After his retirement Knipe apparently lived in London, his address in 1843 being the United Service Club. He died on Jan 15th, 1850.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000490
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Kemball, Vero Clarke (1780 - 1853)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Wright, John ( - 1852)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Standert, Hugh Chudleigh (1782 - 1850)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Vellacott, Keith David (1948 - 2007)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2009-02-10
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/372771372771
Occupation General surgeon
Details Keith Vellacott was a consultant surgeon at Royal Gwent Hospital, Newport. He was born in Tavistock, Devon, on 25 February 1948, the son of Douglas Hugh Vellacott, a surgeon and a fellow of the College, and Lorraine Freda Tibbs. From Kelly College, Devon, Keith followed his father and grandfather to the London Hospital, where he qualified in 1972. He was a house surgeon to John Blandy in the urology department at the London, and a house physician in paediatrics. He then became a casualty officer and a demonstrator in anatomy at Bristol Royal Infirmary, where he went on to the senior house officer rotation, from which he passed the FRCS. After a year as registrar in general surgery at Cheltenham, he spent two years in Nottingham, where he worked with Jack Hardcastle on the development of flexible fibreoptic sigmoidoscopy (publishing his results in 1981) and played a major role in the ground-breaking study of screening for carcinoma of the colon, for which he was awarded the Patey prize of the Surgical Research Society in 1980. He returned to Bristol as a senior registrar in 1981. After a period as locum consultant in Gloucester, he was appointed as a consultant surgeon to the Royal Gwent Hospital in Newport in 1986, becoming honorary senior lecturer in surgery there in 1997. By now an expert and accomplished endoscopist, Keith introduced flexible colonoscopy and endoscopic retrograde cholangiography to Newport, as well as laparoscopic cholecystectomy, and continued his work, now on a national basis, in the screening for colorectal cancer. He organised undergraduate teaching and was appointed clinical director. In 1973 Keith married Jinette, a nurse. They had two sons, Darren (who predeceased him) and Guy, and a daughter, Adele. Keith was, like his father, a man of quiet charm and serious demeanour, who was highly respected by his collegues. His hobbies included sailing, badminton, model-making and reading, and he played an active role in the St Woolos Rotary Club. By a strange irony, in 1999 he himself was found to have carcinoma of the colon, and over the next eight years underwent five successive resections, in spite of which he returned with undiminished energy to his work. His outstanding contributions were recognised by the award of the MBE in 2007, but sadly he died in harness, before he could be invested with his insignia.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000588
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Shields, Sir Robert (1930 - 2008)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by N Alan Green
Publication Date 2009-02-10
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/372772372772
Occupation General surgeon
Details Sir Robert Shields enjoyed a distinguished career in surgery and in academic and health service administration. He was professor of surgery and chairman of the department of surgery and honorary consultant to the Royal Liverpool University and Broadgreen hospitals from 1969 to 1996. His unit was internationally respected for its research, teaching and clinical practice. He was born in Paisley on 8 November 1930, the son of Robert Alexander Shields, an electrical engineer, and his wife, Isobel Shields née Reid. Educated at Paisley’s John Neilson School, he studied medicine at Glasgow University. Showing early promise in his clinical training, he passed pathology with distinction and won the Captain H S Rankin VC Memorial, MacLeod and Mary Margaret Isobel Ure prizes in surgery and the Asher-Asher medal in diseases of the ear, nose and throat. Following house appointments at the Western Infirmary in Glasgow, he served his National Service in the RAMC, as regimental medical officer with the First Battalion of the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders in Berlin. There he met (Grace) Marianne Swinburn, a nursing sister at the British Military Hospital, whom he married in 1957. Over the years that followed he retained a Territorial Army connection as a major with the Seventh Battalion of the Argyll’s until 1962, later becoming an honorary colonel to the University of Liverpool Officer Training Corps. Demobilised in 1956, Robert returned to the Western Infirmary as Hall fellow at the University of Glasgow under Sir Charles Illingworth. This was followed by a year in the USA, where he worked as a research fellow to Charles Cooke and Jesse Bollman at the Mayo Clinic. There his research on intestinal absorption formed the basis of his MD (1965), which won the Bellahouston gold medal. For three years, from 1960, he was lecturer in surgery at Glasgow University. In 1963 he followed Sir Patrick Forrest as senior lecturer at the Welsh National School of Medicine in Cardiff, becoming reader in 1969, when he accepted the chair at Liverpool University in the same year. Here he encouraged the development of a transplant unit which opened in 1973 and, with his great friend, Richard McConnell established the country’s first dedicated gastro-intestinal unit that combined both medical and surgical expertise. Robert Shields had great administrative flair. A good listener to all points of view, he was meticulous in preparation of all paper work, in which he displayed military attention to what he called ‘staff work’. He was appointed dean of the Liverpool faculty of medicine in 1982 and in this position paved the way for new chairs in general practice and public health. He was active within the National Health Service at a national level, advising the Secretary of State for Health. He was chairman of a range of advisory and training committees, as well as working for his own local authorities, the Mersey Regional Health Authority and the Royal Liverpool University Hospital Trust. In addition to all his many commitments, he was in demand as an examiner in surgery to the universities of Glasgow, Edinburgh, Dundee, Leicester and Sheffield, as well as many others overseas. Robert Shields held many prestigious offices. He was president of the Surgical Research Society, the Society of Gastroenterology and the Association of Surgeons of Great Britain and Ireland, from which he received the Moynihan medal. After 30 years of ordinary membership, Bob was elected president of the Travelling Surgical Society of Great Britain and Northern Ireland (from 2002 to 2004) and was later made an honorary member. He was chairman of the British Liver Foundation, a member of the Medical Research Council and the General Medical Council, where he served on the education and professional conduct committees. In 1990 he became the first Glaswegian in nearly 500 years to be elected president of the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh. In our College, he was a member of the Court of Examiners and Zachary Cope lecturer in 1992. Shields published nearly 200 original articles and reviews in the field of gastroenterology, particularly liver problems and oesophageal varices and contributed to several textbooks including *Textbook of surgery* (Philadelphia/London, Lippincott, c.1983) and *Gastrointestinal emergencies* (London, W B Saunders) in 1992, as well as serving on the editorial boards of *Gut*, *British Journal of Surgery* and the international editorial board of *Current Practice in Surgery*. He was much sought after as a visiting professor in five continents. For the Travelling Surgical Society of Great Britain and Northern Ireland he gave many short papers at home and abroad. One notable one was delivered at the diamond jubilee meeting of the society in 1984: ‘Musings of a dean’ was a model of clarity and commonsense. He had what Dean Swift called “the true definition of style”, namely the capacity to use “proper words in proper places”. Many academic distinctions came his way, among them the award of doctor of science by the University of Wales in 1990 gave him particular pleasure. He received honorary fellowships of the Royal College of Surgeons of Ireland, the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Glasgow, the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh, the College of Surgeons of Hong Kong, the American College of Surgeons, the College of Surgeons of South Africa, the American Surgical Association, the Association of Surgeons of India and the Academy of Singapore. In retirement, he continued to serve as a government adviser on issues relating to the restructuring of the NHS. In 1996 he reported to the Scottish Office on *Commissioning better health*, in which he recommended that the onus for maintaining a high-quality environment should fall more directly on hospital boards, which should focus on clinical outcomes and monitor clinical practice using data from clinical audit. Robert Shields was a quiet man and had great integrity: his natural reserve hid a determination to get things done. Throughout a busy life he continued to maintain a close interest in research and supported many doctors in their clinical and laboratory work. He was knighted in 1990 and became Deputy Lieutenant of Merseyside in 1991. The Shields’ main home was in the Liverpool, where he enjoyed walking his dog on the Wirral. He and Marianne relaxed in their retreat ‘north of the border’ around Lochgilphead in the west of Scotland, where they sailed and walked in the Argyll countryside. They had two girls and a boy: Jennifer Camm has been NHS regional commissioner for the South West since 2001. The younger daughter is a commissioning manager on the Wirral and Andrew is a director of Avis Europe, based in London and Paris. Sir Robert Shields died at his Liverpool home after a long illness on 3 October 2008 and is survived by Marianne, their three children and their families.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000589
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Hancock, Henry (1809 - 1880)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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/372385372385
Occupation General surgeon Ophthalmic surgeon
Details Born on Aug. 6th, 1809, at Bread Street Hill, the son of a City merchant, his mother being a daughter of Alderman Hamerton. He was educated at Mr Butter's school in Cheyne Walk and at Westminster Hospital, where his ability soon attracted the attention of G. J. Guthrie and Anthony White. He acted as House Surgeon and was appointed Demonstrator of Anatomy in 1835. In 1836 he was elected Lecturer on Anatomy and Physiology at the Charing Cross Medical School after a severe contest with James F. Palmer, the editor of the works of John Hunter. Palmer afterwards went to Australia and became Speaker of the House of Assembly at Melbourne. Hancock was appointed Assistant Surgeon in 1839 to the recently established Charing Cross Hospital, becoming Surgeon in 1840, on the appointment of Richard Partridge as Surgeon to King's College Hospital. This post he retained until 1872, when he resigned and was appointed Consulting Surgeon. He acted as Ophthalmic Surgeon to the hospital during the year 1841. He was one of the founders and chief ornaments of the Medical School attached to the hospital, and made the tradition of a high standard of teaching for which the school became celebrated. He lectured on anatomy and physiology from 1836-1841, and on surgery from 1841-1867. He acted as Dean of the School from 1856-1867. He was also attached to the Royal Westminster Ophthalmic Hospital, which was then next door to the Charing Cross Hospital in King William Street, but has recently been rebuilt in Broad Street, Bloomsbury. As early as 1832 he acted as House Surgeon; about 1840 he was appointed Assistant Surgeon, becoming full Surgeon in 1845, and Consulting Surgeon in 1870. At the Royal College of Surgeons Hancock was a Member of the Council from 1863-1880 and of the Court of Examiners from 1870-1875. He was Chairman of the Midwifery Board in 1871, Vice-President in 1870 and 1871, President in 1872, and Hunterian Orator in 1873. As Arris and Gale Professor in 1866-1867 he lectured on the foot, his attention having been directed to the study of articular diseases by his old master, Anthony White. He was one of those who early took up the subject of conservative surgery and the excision of joints. He introduced into England, and improved, Moreau's method of excision of the ankle-joint, and devised an amputation which, while preserving the back part of the os calcis and upper part of the astragalus, gives, when these are juxtaposed, a mobile and exceedingly valuable stump. He also modified Syme's amputation of the foot by dissecting the heel flap from above downwards, instead of from below upwards. At the Medical Society of London he was Orator in 1842 and President in 1848. He was greatly interested in the welfare of the Epsom Benevolent College, of which he was first Hon. Secretary and afterwards Treasurer. As an oculist he gained a large practice, and followed the tradition of Guthrie. A mode of dividing the ciliary muscle for glaucoma was introduced by him - an operation which has since given place to iridectomy. He was an excellent surgeon and clinical teacher. He was kindly and considerate, of a lovable character, earnest and enthusiastic about his work, and markedly straightforward and attached to duty. He retired into Wiltshire, and died on Jan. 1st, 1880, of cancer of the stomach, at Standen House, Chute, where he was buried, his father, at nearly the same age, having succumbed to that or a similar disease. He married and left a family. A portrait by George Richmond, R. A., is in the possession of the College, and there is a photograph in the Fellows' Album. The College Collection contains a lithograph by Hanhart after a sketch by Maguire made in the spring of 1849. PUBLICATIONS: - Translation of Velpeau's *Regional Anatomy* Tracts on Operation for Disease of the Appendix Caeci (8vo, London, 1848), and on the Male Urethra and Stricture *Lancet*, 1852, i, 187.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000198
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Curling, Thomas Blizard (1811 - 1888)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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/372386372386
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born in Tavistock Place, London, on Jan. 1st, 1811, the son of Daniel Curling, F.S.A., Secretary to the Commissioners of His Majesty's Customs, and Elizabeth, daughter of William Blizard and sister of Sir William Blizard. He was educated at The Manor House, Chiswick, and was afterwards apprenticed to his uncle Sir William Blizard (1743-1835), Surgeon to the London Hospital. During his apprenticeship he was a student at the London Hospital and attended the lectures of Edward Stanley (q.v.) and Sir William Lawrence (q.v.) at St. Bartholomew's Hospital, where Blizard, his master, had himself been educated. Curling began to write before he was qualified, and communicated an article on the cranium to Partington's *Cyclopoedia*, and another, on cases he had observed at the London Hospital, to the Hospital Reports in the *London Medical Gazette*. Sir William Blizard resigned his office of Surgeon to the London Hospital in 1833, James Luke (q.v.) was promoted, and Curling was elected Assistant Surgeon in January 1834, after a severe contest with William Coulson (q.v.). In the same year he gained the Jacksonian Prize at the Royal College of Surgeons for his essay "On Tetanus", which was published in 1836. About a year after his election Curling was required to reside in the immediate neighbourhood of the hospital, and for seven years he occupied a place called 'The Mount', in the Whitechapel Road, a name given, it is said, because of the accumulated rubbish carted there after the Great Fire of London. He devoted much time to surgical pathology whilst acting as Assistant Surgeon, made the post-mortem examinations, and lectured on morbid anatomy. In 1841 he was appointed, in conjunction with James Luke, Lecturer on Surgery at the London Hospital, and in 1849 was appointed Surgeon in the place of John Goldwyer Andrews (q.v.). He was admitted a F.R.S. on June 6th, 1850, and bequeathed at his death the sum of £200 to the Scientific Relief Fund of the Royal Society. Curling was Consulting Surgeon to the Jewish, to the German, and to the Portugese Hosptials: he was also Consulting Surgeon to the London Orphan Asylum and a member of the Medical Board of the Royal Sea-Bathing Hospital at Margate, in the affairs of which he took an active interest. At the Royal Medico-Chirurgical Society he filled the office of Surgical Secretary in 1845-1846 and President in 1871-1872. At the Royal College of Surgeons he was a Member of Council from 1864-1880, a Member of the Court of Examiners from 1871-1879, Chairman of the Midwifery Board in 1872, Vice-President in 1871 and 1872, and President in 1873. He discovered during his long tenure of office in the out-patient room of the London Hospital that the diagnosis and treatment of diseases of the testicle needed revision. He published a paper in 1841, "Some Observations on the Stucture of the Gubernaculum and the Descent of the Testis in the Foetus", and in 1843, *A Practical Treatise on the Diseases of Testicle, Spermatic Cord, and Scrotum. *The book met with a hearty reception, ran through many editions, and was translated into foreign languages, the Chinese version being made by Sir Patrick Manson in 1866. Curling published in 1851 *Observations on the Diseases of the Rectum*, which also had a large sale, and, like "Curling on the Testis", became a standard work. His paper at the Royal Medico-Chirurgical Society seems to have been the first to draw attention to the occurrence of duodenal ulcer after burns of the skin. He died at Cannes on March 4th, 1888. Curling's punctuality at the London Hospital was proverbial; he entered the gates as the clock struck the hour. In the wards he was exact and conscientious to a degree, his strong sense of duty to the patient leading him into the minutest supervision of the dresser's work. His sound judgement was grounded on vast clinical experience; he was consequently opposed to fanciful inductions. "His practice and his teaching were not at variance; both were sound, upright, and just." He was not personally popular, for his manner was cold, yet he was a staunch and sincere friend, whom to know was to trust and to honour. He was punctual in the performance of his duty in a remarkable way. He was not a good speaker, and instructed his pupils rather by what he did than by what he said. They could readily perceive that Curling's treatment of his patients was guided by fixed princicples, and that they could gain from him much valuable information. He was a careful and cautious operator, whose first consideration was a regard for the good of the individual patient. At the College he enjoyed the complete confidence of his colleagues on account of his zeal and the great interest he took in his work. The estimation in which his judgement was held by his contemporaries was shown by the fact that he was appointed five times to the important post of Surgical Referee at the Royal Medico-Chirurgical Society, the last time succeeding the period of his Presidency. Curling was a man of commanding stature. There is an engraving of him from a daguerrotype in the *Medical Circular*, a photograph in the Fellows' Album, and another in *Photographs of Eminent Medical Men* (Barker and Edwards, 1867, i), and there is an engraving in the possession of the London Hospital. In later life he is described as a gentleman, tall, erect with white hair, pale complexion, and an inheritor of the large nose which marked the Blizard family.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000199
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Brooke, Charles (1804 - 1879)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2010-05-13
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/373157373157
Occupation General surgeon
Details Son of the well-known mineralogist Henry James Brooke; was born June 30th, 1804. He was educated at Chiswick under Dr Turner and at Rugby, where he entered in 1819. He matriculated from St John’s College, Cambridge, and graduated BA in 1827 as 23rd Wrangler. He completed his medical education at St Bartholomew’s Hospital, and lectured on surgery for a short time at Dermott’s School. He acted as Surgeon to the Metropolitan Free Hospital and to Westminster Hospital, resigning the latter post in 1869. He was an advocate of the ‘bead suture’ for bringing together the deeper parts of operation wounds and thus minimizing the tension which was a troublesome and painful condition when all wounds healed by third intention. On March 4th, 1847, he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in recognition of his mathematical and experimental work in connection with physics. Between 1846 and 1852 he published papers on his invention of the self-recording instruments which were adopted at the Royal Observatories of Greenwich, Paris, and other meteorological stations. They consisted of barometers, thermometers, psychrometers, and magnetometers, which registered photographically – inventions which gained for him a premium offered by the Government as well as a council medal from the jurors of the Great Exhibition of 1851. Brooke also studied the theory of the microscope, and invented improved means of shifting the lenses and bettering the illumination. He served as President of the Meteorological and of the Royal Microscopical Societies, and was a very active member of the Victoria Institute and Christian Medical Society. As a surgeon his work was negligible. He died at Weymouth on May 17th, 1879, leaving a widow, who died at 3 Gordon Square, London, on February 12th, 1885, aged 86. Publications: In addition to his scientific papers mentioned above Brooke also wrote:- *Synopsis of Pure Mathematics*, 1829. *The Evidence afforded by the Order and Adaptations in Nature to the Existence of a God*, London, 1872. He edited the 4th edition of Dr Golding Bird’s *Elements of Natural Philosophy* in 1854, and entirely rewrote the work when it appeared as a 6th edition in 1867.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000974
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Brookes, Andrew Good (1814 - 1894)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Brookes, William Penny (1809 - 1895)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2010-05-13
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/373159373159
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born in August, 1809, the son of a medical practitioner in Much Wenlock, Shropshire. He was educated at various schools in the county, and was then apprenticed to Dr Barnett, of Stourport. He became a student at Guy’s and St Thomas’s Hospitals in 1827, but soon afterwards went to Paris, where he studied under Dupuytren, Chopart, and Laennec. He is said to have graduated in Paris and at Padua. During his residence in the French capital the revolution of 1830 broke out, and the lives of English dwellers in Paris were in especial danger; a fellow-student was in fact shot whilst sitting at his window. Brookes succeeded to his father’s practice in Much Wenlock, the latter having died in 1830. He passed his life in his native town, and did not retire till 1891, when he was presented by his friends and admirers with an illuminated address and pieces of plate. Brookes was in many respects a remarkable man of wide influence. He was an active philanthropist, devoting his talents to the public service. When he first came into his practice Much Wenlock was a small insanitary place of less than 500 houses, but owing to Brookes’s endeavours an open sewer in the main street was covered over, gas lighting was introduced, a library and reading-room were added; here Brookes obtained for exhibition the ancient deeds of Much Wenlock Abbey, and a large collection of coins and local antiquities. He was an accomplished Latinist and Hebraist, and a diligent reader, and so convinced of the value of athletics in education that he took a leading part in the movement which resulted in the institution of the National Olympian Association in 1850. This was the germ of the International Olympian Society of Paris, which has held contests in Athens, Paris, and London within recent years. In the middle years of the nineteenth century Brookes was an ardent advocate of reform in the Royal College of Surgeons, and wrote much on the subject in the *Lancet*. He died at Much Wenlock on December 10th, 1895.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000976
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Brookes, William Philpot (1819 - 1865)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Brookhouse, Joseph Orpe (1835 - 1905)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2010-05-13
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/373161373161
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born at Brighton, being descended on his father’s side from a Staffordshire family, while on his mother’s he derived from the Halfords of Leicestershire. He was educated at Ashby-de-la-Zouche Grammar School and received his professional training at Guy’s Hospital. Two years after qualifying he settled in Nottingham (1859) in partnership with John Norton Thompson, MRCS. Later he succeeded to the practice of Dr (afterwards Sir) William Tindal Robertson, MP, and was appointed Physician to the Nottingham General Hospital. He was one of the founders of the Nottingham and Midland Eye Infirmary, and was for some years its Surgeon. He was Senior Physician to the Nottingham General Hospital at the time of his death, and was Chairman of the Medical Committee as well as Physician to the Sherwood Forest Sanatorium for Consumption, and Consulting Medical Officer to the Midland and Great Northern Railways. His duties in connection with these appointments often led to his appearance in courts of law, where his clear, fearless, and straightforward evidence was of the greatest value. His long experience of railway compensation cases made his opinion particularly valuable and supplied him with an almost inexhaustible fund of anecdote. At the meeting of the British Medical Association at Nottingham in 1892 he presided over the Section of Pharmacology and Therapeutics. He was a successful medical practitioner with simple unconventional methods, which inspired confidence. He also loved music and pictures and was in touch with the intellectual and social life of his day. His death occurred at Nottingham on October 27th, 1905. He practised at 1 East Circus Street, Nottingham. Publications:— “Obstruction of Bowel by Large Intestinal Concretion (consisting mainly of Cholesterin): Enterotomy. Death.” – *Lancet*, 1882, ii, 216. “On Defective Nerve Power as a Cause of Bright’s Disease.” – *Brit. Med. Jour.*, 1876, i, 473. “Address to Therapeutic Section of the British Medical Association, Nottingham.” – *Ibid.*, 1892, ii, 250.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000978
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Brooks, James Henry (1807 - 1886)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Broughton, Francis (1817 - 1882)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Brown, Arthur Thomas F. (1865 - 1893)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2010-05-13 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/373164373164
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born on January 12th, 1865, and was educated at Guy's Hospital, where he was House Surgeon and Resident Accoucheur. He entered the Madras Army as Surgeon on July 28th, 1891, and resigned on account of ill health on July 29th, 1892, when he held the rank of Surgeon Captain, a designation introduced in November, 1891. He died on August 29th, 1893. (In the Fellows' *Register* he appears as Arthur Thomas Brown.)
Resource Identifier RCS: E000981
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Brown, Frederick James (1824 - 1879)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2010-05-13
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/373165373165
Occupation General surgeon
Details Fifth son of Dr Robert Brown, who was for many years Medical Superintendent of the Quarantine Station at Stangate Creek. He received his professional training at University College and the University of Edinburgh, and joined the Navy in 1846. He entered into the strong movement then on foot for the removal of the disadvantages under which the Medical Department of the Service was labouring, and in order the more fully to carry out his views left the Navy, where he had been Assistant Surgeon at Haslar, etc., and began to practise at Chatham, whence he removed to Rochester, where he was appointed Consulting Surgeon to St Bartholomew’s Hospital, Rochester, a post which he held until March, 1878. He died on April 27th, 1879. At the time of his death he was a Fellow of University College, London, and a Non-resident Member of the Epidemiological Society. His photograph is in the Fellows’ Album. Publications:- “Questions and Observations in Hygiene,” 1849. Paper on “Typhoid Fever” at the Epidemiological Society, 1855. Paper on “Xiphisternal Chisel-sound” at the London Medical Society, 1856. Two controversial pamphlets of importance, which are: “Requisitions of the Naval Medical Officers, based on the Principle of Equality with the Army,” 8vo, London, 1865. “Comments on the Recommendations of the Committee appointed to Inquire into the Position of the Medical Officers of the Army and Navy,” 8vo, London, 1866.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000982
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Champney, George ( - 1861)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2008-05-01 2013-08-07
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/372685372685
Occupation General surgeon
Details Educated at St George's Hospital, where he was entered as a six-months pupil to Everard Home in October, 1805. He practised at York, and died in or before 1861.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000501
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Ainsworth, James (1783 - 1853)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2008-05-01
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/372686372686
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born in Manchester, March 5th, 1783, the son of Jeremiah Ainsworth, an accomplished scholar and well-known mathematician, who may be regarded as founder of a Lancashire school of mathematicians, and to whom many references will be found in *Notes and Queries*, 1853, viii, 541. The family of Ainsworth, an ancient one in Lancashire, was originally seated in the township of that name. Their arms are still visible over an archway in Plessington Hall, and by their alliances they acquired feudal estates in the county. Several interesting Ainsworths are mentioned in the *Dictionary of National Biography*. Henry Ainsworth, traveller and hebraist, was born at Plessington in 1560. Another learned ancestor was Robert Ainsworth, FAS, author of the standard Latin Dictionary, first published in 1736. Young James Ainsworth, who is one of the earliest born of the Fellows, carried his weight of hereditary linguistic faculty to the Free Grammar School, Manchester, and studied under Mr Lawson, head master, whose colleagues were Messrs Durbey, Pedley, and Holt. On leaving school he became a private pupil of the eccentric but able Rev Joshua Brookes, who was the son of a crippled shoemaker and of whom many delightful stories were told. In 1798, when only 15 years old, Ainsworth became an apprenticed pupil at the Manchester Infirmary, it being stipulated in his indentures that he should be allowed part of each day to go and take his lessons. Thus he studied the Latin classics and acquired a life-long taste for reading. After serving his apprenticeship he was for a short time Clerk at the Infirmary and acted as House Apothecary for nearly a year, during which an epidemic of fever raged and he almost died of the complaint. Some eminent surgeons were then at the Infirmary, such as Charles White and Benjamin Gibson, the oculist, to whose only child Ainsworth was afterwards guardian. From Manchester he went to Edinburgh, and at the University was the intimate friend of Henry Peter Brougham, afterwards Lord Brougham. When he had finished his training he was already a man of recognized ability, and was invited to enter into partnership with Thomas Henry, maker of calcined magnesia and other valuable chemical preparations. In 1806, at the early age of 23, he was elected Surgeon to the Manchester Infirmary, and held office until 1847, when he became Consulting Surgeon. He was also at one time Consulting Surgeon to the Workhouse. There appears to be some doubt as to who first started the medical schools of Manchester. Ainsworth is stated to have been the first to commence anatomical lectures in Manchester, which he began in conjunction with John Atkinson Ransome (q.v.), and he may therefore be regarded as the originator of what has since become the Royal School of Medicine and Surgery, Pine Street. It is worthy of notice, as one of the ‘small beginnings’, that Ainsworth converted the hay-loft over his stable into a lecture theatre. He was most indefatigable and enthusiastic in the pursuit of professional knowledge, and an exceedingly skilful manipulator. Some of his preparations, we are assured, are not to be surpassed, even at the present time. As an instance, we may mention an injected preparation of a large mastiff dog in which all the principal arteries of the body (with the sole exception of the aorta) had been successfully secured by ligature, without destroying the animal’s life. Ainsworth was, indeed, regarded as one of the ablest operators of his day in Manchester. He was among the founders of the Manchester Natural History Society, and of the Botanical and Horticultural Society, and always took a great interest in their progress and in the museum and gardens. In January, 1805, he became a member of the Manchester Literary and Philosophical Society, and at the time of his death nearly half a century later was one of its two oldest surviving members. “In conjunction with the late Mr Thomas Fleming and others, he was one of the revivers of an old Manchester club, which in its days was famous, under the appellation of ‘John Shaw’s’, from the name of the landlord, who is said to have enforced early hours upon his guests by the cracking of a large horsewhip at a fixed time. This club, which still exists, may be regarded as the only link between the social and convivial institutions of ‘Old Manchester’ and those of the present day.” Ainsworth was most hospitable and his large charity was scrupulously unostentatious, and “indeed carefully kept from the knowledge of the world”. He died at his residence, Cliff Point, Lower Broughton, Manchester, on Friday, Oct 28th, 1853, leaving a widow and one son, Dr Ralph Ainsworth. There is a portrait at the Royal Infirmary painted by George Withington. PUBLICATION:- *Syllabus of a Course of Lectures on Anatomy and Physiology*. Conjointly with J A RANSOME. Manchester, 1812.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000502
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Bindley, Samuel Allen (1810 - 1877)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2010-03-04
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/373061373061
Occupation General surgeon
Details Received his medical education in Birmingham and at Westminster Hospital. Was for several years House Surgeon at the General Hospital, Birmingham, where he established a reputation as a sound thinker, a good practical surgeon, and one of the ablest and most respected practitioners of Birmingham. Later he was elected Hon Surgeon of the General Dispensary, and both there and in private practice he did much good for the general public. He was for many years one of the Treasurers of the Birmingham Benevolent Society, in which he took an active interest. He was also at one time President of the Midland Medical Society. He died at Edgbaston in March, 1877.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000878
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Erichsen, Sir John Eric (1818 - 1896)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-03-08 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/372393372393
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born at Copenhagen on July 19th, 1818, the eldest son of Eric Erichsen, banker at Copenhagen by his wife, who belonged to the Govett family of Somerset. The Erichsens are a well-known Danish family and the 'Palais Erichsen' in Copenhagen perpetuates the name. Eric Erichsen received his early education at the Mansion House School, Hammersmith, and studied medicine first at University College, London, where he was a pupil of Robert Liston (q.v.), and afterwards in Paris, where Amussat invited him to witness his first colotomy. He then returned to London and served as House Surgeon at University College Hospital. He bought on July 9th, 1843, a half-share in the lectureship on anatomy at the Westminster Hospital Medical School, his colleague being Dr. Robert Hunter, of Glasgow, who had paid £100 for the post in 1841. The lectures, which dealt with physiology as well as with anatomy, were given conjointly until 1846, when Erichsen bought out Hunter. The result was unsuccessful financially, as the Westminster authorities obtained the premises by compulsory purchase for city improvements and the school was discontinued from October, 1847, till 1849. In 1844 he acted as Secretary of the Physiological Section of the British Association for the Advancement of Science, and was afterwards appointed a member of a small committee to undertake an experimental inquiry into the mechanism and effects of asphyxia and to suggest methods for its prevention and cure. He drew up a report published in 1845 under the title "An Essay on Asphyxia", and was rewarded, on the recommendation of Sir Benjamin Brodie, by the Royal Humane Society with its Fothergillian Gold Medal. Erichsen was appointed Assistant Surgeon to University College Hospital in 1848 in succession to John Phillips Potter (q.v.), the promising young surgeon who died of pyæmia contracted in dissecting a pelvis for Robert Liston, whose House Surgeon he had been. John Marshall (q.v.) was elected Assistant Surgeon on the same day to a vacancy arising by Syme's return to Edinburgh disgusted with life in London. Moncrieff Arnott succeeded Syme but quickly resigned, and in 1850 Erichsen became full Surgeon to the hospital at the age of 32. The appointment carried with it the Chair of Surgery at University College. Erichsen resigned the professorship on his becoming Holme Professor of Clinical Surgery in 1866. The office of Surgeon he retained until 1875, when he was elected Consulting Surgeon. At the College of Surgeons he served as a member of the Council from 1869-1885, a member of the Court of Examiners from 1875-1879, Vice-President 1878-1879, and President in 1880. He was a busy reformer at first in College politics, but later he opposed the democratic demands of the Members on the ground that the Fellows, as an aristocracy of intellect, should have a monopoly of the College franchise. He put forward this view in a pamphlet, but it was on his motion that the first meeting of the Fellows and Members was called in 1870. Erichsen was President of the Royal Medico-Chirurgical Society from 1879-1881, and in 1881 he was President of the Surgical Section at the meeting in London of the International Medical Congress. As a Liberal he contested unsuccessfully in 1885 the parliamentary representation of the United Universities of Edinburgh and St. Andrews. He was elected F.R.S. in 1876, and the honorary degree of LL.D. was conferred upon him by the University of Edinburgh in 1884. The Royal University of Ireland elected him an honorary M.Ch. in 1887 and in the same year he was made an honorary F.R.C.S.I. In 1887 he was appointed the first Inspector under the Vivisection Act (39 & 40 Vic., c. 77), and in the same year he was appointed Surgeon Extraordinary to the Queen. He was created a baronet in January, 1895 - but the honour which he chiefly prized was his election in 1887 to the important and dignified post of President of the Council of University College, an office he held until his death. He married in 1842 Mary Elizabeth, the eldest daughter of Captain Thomas Cole, R.N.; she died in 1893. There were no children. He died at Folkestone on Sept. 23rd, 1896, and was buried in Hampstead Cemetery. As a surgeon Sir John Erichsen's reputation was world-wide. His strong faculty was his sound judgement ripened by a vast experience which gave him an almost unrivalled clinical insight. There was no man in the profession whose opinion in a difficult case was more justly held to be of great weight. He was especially interested in the results of railway accidents, and wrote a treatise on Concussion of the Spine which caused him to be a principal witness in cases brought against railway companies at a time when less was known about malingering and obscure nervous conditions than at present. He had, in his earlier days at least, no English superior as a clinical teacher. Lord Lister, Sir Henry Thompson, and Marcus Beck were amongst his house surgeons, and he may be looked upon as one of the makers of modern surgery. As a man he possessed a most attractive character. He was honourable and candid in all the relations of life, a generous friend, a gentleman in every sense of the word, of peculiar affability and courtliness of manner. Richard Quain had long refused to speak to him on the ground that he, although senior, had been passed over in favour of Erichsen, a junior, in the appointment to the Chair of Surgery at University College, but Sir John Erichsen's patience and conduct at length convinced Quain of the injustice of his attitude, To everyone's surprise the two men one day entered the hospital arm-in-arm. He was very successful in his profession and he owed much of this to a happy combination of good qualities. His work occupied a high place in surgical literature, and he was always ready to accept the surgical advances of younger men. He was a distinguished teacher in a school where many distinguished surgeons had preceded him. If he did not strike out any new path in the field of surgery, he possessed a sound judgement enlightened by a long experience, had much administrative talent, a wise eloquence, dignity of presence, and elevation of view. A bust by Hamo Thornycroft, R.A., presented to Erichsen on his retirement from the hospital stands in the Museum of University College. A replica is in the hall of the Royal College of Surgeons. It is a good likeness. He appears in Brookes's portrait group of the Council of the Royal College of Surgeons and there is a lithograph portrait dated 1853 by Hullmandel and Walton after Baugnut. PUBLICATIONS: - Erichsen wrote a widely read and very excellent text-book on *The Science and Art of Surgery*. The 1st edition was published in 1853 in one volume of 950 pages with 250 illustrations. The 5th edition was issued in 1869 in two volumes. The 8th and 9th editions were edited by MARCUS BECK (q.v.), who brought it up to date as regards Listerian surgery; the 10th edition appeared under the supervision of RAYMOND JOHNSON. Editions from the 2nd London edition were published by Blanchard & Lea, of Philadelphia, in 1859, and again in 1860, and a copy was issued by the American Government to every medical officer in the Federal Army during the American Civil War. *The Science and Art of Surgery* was translated into German by Dr. Thudicum, of Halle; into Italian by Dr. Longhi, of Milan; and into Spanish by Drs. Benavente and Ribera. Parts of it also appeared in Chinese.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000206
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

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

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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 Davies, William Hugh (1923 - 2008)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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 Beaman, George (1803 - 1874)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2009-12-11
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/372976372976
Occupation General surgeon
Details Apprenticed to Peter Holland, of Knutsford, Cheshire, the father of Sir Henry Holland, and became a student at Guy’s and St Thomas’s Hospitals, where he attracted the attention of Astley Cooper. Subsequently he acted as Demonstrator of Anatomy under Grainger at the Webb Street School. He then joined in partnership with Thomas Ansaldo Hewson, practising at 8 Henrietta Street, Covent Garden, later at 32 King Street, and acquired a lucrative practice, which reached £3000 to £4000 a year. Unfortunately, during the railway mania he speculated and became involved in a large debt which was only cleared off a few months before his death. There were then living in the neighbourhood many rich traders as well as visitors to the chief London hotels of the time. This brought Beaman in contact with consultants, Sir Astley Cooper, Frederick Tyrell, Sir Charles Clark, and others, about whom he had many anecdotes. As Medical Officer to the Strand Union and to the Parish of St Paul, Covent Garden, he was called upon to examine the body of an Italian boy, Carlo Ferrier, brought to the dissecting room of King’s College for Richard Partridge (qv), the Lecturer on Anatomy. The teeth had all been extracted after death and over the left eyebrow there was a wound penetrating to the bone without fracturing the skull. But the real injury was not apparent until after exposure of the back of the neck, when a quantity of extravasated blood was found superficial to the spinal column, with coagulated blood in the spinal canal, whilst the bones of the spine were uninjured. The boy had been killed by blows on the back of the neck by Bishop, Williams, and May, the resurrectionists, on Nov 5th, 1831. Beaman and Richard Partridge were the principal witnesses at the Old Bailey trial on Dec 2nd. In later life he was much engaged in official duties as Medical Officer to the South Western Railway from its commencement, and as Medical Adviser to the Board of Inland Revenue. He was also active with Thomas Wakley, senr, in founding the new Equitable Insurance Company, of which he became Chairman. On a visit to Paris he watched Civiale perform lithotrity and became strongly opposed to the operation as rough and inefficient. One of his patients was operated upon by Heurteloup for calculus by lithotomy and survived Beaman. One of his children suffered from epilepsy, and he was hopeful that he had almost discovered the remedy. In his book *Epilepsy and its Cure*, 1868, 4th edition, 1872, his enthusiasm led him to overrate the power of the means he employed, principally bromide of potassium. He rightly discountenanced the prevalent enfeebling measures, blood-letting, purging, blistering, and insertion of setons. His health was failing for two years before his death in 1874.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000793
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Beard, Francis Carr (1815 - 1893)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Crouch, John (1810 - 1872)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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/373529373529
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born at North Stoneham, near Southampton, and was educated at Hyde Abbey School, Winchester. He was apprenticed to W G Wickham of that city, and finished his professional education at St Thomas's and Guy's Hospitals and at King's College, London. He became House Surgeon at Winchester Hospital, and later settled at Bruton, Somersetshire, where he married, became Surgeon to the Hospital, and acquired a large practice. Here he greatly distinguished himself as one of the early and successful ovariotomists at a time when ovariotomy was regarded with apprehension. He had the credit of recording an early case of pregnancy and parturition in a patient from whom a diseased ovary had been removed. From Bruton he went to Mitcham in order to enlarge the sphere of his experience. Here, however, he was crippled by an insidious disease of the spinal cord, against which he fought with signal courage, continuing his custom of visiting the obstetrical and gynaelogical departments of hospitals as soon as he felt at all better. At the same time he resumed his writing for the medical press, but his sufferings increased, and after a painful period he died at Chippenham, Wiltshire, on April 18th, 1872. The *Lancet* is of opinion that a career of great usefulness and ability was thus cut short. Publications:- He was author of various papers on his special subject. These include: "A Successful Case of Ovariotomy by a Large Abdominal Section." - *Lond. Med. Gaz*, 1849, N.S. ix, 366. "On Ovariotomy, with a Table of all the Cases recorded in England previous to 1849." - *Prov. Med. and Surg. Jour.*, xiii, 622. "A Successful Case of Parturition in a Patient who had previously undergone Ovariotomy by a large Incision." - *Med. Times and Gaz.*, ii, 597. Various papers on ovariotomy in *Lancet* (1854-1859) and *Assoc. Jour.* (1854).
Resource Identifier RCS: E001346
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

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

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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 Chalmers, Albert John (1870 - 1920)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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/373297373297
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born at Manchester, the son of the Rev James Chalmers, MA. He was educated at the Manchester Grammar School, then at the Liverpool and University of London Colleges and Hospitals. After obtaining various exhibitions and medals in the earlier subjects, he gained honours in medicine and surgery at the MB in 1890; he obtained the Gold Medal at the MD of the Victoria University in 1893 with a Thesis, "Development of the Liver and Septum Transversum". He also held the following posts: Holt Tutorial Scholar; Demonstrator of Anatomy, Owens College; House Surgeon, Cancer Hospital, London; Assistant Medical Officer, Willson Green Asylum, Birmingham; Surgical Tutor and Pathologist, Royal Southern Hospital, Liverpool. After becoming FRCS in 1895, he joined the West African Medical Service and served on the Gold Coast from 1897-1901. In the Ashanti War of 1900 he was one of the garrison that fought its way out of Coomassie; he was mentioned in despatches and received the medal and clasp. In 1901 he was appointed Registrar of the Ceylon Medical College at Colombo, where during the following ten years he improved the organization and raised the standard of teaching, meanwhile lecturing on pathology and animal parasitology. In 1910 he joined Dr Aldo Castellani as joint-editor of their *Manual of Tropical Medicine* (the 3rd edition of 2500 pages was published in 1919), a standard text-book of permanent value. He served as Major in the Ceylon Medical Corps, and was a member of the Ceylon Coronation Contingent in 1911, for which he received the Coronation Medal. After resigning the appointment he travelled, and studied pellagra in conjunction with Dr Sambon, and he was one of the first to recognize the occasional occurrence of the disease in this country. In 1913 he became Director of the Wellcome Tropical Research Laboratory at Khartoum, and was the author, wholly or in part, of a series of publications on tropical disease. At the same time he was a member of the Central Sanitary Board of the Sudan, of the Sleeping Sickness Commission, and of the Archaeological Committee. During a holiday round the world he was including the study of tropical disease, when he was seized at Calcutta with acute infective jaundice, and died after a week's illness in the General Hospital on April 5th, 1920. He married the daughter of Edwin Cannington, JP, but there were no children. Chalmers collected some 1800 volumes, consisting partly of rare old books, including a 1478 Celsus, and partly of books on tropical medicine. The library was presented by his widow in June, 1922, to the Royal Society of Medicine. The books were arranged in a special room, named the Chalmers Library, and supplied with a special catalogue. The catalogue includes the numerous publications made by him, or in collaboration with others.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001114
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

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

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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/373000373000
Occupation General surgeon
Details Son of Robert Benfield, surgeon; was educated privately and at Hackney Grammar School when Archdeacon Edward Churton was Headmaster. He was then articled to Frederick Carpenter Skey (qv) and entered St Bartholomew’s Hospital Medical School, where he distinguished himself, attracting the favourable notice of Sir George Burrows, J Painter Vincent, and Sir James Paget. After qualifying he became assistant to John Nedham (qv), at Leicester, and married his daughter. In 1850 he and his father-in-law entered into partnership in a large general practice, to which Benfield succeeded on the death of the latter. Appointed Surgeon to the Leicester Infirmary in 1857, he proved a skilful operator, being remarkably successful as a lithotomist. He retired in 1880 and was appointed Consulting Surgeon to the Leicester and Rutland County Lunatic Asylum. He had also been Surgeon to the Leicester Dispensary. He was President of the Midland Branch of the British Medical Association in 1869-1870. Latterly, owing to failing health, he gave up much of his work and took into partnership Dr Herbert Cecil Moore. He died after a long illness involving painful vesical complications, on January 16th, 1890, at his residence in Friar Lane, Leicester. Benfield was gentle, modest, and retiring. He had ready tact in emergency and a singular faculty of obtaining and retaining the esteem and confidence of his colleagues and patients. He always strove to sustain the dignity of his profession, and all good and benevolent work found in him a ready supporter. A Conservative in politics, and in religion a High Churchman, those who most differed from him could live under his roof above all distinctions of politics and of creed. His portrait is in the Fellows’ Album.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000817
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Cooper, Sir Henry (1807 - 1891)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Farrar, Derek Adrian Trickett (1921 - 2007)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2010-04-28
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/373112373112
Occupation ENT surgeon
Details Derek Farrar was one of the few who brought ENT surgery to Tasmania. He was born in Southsea, England, on 27 December 1921, the son of a naval officer. He was educated in Hong Kong and Plymouth, before going to St Bartholomew’s Hospital to study medicine. After graduating, he did six months as an orthopaedic house surgeon at Bart’s, before joining the RNVR, where he served mainly on the destroyers Velox, Meteor (on Russian convoys, for which he was mentioned in despatches) and Sole Bay. After the war, he returned to Bart’s as a demonstrator of anatomy and was then in Birmingham under Sir Solly Zuckerman. He then did general and thoracic surgical jobs and was a casualty officer and deputy resident surgical officer at Queen Mary’s Hospital in the East End, where he was influenced by Alan Small. Having passed the final FRCS, he returned to Bart’s as a registrar to Rupert Corbett, Alec Badenoch and Geoffrey Keynes. After another year as a registrar in Halifax, he decided to specialise in ENT at the Royal Free, Hampstead General and Elizabeth Garrett Anderson hospitals, and then returned to Bart’s as a senior registrar to Capps, Jory and Cecil Hogg. In 1956 he emigrated to Tasmania to join the private ENT practice of Mills Bates in Launceston, and became an honorary ENT surgeon to Launceston Hospital, later moving to Hobart, where he worked at the Royal Hobart and Repatriation hospitals, and served in the Hobart and Launceston branches of the Peter MacCallum clinic. He was an enthusiastic teacher of medical students and registrars and published on otological subjects. Derek was an enthusiastic sailor. He was commodore of the Cruising Yacht Club of Tasmania and was a co-author of D’Entrecasteaux waterways, a book of maps and local guidance for cruising yachts. After he retired he continued to sail, usually to northern Queensland, until 1997, when his yacht sank under him, probably due to hitting a submerged container. He died of pneumonia on 14 February 2007 leaving his widow Rhonwen and two sons, Alan and Nigel.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000929
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Busby, Eileen Rosemary (1930 - )

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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/373311373311
Occupation General surgeon
Details Eileen Busby was an associate specialist at the Royal Marsden Hospital, London. Born in Clapton, London, on 5 December 1930, she was the daughter of William Francis Busby, a house painter and decorator, and Rose Harriet née Stephenson, a dressmaker. Eileen was educated at various schools during the Second World War, before entering Tiffin Girls' School, Kingston-upon-Thames, where she excelled, ending as head girl. She then went on to Bedford College, London, to read zoology and botany, and did her medical education at Charing Cross Hospital. There she gained prizes in anatomy, physiology, pathology, surgery, orthopaedics and applied pharmacology and therapeutics. She qualified with the Llewellyn certificate of merit. After serving as a house physician, house surgeon and casualty officer, she became an anatomy demonstrator and a research assistant in physiology at Charing Cross. In 1957 she went to the Royal National Orthopaedic Hospital as a senior house officer for a year. For the next three years she held posts at Ealing, Bromley, East Ham Memorial and St George's hospitals. In 1964 she began her training in radiotherapy as a registrar at the Royal Marsden Hospital, becoming a senior registrar in 1967 and finally a medical assistant and associate specialist in 1969, a post which she retained until 1994. She published extensively on experimental carcinogenesis in the mouse bladder, and on tumours of the head and neck. Eileen never married. Her many outside interests included knitting, needlework, music and gardening.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001128
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Claremont, Hetty Ethelberta (1892 - 1924)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-05-26
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/373361373361
Occupation General surgeon
Details The daughter of A W Claremont, JP. Her grandfather and many of her relations were members of the medical profession. She was educated at King Alfred School, Hampstead, and received her professional training at the London School of Medicine for Women, the Royal Free Hospital, and St George's Hospital. On becoming a medical student at the former institution "her extremely youthful appearance" evoked comment, but her independence of thought, concentration, and great perseverance soon gained the respect of all who could appreciate a character set on achievement and inspired by the tradition of her family. She worked so well that she became FRCS at the age of 27. At St George's Hospital she won the John Hunter Gold Medal, and held a number of appointments, viz, those of Surgical Registrar, Resident Anaesthetist, House Surgeon, House Physician, Assistant Curator of the Museum, Casualty Officer, and Clinical Assistant in the Venereal Diseases Department. She had come to St George's during the war period, when the staff was much depleted. Sir Humphry Rolleston, writing of her work at the Hospital Museum, says that he came to respect "her high ideals and practical efficiency", and both he and Mrs Scharlieb bore witness to the keenness of her intellect and her personal charm. From St George's she went in 1920 to Zurich, where she spent a year as voluntary Resident Assistant Surgeon at the University Clinic, and she also visited the clinics at Vienna, Budapest, Frankfurt, and Madrid. On her return to England she became Surgical Registrar to the London Temperance Hospital, Surgeon to the Bermondsey Medical Mission Hospital, and Clinical Assistant to the Out-patient Department of the South London Hospital for Women, as well as, temporarily, to the Female Lock Hospital. As a surgeon Miss Claremont showed outstanding abilities and perseverance. Her skill as a diagnostician was great, but even more remarkable was her discernment of human nature. She was deeply concerned with the welfare of her patients, in whom she took a lasting interest. At the time of her sudden illness she was developing some original research work which will now be lost to medicine. Miss Claremont had more than average linguistic ability. She was athletic, possessing an exceptional physique and some experience of mountain-climbing. She could walk twenty miles a day. Her hobbies included carpentry, gardening, and music. At the time of her death she was in private practice as a consulting surgeon at 31 Devonshire Place, W. She died of typhoid fever on March 27th, 1924, the first to die among the women Fellows. Publications: "Shortening of Post-operative Convalescence." - *Lancet*, 1922, i, 427. "Inverted Pylorus obstructing Gastro-jejunostomy Aperture" (with J McClure). - *Ibid*., 1923, i, 750. "Case of Mycosis Fungoides." - *Proc. Roy. Soc. Med.*, 1913.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001178
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Clark, Andrew (1847 - 1913)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-05-26
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/373362373362
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born in Gloucester Terrace on June 1st, 1847, the only child of Benjamin Clark. His parents died when he was young and he was brought up by his grandfather, Andrew Clark, of Greenford Place, near Harrow. He was educated at Brighton College and afterwards at University College School. He entered the medical school attached to the hospital in 1864, was chosen House Surgeon in 1870, and Resident Physician's Assistant or House Physician for the last six months of that year. He was elected Assistant Surgeon to the Middlesex Hospital in 1871 before he had obtained the diploma of FRCS. He served for two years in the out-patient room and acted as Surgical Registrar. In 1875 he was appointed Surgeon to the Ear and Throat Department, being the first to hold the office, and in the same year became Dean of the Medical School, and in this position proved most successful. He resigned in 1887. He lectured on Practical Surgery jointly with Sir Henry Morris (qv) in 1880, and two years later he began to teach the operative surgery classes. He became fourth Surgeon in 1887 and was placed in charge of the Cancer Department of the Hospital, becoming full Surgeon in 1895. He was a good dogmatic teacher of surgery, on the practical rather than on the scientific side. He operated rapidly and obtained good results, though he did not follow Lister's methods. Clark rendered very valuable services to the British Medical Association and served on nearly all its Committees. He represented the Metropolitan Counties Branch on the Central Council from 1892-1899, was Treasurer from 1899-1902, Chairman of Council from 1902-1905, and a General Secretary at the London Meeting in 1895. The British Medical Association recognized his services by awarding him a gold medal in 1905 for distinguished merit. He was also a valued Member of the Council of Epsom College. Clark was an enthusiastic Volunteer. He joined the 1st Volunteer Rifle Corps as a private in 1867 and became Assistant Surgeon to the 4th Middlesex Rifles in 1893. The 4th Middlesex became part of the 13th County of London Battalion of the 2nd London Division of the Territorial Force formed in April, 1908, and Clark, as the senior of all the medical officers, was gazetted PMO of the Division with the rank of Colonel, AMS (TF). In 1906 he was Chairman of a Committee to suggest improvements in the medical arrangements of the Volunteer Force, and many of his suggestions bore good fruit when the Territorial Force was formed two years afterwards. In 1910 he was appointed Honorary Surgeon to the King, being the first Volunteer Medical Officer to be so honoured. As PMO and Administrative Medical Officer of the 2nd London Division (TF) he had the very onerous duty of forming and controlling all the medical details of the division. In the Woolwich companies of the RAMC Volunteers and the 3rd London Bearer Company he found the nuclei of the three field ambulances required, but the two general hospitals and the sanitary company of the division had to be created de novo. It was here that Colonel Clark's administrative capacity, tact, and geniality were of so much use, as the only officers he had available were the Volunteer regimental medical officers, few of whom had any experience of administration; as for non-commissioned officers and men, it is difficult to know how they were obtained, but the units were gradually formed, and under Colonel Andrew Clark's direction they worked well. In addition, medical officers had to be obtained for the infantry battalions, etc, many of which were freshly raised ; it was in this work especially that he found his connection with the British Medical Association so useful. He was an original Member of the Territorial Force Association for the County of London, and worked hard on its sub-committees in the provision of buildings and equipments. He also did much in the formation of Voluntary Aid Detachments in London and Middlesex, and was Chairman of the Voluntary Aid Association from 1890-1908. He retired from the Territorial Force in 1912. Clark was a Knight of Grace of the Order of St John of Jerusalem and a Doctor of Science (honoris causa) of the University of Oxford (1904). Injury to his hand whilst operating in 1906 caused pyaemia which crippled both hands, and compelled him to retire from the Middlesex Hospital in December, 1907. He lived for the rest of his life at Cowley Grove, Uxbridge, Middlesex, where he died on August 29th, 1913. He married in 1876 Mary Helen, eldest daughter of Joseph Hargreaves, of Wellesley House, Prince's Park, Liverpool. She survived him with one son and five daughters. Publications: The Middlesex Hospital Reports of the Medical and Surgical Registrars for 1872. *Ambulance Lectures*, 1888. Editor of 4th edition of Fairlie Clarke's *Manual of Surgery*. A concise history of the Middlesex Hospital Club in the *Middlesex Hosp. Jour.*, 1898, ii, 155. The Club was founded in 1855 by Thomas Taylor and Campbell de Morgan. Clark was Secretary from 1882-1913, and under his guidance the membership was almost trebled and the capital was increased to nearly £1000.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001179
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

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

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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/373538373538
Occupation General surgeon
Details Son of Captain Hugh Cumming, who held the office of Sword-bearer of Exeter. Educated at the Grammar School, he became a pupil of Samuel Barnes (qv). He began his training at the Devon and Exeter Hospital and finished it at St Bartholomew's Hospital. He was elected Surgeon to the Devon and Exeter Hospital in 1865, and resigned on Aug 11th, 1880. He lived at first in Bamfylde Street and afterwards in Southernhay, where he soon built up a practice amongst the highest in social rank and the most wealthy round Exeter. His practice was the more successful because, as he said himself, "it was certainly due to leaving a great deal to nature and not prescribing too much medicine." He was Surgeon to the Corporation of the Poor and the Dispensary, Medical Officer to the Exeter Incorporation, Consulting Surgeon to St Thomas's Hospital for Lunatics and to St John's Hospital. He acted also as Consulting Surgeon to the Dawlish Dispensary and to Wonford House Asylum. He took a partner in 1888 and did not finally retire until 1898, when his former patients made him a handsome testimonial, which took the form of a purse of money. He was the father of fourteen children, some of whom predeceased him. He retired to Morton Road, Exmouth, where he died on April 20th, 1901. He is described as a man of height and of a fine presence, of an equable temper, and a fine sportsman both with gun and with rod and line. In his early days he was very fond of practising Wood's operation for the radical cure of hernia, in which he was successful.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001355
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Bowden, Stephen ( - 1896)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Clark, Charles ( - 1873)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-05-26
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/373363373363
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born in the north of Ireland and received a classical education at the Redemon Academy. In 1825 he qualified as a medical student by passing an examination in Greek and Latin at Apothecaries' Hall. He was apprenticed in 1826 to Dr Murray of Belfast, and later to Sir James Murray of Dublin, and underwent the usual drudgery of the pestle and mortar system of education for four or five years. From 1833-1835 he attended the classes at the Royal College of Surgeons of Ireland and at Trinity College, gaining the prize for the practice of medicine and a certificate in chemistry. Sir James Murray, being then Physician to the Lord-Lieutenant, was at this period made Inspector of Anatomy under the newly-passed Anatomy Act. Clark was appointed his Assistant Inspector, and nearly all the practical duties of the Act devolved on him. Few are aware of the caution and prudence required, and the difficulty and even danger he encountered, in introducing this Act for the first time amongst such an excitable population as that of Dublin and one proverbial for its veneration of the dead. Under the able management, however, of Sir James Murray and the Anatomical Committee formed from the chief teachers of Dublin, all was carried out pretty smoothly; the schools continued to be supplied with anatomical subjects. In the days of the resurrectionists graves were watched by armed friends of the deceased, and two of the resurrection men were shot whilst rifling a grave just before the Act came into operation. As Assistant Inspector, Clark had great opportunities for anatomical study, availed himself of them to the full, and acquired a high reputation in Dublin for his practical knowledge of the subject. Soon after qualifying in London, he made a voyage to the Cape and India. In 1837 he settled in practice in the Hampstead Road. Ill health, however, drove him to sea again, and he was appointed Surgeon in the West India Steam Packet Service. After passing an examination at the Navy Board he joined the *Actoeon* at Barbados in February, 1842. He steamed about a thousand miles a week in this little vessel and visited all the West Indies, as well as Surinam, Berbice and Demerara, Vera Cruz, and Tampico, becoming familiar with all the beautiful scenes from South America to the Gulf of Mexico. At Paramaribo, the chief town of Surinam, the *Actoeon*, being the first steamer ever seen, was a source of great wonder and delight. Clark lectured at Bridgetown in November, 1842, on "The Pleasures and Advantages of Scientific Knowledge" in aid of the funds of the Barbados Literary Association, and was publicly thanked and elected an honorary member. At the close of the lecture nitrous oxide or laughing gas was administered for the first time in Barbados. At St Thomas, the Danish island, Clark felt the shock of the earthquake which shook the whole range of the West Indies on the morning of Feb 8th, 1843. He gave a graphic account of this earthquake in *The Times* (March 9th, 1843). Transferred to the *Severn*, he made several voyages with Captain Vincent, a fine captain, son of a Falmouth pilot. In 1843 Clark retired from the service quite recovered in health. The love of travel was still upon him, and he subsequently emigrated to Australia, where he practised at Brighton, a watering-place in County Adelaide: he died there on December 23rd, 1873. He was a member of the Medical Society of Australia. Publications:- "On Cholera." - *Lancet*, 1846, i, 651. "Extraordinary Bodies passed in the Urine."" - *Ibid.*, 1853, i, 187.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001180
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Clark, Edward ( - 1857)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Clarke, Sir Arthur (1773 - 1857)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Clarke, Benjamin ( - 1906)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Copeman, Edward (1809 - 1880)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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/373454373454
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born on December 26th, 1809, the son of Edward Breese Copeman, a merchant living at Great Witchingham in Norfolk. He received his early education at the Grammar School in Trunch, and was then apprenticed in Norwich, first to A Brown, and then to J G Crosse ('Crosse, of Norwich'), whose midwifery cases he afterwards described. He served as a Dresser at the Norfolk and Norwich Hospital, and then entered St George's Hospital, London. Returning to Norwich, he was elected House Surgeon to the hospital. He started in general practice at Cottishall, near Norwich, in partnership with W Taylor, where he obtained a considerable reputation, and settled at Norwich in 1848 as a consulting physician. He was elected Physician to the Hospital in 1851 and was connected with that institution throughout life, becoming Consulting Physician in 1878. As a consulting physician he enjoyed an extensive practice, and as a consulting obstetrician was held in especial repute. He was a strong advocate for the use of the vectis, his favourite instrument. Besides being for many years Physician to the Hospital, he was at the time of his death Physician to the Norwich Eye Infirmary and the Norwich Magdalen, Consulting Accoucheur to the Norwich Lying-in Charity, and had been one of the founders, and also the first Physician, of the Jenny Lind Hospital for Children. In 1863 he was President of the East Anglian Branch of the British Medical Association, and presided over the Norwich Meeting of the Association in 1874, being elected Vice-President on his retirement in the following year. Copeman was an enthusiastic musician, and played the violoncello admirably. He was for many years Chairman of the Sub-committee of Management of the Norfolk and Norwich Musical Festivals. He took a deep interest in this work, and, on his retirement from it some years before his death, was presented with a handsome testimonial by the Lord-Lieutenant and leading citizens of the county and city of Norwich. Though failing in health for some time, Copeman continued to see patients until the day before his death. He died in an attack of heart failure on February 25th, 1880. Publications: *Remarks on the Poor Law Amendment Act, with reference to Pauper Medical Attendance and Medical Clubs*, 8vo, Norwich, 1838. *Collection of Cases of Apoplexy, with an Explanatory Introduction*, 8vo, London, 1845. *Records of Obstetric Consultation Practice; and a Translation of Busch and Moses on Uterine Haemorrhage*, 8vo, plate, London, 1856. *Brief History of the Norfolk and Norwich Hospital; with a few Biographical Observations on the late W Dalrymple and J G Crosse*, 8vo, Norwich, 1856. *An Essay on the History, Pathology and Treatment of Diphtheria*, 8vo, Norwich, 1859. *Illustrations of Puerperal Fever*, 8vo, London, 1860. Copeman also translated Jean Antoine Gay's work, "On the Nature and Treatment of Apoplexy" (with an Appendix), 8vo, London, 1843. His contributions to the medical journals were numerous and important. He published a paper on "Flooding after Delivery" in the *Med Gaz* and wrote largely in the *Brit Med Jour*. The latter says of his works and of these contributions: "He called attention to the abuse of bleeding in that affection [apoplexy] and was thus one of the first to show the necessity of a more restricted use of the lancet. It is interesting that one of his last contributions - a paper published in this journal on Dec 18th, 1879 - was a paper on bloodletting, in which he gave the result of his matured experience, and, suggesting that the reaction against blood-letting had gone too far, described the conditions in which in his opinion it might be useful."
Resource Identifier RCS: E001271
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Corbin, Marc Antony Bazille ( - 1908)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Bowness, Robert Harrison (1816 - 1879)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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 Boxall, Henry (1817 - 1877)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Boycott, Thomas (1816 - 1886)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Boyd, James Stanley Newton (1856 - 1916)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2010-05-06
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000900-E000999
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373126373126
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born in Shrewsbury on May 18th, 1856, the son of Major James Boyd, 86th Regiment, and Emma, daughter of Henry Newton, a burgess of Shrewsbury. He spent his boyhood with his parents at St Heliers, Jersey, where he was educated in a private school. “I can go back to the charm of his Jersey home at St Heliers”, says one of his oldest friends, Dr Harrington Sainsbury, in the *Lancet* (1916, i, 378), “and recall happy memories of a visit there when the circle was still complete, Major and Mrs Boyd, a younger sister and brother forming that circle; and I can see there, in the simplicities and integrities and unaffected enjoyment of life which prevailed, the natural source of the qualities which characterized and adorned him. It was a military home where duty figured largely and cheerfully, and it has always seemed to me that in consequence Boyd retained much of the soldier’s outlook all through life.” Stanley Boyd, having entered University College Hospital as a student in 1872, and thus living in London, came under the influence of his uncle, Henry Newton, a distinguished retired Anglo-Indian judge. Newton regarded his nephew almost as a son, and through him Boyd came much into contact with the Society of Friends. Through William S Tuke at University College he came to know Dr Hack Tuke and his family, of long-established Quaker origin and traditions. Others of his University College fellow-students were Victor Horsley (qv), Charles Stonham (qv), C T Bond, of Leicester, Dawson-Williams, Alfred Pearce Gould (qv), A J Pepper, Arthur Quarry Silcock (qv), Amand Routh, F W Mott, and Montague Murray, the last three eventually becoming his colleagues at Charing Cross Hospital, and all in time occupying high positions in the profession. He himself was a distinguished student. He was House Physician to Wilson Fox and House Surgeon to John Marshall (qv). Boyd, like others of his generation, owed much of his subsequent success to that disciple of Lister and Billroth, Marcus Beck (qv), whose teaching of the science and the art of surgery was an outstanding feature of University College Hospital. After graduating with high honours, Boyd became Demonstrator of Anatomy and then of Practical Surgery in the Medical School of his hospital. Later he was Surgical Registrar to the hospital. By conscientious devotion to the duties of this office he laid the foundation of his thorough knowledge of pathology and of its important bearings on surgical practice. It enabled him to describe precisely the details of an operation, and also of any subsequent microscopic investigation. In later life he would often refer to the great value of such an appointment to a young surgeon. He was elected Assistant Surgeon to Charing Cross Hospital in 1882, and was soon regarded as an acquisition to the hospital’s anatomical and surgical teaching. In 1891 he became full Surgeon and was Senior Surgeon from 1905 to the time of his death. He held most of the important posts at Charing Cross Hospital, being Lecturer in Anatomy (1888-1897), Pathologist (1886-1888), Dean (1890-1895), Lecturer on Operative Surgery (1899-1901), and on Surgery (1890-1905). His lectures were remarkable for their thoroughness, and as an operator he was brilliant. He was bold but always careful. He was keenly interested in the operative treatment of malignant disease, especially where the breast or mouth or fauces were involved, and his success in radical operations for these conditions was in some measure due to his sound anatomical knowledge. Boyd was Treasurer to the School of Charing Cross Hospital from 1906-1911, holding this post during a transition period. He was also a zealous Chairman of the Medical Committee of the Hospital and of the School Committee and laboured in the interest of both. He was a great believer in athletics as a means of improving the *moral* of a school. It was a critical period through which his hospital was passing. The slums to the east of it, north of the Strand, were being cleared away; one of the two adjacent hospitals was no longer needed; and King’s College Hospital moved to the south side of the river. Charing Cross Hospital got more work, for by its situation it constitutes the casualty station for that region of Central London, where its service is as much in demand by night as by day. Boyd, the foremost among the medical staff in advocating improvements, only lived through the commencement; in particular the new operating theatre was due to him. From being almost overwhelmed by debt, the hospital has come to have funds in hand; it has been largely rebuilt and has taken over the site of the older Westminster Ophthalmic Hospital. Despite his responsible position at Charing Cross Hospital, Boyd found time for much work outside its walls. Thus, at the time of his death he was Surgeon to the Hospital for Consumption at Brompton, Consulting Surgeon to the Paddington Green Hospital for Children, and to the New Hospital for Women. He was also on the honorary staff of certain hospitals in the home counties and suburbs, such as the Norwood Institute for Jews, etc. At the beginning of the Great War (1914-1918), in addition to his arduous hospital and private work, he operated daily at the 4th London General Hospital, with the rank of Lieutenant Colonel RAMC (TF). In July, 1914, he was elected upon the Council of the Royal College of Surgeons, having been previously a Member of the Court of Examiners. He was also Examiner in Surgery at the University of Cambridge. He warmly advocated the medical education of women. In the early days of the Women’s School of Medicine he was a lecturer on anatomy, and much of the success of that school was due to him. He had the courage of his convictions, and never failed to advocate the claims of women to be admitted to the examinations of the colleges and universities. Like all pioneers in this movement, he became for a time unpopular. On the difficult subject of the proper development of the University of London he had very definite views. He was among those who held that the best way to reorganize the University of London as a teaching centre, as far as medicine is concerned, would be to concentrate in a few centres the instruction in the preliminary sciences, and much of the success which has now come to Charing Cross Hospital Medical School by its amalgamation for that purpose with King’s College could have been effected years ago had the counsels of Stanley Boyd been adopted. He married in 1889 Florence Nightingale Toms, MD, from a family well known and much respected in Chard, Somerset, who had been one of his pupils at the London School of Medicine for Women and had distinguished herself in gynaecology. He died, after a short illness from previously latent gall-bladder disease, on February 1st, 1916. A funeral service, with a military escort, was held at St Pancras Church. His London address was 134 Harley Street. Publications: “Reports of Surgical Cases in University College Hospital, 1880, 1881.” Article on “Hospital Mortality and Hospitalism,” etc., in Heath’s *Dictionary of Surgery*. Article on “Diseases of the Mouth, Tongue and Veins” in Quain’s *Dictionary of Medicine*. “Reports on Surgery.” – *Year Book of Treatment*, 1891-4. “Injuries of Bones.” – Treves’ *System of Surgery*, 1895. “Aneurysm.” – *Encyclopoedia Medica*, i. Editor of Green’s *Pathology and Morbid Anatomy*, 7th ed., 1889. Editor of Druitt’s *Vade-Mecum*, 12th ed., 1887. Translation of Koch’s *Etiology of Tuberculosis* in Watson Cheyne’s “Recent Essays on Bacteria,” New Sydenham Society, 1886. “The Bhaau Daji Treatment of Leprosy,” 8vo, 1893, reprinted from *Brit. Jour. Dermatol*., 1893, v. 203. “On Enterorrhaphy by Invagination (Maunsell’s Method).” – *Trans. Med.-Chir. Soc.*, 1893, lxxvi, 345. “Oöphorectomy in Cancer of the Breast” (with W. H. Unwin). – *Brit. Med. Jour.*, 1897-1900. “On a Series of Cases of Cancer of the Tongue” (with W. H. Unwin). – *Practitioner*, 1903, lxx, 626. “On a Series of Cases of Cancer of the Mouth and Fauces.” – *Ibid*., 1904, lxxii, 397.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000943
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Boyd, Sprott ( - 1902)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2010-05-06
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/373127373127
Occupation General surgeon
Details Practised for a time in Weymouth and afterwards in Sydney, New South Wales. He was at one time Surgeon to the Weymouth Infirmary. He resided latterly at 24 Lexham Gardens, SW, and died there on April 15th, 1902. Publication:- “On the Structure of the Mucous Membrane of the Stomach,” 8vo, 2 plates, Edinburgh, 1836, from *Edin. Med. and Surg. Jour.*, xivi, 382.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000944
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Boyes, William Robert (1816 - 1857)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2010-05-06
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/373128373128
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born in October, 1816, the son of William Boyes, merchant, of London. He entered the Bengal Army as Assistant Surgeon on Aug 1st, 1841, being promoted Surgeon to the 2nd Bengal Calvary on October 8th, 1855. He was officiating Medical Storekeeper at Cawnpore when the Indian Mutiny broke out, and succeeded in escaping from the rebels with his wife. He was recaptured, brought down the river twenty-eight miles, and killed in the massacre on June 27th, 1857. His wife, Catherine, a daughter of General Biggs, HEICS, died of dysentery on July 7th, 1857.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000945
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Webb, William (1831 - 1890)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2013-01-30
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E003000-E003999/E003400-E003499
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/375635375635
Occupation General surgeon
Details The son of a well-known surgeon practising at Barton-under-Needwood; was first apprenticed to his father and then studied at Queen's College, Birmingham, where he was a Warneford Scholar and Gold Medallist, and won medals in leading subjects. Although he began to pass examinations at the London University he did not graduate. After further study in Bristol, London, and Paris he was appointed House Surgeon to the Stafford Infirmary, and after two years settled in practice at Wirksworth, Derbyshire, where he became a successful country surgeon. He also served on the Local Board and was influential in obtaining sanitary improvements. He was the Medical Officer of the Cottage Hospital from its foundation. At one time he was President of the Midland Branch of the British Medical Association and represented the Branch on the Council. In later life he gave up general practice and became a consultant with addresses at 42 St Mary's Gate, Derby, and at Gilken View House, Wirksworth. Webb was operated upon in London for the removal of a vascular tumour from the urinary bladder, and died some time afterwards, on August 27th, 1890. He was survived by his widow and one son. Publications: Webb made several contributions to medical journals and also wrote on the local archaeology of Wirksworth.
Resource Identifier RCS: E003452
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Luker, Bryan Carsten Hauch (1916 - 2006)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2010-10-13
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001000-E001099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373220373220
Occupation General surgeon
Details Bryan Luker was a consultant general surgeon at Rotherham and Mexborough hospitals. He was born in London, in Hampstead, on 5 July 1916, the only child of Herbert William Luker MBE and Ella Matilda Henrietta, the daughter of Adam Hauch, the headmaster of the local grammar school in Roskilde, Denmark. Bryan’s early life was spent in Sweden, where his father was managing director of Proctor and Gamble. Returning to London in 1928, Bryan went to University College School, Christ’s College, Cambridge, and then St Thomas’ Hospital for his clinical training. Whilst in London he was awarded a certificate of honour by the Royal Humane Society for rescuing a woman who was “in imminent danger of drowning in the River Thames at Sunbury-on-Thames on 1 August 1935”. After qualifying, he undertook house appointments at St Mark’s Hospital and Bradford Royal Infirmary. By 1944 he was serving as a captain with the RAMC in the 18th Light Brigade Field Ambulance and was mentioned in despatches in November 1945. When serving in Belgium, he met his future wife, Cynthia Eileen Littlewood, a nurse who had trained at Llandough Hospital, Cardiff. They were married on 2 November 1946. After demobilisation, he became a resident surgical officer at the Leicester Royal Infirmary under John C Barrett and E R Frizelle. He was appointed in 1952 on the understanding that a new hospital would be built in Rotherham. In fact the new district general hospital did not open until 1979 and he worked at Moorgate and Doncaster Gate hospitals in Rotherham and Mexborough Montague Hospital for most of his professional life, spending only three years in the new building. Bryan was a keen member of the BMA and chairman of the Rotherham branch from 1974 to 1975. He was a talented watercolourist and fisherman, who created his own flies and was a member of the Linton and Threshfield Angling Club in Wharfdale. Brian and Cynthia had three girls: Anne Louise, Janet Mary and Pamela Jane. A few weeks before Bryan’s death a party was held in his beloved garden to celebrate his 90th birthday, at which a junior consultant colleague, K D Bardhan, gave a moving speech detailing Bryan’s medical life, his contribution to Rotherham and his unique personality. Bryan Luker died peacefully on 30 August 2006 and was survived by his wife Cynthia, his three daughters and two granddaughters.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001037
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching MacDonald, Neil (1927 - 2008)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Macky, James Fraser Warwick (1920 - 2010)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2010-10-14
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/373222373222
Occupation Urologist
Details Warwick Macky was the leading urologist in New Zealand for more than half a century, and a man of outstanding presence and charm. He was born on 8 December 1920 into a successful family of importers. His father, Frank Macky, who qualified in 1914, was senior surgeon of the Auckland Hospital from 1926, and battled to establish a separate urological unit, introducing the Harris prostatectomy. Warwick was educated at Wanganui Collegiate School and followed his father to Ormond College, University of Melbourne, where he graduated in 1943 with the Ryan prize in surgery. After junior posts, Warwick joined the Royal New Zealand Army Medical Corps in 1945. After the war, he carried out postgraduate work in Melbourne, passed his MS in 1947 and won the Gordon Craig scholarship, which took him to the Westminster Hospital. There he specialised in urology under Robert Cox and passed the FRCS. In 1950, he returned to Auckland as a tutor specialist in surgery at Greenlane Hospital. He was appointed as a visiting urologist at Auckland Hospital the following year, remaining there as a senior urologist and head of department until he retired in 1985. During this period he made his department into a first-class modern unit, to which end he travelled extensively and invited many celebrated urologists to visit New Zealand. He also set up the Ormond clinic for private urology, which had day care facilities and became a mecca for visiting urologists for the next 30 years. He was very active in national and international urology. In 1974, he was elected as an international member of the exclusive American Association of Genitourinary Surgeons. At the Royal Australasian College, he served on the New Zealand committee from 1955 to 1963, on the council from 1965 to 1977 and was vice president from 1975 to 1977. He was an examiner in urology from 1966 to 1975, New Zealand censor from 1975 to 1977 and was a member of the Court of Honour from 1981 to 2010. He was president of the Australasian Urological Society from 1965 to 1966, when he hosted the annual conference in Auckland. Warwick was a tall, handsome man with an impish sense of humour and, together with his wife Elizabeth, was popular wherever he went. He was a keen sailor, skippering his 40 foot yacht Ilex as far as Sydney. Three of his children became world champion yachtsmen. His other great interest was St Kentigern’s school in Auckland, of which he was chairman for 37 years. He planted many London plane trees at the school and his funeral was held there. He died on 9 February 2010 at the age of 89, in the presence of Elizabeth, his son Peter, and his daughters Rebecca and Josephine, a week after sustaining a fracture of the hip.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001039
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Allingham, Herbert William (1862 - 1904)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2009-09-18 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/372857372857
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born on April 17th, 1862, the eldest son of William Allingham, (qv); was educated at Chatham House, Ramsgate, and University College School in London. He entered St George's Hospital in 1879, where Timothy Holmes (qv) and Pickering Pick (qv) were surgeons. Here he rapidly developed a marked talent for teaching and for surgery; at school he had been undistinguished. Served as House Surgeon in 1883-1884, and at the end of his term of office was appointed Surgical Registrar and Demonstrator of Anatomy. Elected Assistant Surgeon to St Mark's Hospital in 1885, resigning in 1890, and in 1887 he became Surgeon to the Great (now the Royal) Northern Hospital, a post he held until 1896. Elected Assistant Surgeon to St George's Hospital in 1894. [1] He was appointed Surgeon in Ordinary to the Prince of Wales, now His Majesty King George V, having been previously Surgeon to the Household of King Edward VII. He also filled the offices of Surgeon to the Surgical Aid Society and to the Osborne Home for Officers. He practised at 25 Grosvenor Street, W. He married in 1889 Fraülein Alexandrina Von der Osten, who died in January, 1904, when her husband had become inoculated with syphilis whilst operating in 1903. After her death he became mentally depressed, started for a holiday to Egypt, and died at Marseilles on Nov 4th, 1904, from an overdose of morphia. Allingham was a fine surgeon who did not confine himself to his father's specialty. As an operator he was rapid, neat, and accurate; as a man he was handsome, courteous, and helpful to his juniors. His affectionate nature was shown by the utter prostration into which he was thrown by the death of his lively and charming wife. Publications: Colotomy, Inguinal, Lumbar and Transverse, for Cancer or Stricture with Ulceration of Large Intestine, 8vo, London, 1892. The Treatment of Internal Derangements of the Knee-joint by Operation, 8vo, illustrated, London, 1889. Jointly with his father, Allingham on the Diagnosis and Treatment of Diseases of the Rectum, 5th ed., London, 1888. Operative Surgery, 8vo, London, 1903. [Amendments from the annotated edition of *Plarr's Lives* at the Royal College of Surgeons: [1] '1894' is deleted and '1895' put in its place, together with '[information from Sir Humphry Rolleston]'; Portrait in College Collection.]
Resource Identifier RCS: E000674
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Allingham, William (1829 - 1908)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2009-09-25 2016-01-22
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/372858372858
Occupation General surgeon
Details Educated for the profession of architecture at University College, where he gained prizes. He even practised as an architect, exhibited studies at the exhibitions of the Royal Academy, and obtained honourable mention for a design of a building to house the Great Exhibition of 1851. In this year, however, he decided to abandon architecture for medicine. Entering as a student at St Thomas's Hospital, he carried off prize after prize - the Descriptive Anatomy Prize, the Anatomy Prize (1854), the Medicine Prize, the Clinical Medicine President's Prize, and the Clinical Medicine Treasurer's Prize (1855). After qualifying in 1855 he volunteered as Surgeon in the Crimean War. He was in time to be present at the siege of Sebastopol and to see a vast amount of practical surgery in the most arduous circumstances at the hospitals at Scutari. During a large part of his war services he was attached to the French Army, which was extremely badly provided with surgical aid, and there is no doubt that under the strenuous nature of the duties which devolved upon him, Allingham gained the courage and sense of responsibility which marked him out as a successful operating surgeon from the beginning of his career. After his return home he was Surgical Tutor, Demonstrator of Anatomy, and then Surgical Registrar at St Thomas's Hospital. He set up in practice in 1863 as a consultant at 36 Finsbury Square, EC, but removed to Grosvenor Street, where he soon became a well-known authority on diseases of the rectum and enjoyed a large practice. In 1871 he published his classical book on Diseases of the Rectum. It was accepted at once as an authoritative and inclusive work, though some surgeons differed from the author on points of technique. William Allingham was not attached to the staff of any of the great London Hospitals possessing a medical school, but was for many years Surgeon to the Great Northern Central Hospital and to St Mark's Hospital for Fistula and Diseases of the Rectum. He was also Consulting Surgeon to the Farringdon General Dispensary and to the Surgical Aid Society, of which, together with some of his relatives and others, he was one of the founders in 1862. He was a Member of the Council of the Royal College of Surgeons from 1884-1886, and retired from practice in 1894. Allingham was one of the first surgeons in England to specialize in the treatment of diseases of the rectum, out of which he made a considerable fortune. He was kindly, generous, and hospitable. After his retirement he lived for some time at St Leonards, and then at Worthing, where he died on Feb 4th, 1908. He married twice: (1) Miss Christiana Cooke, by whom he had six children - four sons and two daughters. The eldest son was Herbert William Allingham, (qv). Of his two daughters both married medical men; the elder, who afterwards became Mrs Chevallier Tayler, having been first the wife of Mr Charles Cotes, of St George's; the younger was married to Claud E Woakes. (2) Miss D H Hayles, [1] who, like Mr Herbert William Allingham, predeceased the subject of this memoir. William Allingham appears in the portrait group of the Council by Jamyn Brooks (1884). Publications: Fistula, Hæmorrhoids, Painful Ulcer, Stricture, Prolapsus, and other Diseases of the Rectum, their Diagnosis and Treatment, 8vo, London, 1871. The Diagnosis and Treatment of Diseases of the Rectum. Edited by Herbert William Allingham. 8vo, London, 1871. The final 1901 edition, a collaboration between father and son, was practically rewritten. The work was translated into several foreign languages. "On the Treatment of Fistula and other Sinuses by Means of the Elastic Ligature, being a Paper (with Additional Cases) read before the Medical Society of London, November, 1874." 8vo, London; reprinted again in 1875, etc. [Amendments from the annotated edition of *Plarr's Lives* at the Royal College of Surgeons: [1] who had nursed him through a severe illness]
Resource Identifier RCS: E000675
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

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

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Ashby, Alfred ( - 1922)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2009-10-07
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/372887372887
Occupation General surgeon
Details Educated at Guy’s Hospital, and then became Surgeon to the Western General Dispensary. Appointed Medical Officer of Health to the united districts of Grantham, Newark, Sleaford, and Ruskington, and afterwards to Caversham, and to the Rural Districts of the Grantham, Newark, and Sleaford Unions. He came to Reading about the year 1882, and served the Borough for over forty years, being at the time of his death Consulting Medical Officer of Health to the Reading and Wokingham Union and Wokingham Rural Districts, Public Analyst, and Gas Examiner to the County Borough of Reading. He died suddenly at the entrance to the Reading Town Hall on Jan 7th, 1922. His official address had been at the Municipal buildings in Valpy Street, and his home address was at Ashdene, Argyll Road. Publications: *Grantham, Newark, and Sleaford combined Sanitary District*: Sec. 1. Precautions against the Spread of Infectious Diseases. Sec. 2. Directions for Disinfection. Sec. 3. Penalties for the Neglect of Precautions....Sec. 4. Directions for Rendering House Drainage free from Danger. Sec. 5. General Directions for the Preservation of Health. 8vo, Grantham, *n.d*. “Illustrations of Arrest of Infectious Diseases by Isolation of the Sick.” *Practitioner*, 1878, xxi, 300, and 1879, xxiii, 148. “Log-wood as a Re-agent.” *Analyst*, 1884. “The Fallacies of Empirical Standards in Water Analysis.” *Proc. Soc. M.O.H.*, 1884. “Powers of Local Authorities in respect of Dairies, Cowsheds, Milk Shops, etc.” * Ibid.*, 1886. “The Medical Officer of Health” in Stevenson and Murphy’s *Treatise on Hygiene*, 1893, ii. “The Detection of Methylated Spirits in Tinctures, Spirits or Ether.” *Analyst*, 1894, xix, 265. “Milk Epidemic of Diphtheria associated with an Udder Disease of Cows.” *Public Health*, 1906.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000704
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Alexander, Charles Linton (1820 - 1887)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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/372845372845
Occupation General surgeon
Details Apprenticed to Francis Bennett at the Dispensary, Gateshead, Durham, and entered as a matriculated student at King's College, becoming a student at the hospital as soon as it was opened. He was one of the Surgeons of the Royal South London Dispensary until "the dignity of the profession" required that the staff, Messrs Osborn, Johnson, Berrell, Wood, and Alexander, should resign in a body. He was also Surgeon to the Board of Guardians of St Mary's, Newington, whose sick poor he attended, on the death of the regularly appointed surgeon, during an epidemic of typhus fever from which he himself suffered severely. He practised first at 12 Brunswick Street, Dover Road, SE, and afterwards at 45 Trinity Square, Borough, SE, where he died Jan 27th, 1887.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000662
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

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

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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/372846372846
Occupation General surgeon
Details Surgeon-Oculist to Queen Victoria, and Surgeon to Cork Street Eye Infirmary. He succeeded to the practice of Sir Wathen Waller, and was succeeded as oculist to the Queen by Sir William White Cooper (qv). He is said to have been especially successful in cataract operations, which he always undertook single-handed. He operated upon the Duke of Sussex. An unfriendly notice of him says “He was well known in the West End of London as an oculist and was much respected in his own circle, but he was not remarkable for his scientific labours. He is likely to leave the science of his profession in the state in which he found it.” He died at 6 Cork Street, Piccadilly, W, on Jan 20th, 1859, leaving a son, Charles R Alexander, who became Assistant Surgeon to the Royal Infirmary for Diseases of the Eye.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000663
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

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

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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 Collis, John Leigh (1911 - 2003)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-09-23
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/372229372229
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Jack Collis was a pioneering thoracic surgeon. He was born in Harborne, Birmingham, on 14 July 1911, the son of Walter Thomas Collis, an industrial chemist, and Dora Charton Reay. His choice of medicine was greatly influenced by his local GP and his two medical uncles, one of whom was a professor of medicine at Cardiff. He was educated at Shrewsbury School and studied medicine at Birmingham. There he was a member of the athletic club and captained the hockey team. He was equally outstanding as a scholar, winning the Queen’s scholarship for three years running, and the Ingleby scholarship and Priestley Smith prize in his final year, together with gold medals in clinical surgery and medicine. He graduated in 1935 with first class honours. He was house physician to K D Wilkinson at Birmingham General Hospital and then house surgeon to B J Ward at the Queen’s Hospital. He went on to be surgical registrar to H H Sampson at the General Hospital, before becoming a resident surgical officer at the Brompton Chest Hospital in London under Tudor Edwards and Clement Price Thomas. The outbreak of war saw him back in Birmingham as resident surgical officer at the General Hospital. By July 1940 he was surgeon to the Barnsley Hall Emergency hospital, which received Blitz casualties from Birmingham and Coventry. He was in charge of the chest unit for the next four years, during which time he wrote a thesis on the metastatic cerebral abscess associated with suppurative conditions of the lung, where he showed the route of infection via the vertebral veins. This won him an MD with honours, as well as a Hunterian professorship in 1944. In February 1944 he joined the RAMC to command the No 3 Surgical Team for Chest Surgery, taking his team through Europe into Germany shortly after D-day, for which he was mentioned in despatches. From Germany he was posted to India to receive the anticipated casualties in the Far East. He ended his war service as a Lieutenant Colonel. At the end of the war he applied to the Queen Elizabeth Hospital, Birmingham, from his posting in India, with a glowing reference from Tudor Edwards. He was appointed initially as a general surgeon, though he was soon engaged mainly in thoracic surgery, especially thoracoplasty for tuberculosis, and spent much time travelling between sanatoria in Warwick, Burton-on-Trent and Malvern. With the advent of cardiac surgery, Jack was responsible for a successful series of mitral valvotomies and was one of the first to remove a tumour from within the cavity of the left atrium, using a sharpened dessert spoon and a piece of wire gauze. Later he withdrew from open heart surgery to concentrate on the surgery of the oesophagus. He became celebrated for three advances in the surgery of the oesophagus – the Collis gastroplasty for patients with reflux, the Collis repair of the lower oesophagus and, above all, a successful technique for oesophagectomy. In this his mortality and leakage rates were half those of his contemporaries. He attributed his success to the use of fine steel wire: his assistants attributed it to his outstanding surgical technique. He was Chairman of the regional advisory panel for cardiothoracic surgery, an honorary professor of thoracic surgery at the University of Birmingham, and was President of the Thoracic Society and the Society of Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgeons. He was Chairman of the medical advisory committee at the Birmingham United Hospitals from 1961 to 1963, and Chairman of the planning committee from 1963 to 1965. He trained a generation of thoracic surgeons whose friendship he retained, along with those medical orderlies who served with him during the war. Vehemently proud of Birmingham, he devoted much of his retirement to promoting the city. He married Mavis Haynes in 1941. They had a holiday bungalow in Wales, where he enjoyed walking, gardening and fishing. They had four children, Nigel, Gilly, Christopher and Mark, two of whom entered medicine. He died in Moseley, Birmingham on 4 February 2003.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000042
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

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

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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 Drew, Alfred John (1916 - 2004)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Weaver, Edward John Martin (1921 - 2003)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Webster, John Herbert Harker (1929 - 2003)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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/372330372330
Occupation General surgeon
Details John Herbert Harker Webster was a consultant surgeon in Southampton. He was born in Heswall, Cheshire, on 2 October 1929, the son of Herbert Webster, a biscuit manufacturer, and Doris Louise née Harker, the daughter of a chandler. In 1935 the family moved to Prenton in order to be near to Birkenhead Preparatory School. However, in 1939 he was evacuated to mid-Cheshire because of the war. The schooling there proved unsatisfactory and in 1940 John was sent to Ellesmere College, a school with a fine tradition of choral music, piano and organ teaching. From there he gained a place at Cambridge. He admitted to being absolutely hopeless at ball games, although in his own words he did “become a competent small bore .303 shot” and became a competent rower, rowing fairly consistently in all the major meetings at Cambridge, Putney, Bedford, Chester and Henley. He obtained an upper second degree in anatomy, physiology, pathology and pharmacology. He went up to London and studied for his clinical examinations at the Westminster Medical School, where he won prizes in medicine, surgery, pathology and obstetrics. After qualifying he became house surgeon to Sir Stanford Cade. He then did his National Service in the Royal Air Force from 1955 to 1957, ending up as a medical officer on an Army troop ship, being involved in the preparation of Christmas Island for the first British hydrogen bomb test. On returning to civilian life in 1959 he met Joy, his wife, at St Albans and they were married the following year at Epsom. He was a junior hospital doctor in Sheffield as registrar, lecturer and then senior registrar. He was given the most enormous responsibilities and, as was the case in those days, given wide knowledge of practically all surgical procedures. In 1967 he was appointed to the Southampton hospitals as a consultant general surgeon with a special interest in vascular surgery, more specifically to his favourite, the Royal South Hants. John noted that he had operated not only from his base at the South Hants, but in places as far flung as Southampton General Hospital, Southampton Western Hospital, Romsey and Lymington Hospitals, the Isle of Wight, Haslar, Basingstoke, Torquay and even the Royal Free. John was a member of the Peripheral Vascular Club, a club made up mostly of so-called ‘second-generation’ vascular surgeons. These surgeons had learnt their trade from single-handed vascular surgeons in the teaching hospitals such as London, Leeds and Edinburgh. They in turn became consultants in their own right in what were then considered to be provincial hospitals. This club formed a great part of John's life; he and Joy enjoyed travelling widely with the fellow members. His teaching abilities, particularly at technical surgery, were renowned. Many of his students were endowed with a sense of confidence, the major characteristic needed in a vascular surgeon. In its heyday his unit attracted excellent senior registrars and lecturers, many of whom have become famous in their own right across the country. He had a particular interest in cervical rib surgery and, together with Peter Clifford, David Whitcher and Richard Bolton from the teaching media department, produced an excellent film on first rib resection, which, in 1988, received an award from the Association of Surgeons of Great Britain and Ireland for the most outstanding contribution of the year to surgical education. He was a council member of the Vascular Society. He retired in 1994. John was a rather retiring person and sometimes taciturn, but he was a great raconteur once he got going and told many stories. He was a character, a good friend and an excellent surgeon. There was an intellectual side of John's character. If you looked at the bookshelves in his office you were more likely to find works on art and poetry, rather than the latest textbook of anatomy. He made sure he filled in *The Times* crossword every day, and actually became a semi-finalist in a crossword competition. His main regret was not to pursue music, but in retirement he improved his skill on the keyboard and built his own clavichord. He was also a great fly fisherman, fishing with his old chief and mentor from the Westminster Hospital, Robert Cox. Mixed in with all this was a love of golf and, above all, a love of his family, his son, two daughters and eleven grandchildren. He died on 31 August 2003.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000143
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Young, Terence Willifer (1931 - 2003)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Connell, Anthea Mary Stewart (1925 - 2003)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Enid Taylor
Publication Date 2005-11-02 2008-12-12
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/372333372333
Occupation Ophthalmic surgeon
Details Anthea Mary Stewart Connell was a senior ophthalmic consultant at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital, Barbados, from 1969 to 1996. She was born on 21 October 1925, the daughter of two medical doctors. Her father, John S M Connell, was a surgeon and gynaecologist and had served as a colonel in the RAMC on wartime hospital ships. Her mother, Constance B Challis, had trained at Cambridge and the University of Birmingham Medical School, and became a public health doctor. Anthea was educated at Edgbaston High School, before moving to City Park Collegiate Institute, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, and then to the University of Saskatchewan, Canada. She completed her medical education at the University of Birmingham Medical School, qualifying in 1952. Her ophthalmic training was at Moorfields Eye Hospital, London, firstly as a resident, then as a registrar and subsequently as a senior registrar/first assistant in joint appointments at Moorfields, Guy’s Hospital and the London Hospital. In 1969 she moved to Barbados as a senior consultant and head of the department of ophthalmology and assistant lecturer at the University of West Indies until 1991. She initiated the Barbados Eye Study and was its director from 1987 to 1996. This group investigated glaucoma in the Barbadian population and founded the Inter-Island Eye Service. Although living in Barbados, she held courses and organised diploma of ophthalmology examinations in the Caribbean, which were recognised by the Royal College of Surgeons. She was also a fellow of the American Academy of Ophthalmology, giving presentations at their annual meetings. She wrote extensively, covering her work and research in Barbados and the islands. In 1963 she married George E P Dowglass, a master of wine, who was a wine merchant. They had one child, Charlotte, born in 1965, who became financial director to Hampton Court Palace and the Tower of London. Anthea supported the local community, was chairman of the local Conservative Policy Forum, and enjoyed painting in oil and acrylic, showing her work both locally and in London. She died on 23 September 2003 after a long series of strokes.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000146
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Littlewood, Arthur Henry Martin (1923 - 2004)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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/372334372334
Occupation Plastic surgeon Plastic and reconstructive surgeon
Details Arthur Henry Martin Littlewood was a consultant plastic surgeon in Liverpool. He was born in Guernsey in 1923 and went to school there. On the outbreak of war he went to England, but was dismayed to be declared unfit for military service. He went to Downing College, Cambridge, and then to University College Hospital, where he qualified in 1945. His introduction to plastic surgery was with Emlyn Lewis' unit at Gloucester, where he met Christena, a ward sister whom he later married. He became a senior registrar at Liverpool, and was appointed as a consultant there in 1960, a time when there were only three consultants for a region of some three million people. In 1961 he spent six months in the head and neck unit in Roswell Park, Buffalo, New York, with Hoffmeister and became one of the pioneers of major head and neck surgery in the UK. He was a bold and skilful surgeon, although he was a giant of a man with hands likened to a bunch of bananas, yet he could repair a cleft lip with great delicacy. He retired in 1985, but continued his medicolegal practice until his death. He was a cultured man with many interests, including music, literature and history and he derived much pleasure from sailing and golf (he was a member of the Royal and Ancient Club at St Andrews). He was proud of his family of three daughters, two doctors and a lawyer. He had three grandchildren. He died on 25 March 2004.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000147
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

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

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Brodie, Sir Benjamin Collins (1783 - 1862)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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/372203372203
Occupation Anatomist General surgeon
Details Was the fourth child of the Rev. Peter Bellinger Brodie, M.A., of Worcester College, Oxford, Rector of Winterslow, Wilts, by Sarah, daughter of Benjamin Collins, Banker and printer, of Milford, near Salisbury. The Brodies were originally a Morayshire clan, and the family was fortunate in relations. Dr. Denman, then the accoucheur, had married Brodie's aunt; Sir Richard Goff ['Goff' is crossed out, and the following added: Croft (Lady Croft & Mrs Baillie were Dr Denman's daughters)] had married a cousin; and Dr. Baillie, nephew of William and John Hunter, had married another cousin. Dr. Denman's son afterwards became Lord Chief Justice, and was well known as one of the advocates at the trial of Queen Caroline, whilst Peter Brodie, Benjamin's eldest brother, held a high position as a conveyancer. In 1797 Brodie and his brothers raised a company of volunteers at a time when a French invasion was much dreaded. He was privately educated by his father, and at the age of eighteen went up to London, devoting himself from the first to the study of anatomy. Brodie joined the medical profession without any special liking or bent for it, and in after-days he said he thought those best succeeded in professions who joined them, not from any irresistible prepossession, but rather from some accidental circumstance inducing them to persevere in their selected course either as a matter of duty or because they had nothing better to do. He rose to be the first surgeon in England, holding for many years a position similar to that once occupied by Sir Astley Cooper. Brodie had always a philosophical turn of mind. He learnt much at first from Abernethy, who arrested his pupils' attention so that it never flagged, and what he told them in his emphatic way never could be forgotten. Brodie used to say "that he had always kept in mind the saying of William Scott [afterwards Lord Stowell] to his brother John [subsequently Lord Eldon], 'John, always keep the Lord Chancellorship in view, and you will be sure to get it in the end.'" And a similar aim and distinction were Brodie's. In 1801 and 1802 he attended the lectures of James Wilson at the Hunterian School in Great Windmill Street, where he worked hard at dissection. It was about this time that he formed what proved a lifelong friendship with William Lawrence (q.v.). In 1803 Brodie became a pupil of Sir Everard Home at St. George's Hospital, and was successively appointed House Surgeon and Demonstrator to the Anatomical School, after which he was Home's assistant in his private operations and researches in comparative anatomy, and he did much work for him at the College Museum. "The latter employment," says Mr. Timothy Holmes (q.v.) in his *Life of Brodie*, "was of critical importance for Brodie in several ways - chiefly because it obliged him to work on scientific subjects, and thus prevented a too exclusive devotion to the pursuit of practical surgery. We cannot be wrong in attributing to this cause mainly his connection with the Royal Society, and the many-sidedness of his intellectual activities." At the College he came into contact with Clift, and, through Home, became an intimate in the learned coterie of Sir Joseph Banks, President of the Royal Society, and the chief link between distinguished men of science of two centuries. Brodie still diligently pursued his anatomical studies at the Windmill Street School, where he first demonstrated for, and then lectured conjointly with, James Wilson until 1812. In 1808, before he was twenty-five, he was elected Assistant Surgeon at St. George's, thus relieving Home of some part of his duties. Brodie remained in this position fourteen years, and his "regular attendance at the hospital was an immense improvement, in the interests both of the patients and the students, on the practice obtaining in the metropolitan hospitals of that day". All through life Brodie was consumed with the rage for work which his father had originally instilled into him. So devoted was he to every phase of his duties that he found no time to travel, only once visiting France for a month and often going without a summer holiday. His very recreations were arduously intellectual. Thus he took a leading part in the life of various learned societies - the Academical Society, banished to London from Oxford in the French revolutionary epoch, the Society for the Promotion of Medical and Chirurgical Knowledge, the Royal Medico-Chirurgical Society, of which he was President in 1839 and 1840. He contributed several valuable papers to the last-named society, and at its meetings he stimulated discussion, and had always something of interest to say. Elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1810, he soon communicated a paper "On the Influence of the Brain on the Action of the Heart and the Generation of Animal Heat", and another "On the Effects produced by certain Vegetable Poisons (Alcohol, Tobacco, Woorara)". The first paper, the subject of which he doubtless derived from John Hunter, formed the Croonian Lecture: the two papers taken together won him the Copley Medal in 1811, an honour never before bestowed on so young a man. In 1809 Brodie entered upon private practice, and in 1822 became full Surgeon at St. George's Hospital, from which time forward his career was one of ever-increasing success. He became a Member in 1805, a Fellow in 1843, and from 1819 to 1823 he was Professor of Anatomy, Physiology, and Surgery at the College. He lectured upon the Organs of Digestion, Respiration, and Circulation, and on the Nervous System, the most interesting of his discourses being upon "Death from Drowning", a subject which Hunter had investigated without hitting upon the scientific explanation of that form of asphyxia eventually brought out by Brodie. While Professor at the College, Brodie was summoned to attend George IV, and with Sir Astley Cooper, who was the operator, and a formidable array of medical men of that time, assisted at an operation for the removal of a small sebaceous cyst from the king's scalp. He became Surgeon to George IV, and attended him during his last illness, when he went every night to Windsor, slept there, and returned to London in the morning. "His habit", says Mr. Timothy Holmes, "was to go into the king's room at about six o'clock, and sit talking with him for an hour or two before leaving for town." The king became warmly attached to him. He was Surgeon to William IV, and in 1834, when he was made a Baronet, he was appointed Serjeant-Surgeon. In this capacity he became examiner by prescriptive right in the College, a privilege abolished by the Charter of 1843, which Brodie was largely instrumental in obtaining. He was a Member of Council from 1829-1862, Hunterian Orator in 1837, Vice-President in 1842 and 1843, and President in 1844. He retired from St. George's Hospital in 1840, but for some time continued his activity at the College, which owes to him the institution of the Order of Fellows. The object of this institution, he maintained, was to ensure the introduction into the profession of a certain number of young men who might be qualified to maintain its scientific character, and would be fully equal to its higher duties as hospital surgeons, teachers, and improvers of physiological, pathological, and surgical science afterwards. The Fellowship may be said to have been largely instrumental in raising the college to what it now is - "the exemplar of surgical education to the whole kingdom". Brodie was the first President of the General Medical Council, having been elected in 1858. Within a week after receiving this honour he became President of the Royal Society, an office which he filled with great dignity and wisdom till 1861. He died, nearly blind following double cataract for the relief of which he had been operated upon by Sir William Bowman (q.v.), at Broome Park, Betchworth, Surrey, on Oct. 21st, 1862. Of the immediate cause of his death, Holmes says: "It seems that nearly thirty years [see BLOXHAM, THOMAS] previously he had suffered from a dislocation of the right shoulder. I am not aware that he ever made any complaint of the part after the dislocation had been reduced, but it was in this same joint that in July he began to complain of pain accompanied by much prostration; and this was succeeded in September by the appearance of a tumour, doubtless of a malignant nature, in the neighbourhood of the shoulder." It thus happened that he who had spent his life treating diseased joints died of a joint disease. He married in 1816 Anne, the third daughter of Serjeant Sellon by his wife Charlotte Dickinson, his brother-in-law being Monsieur Regnault, the French physicist. Three children survived to maturity: Sir Benjamin Collins Brodie F.R.S. (1817-1880), who became Professor of Chemistry at Oxford; a daughter who married the Rev. E. Hoare; and another son, the Rev. W. Brodie. [His granddaughter Mary Isabel married Sir Herbert Warren K.C.V.O. President of Magdalen College Oxford - 1885-1928] Brodie was distinguished as a surgeon with the bent of a physician. He was not a great operating surgeon, nor did he regard operations as the highest aim of surgery. His power of diagnosis was great, and he was a distinguished teacher with an elegant and clear deliverance. He attained high success by the legitimate influence of a lofty order of intellect, by his great stores of surgical knowledge, and the sound decided opinions he based upon them. He was single-minded and upright in character and free from all affectations. He knew his duty and did it well. He lived for a great end, the lessening of human suffering, and for that he felt no labour was too great, no patience too long. As a scientific man his object was truth pursued for its own sake, and without regard to future reward. He recognized the great traditions of wisdom, benevolence, and self-denial as the everlasting bases on which true medicine and surgery rest, and he was in truth a master of medicine. Of Brodie's manner as a lecturer, Sir Henry Acland says: "None who heard him can forget the graphic yet artless manner in which, sitting at his ease, he used to describe minutely what he had himself seen and done under circumstances of difficulty, and what under like circumstances he would again do or would avoid. His instruction was illustrated by the valuable pathological dissections which during many years he had amassed, and which he gave during his lifetime to his hospital." Mr. Timothy Holmes says: "It was Brodie who popularized the method of lithotrity in England, and by so doing chiefly contributed to the ready reception of an operation which has robbed what was one of the deadliest diseases that afflict humanity of nearly all its terror. This will remain to all time one of Brodie's greatest claims to public gratitude." Brodie used to tell that he once prescribed for a fat butler, suffering from too much good living and lack of exercise. Sir Benjamin told him "he must be very moderate in what he ate and drank, careful not to eat much at a time or late at night. Above all, no spirituous liquors could be allowed, malt liquor especially being poison to his complaint." Whilst these directions were being given the butler's face grew longer and longer, and at the end he exclaimed, "And pray, Sir Benjamin, who is going to compensate me for the loss of all these things?" Brodie's personal appearance is admirably portrayed in the picture by Watts. He was not, perhaps, strictly handsome, but no one can deny that the features are striking. A fine forehead, keen grey eyes, a mobile and sensitive mouth, and facial muscles which followed all the movements of one of the most active minds, lent to the countenance a charm and an expressiveness to which no stranger could be insensible. His frame was slight and small; but there was nothing of weakness about it. Those who knew him only as a public man would little suspect the playful humour which sparkled by his fireside - the fund of anecdotes, the harmless wit, the simple pleasures of his country walk. The following is a list of portraits of Brodie: (1) A bust by H. Weekes, R.A., in the Royal College of Surgeons. (2) A portrait in middle life, which appeared in the Medical Circular (1852, I, 817). The copy in the College is accompanied by a strikingly picturesque and vivid appreciation of Brodie as a teacher making his round of the wards. (3) A half-length by G. F. Watts, R.A., painted in 1860, which is reproduced in Timothy Holmes's *Life of Sir Benjamin Collins Brodie*, 1897. (4) A medal presented to Sir Benjamin Brodie in 1840 when he retired from office as Surgeon to St. George's Hospital. There is a bronze replica in the Board Room at St. George's Hospital, and an illustration of it in the *British Journal of Surgery* (1918-19, vi, facing p.158). PUBLICATIONS: - As an author Brodie achieved fame by his treatise on *Diseases of the Joints*, 1818, which went through five editions and was translated into foreign languages. He wrote also on local nervous affections, diseases of the urinary organs, the surgery of the breast, lighting-stroke, besides an important work, published anonymously in 1854, under the title of *Psychological Enquiries* [Times 21 Jan 1938. BRODIE - On Jan. 20, 1938. at Brockham Warren, Betchworth, Surrey, of pneumonia, SIR BENJAMIN VINCENT SELLON BRODIE, Bt., M.A. (Oxon), D.L., J.P., aged 75. Funeral at Betchworth Church, 3 p.m. Monday, Jan. 24. SIR BENJAMIN BRODIE. Sir Benjamin Vincent Sellon Brodie, Bt.,. died at his home, Brockham Warren, Dorking, yesterday at the age of 75. He succeeded as third baronet on the death of his father in 1880. Educated at Magdalen College, Oxford, and a barrister at Lincoln's Inn, he was a county councillor and then a county alderman for Surrey, High Sheriff in 1912, and a member of the Surrey Education Committee. He owned about 1,000 acres in Surrey. Sir Benjamin married in 1887 Caroline, daughter of the late Captain J. R. Woodriff, R.N., his Majesty's Serjeant-at-Arms, and they had one son and two daughters. Lady Brodie died in 1895. The heir is Captain Benjamin Colin (amended to Collins) Brodie, who was educated at Eton and Magdalen College, Oxford. He served throughout the War with the Surrey Yeomanry and the 4th Battalion, The Gordon Highlanders, winning the M.C. and bar. Later he became a captain in the Army Educational Corps. He is married and has two sons and one daughter.] [SIR BENJAMIN BRODIE Captain Sir Benjamin Collins Brodie, MC, the fourth baronet, died on Monday. He served with the Surrey Yeomanry at Gallipoli, with the Gordon Highlanders and the 1st Highland Brigade, British Army of the Rhine, in the First World War. He was joint headmaster of Holyrood School, Bognor Regis, from 1927 to 1940. He was twice chairman of the governors of Tonbridge School; and from 1945 to 1960 of Judd School, Tonbridge. He was twice Master of the Skinners' Company. Brodie succeeded his father in 1938 and the heir to the baronetcy is Brodie's son, Benjamin David Ross Brodie.]
Resource Identifier RCS: E000016
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Grimley, Ronald Patrick (1946 - 2005)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-09-22 2007-02-09
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/372439372439
Occupation General surgeon Vascular surgeon
Details Ron Grimley was born in Birmingham on 21 February 1946 and was educated at grammar school in Small Health and Birmingham University. After junior posts, mainly at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital, he was a lecturer on the surgical unit under Sir Geoffrey Slaney. He was appointed vascular and general surgeon to the Dudley Health Authority in 1983, where he developed a busy vascular and endocrine practice, as well as a special interest in melanoma of the lower limb. He published extensively and was a keen teacher of young surgeons. He was an examiner for the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh and the Intercollegiate Board, and a member of the Specialist Accreditation Committee in General Surgery and the first clinical sub-dean. He was a prime mover in the foundation of the undergraduate teaching centre which was opened and named after him on 14 March 2006. He died from a myocardial infarct on 26 September 2005. He was married to Penny and they had three children.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000252
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Johnston, James Herbert (1920 - 2003)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-09-22
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/372440372440
Occupation Urological surgeon Urologist
Details Herbert Johnston was a pioneer of paediatric urology, determined to make what had been a peripheral interest a specialty in its own right. Appointed first as a general surgeon to a leading children’s hospital, Alder Hey in Liverpool, he soon saw that the urogenital problems required a much closer attention than had been accorded them, and by years of dedicated practice and research he built for himself an international reputation and inspired a succession of young disciples. James Herbert Johnston, known to his intimates as ‘Herbie’, was born on 26 February 1920 in Belfast. His father, Robert Johnston, was in the linen business, his mother, Mary née McCormack, a science teacher. He was always destined for a career in medicine and distinguished himself as an undergraduate by gaining several surgical prizes. He graduated from Queens University, Belfast, in 1943, and after a house job became assistant to the professor of surgery at the Royal Victoria Hospital and at the Children’s Hospital. After military service, from 1946 to 1948, he returned to Belfast, taking the FRCS Ireland in 1949 and the English Fellowship in the following year. He then crossed the Irish Sea, theoretically for a short spell, but actually for the rest of his life, taking up senior registrar posts in Liverpool. There he came under the powerful influence of Charles Wells, who not only trained his registrars but directed them to their consultant posts. Thus it was that in 1956 Herbert was appointed surgeon to the Alder Hey Children’s Hospital. Although Charles Wells was much concerned with urology, Herbert had had no specialist training and, curiously, he was at first given responsibility for the management of burns. With this in mind he went to a famous burn unit in Baghdad, but this venture was abruptly ended by the Suez War. At Alder Hey Isabella Forshall and Peter Rickham were making great strides in neonatal surgery, but had no particular interest in urology and Herbert saw both the need and the opportunity to make that field his own. As Hunterian Professor in 1962 he lectured on vesico-ureteric reflux, the topic then exciting all paediatric urologists, and went on to produce a long series of papers illuminating important, or neglected, aspects of children’s disorders. He joined with Innes Williams in writing the standard British textbook on this subject and his published work soon brought him an international reputation, with invitations to deliver eponymous lectures in the USA and elsewhere. In 1980 he was awarded the St Peters medal of the British Association of Urological Surgeons in recognition of his many contributions. In spite of all this evidence of enthusiasm Herbert did not at first acquaintance give an impression of liveliness. Deliberate in speech, he could at times look positively lugubrious. However, he became a popular lecturer, making his points with logic and a clarity laced with dry wit and self deprecating humour. To those who knew him well he was a delightful companion who could make fun of all life’s problems. His hobbies were few, though he was a keen golfer if not an outstanding performer in this field. In 1945 he married Dorothy Dowling, who made a happy home for him and their son and daughter, who are now in the teaching profession. His retirement was marred by a stroke which left him with considerable disability, but he was lucky to have Dorothy to look after him so well. He died on 4 February 2003.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000253
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

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

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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 Walt, Alexander Jeffrey (1923 - 1996)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Groves, Harry John ( - 2010)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Sarah Gillam
Publication Date 2011-12-20 2018-01-04
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/373965373965
Occupation ENT surgeon
Details John Groves was a consultant ENT surgeon at the Royal Free, Hampstead General and New End hospitals in London. He studied medicine at St Mary’s Hospital Medical School, qualifying MB BS in 1947. He gained his FRCS in 1953. Prior to his consultant appointments, he was a house surgeon at St Mary’s Hospital, a senior house officer in the ENT department at Westminster Hospital, and a senior ENT registrar back at St Mary’s. He was a member of the British Association of Otolaryngologists and an examiner for the diploma in otolaryngology. With John Ballantyne he co-edited the second (1965), third (1971) and fourth (1979) editions of W G Scott’s *Diseases of the ear, nose and throat* (London, Butterworth). John Groves died on 12 July 2010.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001782
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Hawthorne, Arthur Neville (1820 - 1866)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England Updated obituary: Sarah Gillam
Publication Date 2012-04-11
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E002000-E002999/E002100-E002199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/374352374352
Occupation General surgeon Apothecary
Details Practised at Eccleshall, Staffordshire, and died on January 20th, 1866. *See below for an expanded version of the published obituary uploaded 02/04/2025:* Arthur Neville Hawthorne was a surgeon who practised at Eccleshall, Staffordshire. He was born in Ireland in around 1820. He started his medical career as an apothecary: in January 1833 he signed up as an apprentice to an apothecary in Dublin. He went on to become a member of the Royal College of Surgeons of England on 17 June 1840 and a licentiate of the Society of Apothecaries of London in 1843. On 8 June 1859 he became a fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons of England. He also gained a licence in midwifery in Dublin. He was a fellow of the Obstetrical Society of London. For most of his career he worked from a practice on the High Street in Eccleshall. In September 1860, listed as ‘gentleman’, he became an honorary assistant surgeon to the Staffordshire Rifle Volunteer Corps. In April 1850 he married Anne Buckley. They had five children: Arthur, Jane Kathleen, Archibald Stewart, Frederick Buckley and Edith Mary. Hawthorne died on 20 January 1866 of ‘apoplexy’, according to his *Lancet* death notice, aged 46. He was survived by his wife and children.
Resource Identifier RCS: E002169
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Haydon, Nathaniel John (1814 - 1884)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2012-04-11
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E002000-E002999/E002100-E002199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/374353374353
Occupation General surgeon
Details Studied at St Bartholomew's Hospital, where he gained the Senior Prize for Clinical Surgery in 1886, and afterwards in Paris. He practised first at Bodmin, then at Bovey Tracy, Devonshire, where he was Certifying Factory Surgeon, Surgeon to the Oddfellows, and Local Medical Referee to the Home for Incurables. In the early seventies he removed to Minchinhampton, Gloucestershire, where he was Surgeon to the Dispensary. Finally he returned to Devonshire, and practised at Bampton Street, Tiverton, where he died on December 6th, 1884.
Resource Identifier RCS: E002170
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Eastes, George (1841 - 1909)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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/373717373717
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born on May 16th, 1841, in Old Folkestone close to the harbour. He was the eldest child of Sylvester Eastes, MRCS, JP, the Mayor of Folkestone, at that time a small place with fields covering the West Cliff up to the Parish Church. Eastes went to school at St Margare's Bay, then to Tonbridge Grammar School, where the boys got up at 5 am in the summer for preparation, lasting to 8 am. In 1854 he was transferred to Maidstone, where at the end of the Crimean War he won a prize for a school poem on 'Peace'. At the age of 15 he was apprenticed to his father, after which in 1860 he entered Guy's Hospital, where he proceeded to the London Degree and to the Fellowship of the College of Surgeons. He was House Surgeon, and then for two years Surgical Registrar and Tutor. After six months' study in Paris he settled in general practice at 5 Albion Place, W, in succession to Dr Egbert W Charlton. In 1863 he was one of the founders of the Guyite Club, composed of forty-three original members with a motto 'Dum licet nobis', and was its Secretary to the end of his life, when the little society had dwindled to fifteen. With the aid of the Guy's surgeons he was able to develop a special practice in the administration of anaesthetics; he was for fourteen years Anaesthetist to the Great Northern Hospital, and was one of the founders of the Society of Anaesthetists. He acted as Secretary to the first British Medical Association Committee of Inquiry, and devoted much time to a tabulation of the results of the inquiry into anaesthetic administrations. From about 1874 he acted with Alban Doran and Fancourt Barnes on the editorial staff of the *British Medical Journal*, under the Editor, Ernest Hart, and he continued throughout his life to contribute to it. At the Metropolitan Counties Branch he was Secretary (1886-1888), Treasurer (1892-1899 and 1901-1903), President (1900), and Secretary of the Investigation Committee (1885-1887). Up to 1908 he was the Branch Representative on the Council, and a member of the Finance and Journal Committee. At the Leeds Meeting in 1889 he was Secretary of the Section of Public Medicine, and at the Newcastle Meeting in 1893, Vice-President of the same section. He was President of the Harveian Society in 1895. Further, he was instrumental in erecting on the Leas at Folkestone the memorial statue to Harvey at his birthplace. He published a short account of Harvey in 1871. In later life he practised at 35 Gloucester Terrace. He was fond of riding, shooting, the sea, and travel. After a short illness, from which he seemed to be recovering, he died with an attack of thoracic pain on January 23rd, 1909, and was buried in Folkestone Cemetery. He had married in 1869 Miss Fanny Elizabeth Friend, of Hambledon, who survived him with two daughters and one son, Dr George Leslie Eastes, pathologist. His younger brother was Thomas Eastes (qv).
Resource Identifier RCS: E001534
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Eastes, Thomas (1850 - 1928)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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/373718373718
Occupation General surgeon
Details The second son of Sylvester Eastes, who practised at Folkestone in Kent for about forty-five years. He was born on December 27th, 1850, was educated at Epsom College and then went to Guy's Hospital, where he filled the offices of House Surgeon, House Physician, and Resident Obstetric Assistant. He graduated at London University with first-class honours in medicine and obstetrics at the MB in 1874, and gained the Gold Medal at the MD examination in 1875. He then settled at Folkestone, where he obtained the leading practice, was Surgeon to the Victoria Hospital, becoming the first Consulting Surgeon; President of the South-Eastern branch of the British Medical Association; President (1892-1905) of the Folkestone Natural History and Microscopical Society, and a member of the Society of Medical Phonographers. In conjunction with his elder brother, Dr George Eastes (qv), of London, he was active in perpetuating the connection with Folkestone of the memory of Dr William Harvey, the discoverer of the circulation of the blood. The memorial took the form of a statue by Mr A B Joy which was unveiled and presented to the town by Professor Richard Owen (qv) on August 6th, 1871. He married Alice Elizabeth, second daughter of the Rev A H Rumboll, Vicar of Thorpe-le-Soken, Essex, but there were no children of the marriage. He died at Manor Road, Folkestone, on August 8th, 1928, and was buried in the Folkestone Cemetery. Eastes had more than a local reputation and might have been appointed Obstetric Physician to Guy's Hospital had he not preferred to carry on his father's practice at Folkestone. For many years he found time for wide reading, and being of regular habits he devoted one hour daily to general literature and a second hour to recent advances in medicine, surgery, and midwifery. His devotion to his church was extraordinary, and he seldom allowed his medical work to interfere with his attendance at both the Sunday services at Christ Church, where he read the Lessons regularly for forty years. He was correct and precise to a fault and was intolerant of slang. So long as he was in practice he retained his carriage - though a motor-car would have saved him much time - not because he preferred it, but because he was unwilling to discharge the faithful coachman who had been in his service for many years. His recreations were travel, natural history, and cricket.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001535
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Ebbage, Thomas ( - 1874)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

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

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Fenton, John (1817 - 1877)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-12-14
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/373928373928
Occupation General surgeon
Details Practised at 19 Mornington Terrace, Liverpool, where at the time of his death he was Surgeon to the Liverpool Police Force, and Hon Surgeon to the Ladies' Charity and Dispensary. He died on September 26th, 1877.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001745
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Wells, Meher Derek (1937 - 2011)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Sarah Gillam
Publication Date 2012-01-23 2015-07-20
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/374065374065
Occupation ENT surgeon
Details Meher Derek Wells was a consultant ENT surgeon in Canterbury and Thanet, and a research fellow at the Institute of Laryngology and Otology, London. She was born Meher Mehta in Hyderabad, India, in 1937. She studied medicine at Osmania Medical College and qualified MB BS in 1960. After going to the UK, she was a senior house officer in otorhinolaryngology at the Royal Throat, Nose and Ear Hospital in London, and a registrar at Wexham Park Hospital, Slough, West Middlesex Hospital, Isleworth, and at Great Ormond Street. She then became a senior registrar and later a locum consultant at University College Hospital, London. She was subsequently appointed as a consultant in Canterbury and Thanet, Kent. She was also a research fellow in pathology at the Institute of Laryngology and Otology in London. She gained her fellowships of the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland and of England in 1968 and 1970 respectively, and, in 1992, was awarded an MD for her work on neonatal temporal bone development and pathology. She was a devout Parsi Zoroastrian. She was married twice. Her first husband died of renal failure, and she then married Derek Wells, a haematologist. Meher Derek Wells died on 24 May 2011.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001882
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Watson, Neil Alexander (1944 - 2009)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by David K C Cooper
Publication Date 2012-01-23 2013-09-06
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/374066374066
Occupation Artist Hand surgeon Orthopaedic surgeon
Details Neil Watson was a hand surgeon in Oxford and Milton Keynes, and later a successful artist. He was born on 13 February 1944 at the Radcliffe Infirmary in Oxford. Neil's father, John Stuart Ferra Watson, and paternal grandfather were both Guy's-trained doctors. As his father served in the Royal Army Medical Corps, Neil's parents were overseas for most of his childhood, and, after the age of five, he saw them during only one school holiday each year. The other holidays he would spend with his grandparents or with various great aunts in the UK. With the help of a British Army bursary, Neil was educated at St Edward's School in Oxford, which proved 'a marvellous experience' for him. Although he already had an interest in the arts, probably inherited from his 'extremely creative' mother Rosemary (née Underhill), St Edward's exposed him to art and music on a greater scale. He played the violin in the school orchestra and greatly enjoyed the chapel organ and choir. He described these formative years 'as if I was in paradise'. He also developed a love of rowing but, because of the extremely high standard at the school at the time, he had to be content with being a member of the second or third VIII. He originally planned a career in architecture but, through the influence of a biology teacher, he finally chose medicine. Although offered a place at St John's College, Cambridge, he chose to go straight to Guy's, a decision he later regretted as he 'missed out on the Cambridge experience'. First, however, he spent several months in Florence and Rome, developing his drawing and painting, and learning Italian. In 1962, Neil entered Guy's Hospital Medical School, and found the next five years 'immensely exciting'. Rowing became very important to him and, in the summer of 1963, he represented the boat club at Henley Royal Regatta. He was also an active member of the arts club and the theatre club, for which he designed sets. He bought 'beer and petrol' and even 'a fiercely fast car' by selling etchings and paintings. One of his pen and ink drawings of the hospital featured on the cover of *Guy's Hospital Gazette*. In his clinical years, he was greatly influenced by the senior orthopaedic surgeon, Tim Stamm, who he described as 'an absolutely phenomenal surgeon'. After graduating in 1967, he was appointed orthopaedic house surgeon at Guy's, during which period he married, and followed this by a series of house appointments in Truro in Cornwall. He then returned to Guy's on the junior surgical registrar rotation (when Sir Hedley Atkins was handing over to Lord McColl as professor of surgery). He found working with the urologists, F R Kilpatrick and Hugh Kinder, and the neurosurgeon, Murray Falconer (at the Maudsley), especially valuable. After two years as a registrar in Guildford (becoming an FRCS in 1971), he was appointed orthopaedic registrar at Oxford under Robert Duthie, one of the most influential orthopaedic surgeons in the UK. In 1977, a travelling fellowship from the Worshipful Company of Scientific Instrument Makers enabled him to spend time with several innovative hand and plastic surgeons in Melbourne, Australia, where he learned microsurgery and wrote several research papers. He returned to Oxford as a senior registrar. His first consultant position was a joint appointment between the Nuffield Orthopaedic Centre and Banbury, where he acquired an operating microscope, and started carrying out peripheral nerve surgery and teaching microsurgery courses. Unfortunately, at Oxford, Duthie was of the opinion that 'we're all generalists here', and Neil's efforts to expand his work in nerve surgery met with resistance. Sadly, during this period, his marriage broke up, but he was able to maintain a close relationship with his three children. When the post of clinical reader in orthopaedics at Oxford became vacant, he was appointed and also elected to a fellowship at Green College. He specialised in surgery for rheumatoid arthritis, which he found particularly rewarding, but he was disappointed that his planned research projects were not fully achieved. After two or three years, a new hospital opened in Milton Keynes, and the opportunity of developing a new type of consultant-led service was so appealing that he accepted a position there and began to specialise in hand surgery. During these years at Oxford and Milton Keynes, he wrote about 50 scientific communications and three books on hand surgery. As a registrar, he had written *Practical management of musculo-skeletal emergencies* (Oxford, Blackwell Scientific, 1985), and as a consultant, *Hand injuries and infections* (London, Gower Medical, 1986). He then co-edited *Methods and concepts in hand surgery* (London, Butterworths, 1986). At a surgical conference, he met an American woman who ran a hand and rehabilitation centre in North Carolina. Neil soon made the momentous decision to relocate to the US, with the intention of obtaining a license to practise hand surgery there. However, the medical board of North Carolina made it so difficult for him that he made the even more momentous decision to abandon his surgical career and revert to his first love, drawing and painting. Even though he was thereafter relatively financially insecure, he never regretted the decision to begin his new career as a 'creative person'. For the next 20 or more years he painted, taught workshops in drawing and painting, and made several CDs of his own improvisational music. These endeavours went well, and he found he was earning $45,000 to $50,000 a year selling paintings in galleries. The highlight of his artistic career was when he held an exhibition of his work, 'Architecture observed', in Venice in 1996. For three months he exhibited 135 of his works, which were viewed by almost 10,000 people. One visitor was a Venetian writer, Renato Pestriniero, and together they published a book of Neil's paintings with commentaries by Pestriniero, *Seeking Venice* (Vianello Libri, 2001), which became available in Italian, French and English. Neil also found time to learn to fly, partly by using simulation, which gave him the idea of developing a simulator for microsurgical techniques. He received a grant of $250,000 from the US National Institutes of Health, with which he developed realistic layered replications of the rat femoral artery, vein and sciatic nerve. He became co-director of the Microsurgical Training Institute in Santa Barbara, California, where surgeons came from all over the world. When his second marriage was dissolved, he decided to move to the San Francisco bay area, where he continued painting and, for periods, was more active in teaching and in writing about art. He taught intermittently at Cal Poly and at the Academy of Art College in San Francisco (now the Academy of Art University). His painting evolved from being realistic and conventional to more abstract, eventually combining images with the written word, a form of art he termed 'diagraphica'. He brought out several CDs, including *The drawing spirit: developing the art of your drawing hand* (2003) and *Trigraphica: a drawing trilogy* (2007?), and a book *Drawing - developing a lively and expressive approach* (Neil Watson, 2007). He also rekindled his early interest in music. In late 2008 he became engaged again, but the development of a brain tumour curtailed this plan and, having returned to Oxford to be near two of his children, he died there on 4 October 2009 at the age of 65. He was survived by his three children, Ben, Anita and Hugh, and his two former wives.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001883
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Watts, John Inwood Michael ( - 2009)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Wilmot, Thomas James (1920 - 2011)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Sarah Gillam
Publication Date 2012-01-23 2015-07-03
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/374068374068
Occupation ENT surgeon
Details Thomas James Wilmot was a consultant ENT surgeon in Tyrone and Fermanagh, Northern Ireland. He was born in 1920. His father was a general practitioner in Louth, Lincolnshire, but was originally from County Kerry. His mother was from Inverness. Wilmot was educated in Norfolk and at Epsom College, and then studied medicine at Middlesex Hospital Medical School. He was evacuated to Leeds and Bristol during the Second World War and qualified MB BS in 1944. His first posts were in Inverness and at Mount Vernon Hospital. He then returned to Middlesex Hospital, first as a surgical registrar and then as an ENT registrar. From 1947 to 1949 he served in the Royal Air Force as a graded ENT specialist. In 1950 he was based at the Royal National Throat, Nose and Ear Hospital, where he gained his FRCS and MS. He then returned to Middlesex Hospital as a senior ENT registrar. In 1951 he was appointed to a consultant post at Omagh in County Tyrone, where he set up the first ENT service outside Belfast. Working with colleagues at Middlesex Hospital and the University of Geneva, he installed specialist auditory and rotational equipment for the study of sensorineural deafness and vertigo, then the most advanced equipment in the British Isles. He published papers, wrote a monograph on Ménière's disease and contributed to text books on otology, audiology and occupational medicine. He was president of the otology section of the Royal Society of Medicine in 1973 and of the Irish Otolaryngology Society in 1981. In the 1970s he was awarded the Dalby, Jobson Horne and Norman Gamble prizes. He was a founder member of the Otorhinolaryngological Travelling Club. Outside medicine, he had a passion for fishing and was a skilled painter in oils. He also made his own wine. In later years he developed Parkinson's disease. His first wife Pat died in 1986. He died on 31 March 2011 and was survived by his second wife, Ivy, his son Tom and daughter Heather, five grandchildren and three great-grandchildren.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001885
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Jeaffreson, William (1790 - 1865)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2012-05-16
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E002000-E002999/E002300-E002399
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/374536374536
Occupation Gynaecologist Obstetrician
Details Went to Bury St Edmunds Grammar School, then to Guy's and St Thomas's Hospitals, to which the fame of Sir Astley Cooper attracted him as it did others. He settled in practice at Framlingham, Suffolk, and there gained for himself the honour of being amongst the first in England to remove an ovarian cyst successfully. In the United States McDowell and Nathan Smith had succeeded in eleven cases. At the post-mortem on a woman who had died from another cause Jeaffreson had noted an ovarian cyst, without adhesions, which when collapsed could be drawn out through a one-inch incision. Robert Houston (*Phil Trans*, 1724, xxxiii, 8) had reported that he had cut into an ovarian cyst, evacuated the contents, and the woman had recovered. William Hunter (*Med Obs and Inquiries*, 1762, ii, 26, 41, and 45: on the "Cellular Membrane and Some of its Diseases" and on "Encysted Dropsy of the Ovarium") had suggested, with reference to Houston's case, the removal of the cyst through a one-inch incision after emptying it by means of a trocar and cannula. Jeaffreson had also learnt of Nathan Smith's operation. He first examined the case of ovarian cyst in 1833, and watched the woman until 1836, when, assisted by King, of Saxmundham, he made a one-inch incision midway between the umbilicus and pubes through the linea alba, emptied the cyst through a cannula inserted by means of a trocar, removing 12 pints of fluid. As the sac emptied it was seized and drawn forwards; a second cyst containing 2 oz was similarly emptied. A ligature was then placed on the pedicle, the ends of the ligature were cut close to the knot, the sac was removed, and the wound sutured. The woman recovered and continued in good health. The prevalence of bladder calculus in East Anglia gave Jeaffreson opportunities of becoming a successful lithotomist. He also tried lithotrity advocated by Civiale and Heurteloup in France, by Costello in England. He was the first provincial surgeon to try the procedure, and selected cases in which he obtained success except in one. The College recognized his surgical success by electing him an Hon Fellow and he attended the annual elections and dinners. He joined the Provincial Medical and Surgical Association, and was President at a meeting of the Eastern Branch at Framlingham in 1848. He retired later and died at Framlingham on November 8th, 1865. Publications: The Surgeon General's Library Catalogue attributes to Jeaffreson *A Practical Treatise on Diseases of the Eye*, 1844, which in fact was written by a surgeon of the same name who spent many years in Bombay.
Resource Identifier RCS: E002353
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Jeffree, John (1821 - 1899)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Jenkins, Herbert Stanley (1875 - 1913)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2012-05-16
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E002000-E002999/E002300-E002399
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/374538374538
Occupation General surgeon
Details The son of F A Jenkins, great-nephew of Dr Robert Fletcher, of the Surgeon General's Library, Washington. He studied at the Bristol Medical School and Hospital, where he gained several prizes, scholarships, and a Gold Medal, acting later as Assistant House Surgeon, House Physician, and Casualty Officer at the Bristol General Hospital. He was also House Surgeon at the Children's Hospital. In 1900-1901 he was House Surgeon at St Mark's Hospital, London, then Registrar, Pathologist, and Resident Medical Officer at Mount Vernon Hospital for Tuberculosis, Northwood. A leader in the Students' Christian Movement, he felt called to the Medical Missionary Field, went out to China under the Baptist Missionary Society, and took charge in 1904 of the medical work at Sian Fu, in Shensi, North China. The Chinese language presented no difficulty to him. China was just then settling down after the Boxer Rising; the natives were more ready to recognize that the foreign missionaries only desired to help them. His knowledge of their language made friends of his patients, and they consulted him on other than medical matters. There is nothing that pleases a Chinese as much as finding someone who is willing to listen to his story, and Jenkins was a patient listener. There was no railway and Sian Fu was a month's journey inland; there were the same diseases as at home and a few others, but all in a more advanced state - wounds full of maggots; malignant disease long past the operable stage; a dislocated shoulder of six months' standing covered by a plaster; needles previously inserted to let out evil spirits; common drugs in very crude form. The native doctors usually prescribed the infusion of a herb in a pint of water, so that concentrated drugs in the form of tablets were viewed with suspicion. Until he can train assistants the missionary doctor has to be surgeon, house surgeon, nurse, and manservant, and dispense his own medicines. Until trained in antiseptic methods, Chinese assistants could not assist at operations; the Chinese are averse to major operations, particularly to amputations, and permission to open the abdomen was a novelty till the Chinese learnt that lives could be saved thereby. During his first furlough Jenkins was engaged in collecting appliances for his hospital, especially an X-ray installation, which was well on its way out when he became ill. He had other improvements in mind, particularly the building of a new hospital. On his return at the end of 1912 he took up work in conjunction with Cecil Frederick Robertson, FRCS; but in Sian Fu, which had been exhausted by famine, fire, and snow, typhus was prevalent, and Robertson caught it in the out-patient department. Jenkins took his share in nursing his colleague, and after twenty-one days himself sickened. He did not give up, but saw sixty out-patients with a temperature of 103° F, and went to bed with his Chinese attendant sleeping in his room. Mrs Jenkins had been with her children to the coast, but was able to reach her husband and nurse him for the last few days. Although after a fortnight the fever left him, he died at the end of a three weeks' illness on April 6th, 1913. He was buried in the Baptist Missionary Churchyard by his fellow-missionaries, many of his Chinese patients following to his grave. He married the daughter of Mr and Mrs Thomas Liveridge, of Llandaff, and she was left with two young children.
Resource Identifier RCS: E002355
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Laing, Patrick Gowans (1923 - 2012)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Janet Cavanagh
Publication Date 2012-06-28 2013-11-25
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E002000-E002999/E002500-E002599
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/374730374730
Occupation Orthopaedic surgeon
Details Patrick Gowans Laing was an orthopaedic surgeon in Pittsburgh, United States, and a pioneering researcher into the use of safe metals for surgical implants. He was born in Putney, London, on 8 November 1923, the son of Harold James Gowans Laing, a major in the Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers, and Elsie Laing née Mackey, a novelist and journalist. He came from a long line of doctors, dating back to James Gowans Laing, a doctor in Scotland in the early 19th century. Patrick's early childhood was chaotic, and he moved between caregivers in France and England, and in various parts of East Africa. By age nine, Patrick was brought back to England, where he settled in the care of his Uncle Reg and Aunt Dolly. He attended boarding school in Romsey, Hampshire. Here the head teacher provided the stability and inspiration Patrick needed to excel at sport and at his academic work. In 1939 he enrolled at Southampton University College to begin his medical studies. He then went on to King's College, London, qualifying in 1945. His studies in wartime London were accompanied by frequent air bombings, however Patrick continued to get high marks and to enjoy student life! He held house posts at King's and then joined the Royal Air Force as a flight lieutenant in the Medical Corps. Following his demobilisation, he began his training in orthopaedics, at the Royal Hampshire County Hospital in Winchester, at King's, Queen Mary's Hospital, Sidcup, and at Lewisham Hospital. He gained his FRCS in 1948, aged just 25. From 1950 to 1952 he was a senior registrar at Pembury, Kent, and then, from 1952 to 1954, in Bradford. He 1954 he emigrated to Canada, where he was a resident surgeon in New Brunswick. A year later he moved on to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, where he held a year-long fellowship in cerebral palsy at the Children's Hospital. In 1956 he became an assistant professor of orthopaedic surgery at the University of Pittsburgh, and, from 1968, was a clinical professor. Patrick was involved in the early development of bone replacement surgery. In the aftermath of the Second World War, it was clear to him that most of the implants used to repair complicated orthopaedic injuries were unsuitable. This was due in large part to the body's reaction to the materials used to make the implants. Over a period of three decades, Patrick sought to identify the metals best suited for use in orthopaedic implants, such as hip replacements. His research showed that alloys of titanium, chromium and certain types of stainless steel were (and remain) the most suitable. These studies provided the basis of what is now the field of biomedical metallurgy. In 1962, as a member of the American Society for Testing and Materials (ASTM), Patrick was instrumental in forming the medical and surgical materials and devices committee. This committee provided metallurgists with a platform to make recommendations for setting high, scientifically-based and credible manufacturing standards. In recognition of his lifelong contribution, the committee changed the name of their award of merit to the Patrick G Laing award. As a leading member of the American delegation, Patrick also made substantial contributions to the International Organization for Standardization, ensuring that science-based standards for implants were internationally upheld. With Brian Williamson in Cambridge, Patrick also contributed significantly to the research that led to a worldwide switch from steel to stainless steel for all surgical instruments. During his early professional career he found time to write poetry and paint. Later, in his rare moments of leisure time, Patrick enjoyed the outdoors - nature walks, bird watching, camping, fishing, hunting, canoeing and scuba diving. He is remembered as always having some form of camera with him, whether above or below water. As he got older, he pursued his interests in poetry, stamp collecting and listening to music. In 1945 he married Stephanie ('Judy') Townley, a fellow medical student. The following year their daughter, Janet, was born. Sadly, his marriage was short lived. In 1957 he married Patricia Kromer, with whom he had five children: Catherine, Deirdre, James, Walter and Elizabeth. He died on 28 March 2012, aged 88, and was survived by Judy and Patricia, his six children, 11 grandchildren and 11 great-grandchildren.
Resource Identifier RCS: E002547
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Ives, Louis Arnold (1914 - 2008)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Tina Craig
Publication Date 2011-12-21 2014-07-25
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/373984373984
Occupation General surgeon
Details Louis Arnold Ives was a consultant general surgeon at St Charles Hospital, London. He trained at London University and St Bartholomew's Hospital graduating MB, BS in 1938. At the Royal Postgraduate Medical School in London he became honorary lecturer in surgery. While working in London he lived in Hampton-on-Thames but retired to New Milton in Hampshire. He died on 4 March 2008.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001801
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Phatak, Prabhakar Shankar (1936 - 2011)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Sarah Gillam
Publication Date 2012-06-28 2014-06-27
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E002000-E002999/E002500-E002599
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/374734374734
Occupation General surgeon
Details Prabhakar Shankar Phatak, known as 'Prabhu', was a consultant general surgeon at the Whittington Hospital. He was born in Pusad, Maharashtra, India, on 20 March 1936, the son of Shankar Ganesh Phatak, a lawyer, and Uma Phatak née Kelkar, a housewife. His mother's father was a doctor. He attended the local government high school, matriculating with first class honours and five distinctions. He then studied sciences at Vidarbha Mahavidyalaya College in Amravati and joined Nagpur Medical College in 1954. He qualified MB BS in 1960. In 1961 he went to the UK for further training, and gained his FRCS in 1967. He was a registrar at Bishop's Stortford, Queen Mary's, Sidcup, and at the Whittington Hospital in London. He was appointed as a consultant surgeon at the Whittington, and later worked in Dudley and Luton. In 1967 he married Jean McKinnon, who later became a GP. They had two children, a daughter, Nilima, a consultant haematologist, and a son, Devendra, and five grandchildren. Phatak died on 24 December 2011, aged 75.
Resource Identifier RCS: E002551
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Jay, Barrie Samuel (1929 - 2007)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Enid Taylor
Publication Date 2011-12-21 2013-02-20
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001800-E001899
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373986373986
Occupation Ophthalmic surgeon
Details Barrie Samuel Jay was professor of clinical ophthalmology at the Institute of Ophthalmology, University of London. He was born in London on 7 May 1929, the son of Maurice Bernard Jay, a medical practitioner, and Julia Sterling Jay, a housewife. He attended Perse School and then Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge, and University College Hospital, London. He trained in ophthalmology at Moorfields Eye Hospital and the London Hospital. He was a Shepherd research scholar at the Institute of Ophthalmology from 1963 to 1964. In 1965 he became a consultant ophthalmic surgeon to the London Hospital. Four years later, in 1969, he was also appointed to Moorfields Eye Hospital. He was dean of the Institute of Ophthalmology from 1980 to 1985 and professor of clinical ophthalmology from 1985 to 1992. In 1992 he was appointed as an emeritus professor and as an honorary consultant surgeon to Moorfields Eye Hospital, London. Barrie Jay was much respected as a clinician and for his research work, especially in paediatrics and genetics, in both of which fields he was honoured. His scientific contributions were considerable, with a large body of peer-reviewed publications, book chapters and books. He also showed considerable foresight in embracing information technology at an early stage, and created the first database of ophthalmic training facilities in the UK. With other far-sighted colleagues he was instrumental in setting up the Royal College of Ophthalmologists and was a senior vice-president of the college. At the Royal College of Surgeons he was an examiner for the diploma in ophthalmology from 1970 to 1975, a member of the Court of Examiners from 1975 to 1980, and a co-opted member of the Council from 1983 to 1988. In 2004 he was the first recipient of a lifetime achievement award, presented by the European Paediatric Ophthalmological Society. He had many interests outside ophthalmology. His greatest passion, or obsession as he himself described it, was British postal history. He claimed that his wife said it was more important to him than his work! He wrote a standard history on the subject and over the years amassed an internationally known collection which sold at auction in the year 2000 for a considerable sum. He was president of the Royal Philatelic Society in 1998. He was also a keen gardener with a particular interest in dwarf irises. He was master of the Society of Apothecaries in 1995. He married Marcelle Ruby Byre, a geneticist, in 1954. They had two sons, Robert Maurice, a barrister, and Stephen Mark, an accountant. Barrie Jay died on 10 March 2007, at the age of 77, after a short illness.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001803
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Jeffs, John Victor (1928 - 2007)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Brian Morgan
Publication Date 2011-12-21 2015-05-29
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/373987373987
Occupation Plastic surgeon Plastic and reconstructive surgeon
Details John Jeffs was a consultant plastic surgeon at Charing Cross Hospital, London. He was born in Tredegar, Gwent, where his father, Victor Henry Jeffs, was the local butcher. His mother was Ivy Elizabeth Jeffs née Lewis. He went to Lewis School in Pengam. His medical training was at Guy's Hospital, where he benefitted from the teaching of James Whillis (anatomy) and Samuel Wass (surgery). He qualified 1951 then did his National Service as a captain in the RAMC and spent much of his time in Korea and Japan. He passed his FRCS in 1959 and went on to train in plastic surgery. He was appointed as a consultant in plastic surgery to Charing Cross Hospital, Westminster Hospital, Queen Mary's Hospital, Roehampton, and St George's Hospital. He published articles on plastic and hand surgery and was on the council of the Medical Protection Society from 1952 to 1990. He commented that he had a very satisfying professional life as a 'service surgeon'. His hobbies were fencing and shooting. In 1955 he married Margaret Lewis and they had one daughter, Jennifer. John Victor Jeffs died on 23 September 2007. He was 79.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001804
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Iceton, Sydney John (1925 - 2007)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Sarah Gillam
Publication Date 2011-12-21 2014-11-25
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/373988373988
Occupation General surgeon
Details Sydney John Iceton was a surgeon in Australia. He gained his FRCS in 1956. His last known address was in Cronulla, New South Wales. He died on 1 June 2007, aged 81.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001805
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Jenkins, John Dudley (1931 - 2002)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-12-21 2014-12-23
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/373989373989
Occupation Urological surgeon Urologist
Details John Dudley Jenkins was a consultant urologist in Southampton. A proud Welshman, he was born in Swansea on 7 August 1931. His father, John Gerwyn Jenkins, was the director of wage negotiations for British Steel in South Wales. He was also 'Roy Allan' in the thirties BBC programme 'Roy Allan and his Premier Dance Band', playing his trombone and French horn. His mother, Dorothy Mary Jones, was a talented pianist, an enthusiastic naturalist and an avant-garde cook. John was educated at King Henry VIII Grammar School, Abergavenny, and Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge, where he sang in the college and university choirs, and played rugby for the university second XV and for Caius. His clinical training was at University College Hospital, where he continued to play rugby and starred in Christmas shows. He achieved 'international fame' as Dirk Bogarde's double on the rugby field in the film *A doctor in the house*. After junior jobs at UCH, he took a three-year commission in the Royal Navy, where he qualified as a naval diver and did research in the deep pressure diving school at HMS Haslar. He served at sea during the 'cod war'. After further posts in Cardiff and Addenbrooke's, he spent a year doing research under William Stahl in Bellevue Hospital, New York. On his return, he became senior registrar at the Royal Infirmary Leeds under Leslie Pyrah, Philip Clark and R D Williams. He was appointed as a consultant general surgeon with an interest in urology in Southampton in 1969. At first he shared the emergency general surgical rota with one other general surgeon. He was later joined by a former trainee, Christopher Smart, and together they established a specialised department of urology. He was a member of the councils of the section of urology of the Royal Society of Medicine and the British Association of Urological Surgeons. He carried out research, in collaboration with the neurosurgical department, into bladder function in spinal disease. John was an immensely sociable man with a wide range of knowledge, a love of music and the literature of the first world war, which he shared with his colleague John Garfield. Together they went on many walking holidays of the war cemeteries on which they lectured together, and which resulted in Garfield's monograph *The fallen* (London, Leo Cooper, 1990). He married Siân Reynolds, a dental surgeon, in 1963. They bought a house in Bursledon with a windmill in the garden, which served as a shed for many years. They handed it over to Hampshire County Council, which restored it as the only working windmill in Hampshire. They often entertained at the Mill House. They had four children, of whom the eldest became a general practitioner in Cardiff. In 1989 they bought a house in France and began restoring it, but sadly increasing illness prevented this from becoming a retirement home. They moved to Cardiff in 1997. He died at home on 4 August 2002.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001806
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Jessop, Walter Hamilton Hylton (1853 - 1917)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2012-05-23
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E002000-E002999/E002300-E002399
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/374545374545
Occupation Ophthalmic surgeon
Details Born at Cheltenham, the son of Walter Jessop. His father, who was in partnership with William Dalton, had been House Surgeon at the Charing Cross and Westminster Ophthalmic Hospitals. At the time of his son's birth he was Surgeon to the General Hospital and Dispensary, to the Ophthalmic Dispensary, and to the Dispensary for Women and Children in Cheltenham. Walter Jessop was educated at the Bedford Commercial School, where he gained the Harpur Exhibition of £200. He then proceeded to the Hartley Institute at Southampton and began to work for the Indian Civil Service. He was given a Tancred Studentship in medicine tenable at Caius College, Cambridge; matriculated on October 1st, 1872, and graduated BA in 1876, proceeding MB in 1882 and MA in 1886. He entered St Bartholomew's Hospital in October, 1876, and served the offices of House Surgeon to Alfred Willett (qv) and Ophthalmic House Surgeon to Henry Power (qv) and Bowater J Vernon (qv). In the course of his duty he contracted a severe attack of diphtheria with subsequent paralysis of his vocal cords, the effects of which never completely disappeared. In 1882 he was appointed Assistant Demonstrator of Anatomy at St Bartholomew's Hospital with W J Walsham, W Bruce Clarke, and C B Lockwood as his colleagues. He served from 1882-1894, and during the latter years, as full and Senior Demonstrator, he was in charge of the rooms. These years were times of anxiety and trouble. He married and shortly afterwards lost his wife, who left him with an infant daughter; he took a large house and, like the majority of his contemporaries who were seeking hospital appointments, paid his rent by taking resident pupils at the rate of £126 a year each. The fee was not always paid regularly and the pupils often required a firm controlling hand. During these years, too, Jessop had determined to devote himself to ophthalmic practice. He became attached to the staff of the Central London Ophthalmic Hospital, after being a Clinical Assistant at Moorfields, and acted as Ophthalmic Surgeon to the Western General Dispensary, and later to the Foundling Hospital and to the Children's Hospital at Paddington Green. He was elected Junior Ophthalmic Surgeon to St Bartholomew's Hospital in October, 1894, in succession to Henry Power, who retired on reaching the age limit of 65. The election, which involved a personal canvass of the Governors, was keenly contested, and at the poll Jessop obtained 98 votes, Ernest Clarke 27 votes. He succeeded to the office of Senior Ophthalmic Surgeon on the retirement of Bowater J Vernon in 1901, and then rapidly obtained a large practice. Being a Liberal in politics, he took No 73 Harley Street on the site of a house once occupied by W E Gladstone. He had later in life a country house on the river bank at Sutton Courtney, Berks, where he was appointed a JP for the county. In 1915 he was elected President of the Ophthalmological Society. Jessop made an exhaustive research in 1885 on the action of cocaine on the eye, and the conclusions at which he arrived were confirmed by other observers. The results show that he could have done good scientific work had he chosen, but he preferred to devote his energies to the clinical side of ophthalmic surgery. He delivered the Hunterian Lectures at the Royal College of Surgeons in 1887-1888, taking as his subject the anatomy and physiology of the intra-ocular muscles of the eye, and in 1888 he communicated a paper on the same subject to the International Ophthalmic Congress. From 1885 every volume of the *Transactions of the Ophthalmological Society* contains some contributions by him, and in 1898 he published an excellent *Manual on Diseases of the Eye*, of which a second edition appeared in 1908. During the War he acted as Ophthalmic Surgeon at the First London General Hospital whilst carrying on his work at the different hospitals with which he was connected, as well as his own private practice. He added to the fatigue - somewhat unnecessarily - by living at Sutton Courtney, rising very early to swim in the river, and returning late in the evening. He died of pneumonia after a few days' illness on Friday, February 16th, 1917, and was cremated at Golder's Green. He married twice and left a daughter by his first wife. Jessop made a unique position for himself in the ophthalmological world; and he was probably the best known of the English ophthalmic surgeons to his brethren on the Continent of Europe, for he was an assiduous attendant at the various International Congresses of medicine or ophthalmology and was usually present at the Annual Meetings of Ophthalmic Surgeons held at Heidelberg and Paris. The latter years of his life were much occupied in arranging for a *British Journal of Ophthalmology* to be financed by a limited liability company, of which he was appointed the managing director. The journal was to incorporate the *Royal London Ophthalmic Hospital Reports*, the *Ophthalmic Review*, and the *Ophthalmoscope*. The suggestion came originally from Professor Straub, of Amsterdam, but Jessop was the moving spirit in the enterprise. He also acted as librarian of the Bowman Collection when the library was transferred from the Ophthalmological Society to the keeping of the Royal Society of Medicine. His habits portrayed in a striking way the 'herd instinct'. He was gregarious and was never so happy as when he was surrounded by troops of his friends. He was a lover of music and of art, and had made a first-rate collection of Whistler etchings, examples from which were shown at the Royal Academy Exhibition in 1917. The collection was dispersed in the United States after his death. He was a good sportsman, President of the Hospital Football Club, and from very early days to the end of his life he kept a boat on the Thames. He was appointed a Junior Grand Deacon in the United Grand Lodge of Freemasons in 1905.
Resource Identifier RCS: E002362
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Jobson, John (1810 - 1889)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Lloyd, John Augustus ( - 1874)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2012-07-04
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E002000-E002999/E002500-E002599
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/374741374741
Occupation Physician
Details Educated at St Bartholomew's Hospital and the Royal College of Surgeons, Ireland. He was the second son of Lieut-Colonel Herbert Lloyd, of Chelsea. Settling as a medical practitioner in Bath in 1829, he practised there for more than forty years, holding various medical appointments. At the time of his death, and for many years previously, he was Physician to an Institution for Diseases of the Chest and Cancer, at Bath. In 1870 he was appointed JP. His death occurred after a long illness at his residence, 17 Bennett Street, on April 29th, 1874.
Resource Identifier RCS: E002558
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Jones, Robin Francis McNab (1922 - 2009)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Neil Weir
Publication Date 2012-01-05 2016-05-27
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001800-E001899
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/374000374000
Occupation ENT surgeon
Details Robin Francis McNab Jones, a much-respected leading ENT surgeon, was a consultant at both St Bartholomew's Hospital and the Royal National Throat, Nose and Ear Hospital, London, where for five years he also served as dean of the Institute of Laryngology and Otology (from 1971 to 1976). He was born in Bristol on 22 October 1922. His father was a civil servant; his mother, Mary, née Evans, a teacher. He moved as a child to Manchester, where he attended Manchester Grammar School. His family later went to London and Robin McNab Jones completed his secondary education at Dulwich College. He used to reminisce that he first thought of medicine as a career at about the age of nine after falling from a horse and receiving stitches in an ear. His parents both had an interest in science and were heavily involved in charitable work; theirs was a caring family. McNab Jones graduated from St Bartholomew's Hospital Medical College in 1945. He completed his house posts at St Bartholomew's, which included ENT, where he was much inspired by Frederick Capps to follow him into the specialty. National Service in the RAF intervened before McNab Jones could start his ENT training, firstly as a registrar at the Royal National Throat, Nose and Ear Hospital, and then as a senior registrar at St Bartholomew's. He then returned to Manchester as senior lecturer in otolaryngology. A vacancy at St Bartholomew's arose in 1961 and Robin McNab Jones was appointed consultant ENT surgeon. For the Royal College of Surgeons, he served as a co-opted member of the Council and as a member of the Court of Examiners. He was president of the section of laryngology of the Royal Society of Medicine and a member of the North of England Otolaryngology Society. He wrote on 'Diseases of the nose, sinuses, pharynx and larynx' for *Price's textbook of medicine* (tenth edition; London, English Language Book Society, Oxford University Press, 1966) and chapters on the nose in the third edition and on the mouth, pharynx and oesophagus in the fourth edition of *Scott-Brown's diseases of the ear, nose and throat* (London, Butterworths). His innovations included using the operating microscope for nasal surgery and an external approach for medialisation of a paralysed vocal fold. Robin McNab Jones was a kindly man who showed a keen interest in benefitting his patients and also those who worked with him. Well-known as a teacher, in his retirement he continued his interest in education as chairman of the board of governors of Worsley Bridge School, Beckenham (from 1992 to 1997). He also served as a trustee of the Macnab Memorial Trust. (His mother was descended from Archibald McNab the 17th chief of the clan.) Throughout his life he had been a keen sportsman and an avid fisherman. He married Mary Garrett in 1950, with whom he had four children. Two daughters have studied at St Bartholomew's; one read medicine, the other became a nurse. A third daughter has in midlife changed her profession to become an occupational therapist. Robin and Mary were close to all their family. They enjoyed holidays in Cornwall together with their ten grandchildren and it was on such a holiday in June 2009 that Robin McNab Jones became unwell. He died on 15 June after a short illness, aged 86.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001817
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Heaton, George (1861 - 1924)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2012-04-13
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E002000-E002999/E002100-E002199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/374380374380
Occupation General surgeon
Details The eldest son of George Heaton of Handsworth, connected with the Birmingham Mint and later of Milan, was educated at Clifton College (1873-1880), where he became Head Boy, and then at Magdalen College, Oxford, having obtained a Demyship in Science, from Oct 16th, 1880, to 1885. He obtained 1st Class Honours in the Natural Science School in 1883, but did not graduate BA until 1885. He entered St Bartholomew's Hospital in October, 1883, winning the Senior Entrance Scholarship and later the Brackenbury Scholarship and the Lawrence Scholarship and Gold Medal. After serving as House Surgeon under Alfred Willett, he returned to Birmingham in 1890 as Resident Surgical Officer at the General Hospital. Whilst holding that post he suffered the misfortune of an infected wound which in some degree lowered his general health and vitality. Elected Assistant Surgeon to the General Hospital in 1891, he acted as Demonstrator of Surgical Pathology and Assistant to the Professor of Surgery, and for eleven years was Lecturer on Operative Surgery. Becoming full Surgeon in 1894 at the age of 33, he served until 1909, when he became Consulting Surgeon. He also acted as Examiner in Surgery at the University of Oxford, and was Surgeon to the Birmingham and Midland Counties Hospital for Sick Children, and Consulting Surgeon to the Corbett Hospital, Stourbridge, the Sutton Coldfield Hospital, the Birmingham General Dispensary, the Royal Institution for Deaf and Dumb Children, and the Birmingham Bluecoat School. In 1911 at the Birmingham Meeting of the British Medical Association he was Vice-President of the Section of Diseases of Children. He took a full share in Boards of Management, including the Medical Societies and the Birmingham Medical Benevolent Society. He was a keen golfer and devoted to sailing. He had practised at 47 Newhall Street and had a country house at Woodgate Four Oaks, Warwickshire. He seemed to be recovering from a prolonged attack of phlebitis, when he relapsed and died on August 12th, 1924. He was buried at Handsworth Parish Church. Publications:- Heaton's publications chiefly related to abdominal surgery "Surgical Interference with Diseases of the Stomach." - *Birmingham Med Review*, 1901, xlix, 257. "Operative Treatment of Enlarged Prostate." - *Ibid*, 1903, liii, 355. "Clinical Observations on Some Acute Abdominal Disorders." - *Brit Med Jour*, 1906, I, 142, etc. "Surgical Treatment of Colitis." - *Lancet*, 1909, I, 1678. "Abdominal Section Twice on the Same Patient for Volvulus." - *Ibid*, 1912, I, 430.
Resource Identifier RCS: E002197
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Helm, George Frederick (1838 - 1898)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2012-04-13
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E002000-E002999/E002100-E002199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/374381374381
Occupation Ophthalmic surgeon
Details The youngest son of the Rev Joseph Helm, Vicar of Worthing; educated at Marlborough College, then at St Catherine's College, Cambridge, where he took his BA degree as a Fellow Commoner in 1864. At the same time he became a pupil of Sir George Humphry, Surgeon to Addenbrooke's Hospital, for three years, during which he acted as Demonstrator of Anatomy. He distinguished himself also as a cricketer, especially as a bowler, and played twice in elevens against Oxford, also in the Sussex County Eleven, and formed one of the representative eleven which for the first time visited Australia. At the end of his apprenticeship he won an open scholarship at St Bartholomew's Hospital, where he gained the approval of Sir James Paget, and became House Surgeon. After a study in Paris and becoming FRCS he was appointed Physician to Rugby School when Dr Temple was Head Master. In 1867 a failure of health forced him to travel; he was in Australia for two years, and then returned to Marazion, Cornwall, where the climate so far restored his health that about 1888 he was able to accept the appointment of Ophthalmic Surgeon to the Royal Cornwall Infirmary, Truro, and won a consulting practice in that specialty. He was a member of the Ophthalmological Society, and as a member of the Penzance Board of Guardians was largely instrumental in obtaining an efficient water-supply for Marazion. Besides he practised in Truro at 81 Ferris Street. Although he suffered from heart disease he continued in active work until he expired suddenly in his carriage as he was driving home to The Greenfield, Marazion, on March 31st, 1898. Helm married: (1) in 1863 a daughter of the Rev F Thomas, Rector of Parkham, Devon, and (2) a daughter of Mr Edward Shearme, of Stratton, North Cornwall, who with a son and two daughters survived him. Publications: *Long Sight, Short Sight, and Astigmatism*, 1886. "Retinoscopy in Errors of Refraction." - *Prov Med Jour*, 1890, ix, 455. "Sympathetic Ophthalmia 14 Years after the Receipt of Original Injury." - *Lancet* 1890, ii, 1157. "Advantage and Use of Lang's Knives in Division of Anterior Synechiae." -*Ibid*, 1891, i, 655.
Resource Identifier RCS: E002198
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Hall, Edward (1808 - 1892)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Hall, Geoffrey Craythorne (1848 - 1923)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Hall, Sir John (1795 - 1866)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Hall, John Basil (1868 - 1926)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2012-03-22
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/374272374272
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born at Leeds, the second son of William Hall, MRCS, who died in 1923, in his ninetieth year, a well-known practitioner in Leeds and an advocate of free meals for poor school-children. His paternal grandfather, Dr Matthew Hall, practised as an apothecary at Wortley, near Leeds, and his maternal grandfather, Dr John Bowe, at Richmond, Yorkshire. He was educated at King's School, Canterbury, Pembroke College, Cambridge, St Thomas's Hospital, and Vienna. He was then in succession House Surgeon and Resident Surgical Officer at the Leeds General Infirmary. In 1897 Bradford offered to him a better prospect; he set up there as a surgeon, and in 1901 was appointed Surgeon to the Bradford Royal Infirmary, a post he held for twenty years, until in 1921 he became Consulting Surgeon. He was the persistent advocate for a new building for the Infirmary, and was chairman of a committee through which a considerable sum of money was collected, and the 'Field House Estate' of twenty-three acres at Daisy Hall on the outskirts of Bradford purchased. Unfortunately the War intervened, and it was a great disappointment to Hall that his scheme did not materialize in his lifetime. But by letter dated Dec 6th, 1928, Mr J J Barron, Secretary Superintendent, stated that the original plans had been revived in 1925, an appeal for £500,000 launched, of which four-fifths had been received; building operations had been in progress for some months, and it was anticipated that a first unit of seventy beds would be completed about the middle of 1929. The scheme for which Hall had worked so strenuously in its initial stages was thus being brought to a successful completion. At the outbreak of the War (1914-1918) Hall was a Captain RAMC (T); he was appointed administrator of Field House Auxiliary Hospital, Bradford; later Surgical Specialist with the Mediterranean Forces at the Dardanelles. In the Bradford Division of the British Medical Association he became President, and at the annual meeting at Bradford in 1924 he was President of the Association during a successful meeting. This led to an invitation to address the Ontario Medical Association at Toronto; after which, as the Representative of the British Medical Association, he crossed to the annual meeting of the American Medical Association, where he delivered an address. Upon this he was elected a Fellow of the American College of Surgeons. As an active freemason he was installed Worshipful Master of the Pentalpha Lodge at Bradford in 1904, and was PPGD (West Yorks). His death occurred suddenly from angina pectoris in the midst of active practice on January 12th, 1926, at Elder Place, Bradford, and he was buried at Lawnswood Cemetery. He left an estate valued at £29,000. He married in 1898 Lisbeth, daughter of Thomas Mackenzie, JP, of Achnalaird, who with one daughter survived him.
Resource Identifier RCS: E002089
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Jones, Charles Marchant (1835 - 1884)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Jones, David John ( - 1913)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Ommaya, Ayub Khan (1930 - 2008)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Sarah Gillam
Publication Date 2012-01-09 2014-11-28
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/374012374012
Occupation Neurosurgeon
Details Ayub Khan Ommaya was an internationally-known expert on brain injury and the inventor of the Ommaya reservoir, which is used to administer chemotherapy to the site of brain tumours. He was born in Mian Chanuu, in what was then British India, on 14 April 1930, the youngest son of Nadir Khan, of the British Indian Calvary, and his wife Ida, who was a French Catholic. Ommaya studied at Gordon College, Rawalpindi, and then at King Edward Medical College in Lahore. While at medical school he won the Harper Nelson gold medal for outstanding academic achievement. He was also a champion debater, boxer and swimmer. After qualifying, he was awarded a Rhodes scholarship to study at Balliol College, Oxford. At Oxford he developed his interest in mechanisms of brain injury and worked with the distinguished American neurosurgeon Joe Pennybacker. He also rowed for Balliol. He then moved to the United States and began working as a researcher and clinician at the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke, where he eventually became chief of neurosurgery. From 1980 he was a clinical professor at George Washington University. He was also chief medical adviser to the US Department of Transportation (from 1980 to 1985). Early in his career at the National Institute he developed the first coma scale, although it was never used beyond the Institute. He also invented the Ommaya reservoir, a silicone dome with a catheter designed to run via a small hole in the skull into the brain, meaning chemotherapy could be effectively directed straight into the site of brain tumours. The reservoir is now used across the world. Ommaya published more than 150 articles, chapters and books. He developed the centripetal theory of traumatic brain injury, which allowed researchers to model how brains are affected by force. He also worked with Sir Godfrey Hounsfield on early computed tomography (CT) scanning, determining the spatial resolution of the scanner, effectively leading the way to its use in stereotactic surgery. With Congressman William Lehman, chair of the House Appropriations Committee responsible for the Department of Transportation, he developed the US Centers for Disease Control's National Center for Injury Prevention and Control, focusing on traumatic brain injury. Outside medicine, he was known as having a fine operatic voice, and often sang before and after surgery. He was married three times. His first two marriages, to Parvaneh Modaber and Wendy Preece, ended in divorce. He retired from George Washington University in 2003, and he and his third wife, Ghazala, returned to Pakistan. He died on 11 July 2008 in Islamabad of complications of Alzheimer's disease. He was 78. He was survived by Ghazala, his three children from his second marriage (David, Alexander and Shana), his three children from his third marriage (Asha, Iman and Sinan) and five grandchildren.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001829
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Hovell, Dennis De Berdt (1818 - 1888)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2012-04-25
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E002000-E002999/E002200-E002299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/374454374454
Occupation General surgeon
Details The younger son of Thomas Hovell, of Wyverstone, Suffolk, who had been educated at the London Hospital and had practised at Clapton, North London. Dennis, together with his elder brother, Mark, also studied at the London Hospital, being articled to John Scott, Surgeon to the London Hospital. Both brothers held resident appointments, and Dennis in 1837 gained the Hospital Gold Medal for Surgery. Both his father and his elder brother having died, Dennis Hovell continued his father's practice at Five Houses, Clapton. He especially gave attention to midwifery, and was particularly fond of a truss after labour instead of the usual binder, for he held it as comfortable to the patient and preventive of post-partum hemorrhage. He objected to the current view of hysteria, which attributed it to uterine trouble and a defective moral sense; he attributed it to injury or shock to the nervous system. In a letter dated Feb 18th, 1888, to the President of the Hunterian Society, he recommended "the term 'neurokinesis', that is, nerve shock, or shaking, or nerve commotion", in place of the term 'neurasthenia'. He was for many years Surgeon to the Orphan Asylum, and on its removal from Clapton to Watford he became its Consulting Surgeon. He took an active interest in the Hunterian Society, of which he was Orator in 1866, President in 1870, and for many years Trustee; he also served on the Committee of the British Medical Benevolent Fund. In later years he had a consulting practice at 3 Mansfield Street, Cavendish Square, and on retiring lived at Boreham Hall, Elstree, which he had bought. He died after a fourth attack of angina pectoris on June 5th, 1888, leaving a widow and a large family. He was buried in Elstree Churchyard. His son, Mark Hovell, then in attendance on the Emperor Frederick, had to hurry back to his patient immediately after the funeral.
Resource Identifier RCS: E002271
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Howard, Robert Jared Bliss (1859 - 1921)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2012-04-25
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E002000-E002999/E002200-E002299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/374455374455
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born at Montreal, the only son of Dr Robert Palmer Howard, Dean of the Faculty and Professor of Medicine, McGill University, and one of the three teachers Sir William Osler recalled as having most influence on his mind in his early years. When Howard began studying at the McGill University, Sir William Osler was Professor of Medicine and remained his friend. Howard graduated brilliantly, gaining 320 out of a possible 350 marks, and then went for further study to the London Hospital, and along with Osler to Berlin, Vienna, and Leipzig. He was next for some years associated with his father in practice at Montreal, was Demonstrator of Anatomy and Surgery in McGill University in 1883, Assistant Surgeon and Pathologist at Montreal Hospital, and Surgeon to the Dispensary. During the South African War he worked at the Guards' Hospital, Rochester Row. Later he practised in London as a laryngologist at 31 Queen Anne Street, Cavendish Square, but after some years retired to his country houses at Gleneve and at Debden in Essex. During the War (1914-1918) he organized and supervised the Mount Royal Hospital for Officers at Bath, and also worked at the 3rd London General Hospital, Wandsworth, for which he was awarded the OBE. He died after a long and painful illness at his town house, 46 Green Street, W, on January 9th, 1921. He had married in 1888 the only daughter of Sir Donald Smith, afterwards Lord Strathcona and Mount Royal, and they had as family three sons and two daughters. His eldest son served during the War, the second was killed in action, and the third was severely wounded. He was survived by his wife, who, as heir to her father, became Lady Strathcona, and on her death the elder of the two sons succeeded to the barony as Lord Strathcona.
Resource Identifier RCS: E002272
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Jones, Oswald Meredith (1863 - 1918)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Jones, Sir Philip Sydney (1836 - 1918)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2012-05-23
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E002000-E002999/E002300-E002399
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/374566374566
Occupation General surgeon Physician
Details Born in Sydney and was educated at three local schools. He came to Europe to finish his general education, and was enrolled as a student of medicine at University College, London, where he obtained medals for proficiency in anatomy and in medicine, and won the Fellowes Gold Medal as the most proficient student in clinical knowledge of his year. He was also House Surgeon, House Physician, and Resident Medical Officer at University College Hospital, and spent some months studying medicine and surgery in Paris. He returned to Sydney in 1861 and began to practise at 10 College Street. Within a few months he was elected Surgeon to the Sydney Infirmary (later the Sydney Hospital). His colleagues were Charles Nathan, Sir Alfred Roberts, and Charles McKay. The duties of the staff in those days were onerous, since there was only one resident house surgeon, and each member of the honorary staff was expected to do his own dressings. Dry dressings were unknown, and much time was spent in applying wet cloths. Sir Philip was elected Consulting Surgeon after holding office at the infirmary for fourteen years. Like the other medical practitioners of his day, Sir Philip Sydney Jones carried on a general practice. There was no specialism in the sixties, and all kinds of special and general surgery were carried out by the medical practitioners. Sir Philip was the first medical man in Sydney to remove an ovarian tumour successfully. Giving up general practice, he established himself as a physician in 1876, and was the first in Sydney to engage in consulting work. He was appointed Consulting Physician to the Royal Prince Alfred Hospital in 1887. At the time of his death he was the senior member of the Royal Society of New South Wales, his membership having lasted fifty-one years. He had always taken a leading part in the Society's medical section. In 1882 he was a member of the Royal Commission which investigated and reported on the arrangements of the Quarantine Station. The result of this commission was the establishment of the Quarantine Station at North Head, Port Jackson, for the reception of all cases of infectious disease that came to New South Wales by sea. The value of the work of this Commission is shown by the fact that it was not necessary to remodel the system suggested by the Royal Commission, even after thirty-five years' experience. He was much interested in the progress of education in the Colony, and especially in that of medical students. He was for a time Examiner in Medicine to the University of Sydney; a Member of the Senate from 1887-1918; and Vice-Chancellor, 1904-1906. He was also a member of the Committee appointed in 1868 to raise funds to erect a "permanent and substantial memorial as a token of the heart-felt gratitude of the inhabitants of New South Wales for the recovery of His Royal Highness the Duke of Edinburgh". The memorial took shape as the Royal Alfred Hospital, which was incorporated in 1878. Sir Philip served on the Board of the hospital, for nineteen years as a Director, and for many years as Chairman of the Medical Board. He was unanimously elected President of the third International Medical Congress of Australia, held in Sydney in 1892. His address dealt with the large saving of life which sanitation had effected in the Colony, and he spoke of electric lighting, gas-heating, and smoke-consumption as desirable reforms in the future. As President of the New South Wales Branch of the British Medical Association in 1896-1897 he delivered a thoughtful address, in which he spoke of the X rays and the use of serums, then in their infancy, as subjects of great promise. The address reveals the acumen and foresight possessed by Sir Philip as a medical practitioner. He owed his knighthood to his distinguished services to science in the war against tuberculosis. He was knighted as a Birthday Honour in 1905. Sir Philip Sydney Jones was for thirty years a member of the Medical Board of New South Wales, of which he was elected President in 1909. He was a member of the Royal Commission which inquired in 1895 into the locally notorious Dean case. In 1903 he was a member of the Royal Commission on the Decline of the Birth-rate and on the Causes of Infantile Mortality. In 1913 he was a member of the Tuberculosis Board, appointed by Government to advise concerning measures for the suppression of tuberculosis. He will perhaps be specially remembered for his unceasing efforts to control tuberculosis, and as the pioneer in New South Wales of open-air treatment. He was instrumental in establishing the Queen Victoria Homes at Thirlmere and at Wentworth Falls, where the object is to treat the early phases of the disease. He was for long President of the Executive Committee of these sanatoria. In 1914 he took a leading part in founding the National Association for the Prevention and Cure of Consumption, and was its first President. He also gave valuable advice concerning the institution of anti-tuberculous dispensaries founded in New South Wales between 1913 and 1918. He took an active part in many charitable institutions, notably in the New South Wales Institute for the Deaf and Dumb and the Blind, of which he was Vice-President in 1916. Sir Philip was given to scientific pursuits, and was an original member of the Linnean Society of New South Wales (1875), and, up to the last, a trustee of the Australian Museum. He was a Congregationalist, and for thirty years was senior deacon of his church. He married in 1863 Anna Howard, daughter of the Rev G Charter. She died in 1892, leaving a family of three sons and four daughters, who survived their father. The eldest son, Dr Philip Sydney Jones, practised at The Glebe, New South Wales. Sir Philip died at Strathfield, where he owned land, on Sept 18th, 1918. A presentation portrait by Percy Spence, painted at the request of the Council of the New South Wales Branch of the British Medical Association in 1905 on the occasion of his receiving the honour of Knight Bachelor, hangs in the Great Hall of the University of Sydney. There is another portrait in sepia, also made in 1905, and presented by his fellow-members on the executive committee of the tuberculosis sanatoria. Sir Philip Jones was to the medical profession of New South Wales a pattern of the wise physician of exemplary probity, of unfailing courtesy, and of the widest charity. He utilized his professional attainments as far as possible for the benefit of his fellow-citizens. He employed his great experience in the care and treatment of the sick, more especially in advocating better methods for the control of tuberculosis. For a quarter of a century he was recognized as the leader of the medical profession in New South Wales. Publications: Jones contributed a few papers on the treatment of consumption and on medical ethics to the *Australasian Med Gaz*, and published a paper on "The Tuberculosis Problem in Australia" in the *Brit Jour Tubercul*, 1910, iv, 1.
Resource Identifier RCS: E002383
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Jones, Richard (1800 - 1880)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Jones, Richard (1801 - 1878)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Jones, Richard (1815 - 1872)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Jones, Robert ( - 1855)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Jones, Richard Phillips ( - 1867)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Glendinning, Bryden (1880 - 1927)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2012-02-08
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/374174374174
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born at Dunedin, New Zealand. Coming to England in 1898, he became a student at Guy's Hospital, where he held house appointments in 1903-1904 under Sir William Arbuthnot Lane and was House Surgeon. He then studied medicine in Paris and became Resident Surgeon at the Hertford British Hospital. He accompanied the Queen of Spain to Madrid on the occasion of her marriage, and afterwards remained in Spain as her personal medical attendant for about two years. After his return to England he worked under Comyns Berkeley and Victor Bonney, and was appointed Pathologist, and later Assistant Surgeon, to the Chelsea Hospital for Women. In 1911 he was also elected to a Walter Emden Research Scholarship in the Cancer Research Laboratories at the Middlesex Hospital. During his three years' tenure of this scholarship he wrote nine papers, nearly all of which were on the subject of malignant disease in its relation to gynaecology. The most important was that on the spread of carcinoma by the Fallopian tube, in which he put forward a view as to the invasion of the Fallopian tube by carcinoma from the uterus and ovary. He adduced evidence that it may be brought about by cancer cells which, coming in contact with the fimbriae or being swept into the lumen, engraft themselves upon the columnar cells and thence travel to deeper parts. He saw, however, that the possibility of lymphatic permeation from the ovarian growths could not be entirely excluded. He also acted as Obstetric Tutor and Registrar at the Middlesex Hospital, and was elected Gynaecological Surgeon to the Hampstead General and North-West London Hospitals in 1912, though he did not relinquish his research work. His health broke down late in 1913, but he resumed active work in 1914 both at Chelsea and Hampstead, and, with the advent of the Great War, was appointed Surgeon to the Duchess of Bedford's War Hospital of 102 beds in Woburn Abbey and Woburn Cottage Hospital. He was here confronted with work of a general surgical character and had full scope for the display of his peculiar genius for combining diagnostic acumen with operative skill. He was a bold operator, not hesitating to undertake what his pathological knowledge told him was necessary; yet in actual manipulations a lightness and sureness of touch was shown in everything he did. Late in 1916 his health once more broke down and he had to rest for some months, but he was at work again in 1917, and continued to act as Surgeon at the Woburn War Hospital till its closure in 1920 and at the Woburn Cottage Hospital till 1925. Early in that year failing health compelled him to retire from active work of any kind. He died at Woodcote, Aspley Guise, Bedfordshire, on May 19th, 1927. He was survived by his widow, who was a daughter of Captain G E Hodgson, of the 44th Regiment, and by an only son. Publications: "Spread of Cancer by the Fallopian Tube." - *Jour Obst and Gynaecol*, 1910, xvii, 24. "Malignant Disease of the Ovaries: a Statistical Study." - *Arch Middlesex Hosp Cancer Lab*, 1909, xv, 50. "Extension of Sarcoma in Pelvic Regions of the Female." - *Ibid*, 1910, xix, 82. "Ossifying Fibromyoma invaded by Carcinoma Corporis Uteri." - *Ibid*, 94. "Adenomatosis Vaginae: a hitherto Undescribed Condition" (with Victor BONNEY) - *Proc Roy Soc Med (Obstet Sect)*, 1910-11, iv, 18. "Fibro-adenoma of Ovarian Fimbriae and the Question of Accessory Ovary." - *Ibid* (Obstet Sect), 1911-12, v, 271. "Catheterisation of Ureter in Pyelitis of Pregnancy." - *Arch Middlesex Hosp Clin Rep*, 1911, viii, 21. "Gynaecology and Obstetrics" in Rendle Short's *Index of Prognosis and End-results of Treatment*, 1915.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001991
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Parry, Edgar Williams (1919 - 2011)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Sarah Gillam
Publication Date 2012-01-10 2015-09-01
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/374018374018
Occupation General surgeon Vascular surgeon
Details Edgar Williams Parry was a consultant surgeon at Broadgreen, Bootle and Waterloo hospitals, Liverpool, and a leader in the field of vascular surgery. He was born at Betws Garmon, a hamlet in north Wales, on 1 May 1919, the son of a farmer, and was educated at Caernarvon Grammar School. He studied medicine at Liverpool University and qualified MB ChB in 1943. He was a house officer, a resident surgical officer and a registrar in Liverpool. He then went back to Wales, working at the Caernarvon and Anglesey Hospital in Bangor. In the early 1950s he spent some time at the Bristol Royal Infirmary, where he researched venous thrombosis and pulmonary embolism under Robert Milnes Walker. He then went to the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, for a year, where he worked with Jack Grindley. On his return to the UK he became a senior lecturer in surgery at Liverpool under Charles Wells. In 1956 he was appointed to his consultant post at Bootle, Waterloo and Broadgreen hospitals, and was an honorary senior lecturer at the University of Liverpool throughout his consultant years. From 1980 to 1981 he was president of the Liverpool Medical Institution. During his career he saw a rapid development in the techniques of vascular surgery. When he began as a consultant the most common vascular operations were amputations and lumbar sympathectomy (an operation to treat blocked arteries which involved dividing the lumbar sympathetic nerve chain). As new preventative techniques emerged, Parry was among the first to introduce them into UK hospitals. In 1956 he carried out his first non-ruptured aortic aneurysm operation, and he went on to perform successful operations on the carotid artery under hypothermia and to bypass femoral arteries in the leg. He also took part in the first few kidney transplants in the Mersey region, and developed new procedures for the removal of blood clots from deep veins in the leg. Outside medicine, he enjoyed golf, travelling and gardening. Edgar Parry died on 9 February 2011, aged 91. He was survived by his wife Enid (née Rees), a fellow medical student, whom he had married in 1949, their son and daughter.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001835
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Newton, Eric Joseph (1919 - 2011)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Sarah Gillam
Publication Date 2012-01-10 2014-08-22
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/374019374019
Occupation Neurosurgeon
Details Eric Newton was a consultant neurosurgeon at North Staffordshire Royal Infirmary. He was born in Surrey in 1919, but was educated in northern India. He gained an Indian Army scholarship to study medicine at Madras Medical School and qualified in 1942, during the Second World War. He immediately became a medical officer in India, the Maldives and then Ceylon. In 1946 he returned to the UK, and four years later became a resident surgical officer at the Royal Salop Infirmary, Shrewsbury. In his free time he travelled to Birmingham to learn more about neurosurgical techniques. Here he was influenced by Brodie Hughes and Jack Small, both leading neurosurgeons. In 1951 Newton was appointed as a neurosurgical registrar at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham. He then became a senior neurosurgical registrar at West Midlands Neurosurgical Centre in Smethwick, and in 1959 he was appointed as a consultant there, with responsibility for looking after patients in the north of the region. In 1961 he set up a new neurosurgical unit in the North Staffordshire Royal Infirmary, Stoke-on-Trent, and for about 10 years he was singlehanded - the only neurosurgeon between Birmingham and Manchester. He was awarded a Royal College of Surgeons Hunterian professorship in 1968. He had many other interests outside medicine, including chess. He played for Stafford chess club for 25 years, was captain of the club team for many competitions, became chairman and was later made honorary president. He was married to Eileen, a former nurse, whom he met at the Royal Salop Infirmary. They had two sons, James and John, who both became doctors. Eric Newton died on 10 January 2011 and was survived by his family.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001836
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Godfrey, Thomas (1820 - 1878)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Godson, Charles (1819 - 1904)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching O'Reilly, James Alphonsus (1925 - 2008)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Sarah Gillam
Publication Date 2012-01-10 2016-04-27
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/374022374022
Occupation ENT surgeon
Details James O'Reilly, known as 'Seamus' was a consultant ENT surgeon at South Tyrone Hospital, Dungannon, Northern Ireland. He was born in 1925 into a medical family in County Cavan, Ireland. His father, grandfather, two uncles, a brother and several cousins were all doctors. He studied medicine at University College Dublin, qualifying MB BCh BAO in 1948. He trained in surgery in Bradford and Hull, and also spent time in general practice, as a locum for members of his family. In 1960 he gained his fellowships of both the Royal College of Surgeons of England and of Edinburgh. In 1962 he was appointed to South Tyrone Hospital. Initially he also worked at Mid Ulster Hospital (Magherafelt) with some sessions in Omagh. He retired in August 1989. James O'Reilly died on 25 March 2008 at his home in Cookstown, County Tyrone. He was survived by his wife, Rosamund, and children, John, Katharine and James.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001839
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Negus, David (1930 - 2010)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Sir Barry Jackson
Publication Date 2012-01-10 2012-11-07
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/374023374023
Occupation General surgeon Vascular surgeon
Details David Negus was a consultant general and vascular surgeon at Lewisham Hospital, London, and a pioneer in the newly emerging sub-specialty of phlebology. He was born on 11 August 1930 in London, the son of a distinguished otolaryngologist, Sir Victor Ewings Negus, and his wife, Winifred Negus née Rennie. David was schooled at Charterhouse, from where he was called up for National Service at the age of 18 to serve in the Royal Armoured Corps. On demobilisation he proceeded to New College, Oxford, in 1950, taking an honours degree in animal physiology in 1954. He then studied at St Thomas's Hospital Medical School and qualified in 1958 with both the conjoint and an Oxford degree. Early surgical training was in Cambridge, Southampton and St Thomas', with the FRCS being passed in 1962. He was then appointed as a registrar to the Royal Portsmouth Hospital for two years, before returning to St Thomas' and embarking on a research project into post-thrombotic syndrome under the supervision of Frank B Cockett. This work resulted in the award of an Oxford DM MCh in 1967, an Arris and Gale Lecture delivered in 1970 (*Annals RCSEng* 1979, 47; 92-105) and a lifelong interest in venous disorders. There followed a succession of posts in the St Thomas' training circuit before he was appointed as a consultant to Lewisham Hospital in south London in 1976. At Lewisham he practised the entire range of general surgery, but with a special interest in peripheral vascular surgery, including lymphology and phlebology. He was an active fellow of the Royal Society of Medicine, becoming a member of council of both the surgical and the clinical sections, and chairman of the newly-formed venous forum. In 1984 he was appointed Hunterian Professor and delivered a lecture entitled 'The prevention and treatment of venous ulceration'. He published widely, principally on various aspects of venous disorders, including chapters in textbooks and, in 1991, a monograph, *Leg ulcers: a practical approach to management* (Butterworth-Heinemann), which went into several editions. In 1986 he was instrumental (with others) in founding the journal *Phlebology* and three years later became its editor. On relinquishing this post he was appointed editor emeritus. He was elected an honorary member of the Société de Française de Phlébologie in recognition of his considerable contributions to this specialty. In private life he enjoyed sailing, cruising and ocean racing. As a young man he was an above average hockey and tennis player, and for many years enjoyed beagling, being master of Christchurch and New College beagles whilst an undergraduate. As a St Thomas's medical student, he contributed variously to the annual Christmas show and wrote several of the songs which became legendary. He confounded many of his student contemporaries by owning and driving a Rolls Royce, but he was not the only St Thomas's graduate of those days to do this! Of high intellect but quiet disposition, he had a keen wit and a dry sense of humour, always with a twinkle in his eye. Married to Anne (née Turner), a St Thomas' nurse, they had three children: Verity, a literary editor; Rupert, a gastroenterologist at the Royal Free Hospital; and Samantha, a radiologist at St George's Hospital. In retirement he moved to the Isle of Wight, but died on 8 October 2010, aged 80, after a long battle with carcinoma of the bladder, a disease that he faced with typical stoicism.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001840
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Neophyton, John (1938 - 2009)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by John Gullotta
Publication Date 2012-01-11 2015-03-27
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/374024374024
Occupation General surgeon
Details John Neophyton was not only a lifelong family friend but he was my mentor. 'Dr John Neo', as he was affectionately called, was a university colleague and one of the best and closest friends of my father Andrew, so I have known John and his family all my life. My earliest memory was when I was a young boy and he showed me how to pack a medical kit. John followed and guided me throughout my career and was always there for me, answering any questions I had, practical, theoretical or otherwise. My first experience in an operating theatre was with John. It was in the sanctity of his beloved operating theatre that I learned the most about him. His witty, dry sense of humour, his love of cricket, all codes of football and rugby, exotic cars, good food and horse racing! He was extremely highly respected both by his patients and his colleagues. At times he was feared by the nursing staff because it was John's edict that he always wanted things perfectly done without exception. Second best or 'she'll be right mate' was not in his vocabulary. He always said that his job was to do the best for his patient and he was not there to win any popularity contests. John's passion was his family - his children David and Joanne and his wife Averil. His vocation was medicine and general in particular. His major interests were colorectal surgery, breast surgery and sports medicine. He graduated from the University of Sydney in 1963 and was awarded his Fellowship of the Royal Australian College of Surgery in 1971. He was awarded his FRCS (Eng) in 1972. After returning from England he began working as an Honorary Medical Officer at Sutherland Hospital in 1975 and started his private practice in Miranda. He was a VMO at the St George Private Kareena and President Private Hospitals. He also consulted at my rooms in Matraville a few times a week and operated at the Prince of Wales Private Hospital. He had a strong involvement in sports medicine and was the team doctor for the Broncos Rugby League Club for 20 years as Wayne Bennett's right-hand man. In the words of Wayne Bennett who was among the hundreds of people at his funeral, 'He was a very good person, John was capable, trustworthy and a good friend to everyone at the Broncos.' In 1996 and 1997 he served as Chairman of the Medical staff Association of Sutherland Hospital and 1999-2001 as Chairman of the Department of Surgery. From 2002-2004 he was acting Director of Medical Services for Sutherland Hospital. He was also past Chairman of the Medical Staff Association of both Kareena Private Hospital and President Private Hospital. Over the years I exposed him to AMA politics and convinced him to serve as an AMA (NSW) Councillor for the past five years, which he thoroughly enjoyed. He was also a member of the association's Ethics and Hospital Practice Committees. He was a great asset to the AMA and his contribution was greatly valued, especially on hospital issues. John's yearning for knowledge was never quenched so he enrolled in Law, graduating with distinction in 2002. This law degree helped John to once again diversify his practice and over the past few years he specialised in the medico legal field after passing the WorkCover, Comcare and American Board of Independent Medical Examiners Courses. 'Dr Neo' will certainly be missed by his family, colleagues and patients. I will miss his passion, dedication, wisdom, guidance and most of all his loyal friendship. He is now in the hands of God. May he Rest in Peace.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001841
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Owen, William Mervyn ( - 2004)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Sarah Gillam
Publication Date 2012-01-11 2015-07-20
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/374025374025
Occupation ENT surgeon
Details William Mervyn Owen was a consultant ENT surgeon who worked in Liverpool. He was brought up in Caernarfon, Wales, and studied medicine at St Thomas's Hospital Medical School, qualifying with the conjoint diploma in 1937 and the MB BS in 1938. During the Second World War he served in the RAMC and in 1940 was on the beach at Dunkirk. After the war he continued to serve in the RAMC. He rose to the rank of major and spent a long period stationed in Germany, on the Rhine. In 1948 he gained his diploma in laryngology and otology, and became a senior specialist in otolaryngology. After leaving the Army, Owen became a consultant ENT surgeon on Merseyside. He was also a visiting consultant to the Isle of Man Health Services Board. He was a member of the Liverpool Medical Institution. Owen was married to Annie (née Daly), a nurse who had trained at the Middlesex Hospital. They had seven children. Two sons (Anthony Wynn Michael Carton and Eoghan) became surgeons. William Mervyn Owen died on 21 April 2004.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001842
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Osung, Okon Akpan ( - 2008)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Tina Craig
Publication Date 2012-01-11 2014-11-25
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/374026374026
Occupation General surgeon
Details Okon Osung was a surgeon at Neath General Hospital in Wales. He had previously worked at the Morriston Hospital in Swansea. Of Nigerian origin he was found dead in his flat in Neath on 9 July 2008. He was 65 years old and was survived by three children from whom he was estranged.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001843
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Goodsall, David Henry (1843 - 1906)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2012-02-15
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/374200374200
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born at Gravesend on January 4th, 1843, the second of four brothers, one of whom, Dr Frederick Goodsall, at one time practised in the City. Their father, relatively late in life, was a student at St Bartholomew's, where he died of the effects of a finger-prick received during a post-mortem on the eve of his MRCS examination, leaving his widow and family unprovided for. David Henry Goodsall was taken from St Ann's School and apprenticed at about the age of 14 years to Mr Manley, a chemist near Aldgate, and from that early period of life he began to support himself entirely by his own exertions. He entered the Medical School at St Bartholomew's Hospital in the early sixties, being excused his fees on the ground that his father's fatal wound was inflicted by a member of the staff. During his whole studentship he supported himself by acting as assistant to Fred Ingoldsby, of Finsbury Square, with whom he gained great experience in midwifery. He was thus enabled to serve with distinction the office of Midwifery Assistant under Dr Greenhalgh, the Physician-Accoucheur of St Bartholomew's, his tenure of office being from September, 1889, to April, 1870. At the latter date he was already 27 years of age, and through hard experience and study had acquired a maturity of manner, both serious and kindly, which endeared him to his patients. He was elected House Surgeon to St Mark's Hospital on leaving his old hospital in 1870, was appointed Assistant Surgeon in 1871, full Surgeon in 1888, and retired on reaching the age limit in 1903, when he was appointed Consulting Surgeon. He was peculiarly identified with St Mark's up to the last, and on his work there his reputation is based. He was elected Surgeon, with charge of In-patients and Out-patients, at the Metropolitan Hospital, at that time in Devonshire Square, City, in October, 1872. He became Senior Surgeon in January, 1892, retaining office till the end of his life. He was also a member of the Committee of Management from 1887, and a Trustee from 1898. For the last ten years of his life Goodsall was likewise Surgeon to St Saviour's Hospital. A great authority on rectal surgery and an excellent operator, Goodsall had doubtless been first led to take up the course of practice which specially distinguished him through his early association with Peter Yeames Gowlland (qv), Senior Surgeon at St Mark's, to whom he acted as assistant in Finsbury Square, a locality where Goodsall himself took up his residence about the year 1871. Goodsall was a most careful and painstaking surgeon who left nothing to chance; it is not to be wondered, therefore, that he obtained most excellent results. He was a splendid man of business, and as such he was greatly valued by the authorities of the hospitals with which he was connected. He was associated with the Metropolitan Hospital when it was in Devonshire Square, City, then in the temporary premises in Commercial Street, and was largely instrumental in securing its present site. He was for nineteen years Chairman of the House and Finance Committee of the Medical Society of London and was Hon Treasurer of the Society from 1896 onwards. During the last year of his very busy life he took a leading part on behalf of the Medical Society in the negotiations then proceeding for the union of the London societies in one body. He was formerly a director of the Odessa Waterworks Company, and at the time of his death was on the directorate of the Western Telegraph Company, which he had greatly assisted, as well as being managing director of a printing company. So various were Goodsall's activities that he had no time for society, but he enjoyed playing and watching a game of chess. For half a century he never spent a single day ill in bed, and returned from his holiday, shortly before his death, apparently in excellent health. He died just before midnight on September 14th, 1906, and was cremated at Golder's Green. He left a widow and a young son. He practised at 17 Devonshire Place, Upper Wimpole Street. Publications: *Diseases of the Anus and Rectum* (with W ERNEST MILES), 8vo, London, vol. I, 1900; vol. Ii, 1905. This classic embodies much of the matter contained in Goodsall's widely diffused contributions to journals and transactions. It is based on his long experience. The passages on operations devised by contemporary specialists were submitted to their scrutiny before publication. Goodsall had the good fortune to live to an age which allowed of a long record of experience. His observations on left iliac colostomy in the second volume showed how surgery had advanced since 1870. "Twenty Cases of Foreign Bodies in the Rectum." - *St Bart's Hosp Rep*, 1887, xxiii, 71. This includes careful observations about the time that a bone takes to pass from the mouth to the rectum. "Six Cases of Sinus over the Sacrum and Coccyx." - *Ibid*, 1888, xxiv, 229. "Fissure, Non-syphilitic and Syphilitic, of the Rectum and Anus." - *Ibid*, 1892, xxviii, 205. "Two Cases of Opening the Caecum for Intestinal Obstruction." - *Trans Med Soc Lond*, 1892, xv, 439. "New Rectal Bougie." - *Lancet*, 1888, I, 1250. "Diseases of the Anus." - *Practitioner*, 1895, lv, ii, 350.
Resource Identifier RCS: E002017
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Goodwin, Robert Docksey ( - 1882)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Goold, Hugh ( - 1857)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Harris, Samuel (1794 - 1865)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

First Title value, for Searching Harris, William (1808 - 1896)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2012-03-29
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E002000-E002999/E002100-E002199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/374312374312
Occupation General surgeon
Details Studied at St Bartholomew's Hospital, and first practised at Worthing, where he was Surgeon to the Dispensary. In 1871 he was practising at 333 Clapham Road, London, SW. He retired to Worthing and lived at Shelley House, then at Aller House, Broadwater Road, until his death on December 14th, 1896. The photograph in the Fellows' Album marked 'William Harris', a fine face of an old man, is probably his.
Resource Identifier RCS: E002129
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Harris, William ( - 1878)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2012-03-29 2012-04-04
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E002000-E002999/E002100-E002199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/374313374313
Occupation General surgeon
Details Studied at University College Hospital; was Surgeon to the Surrey House of Correction; served as Assistant Surgeon to the 88th Regiment in the Crimean War, and was awarded the Medjidie Medal and Crimean War Medals. He later practised at Truro, and died between November 2nd, 1878, and 1879.
Resource Identifier RCS: E002130
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Harris, Wintour (1807 - 1889)

2026-04-28T15:41:31Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2012-03-29
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E002000-E002999/E002100-E002199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/374314374314
Occupation General surgeon
Details Studied at the London Hospital and at Bristol Hospital. He first practised at 16 Dorset Terrace, Clapham Road, London, SW, where he was Surgeon to the County Gaol. He then practised at 28 Brunswick Road, Hove, Brighton, where he died in retirement on March 8th, 1889.
Resource Identifier RCS: E002131
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset