Search Results for

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2009-11-04
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000700-E000799
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372921372921
Occupation General surgeon
Details Son of Charles Bernard Baker, CE, of 5 The Crescent, Bedford, and afterwards of St Albans. Born Nov 17th, 1864, at Uttoxeter, Staffs. Educated at Haileybury, where he was admitted in 1878 under Mr Bradby, and entered Trinity College, Cambridge, as a Pensioner on June 16th, 1883, with Mr Image as his tutor. Graduated BA after taking a first class in the Natural Science Tripos, and entered St Bartholomew’s Hospital in 1886. He acted as House Surgeon to Sir Thomas Smith, whose third daughter, Ada Marion, he married in 1895, and by her had two daughters. Held resident appointments at the East London Hospital for Children, at the Royal Free Hospital, and at the Royal Orthopaedic Hospital. He practised at 5 Gledhow Gardens, South Kensington, where he died from taking 7½ gr of veronal on March 28th, 1909. His death was amongst the earliest to show that an idiosyncrasy existed for this hypnotic. Whilst he was busy in practice he made time to act for four years as Clinical Assistant at the Royal Eye Hospital, Southwark.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000738
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Balding, Daniel Barley (1831 - 1923)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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/372924372924
Occupation General surgeon
Details Educated at Middlesex Hospital, where he was Resident Medical Officer. Practised at Royston, Hertfordshire for more than forty years, during which time he was well known as Coroner for Hertfordshire and as a Justice of the Peace for Hertfordshire and Cambridgeshire. For many years he was Medical Superintendent of the Royston Hospital. He was keenly interested in all matters relating to the Poor Law, on which he was a frequent contributor to the *British Medical Journal*, and was President of the Poor Law Medical Officers’ Association. He was Surgeon Lieutenant-Colonel in the 1st Herts Volunteer Battalion Bedfordshire Regiment. In his retirement he lived at The Beeches, Royston, where he died on April 8th, 1923.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000741
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Bally, William Ford ( - 1859)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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
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First Title value, for Searching Darné, Francois Xavier ( - 2003)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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 Davis, Abram Albert (1904 - 2003)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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/372235372235
Occupation Obstetrician and gynaecologist
Details Albert Davis was an obstetrician and pioneering neuro-gynaecologist. He born on 4 January 1904 into a Jewish family in Manchester, where he studied medicine and became resident at the Manchester Royal Infirmary to Sir Harry Platt and Sir Geoffrey Jefferson, who greatly influenced him. He soon developed an interest in neurology and gynaecology. He was a Dickeson research scholar in the gynaecology research laboratory in Manchester, studying the innervation of the pelvis. He visited Cotte in Lyons, the founder of presacral neurectomy, and performed meticulous work on the cadaver, leading to an MD and a Hunterian professorship at the College. His lifelong concern was with chronic pelvic pain, which he treated with alcohol injection or open presacral neurectomy. After resident posts at Guy’s and Chelsea Hospitals, he was appointed as a consultant to Dulwich, St Giles, the London Jewish, Bearsted Maternity, the Prince of Wales and French Hospitals, and, after the war, King’s College Hospital. During the second world war, he was obstetrician to the south east London metropolitan sector, and later also to the north east sector. Here he honed his surgical skills, being able to perform a caesarian section in 20 seconds. In one day in Hackney he performed 11 of these operations in a single day. In 1950, together with Purdom Martin at Queen Square, he drew attention to the horrors of back street abortion in a *BMJ* paper. The paper reviewed 2,655 cases, describing their neurological consequences. In retirement, he continued his interests in literature, music, art and numismatics. He was a fellow of the Royal Numismatic Society. When he was 90 he was delighted to hear that presacral neurectomy had been reintroduced in the United States with the laparoscope. In 1947, he married Renate Loeser, a cytopathologist, who survived him along with two children, one of whom is Charles Davis, the neurosurgeon. He died on 21 October 2003.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000048
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Denham, Robin Arthur (1922 - 2004)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-09-23 2010-01-27
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000000-E000099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372237372237
Occupation Neurosurgeon
Details Trevor Dinning, known since childhood as ‘Jim’, was the architect of neurosurgical services in South Australia and the creator of a very successful research foundation. He was born in Dulwich, Adelaide, on 16 February 1919, the second child of Alfred Ernest Dinning, a school inspector and later headmaster of Adelaide Boys High School, and Maud Isabel née Ridley, who died two years after his birth. He was educated at his father’s school and then went on to study medicine at the University of Adelaide, qualifying in 1942 in the top three of the year after completing a shortened wartime course. In 1943 he joined the Army, serving as a captain in the Northern Australia Observer Unit and then in the 2nd 17th Australian Infantry Battalion. He developed pulmonary tuberculosis, which incapacitated him for some two years. He was discharged from the Army in 1946. It was at this time that he decided to make a career in neurosurgery. After his recovery, he took an appointment as lecturer in anatomy at the University of Adelaide, under the brilliant neuro-anatomist Andrew Abbie. During this time he wrote a paper on healed fractures in aborigines, based on the collection of skeletons in the South Australian Museum. Work as an anatomist doubtless contributed to his success as a surgeon: as an operator he was at his best in procedures demanding exceptional anatomical skill. At that time, it was virtually impossible to train as a specialist neurosurgeon in Australia, so, on a grant from the Royal Adelaide Hospital, Jim went to the UK. He entered neurosurgical training at Guy’s Hospital under Murray Falconer. During this appointment he was first author of a paper on ruptured intracranial aneurysm as a cause of sudden death, the work being based on forensic cases. Falconer had been a pupil of Sir Hugh Cairns, who was a pupil of the pioneering American neurosurgeon Harvey Cushing. Jim was to exemplify the best qualities of the Cushing/Cairns school – great interest in the neurosciences, unhurried and meticulous operative technique and total commitment to the welfare of patients. Jim returned to Australia in 1953 and took up an appointment in the Royal Adelaide Hospital, where he was to work for the next 30 years under a variety of titles – first as a member of the honorary staff, then from 1970 as full-time director of neurosurgery. After his resignation in 1979 he remained as a visiting consultant until 1983. He was also chief of neurosurgery in what is now the Women’s and Children’s Hospital. In both hospitals he rapidly established modern neurosurgical units, with rigorous attention to quality control and case audits. He was not the first neurosurgeon to serve these two hospitals – he was preceded Sir Leonard Lindon, one of the founders of Australian neurosurgery. Sir Leonard welcomed and supported Jim, but it is true to say that the development of an integrated state-wide neurosurgical service was very largely Jim’s achievement. He gave special attention to the needs of South Australians living in country areas, and in the 1960s persuaded the then minister of health to equip country hospitals with instruments to care for head injuries. Although he was happiest in his work in public hospitals, he ran a well-organised private service, chiefly at the Memorial Hospital, where after his retirement he treated cases of intractable pain. As a consultant neurosurgeon, Jim was liked and trusted by his colleagues, and admired as a superb diagnostician. As a doctor, he was warm and compassionate. Jim planned his unit with research in mind. When he had promising trainees, he placed them in overseas units with good research facilities, where they learned the skills that have since helped to make Adelaide a leader in head injury research. Most imaginatively, he created in 1964 what is now the Neurosurgical Research Foundation (NRF) to raise funds to sustain research work. The foundation received support because community leaders knew Jim and trusted him, and it received donations from those who knew him as a good doctor. In 1988, when Jim was president of the NRF, fundraising for an academic chair in surgical neuroscience was initiated, and in 1992 the University of Adelaide established a chair of neurosurgery research. This very productive chair is one of Jim’s greatest achievements. Jim was a master of bedside teaching, and he also taught by example. No one who worked with Jim could fail to know that he practised medicine according to the highest ethical standards and expected that his pupils would do the same. His teaching was fruitful. Today, Adelaide’s neurosurgeons are all in a sense his pupils. Some were directly recruited and trained by him. Others came to him trained elsewhere but are proud to have learned from him. Even those who came after his retirement were taught by his trainees and worked in the environment that he made. On a national level, Jim was a major force in the creation of neurosurgical training systems in Australia, which began around 1970, when he was president of the Neurosurgical Society of Australasia. Outside Australia, some of Jim’s pupils now hold distinguished neurosurgical positions in Scotland, England and New Zealand. One of his earliest interns, J K A Clezy, was the first professor of surgery in Papua New Guinea, and brought neurosurgery to that country. Jim married Beatrice Margaret née Hay in 1943 and they had one son, Andrew, and three daughters – Anthea, Josephine and Nadia. He had many interests outside his profession, including photography, farming, stock-breeding, bee-keeping and sailing. He died on 22 September 2003 from chronic renal failure after a long illness. He has many memorials. He is commemorated by the Dinning Science Library at the Royal Adelaide Hospital, which is appropriate – he was a very scholarly man. He is remembered in the research foundation that he created. And, lastly, his example and his teaching have entered into the fabric of Australian neurosurgery.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000050
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Doey, William David (1922 - 2004)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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/372238372238
Occupation ENT surgeon
Details Bill Doey was a consultant ear, nose and throat surgeon at the Royal National Throat, Nose and Ear Hospital in London. He was born in Bessbrook, county Armagh, Northern Ireland, on 22 February 1912, the son of Rev Thomas Doey, a Presbyterian minister. His mother was Charlotte Chesney née McCay, the daughter of a minister and farmer. Bill was educated at the Academical Institution, Coleraine, Derry, and at St Catharine’s College, Cambridge. He then completed his clinical studies at the London Hospital, where he did house jobs until the outbreak of the second world war. From 1940 to 1946 he served in the RAF Volunteer Reserve, as a squadron leader and ENT specialist, in mobile field hospitals in France, Belgium and Holland. After the war, he was appointed as a consultant ear, nose and throat surgeon to the Royal National Throat, Nose and Ear Hospital, and as a lecturer at the Institute of Laryngology and Otology. He also held appointments at St Albans City Hospital and the Hemel Hempstead Hospital. He had a particular interest in medical history, especially that of the fatal illness of Crown Prince Friedrich, Queen Victoria’s son-in-law, who had been treated by Sir Morell MacKenzie. He lectured on the subject at the Kopfklinikum, Wurzburg, Germany. Bill’s lifelong interest in fishing went back to his boyhood days in Northern Ireland, and throughout his life he and his wife, Audrey Mariamné née Newman, whom he married in June 1940, enjoyed many fishing holidays. He retired to Llandeilo, where they renovated an old farmhouse and landscaped a garden out of a former paddock. He enjoyed music, languages, photography and driving – he was a member of the Institute of Advanced Motorists. He died from a heart condition on 12 January 2004, leaving three daughters, Virginia, Louise and Angela, and four grandchildren, Mariamné, Corinna, Sibylle and Niklas.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000051
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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/372239372239
Occupation General surgeon
Details Alfred John Drew, known as ‘Jack’, was a former consultant general surgeon in Walsall. He was born in Ceylon on 17 February 1916, the son of the chief pilot for the harbour at Colombo. He was educated at Nuwara Eliya, and was then sent to Ipswich School at the age of 11. He became head boy and rugby captain. He went on to study medicine at Guy’s, qualifying in 1939. At medical school he swam and played rugby for the first XV. After house appointments at Guy’s and with the south east sector of the Emergency Medical Service during the war, he went to Preston Hall, Maidstone, as a surgical trainee. He then moved to Pembury, where he became a senior lecturer in anatomy, living in a baronial house with many others from Guy’s. After obtaining his FRCS in 1941, he moved to Sheffield as resident surgical officer to Sir Ernest Finch. Drew then joined the Navy, initially as a specialist with the First Submarine Flotilla in the Eastern Mediterranean, managing to survive the sinking of the *Medway*. He was transferred to *HMS Zulu*, and ended up in Beirut. He then spent a long period at the Massawa Naval Base on the Red Sea. He returned to the UK, as a senior surgical specialist at Chatham, having asked to be posted to the Pacific, where the fighting was continuing. Following demobilisation, he returned to Guy’s as a senior surgical registrar, working under, among others, Brock, Slessinger, Ekhof, Grant-Massey, Stamm, Wass and Kilpatrick. He also worked at St Mark’s as a clinical assistant to Gabriel. In 1951 he was appointed general surgeon to the Walsall Hospitals (the Manor and the General), where he worked for the next 30 years. A true general surgeon, he taught trainees from all over the world, spending time visiting them during his retirement. He loved to sail, and, once he had retired to Lymington in 1981, he was able to devote more time to sailing along the south coast and to France. He was also able to tend his garden and watch rugby on television. He died in Lymington on 29 February 2004, and is survived by his wife, Patricia, his daughter, Sally, and his sons, Richard and Peter.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000052
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Eddey, Howard Hadfield (1910 - 2004)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-09-23 2012-03-22
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/372240372240
Occupation ENT surgeon
Details Howard Eddey was a former professor of surgery at Melbourne University. He was born on 3 September 1910, in Melbourne. His father was Charles Howard Eddey, a manager, and his mother was Rachel Beatrice née Hadfield, the daughter of a teacher. He was educated at Melbourne High School, where he was captain of boats and featured in many winning crews. He was also in the school lacrosse team. He went on to the University of Melbourne, where he won a university blue. He was subsequently a resident at the Royal Melbourne Hospital for two years. He then went to the UK, where he studied for his FRCS, winning the Hallet prize in the process. During the second world war he served in the Australian Imperial Force with the 2/13 Australian General Hospital, becoming a Major in the Australian Army Medical Corps. He was captured by the Japanese and spent time in prisoner of war camps in Changi and then in North Borneo. While he was captured he was involved in 'kangkong' harvesting and the treating of a local wild vegetable, to produce a drink that was rich in vitamins. Howard made sure the soldiers drank this frequently, as it reduced the incidence of beriberi and pellagra. During his time in captivity Howard also wrote notes on anatomy on scrap paper. This later became a key anatomy text, used by generations of medical students. He returned to the Royal Melbourne Hospital after the war as an honorary surgeon. He was dean of the clinical school there from 1965 to 1967. As a clinician he gained an impressive reputation as a head and neck surgeon. In particular his parotid gland surgery and cancer work with radical neck dissection gained considerable prominence. In 1966 the University of Melbourne decided to establish a third clinical school at the Austin Hospital and Eddey was invited to become the foundation professor of surgery. He had no background in research, but recruited a team of young surgeons with research skills and the research reputation of the department of surgery was rapidly established. In 1971 Eddey became dean and held this position until 1975. He was a member of the board of management from 1971 to 1977, and was vice-president from 1975 to 1977. In honour of his contribution to the development of Austin as a clinical school, the new operating theatres and library have been named after him. Eddey was regarded as an outstanding teacher and, through his role with the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons (RACS), helped surgical education in South East Asia. He made many visits to Asian hospitals and was involved with examinations and giving lectures. The RACS created the Howard Eddey medal in recognition of his work in Asia. He was a member of the board of examiners at the RACS from 1958 to 1973, and was chairman from 1968 to 1973. He was a member of council from 1967 to 1975 and served as honorary librarian from 1968 to 1975. He served on many other bodies, including the Cancer Institute and the Anti Cancer Council. His service to the community was recognised by his appointment as honorary surgeon to Prince Charles and he was made a Companion of the Order of St Michael and St George. He was married to Alice née Paul from Kew, Victoria, for 30 years. They had three children - Robert Michael, Peter and Pamela Ann. Eddey died on 16 September 2004.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000053
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Evans, Arthur Briant (1909 - 2005)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-09-23
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000000-E000099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372241372241
Occupation Obstetric and gynaecological surgeon Obstetrician and gynaecologist
Details Briant Evans was a former consultant obstetric and gynaecological surgeon at Westminster Hospital, Chelsea Hospital for Women and Queen Charlotte’s Maternity Hospital. He was born in London in 1909, the eldest son of Arthur Evans, a surgeon at the Westminster Hospital. He was educated at Westminster School and Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge, before completing his clinical studies at the Westminster Hospital. On the day he qualified in April 1933 his father, who had a large number of theatrical clients, took him to the theatre. They went to see Sir Seymour Hicks in his dressing room in the interval. On hearing that Briant had just qualified, he asked “How do I look?” Briant said, “Very well sir.” “Good, here’s your first private fee,” he replied, handing him a £1 note from his coat pocket. Following junior appointments at Westminster Hospital, Chelsea Hospital for Women and Queen Charlotte’s Maternity Hospital, he acquired his FRCS and the MRCOG. During the war he served in the Emergency Medical Service in London and was in the RAMC from 1941 to 1946, serving in the UK, Egypt (with the 8th General Hospital, Alexandria), Italy and Austria (where he was officer in charge of the No 9 field surgical unit) and was obstetric and gynaecological consultant to the Central Mediterranean Force. He ended the war as a lieutenant colonel. He was subsequently appointed obstetric and gynaecological surgeon to Westminster Hospital, obstetric surgeon to Queen Charlotte’s Maternity Hospital and surgeon to the Chelsea Hospital for Women. He examined for the Universities of Cambridge and London, and for the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists. Briant was much loved and respected by his patients and colleagues. He made operating appear easy. Quiet in manner and ever courteous, he loved teaching and was never happier than when accompanied by students on ward rounds and in the theatre. After retiring he bought a farm in Devon and his son Hugh was brought in to run it. He loved country life. He was a keen gardener, enjoyed sailing and had been a good tennis player in earlier days. His last home was in Buckinghamshire. In 1939 he married Audrey Holloway, the sister of David Holloway, who was engaged to Briant’s sister, Nancy. His wife died before him. They leave three sons (Roddy, Martin and Hugh), eight grandchildren and six great grandchildren. He died from a stroke on 3 March 2005.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000054
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Falloon, Maurice White (1921 - 2004)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Gatehouse, David (1944 - 2003)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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 Graves, Frederick Thomas (1919 - 2003)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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 Lessington-Smith, Caroline Mathilda (1918 - )

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Neil Weir
Publication Date 2006-06-21 2009-05-07
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000200-E000299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372430372430
Occupation ENT surgeon
Details Caroline Lessington-Smith was an ENT surgeon at King’s College Hospital, London. Born Caroline van Dorp on 25 May 1918, she was the daughter of a Dutch pastor based in London. She qualified at the London School of Medicine for Women in 1941 and, choosing ENT as a career, she became senior registrar to the ENT departments at the Royal Hospital, Sheffield, and the Royal Infirmary, Leicester, and senior registrar to the department of surgery of the General Hospital, Leicester. She was subsequently appointed as surgeon in charge of the ENT department of St Giles Hospital, Camberwell, and the Dulwich Hospital. She was interested in paediatric ENT and later worked at the Belgrave Hospital for Children. All three of these hospitals became part of the King's College Hospital group in the early 1960s. A highly intelligent and amiable colleague, she brought her extensive experience to the foreign body endoscopy unit at Camberwell and published a paper in the *Journal of Laryngology & Otology* (1954) entitled ‘Unusual foreign body in the maxillary antrum’, which turned out to be a flat metal ring measuring 7.7cms in diameter which had penetrated the antrum. A year earlier she wrote ‘Tonsillectomy for carcinoma of the tonsil in a dog – with survival’ in the *Veterinary Record*. Whilst at Camberwell in 1963 she met and married Hugh Sim, who had been injured at the Battle of Arnhem and was at the time a hospital administrator. They had two sons. Hugh died whilst Caroline was still working and, shortly after her retirement in the mid 1970s, she remarried and lived in her delightful cottage in Mayfield, East Sussex. She is believed to have died in late 2001 or early 2002, as noted in the *Medical Directory* 2002.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000243
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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 House, Howard Payne (1907 - 2003)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-09-28 2013-10-11
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/372264372264
Occupation Otolaryngologist ENT surgeon
Details Howard Payne House was a pioneering ear specialist. During his long career he treated thousands of patients, including Howard Hughes, Bob Hope and the former President, Ronald Reagan. A graduate of the University of Southern California's Keck School of Medicine, House perfected the wire loop technique to replace the stapes bone of the middle ear and developed procedures to reconstruct middle ear parts. In 1946 he established the House Ear Institute as a research facility dedicated to the advancement of hearing research and education. A year later, he was appointed Chairman of the subcommittee on noise and directed the national study on industrial noise that set the Occupational Safety and Health Administration hearing conservation standards in use today. House was head of the department of otolaryngology at University of Southern California School of Medicine from 1952 to 1961 and served on the faculty as clinical professor of otology. House received numerous awards and honorary degrees. He served as President of many professional associations in the US, including the American Academy of Otolaryngology - Head and Neck Surgery and the American Otological Society. He was awarded the University of Southern California's outstanding career service award, and was named a physician of the year by the California Governor's committee for employment of the handicapped. House died from heart failure on 1 August 2003 at St Vincent Medical Center, Los Angeles. He is survived by his sons, Kenneth and John, and his daughter Carolyn, and nine grandchildren.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000077
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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 Hudson, James Ralph (1916 - 2003)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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/372266372266
Occupation Ophthalmic surgeon
Details James Hudson was an ophthalmic surgeon at Moorfields in London. He was born on 15 February 1916 in New Britain, Connecticut, USA. His father, William Shand, was a mechanical engineer and farmer. His mother was Ethel Summerskill. He was educated in Massachusetts, at Winchester County Day School and then Belmont High School, before he went to England, where he attended the King’s School, Canterbury, and then Middlesex Hospital, where he was Edmund Davis exhibitioner. After qualifying, he joined the RAFVR, where he rose to the rank of Squadron Leader. In 1947, he went to Moorfields as a clinical assistant, trained in ophthalmology, and was appointed consultant in 1956 to Moorfields and to Guy’s Hospital. He also held posts at the King Edward VII Hospital for Officers, the Hospital of St John and St Elizabeth, London, and ran a private practice in Wimpole Street. He retired in 1981. He was a most competent general eye surgeon. An expert in surgical technique rather than an innovator, he devoted much of his time to the diagnosis and management of retinal detachment in an era when subspecialisation within ophthalmology was still new. In this field he made his reputation. For 25 years he presided over the retinal unit at the High Holborn branch of Moorfields, setting new standards by his unique and thorough methods of retinal examination and his meticulous records. His patients included the Duke of Windsor. He taught by example, and juniors soon learned that the soft cough at the end of a case presentation meant that something was not to his liking. He wrote chapters in Matthew’s *Recent advances in the surgery of trauma* and contributed to Rob and Rodney Smith’s *Operative surgery.* He was President of the Ophthalmological Society of the United Kingdom and the Faculty of Ophthalmologists, representing that faculty on the Council of the College. He was an examiner in ophthalmology to the Court of Examiners of the College. He was consultant adviser in ophthalmology to the DHSS and a civilian ophthalmic consultant to the RAF. His services were recognised by the award of the CBE in 1976. Abroad he was a respected member of the Société Française d’Ophtalmologie and represented the United Kingdom on several European committees. He was a member of the International Council of Ophthalmology and helped found the Jules Gonin Club, an worldwide association of retinal experts. He was interested in motoring, travel and cine-photography. He married Margaret May Oulpe, the daughter of a translator, in 1946. They had four children (Ann, Jamie, Sarah and Andrew) and five grandchildren (Matthew, Timothy, Mark, Jessica and Olivia). He died after a long illness on 30 December 2003.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000079
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Hulbert, Kenneth Frederick (1912 - 2003)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Jones, Bruce Victor (1919 - 2005)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-10-12
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/372271372271
Occupation Orthopaedic surgeon
Details Surgeon captain Bruce Jones RN was born on 26 June 1919 at Ringwood, Hants, the first son of Ernest Victor Jones, a dental surgeon, and Gladys Maud Jones née Sloper. He was educated at Great Ballard School near Hilton, Hants. He then moved on the Sherborne School. Initially, he started dental training at the Royal Dental Hospital in 1938 and was awarded certificates of honour, but did not qualify as a dental surgeon. In 1939, because of the war, he transferred to Charing Cross Medical School which had been evacuated to Glasgow. After qualifying MRCS in 1943 and MB in 1944 he joined the Royal Navy, serving as a surgeon lieutenant at sea, on HMS Aberdeen. In 1947, after demobilisation, he did a good surgical rotation at Poole and Hertford General Hospitals and the old Radcliffe Hospital in Oxford, passing his FRCS in 1949. Orthopaedics fascinated him: he had appointments at the Royal National Orthopaedic Hospital in London and Heatherwood Orthopaedic Hospital in Ascot. The Royal Navy called, so in 1954 he rejoined on a permanent commission as surgeon lieutenant commander, specialist in orthopaedics. There followed the normal service rotation of orthopaedic jobs in RN hospitals in Chatham, Kent, Hong Kong and HMS Ganges, the RN boys training establishment in Shotley, Suffolk. The Armed Services Consultant Approval Board at the RCS appointed him as a consultant in orthopaedic surgery in 1959. Bruce was then posted to Mauritius to establish joint services medical facilities. He returned to the UK in 1961, to the RN Hospital Stonehouse, Plymouth, Devon, then to RN Hospital Haslar as senior consultant in orthopaedics and later adviser to the medical director general of the Royal Navy. During this time he was delighted to be seconded on an operational posting to the aircraft carrier HMS Albion, the task to cover HM forces’ withdrawal from Aden. He was promoted to surgeon captain during this voyage whilst en route to Singapore. From 1968 to 1976 he was an honorary surgeon to HM the Queen. Later he was a brother of the Knights of Malta. He was a fellow of the Royal Society of Medicine for over 50 years and a fellow of the British Orthopaedic Association. Bruce was very keen on inter-service cooperation and initiated the Joint Services Orthopaedic Club. He was a keen and stimulating chairman who encouraged surgeons from the Army and RAF to take a full part in its activities. After retiring in 1976, he became a civil consultant to the RAF Hospital Wroughton, finally retiring in 1984. He was a keen sailor and photographer, and developed a productive interest in beekeeping. Fly fishing and entomology were other interests. Bruce married Sheila Ray Hogarth – a descendent of the painter – in May 1954 and they had two sons. James Victor Hogarth Jones was born in 1955 and is now head of farm business management at the Royal Agricultural College, Cirencester. Bruce Jonathon Hogarth Jones, born in 1959, is now a lawyer with Citibank London. Bruce was an excellent orthopaedic surgeon with a keen interest in the correction of recurrent shoulder dislocation, a common service problem, and hand surgery. When asked how he would like to be remembered, he stated: “conscientious and thorough and unsparing attention to patients’ needs”. That summed up his life as a naval surgeon. He died on 28 February 2005 after many years of infirmity, patiently borne.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000084
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Jones, Rhys Tudor Brackley (1925 - 2003)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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/372272372272
Occupation General surgeon
Details Air Vice Marshal Rhys Tudor Brackley Jones was born on 16 November 1925 in Middlesex, the son of the late Sir Edgar and Lady Jones. He studied medicine at St Mary’s Hospital, where he qualified MRCS LRCP in April 1950 and became a house surgeon there. His surgical training rotation continued at Harold Wood Hospital, becoming a junior surgical registrar, before call up for National Service by the Royal Air Force in September 1952. He married Irene Lilian Henderson in August 1953. He was rapidly promoted to squadron leader in 1954 whilst serving at the RAF Hospital Wroughton. Typical service annual moves to RAF Hospitals Nocton Hall, Weeton, Uxbridge, Ely and Wegberg happened until 1960, when he passed his FRCS and was posted on active service to the RAF Hospital in Aden. This was a period of terrorist activity and he rapidly gained extensive experience in battle surgery. After returning to the UK, he continued as a general surgeon, gaining the wide experience the service required, before being promoted to wing commander in 1963. He had a sabbatical year and was appointed as a consultant by the Armed Services Consultant Approval Board at the College in 1967. An overseas posting to RAF Hospital Changi soon followed, where a wide range of general surgery was undertaken. After returning to the UK he had a further period of external study before being promoted to group captain. He was soon posted to the RAF Hospital Wegberg as the senior consultant. This hospital was at the western end of British Forces Germany and he was responsible for the surgical treatment of the Army as well as the RAF. He was a very capable surgeon and this was soon recognised by the Army surgeons, with whom he established an excellent working relationship. In 1978 he went to the senior RAF Hospital the Princess Mary’s and was in charge of the Stanford Cade unit, where all the RAF cases of malignant disease were treated. In 1982 he was appointed as a consultant adviser in surgery and was soon promoted to air commodore. This was a busy and difficult period following the Falklands war, and included the dissolution of all military hospitals. In 1987 he was promoted to air vice marshal, with responsibility for all postgraduate training of RAF medical officers. He rapidly became the senior consultant of the RAF and honorary surgeon to the Queen. He retired in 1990 and died suddenly on 8 December 2003.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000085
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Kell, Robert Anthony (1939 - 2003)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-10-12 2006-12-07
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/372273372273
Occupation ENT surgeon
Details Robert Anthony Kell, known as ‘Robin’, was a consultant ear, nose and throat surgeon at the Victoria Infirmary and Southern General Hospital, Glasgow. He was born in Bishop Auckland, County Durham, in 1939, the son of William Kell, a colliery manager and Lilian. His mother died from leukaemia when Robin was only seven, and he was brought up by his father and stepmother, Ann, in Acomb. He was educated at the Friends’ School, Brookfield, Wigton, a co-educational boarding school, where his report reads: “he will develop not only into a first class scientist but also a man of wide sympathies and a strong social conscience”. He had hoped to follow in his father’s footsteps, but failed the coal board medical due to his eyesight. After graduating from St Andrews in 1963, he trained at Dundee Royal and the department of anatomy, Dundee. He began his ENT training in Dundee, but then moved to the Liverpool ENT Hospital to develop this interest further. He was appointed to his consultant posts in Glasgow in 1972. He was the clinical director for ENT at the Victoria Infirmary and Southern General Hospital for many years. His main interests were in audiology, the middle ear, and head and neck oncology. Robin served on the council for the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Glasgow, was President of the Scottish ENT Society and was an examiner for the intercollegiate board. He married Babs Scorgie, whom he met while working in Dundee. An expert pianist, he enjoyed music, playing the fiddle, and played with the Strathspey and Reel Society. He was also a keen traveller, particularly enjoying visiting Italy, the Lake District and west Cork. He died from metastatic prostate cancer on 17 December 2003, leaving a daughter, Valerie, and two sons, Alistair and Malcolm Kell, a general surgeon and a Fellow of our College. There are two grandchildren, Ruby and Genevieve.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000086
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Kenyon, John Richard (1919 - 2004)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Ketharanathan,Vettivetpillai (1925 - 2005)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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/372275372275
Occupation Vascular surgeon
Details Vettivetpillai Ketharanathan or ‘Nathan’ was a senior research associate at the vascular surgery unit at the Royal Melbourne Hospital, Victoria, Australia. He was born in Jaffna, Sri Lanka, on 25 November 1935 to Appiah Ketharanathan and Rukmani Nama (Sivayam) Ketharanathan, who were both teachers. He attended Jaffna Central College, but from the age of 14, when his father died, he had to shoulder the burden of family responsibilities. He studied medicine in Colombo, qualifying in 1960. After house jobs in Colombo and four years as a registrar at the General Hospital, Malacca, he went to Melbourne in 1966, as a registrar on the cardiothoracic unit at the Royal Melbourne Hospital, where he came under the wing of Ian McConchie. He became an Australian citizen, and was encouraged by McConchie to go to London, where he completed registrar posts in Hackney and the Brompton Hospital. He returned to Melbourne, where he began to carry out research into improved biomaterials for replacing cardiac valves and blood vessels, research he continued whilst he was working as a consultant thoracic surgeon at Ballarat. This work took him later to Portland, Oregon, as an international fellow in cardiopulmonary surgery. A number of new materials were patented by him and in 1990 he set up two companies, BioNova International and Kryocor Pty, to exploit them, whilst he was appointed senior research associate at the Royal Melbourne Hospital. An indefatigable investigator, he was an inspiration to many young surgeons. Among his many interests were cooking, and he was a regular client at the Queen Victoria market, seeking the freshest produce, rewarding his friends with examples of Sri Lankan fare. He died on 3 March 2005, leaving his wife Judith, and four children, of whom his eldest daughter, Selva, is an infectious diseases specialist at Sir Charles Gardiner Hospital in Perth. His second daughter, Naomi, is about to qualify at Amsterdam.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000088
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching King, Philip Austin (1918 - 2004)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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/372276372276
Occupation General surgeon
Details Philip King was a consultant surgeon at St Stephen’s Hospital, Chelsea, and honorary consultant surgeon at the Hospital of St John and St Elizabeth. He was born in 1918, the son of an obstetrician and gynaecologist. He was educated at Stonyhurst, and went on to read medicine at Sheffield, but the loss of some of his friends in the second world war made him interrupt his studies and join the RAF, where he served as a pilot. After the war, he completed his medical degree and then did house jobs at Sheffield and became resident surgical tutor. He then came to London as senior registrar to Sir Clement Price Thomas, Charles Drew and Frank d’Abreu at the Westminster Hospital, where he was one of the team that introduced the artificial kidney and cardiac bypass machines. He was then appointed general surgeon to St Stephen’s Hospital in Chelsea, part of the Westminster group. At this time he began his long association with the Hospital of St John and St Elizabeth, where Sister Pauline of the Sisters of Mercy, remembered him as a “faultless charismatic performer who cared deeply for his patients”. There he served as chairman of the medical staff committee and continued to serve the hospital long after he retired. He was admitted to the Order of Malta, first as a Knight of Grace and Devotion and later as a Knight of Obedience, and served the order with distinction, acting regularly as chief medical officer to their annual pilgrimage to Lourdes. Ironically, he developed a carcinoma of the oesophagus, a condition he had studied and written about. He underwent oesophagectomy and made a remarkable recovery. A keen sailor, for a time he owned a small island in the Menai Straits. He died of cardiovascular disease in the Hospice of St John and St Elizabeth, which he had helped established, on 7 June 2004, leaving his wife Gabrielle and three children, one of whom qualified at Westminster and became a consultant radiologist.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000089
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Kirklin, John Webster (1917 - 2004)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-10-12
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/372277372277
Occupation Cardiovascular surgeon
Details John Kirklin, former chairman of the department of surgery at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, revolutionised cardiovascular surgery through his development and refinement of the heart-lung machine. Throughout his life, he sought new methods and techniques to improve the care of patients. Born in Muncie, Indiana, on 5 August 1917, his father was director of radiology at the Mayo Clinic. John earned his bachelor’s degree from the University of Minnesota in 1938. He then went on to Harvard, where he gained his medical degree in 1942. He completed an internship at the University of Pennsylvania Hospital in Philadelphia and then served as a fellow in surgery at the Mayo Clinic. From 1944 to 1946 he served in the US Army, with the rank of Captain. He then spent six months at the Boston Children’s Hospital. In 1950, he joined the staff of the Mayo Clinic, pioneering the development of cardiovascular surgery and performing the first operations for a range of congenital heart malformations. He also modified the Gibbon machine, improving the original pumping and oxygenator system, and performed the world’s first series of open-heart operations using a heart-lung machine. At Mayo he became chairman of the department of surgery, and trained the next generation of cardiovascular surgeons from all over the world. In 1966, Kirklin joined the faculty of the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB) as chairman of the department of surgery and the surgeon in chief for UAB Hospital. He held these positions until 1982, during which time he built one of the most prestigious cardiovascular surgical programmes in the world. He retired from surgery in 1989. He wrote more than more than 700 publications, but he often stated that his greatest contribution was his textbook, *Cardiac surgery: morphology, diagnostic criteria, natural history, techniques, results, and indications* (Churchill Livingstone, 1956), which remains an important reference text in the field. He also served on multiple editorial boards and served as editor of *The Journal of Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgery.* He received many awards, including the American Heart Association research achievement award (in 1976), the Rudolph Matas award in vascular surgery, the Rene Leriche prize of the International Society of Surgery and the American Surgical Association medallion for scientific achievement. In 1972 he was awarded the Lister medal by the College. Many universities awarded him honorary degrees, including the Hamline University, St Paul, Minnesota, Indiana University, Georgetown University, the University of Munich, Germany, and Bordeau and Marseille Universities, France. He was a member of more than 60 local, state, national and international associations and scientific societies, including the American Association for Thoracic Surgery (serving as President from 1978 to 1979), the American College of Cardiology, the American Heart Association, the American College of Surgeons and the National Academy of Sciences Institute of Medicine. His wife Margaret Katherine was a physician. They had two sons and a daughter. The Kirklins have continued the medical tradition: his son is a cardiac surgeon and director of cardiothoracic transplantation at UAB, and his grandson is a medical student at UAB. John died on 21 April 2004 from complications from a head injury that occurred in January. The new clinic at Birmingham Alabama, designed by the world-famous architect I M Pei, is named in his honour.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000090
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Leacock, Sir Aubrey Gordon (1918 - 2003)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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/372278372278
Occupation General surgeon
Details Sir Aubrey Gordon Leacock, known as 'Jack', was a leading consultant surgeon in Barbados. He was born on 27 October 1918 in Barbados, into an established Bridgetown family. His father, Sir Stephen Leacock, was a leading merchant. He received his early education in Barbados, at Harrison College. In 1928, he won a scholarship to Rugby, from which he went on to Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge, where he took first class honours. He went on to St Bartholomew's for his clinical training. He was a senior registrar at St George's, Tooting, and was on blood transfusion duty at the Channel ports when the British Expeditionary Force came back from Dunkirk, a heart condition having prevented him from active service. His interest was always in surgery and he became a senior registrar at St Bartholomew's when many of the consultant staff had both a national and international reputation. Jack Leacock's particular interest was in anorectal surgery. He might well have obtained a consultancy in the United Kingdom, but, when on a short trip home in 1948, he was offered an appointment at the General Hospital in Barbados. At this time general practitioners carried out the general surgery and gynaecology, the only specialists being in ENT and ophthalmology. His London training, surgical skill and imagination completely revolutionised the care of the people of Barbados. He was the first to introduce oesophagectomy for carcinoma of the oesophagus, replacing it with large bowel. His range of surgery was enormous, and done with a high degree of skill. Each year he would visit the USA or UK to keep up to date, particularly in the management of scoliosis, where he used Harrington's rods to correct the deformity. At the time of independence the British, as a goodwill gesture, built the Queen Elizabeth II Hospital in Barbados. Jack Leacock was involved in its design, and in setting up a blood bank, for which he had to overcome some local beliefs. Early on, he recognised the need for birth control in a small island with a burgeoning population and was one of the founders of the Barbados Family Planning Association in 1950, which effectively halved the birth rate. He was a keen sportsman, enjoying sailing, snow skiing, hang-gliding, wind surfing and polo. He rode until he was nearly 80, and began playing squash in his early seventies. He enjoyed travelling and was a talented pianist. He was equally keen on reading, and after he retired in 1977 he wrote a weekly column in the Barbados *Advocate*, in which he commented on a wide range of topics. He was knighted in 2002 for his many services to Barbados. He died in Barbados on 24 August 2003. He is survived by his wife, Margaret-Ann, whom he married in 1962, and two daughters from his first marriage and one from his second. He had two grandchildren. He gave instructions that there should be no funeral, just a simple cremation, to be followed a week later by a jazz party.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000091
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Richardson, John Samuel, Lord Richardson of Lee in the County of Devon (1910 - 2004)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-01-13
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000100-E000199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372367372367
Occupation Physician
Details John Samuel Richardson was a former President of the General Medical Council and the British Medical Association who inadvertently played a key role in the resignation of Macmillan in 1963. The son of a solicitor, he was born on 16 June 1910 in Sheffield, where his grandfather had been Lord Mayor, Master Cutler, an MP and Privy Councillor. He was educated at Charterhouse and Trinity College, Cambridge, going on to St Thomas’s to do his clinical studies, where he won the Bristowe medal and Hadden prize. After qualifying, he did his house jobs at St Thomas’s, winning the Perkins fellowship. He served in the RAMC in North Africa with the rank of lieutenant colonel, and there, in 1943, was assigned to be physician in attendance to King George VI (whom he treated successfully for sunburn), on which occasion he met and treated Harold Macmillan, with whom he became a close friend. After the war Richardson returned to St Thomas’s as a consultant physician, where he became very successful thanks to his considerable charm. In due course he became President of the General Medical Council, British Medical Association and the Royal Society of Medicine, and was the recipient of innumerable honours. Rather unfairly he is probably remembered today not for his many and considerable contributions to his profession but for being on holiday when Harold Macmillan developed acute-on-chronic retention of urine, formed the (wrong) impression that he was going to die of cancer and handed over the reins of government to Alec Douglas Home. Lord Richardson married the portrait painter Sybil Trist, who predeceased him. They had two daughters. He died on 15 August 2004.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000180
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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 Levy, Ivor Saul (1941 - 2005)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-06-21 2012-03-14
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000200-E000299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372434372434
Occupation Ophthalmologist
Details Ivor Levy was a consultant ophthalmologist at the Royal London Hospital, Whitechapel. He was born in Manchester on 29 June 1941 and educated in Manchester, at Pembroke College, Oxford, and at the London Hospital. After junior appointments, he held a research fellowship at the Bascom Palmer Eye Institute in Miami, USA, which led to his special interest in neuro-ophthalmology. He was appointed to the Royal London Hospital in 1973. He had a particular interest in collecting books, especially those of Sir Frederick Treves. In 2000 he developed a tremor, which was found to be caused by a communicating hydrocephalus, for which he underwent shunt surgery. He died at Addenbrooke's Hospital, Cambridge, on 21 March 2005.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000247
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Leighton, Susanna Elizabeth Jane (1959 - 2004)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-10-12 2011-07-20
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/372279372279
Occupation Paediatric otolaryngologist
Details Susanna Elizabeth Jane Leighton née Hurley was a consultant paediatric otolaryngologist at Great Ormond Street Hospital, London. She was born in Kobe, Japan, on 20 January 1959. She qualified at St Thomas's Hospital, London, where she completed an intercalated BSc in anatomy, and was vice-president of the Amalgamated Clubs and secretary of the Medical and Physical Society. After house jobs, she decided to train as a surgeon, and became the lead surgeon on the cochlear implant team at Great Ormond Street. She also developed an interest in airway management in craniosynostosis and wrote extensively on the subject, producing guidelines. She married Barry and had a daughter (Claudia) and two sons (John and Finn). She died from metastatic breast cancer on 6 August 2004.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000092
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-07-20 2012-07-19
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000000-E000099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372196372196
Occupation General surgeon Military surgeon
Details Was gazetted Assistant Surgeon in the 5th Foot on July 13th, 1809, and retired on half pay on Sept 25th, 1817, commuting his half pay on June 22nd, 1830. He saw active service in Walcheren in 1809 and served in the Peninsula War from 1810-1814. He also served in Canada during the years 1814-1815. After he had retired he settled in practice in Westminster, and by 1847 had removed to Claygate in Surrey, and later to Aldenham Grove, Elstree, Herts, whence he returned to Claygate, where he died on July 27th, 1878. His son was W T Lynn, the Cambridge astronomer.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000009
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Thomas, Honoratus Leigh (1769 - 1846)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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/372531372531
Occupation Ophthalmologist
Details John Keast-Butler was a consultant ophthalmologist at Addenbrooke’s Hospital in Cambridge. He was born in London on 26 September 1937. His father, Joseph Alfred Keast-Butler, was a salesman and his mother, Mary Loise Brierley, was a secretary. He was educated at University College School and went up to Trinity College, Cambridge, to read medicine, going on to University College Hospital for his clinical studies. After National Service in the RAMC he specialised in ophthalmology, at first as a registrar at Addenbrooke’s Hospital, Cambridge, then as a senior resident officer at Moorfields Eye Hospital, City Road, and finally as a senior registrar at St Thomas’s Hospital and the National Hospital for Nervous Diseases. In 1977 he was appointed as a consultant ophthalmic surgeon to Addenbrooke’s NHS Trust, Cambridge University Teaching Hospitals Trust and Saffron Walden Community Hospital. In addition he was associate lecturer (medicine) at the University of Cambridge, director of studies (clinical medicine) at Trinity College, Cambridge, and attachment director in ophthalmology, University of Cambridge School of Medicine. He was a fellow of the Royal Society of Medicine, chairman of the BMA ophthalmic group committee for some years and honorary secretary of the Cambridge Medical Graduates’ Club. His colleagues rightly described him as a big man in stature and in personality. He was a skilled craftsman and enjoyed carpentry, photography and gardening. He married Brigid Hardy, a nurse, in 1967 and they had three children – one daughter (a civil servant) and two sons (a trainee ophthalmic surgeon and a business analyst). He died on 19 March 2005 while travelling with his wife in Goa. He had a major fall that proceeded a fatal pulmonary embolism.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000345
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Lange, Meyer John (1912 - 2005)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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/372532372532
Occupation General surgeon
Details Meyer John Lange, known as ‘Nick’, was a consultant surgeon at New End and Royal Free hospitals, London. He was born on 5 August 1912 in Worcester, South Africa, the second son of Sally Lange, a government contractor, and Sarah née Schur. His older brother also became a doctor. Nick studied at Worcester Boys High School and the University of Cape Town, before going to England to Guy’s Hospital, where he qualified in 1935. After junior posts he joined the RAF at the outbreak of the Second World War, and rose to the rank of squadron leader. He became a consultant surgeon at New End Hospital, Hampstead, and later at the Royal Free Hospital. He was a specialist in the surgery of the thyroid gland, being influenced by Sir Geoffrey Keynes and by Sir Heneage Ogilvie, who had been on the staff of Hampstead General Hospital before transferring to Guy’s Hospital. At New End he was a colleague of the charismatic John (Jack) Piercy, who had been born in Canada, and who had built up an endocrine unit, created by the London County Council, which was to become internationally famous. Nick published extensively on thyroid surgery and myasthenia gravis. He was a quiet, modest but charming colleague, and a meticulous and excellent surgeon – a surgeon’s surgeon. He married a Miss Giles in 1945 and they had one son and one daughter, who studied medicine at Guy’s. Nick Lange died on 27 November 2005.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000346
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Sen, Adosh Kumar (1942 - 2005)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-01-19
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Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000100-E000199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372369372369
Occupation General surgeon
Details Adosh Sen was a surgeon based in New Delhi, India. He was born in Dalhousie, India, on 27 June 1942. His father, Santosh Kumar Sen, a surgeon, and his mother, Sita Sen, a gynaecologist, had founded the celebrated Dr Sen’s Nursing Home, in New Delhi. He was educated at the Modern School, Barakhamba Road, New Delhi, where he excelled in sport, particularly swimming. He did his premedical studies at the Hindu College, before going on to study medicine at the Maulana Azad Medicel College, where he continued to swim, representing his state in the All India championship. After house jobs he went to England to specialise in surgery, and completed training posts at Rowley Bristow Orthopaedic Hospital, Pyrford, St Peter’s Hospital, Chertsey, and Barking General Hospital. He returned to India as a general surgeon in his father’s clinic in New Delhi. He married Rehana Tasadduq Hosain in 1969 in London, who had a masters degree in English and taught that subject in New Delhi. They had three sons, Ashish, Nikhil and Shirish, none of whom went into medicine. Sen continued to be a keen sportsman, his main sport being swimming, but he was also a keen follower of cricket. Among his many interests was education, and he was vice president of the Magic Years Educational Society, which promotes Montessori education, and served on the board of trustees of the Modern School and its many branches. He died on 18 April 2005.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000182
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Shapland, Sir William Arthur (1912 - 1997)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-01-19 2012-03-09
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000100-E000199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372370372370
Occupation Accountant Philanthropist
Details Sir William Shapland, an honorary fellow of the College, was born on 20 October 1912, the son of Arthur Frederick Shapland and Alice Maud née Jackson. Educated at Tollington School, he joined the firm of Allen Charlesworth & Co, chartered accountants. He was given the responsibility of dealing with the accounts of John Blackwood Hodge & Co and Bernard Sunley & Sons, and, later, of advising the chairman, Bernard Sunley, a construction magnate. So valuable was his advice that, in 1946, he was invited to join the group as a non-executive director. In 1954 he became an executive director, succeeding Sunley as chairman of Blackwood Hodge ten years later. In 1960 he helped set up the Bernard Sunley Charitable Foundation, which distributes almost £3 million a year to good causes. Charities and institutions as varied as the Scout movement, Charing Cross Hospital and the Wild Fowl Trust have benefited. Among his many honours he was a Waynflete fellow of Magdalen College, Oxford, and honorary fellow of St Catherine's College, Oxford. He died on 1 October 1997, leaving his wife Madeleine and two daughters.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000183
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Lawrence, Sir William (1783 - 1867)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-07-28 2012-07-19
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Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000000-E000099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372201372201
Occupation Anatomist General surgeon Medical Lecturer Ophthalmic surgeon
Details Born on July 16th, 1783, at Cirencester, where his father, William Lawrence (1753-1837), was the chief surgeon of the town. His mother was Judith, second daughter of William Wood, of Tetbury, Gloucestershire. The younger son, Charles Lawrence (1794-1881), was a scientific agriculturist who took a leading part in founding and organizing the Royal Agricultural College at Circencester. William Lawrence went to a school at Elmore, near Gloucester, until he was apprenticed in February, 1799, to John Abernethy, who was then Assistant Surgeon to St. Bartholomew's Hospital. Abernethy became Lecturer on Anatomy in 1801 and appointed Lawrence his Demonstrator. This post he held for twelve years, and was esteemed by the students as an excellent teacher in the dissecting-room. He was elected as Assistant Surgeon to the Hospital on March 13th, 1813, and in the same year was elected F.R.S. In 1814 he was appointed Surgeon to the London Infirmary for Diseases of the Eye, in 1815 to the Royal Hospitals of Bridewell and Bethlehem, and in 1824 he became full Surgeon to St. Bartholomew's, a post he did not resign until 1865. In 1829 he succeeded Abernethy as Lecturer on Surgery and he continued to lecture for the next thirty-three years. He had also lectured on anatomy for some years before 1829 at the Aldersgate Street School of Medicine. He became a Member of the College in 1805, a Fellow in 1843, was a Member of Council from 1825-1867, a Member of the Court of Examiners from 1840-1867, Chairman of the Midwifery Board in 1854, Vice-President four times, and President in 1846 and 1855. He obtained the Jacksonian Prize in 1806 with an essay on "Hernia, and the Best Mode of Treatment", which went through five editions in its published form, and he delivered the Hunterian Oration in 1834 and 1846. From 1816-1819 he was Professor of Anatomy at the Royal College of Surgeons. At his first lecture in 1816 he criticized Abernethy's exposition of Hunter's theory of life. His views on the "Natural History of Man" (1819) scandalized all those who regarded life as an entity entirely separate from, and above, the material organism with which it is associated. The lectures caused a serious breach between Abernethy and Lawrence, who was accused of "perverting the honourable office entrusted to him by the College of Surgeons to the unworthy design of propagating opinions detrimental to society, and of loosening those restraints on which the welfare of mankind depend." Lawrence regarded life as the assemblage of all the functions and the general result of their exercise, that life proceeds from life and is transmitted from one living body to another in uninterrupted succession. In his lectures on comparative anatomy he endorsed the views of Blumenbach, and showed that a belief in the literal accuracy of the early chapters of Genesis is inconsistent with biological fact. The lectures on the "Physiology, Zoology, and Natural History of Man" - the beginning of modern anthropology in this country - were republished by Lawrence, but Lord Eldon characteristically refused to protect his rights in them on the ground that they contradicted Scripture. Lawrence valued the work so little that he announced its suppression, and having, in the satire of the day, been ranked with Tom Payne and Lord Byron, he was thereupon vilified as a traitor to the cause of free thought. This form of abuse pursued him still more fiercely when, like Burke, who changed his views after an introduction to the King's Cabinet, he became a Conservative in the College Council Room, after having headed an agitation against the rule of the Council of the College. In 1826 there appeared a "Report of the Speeches delivered by Mr. Lawrence as Chairman at two meetings of Members, held at the Freemasons' Tavern". On the occasion of his second Hunterian Oration in 1846 a new charter which had lately been obtained failed to satisfy the aspirations of the Members of the College. An audience mostly hostile had assembled, and Lawrence defended the action of the Council and spoke contemptuously of ordinary medical practitioners, thereby raising a storm of dissent. "All parts of the theatre", says Stone, "rose against him. So great was the storm that Lawrence leant back against the wall, folded his arms, and said, 'Mr. President, when the geese have ceased their hissing I will resume.' He remained imperturbable, displayed his extraordinary talent as an orator, and concluded his address in a masterly peroration which elicited the plaudits of the whole assembly." Lawrence was at one time much in the councils of Thomas Wakley, the founder of the *Lancet*, with whom he conducted a weekly crusade against privilege in the medical world. This, of course, had not been forgotten when he appeared as the advocate of the College in 1846. As a lecturer on purely medical subjects Lawrence had a long career, during which he was without superior in manner, substance, or expression. He republished his lectures on surgery in 1863, and the work was praised by Sir William Savory and Sir Jonathan Hutchinson, who said of them that, "though superseded by other works, they are still a mine of carefully collected facts to which the student refers with pleasure and profit". Sir G. M. Humphry (q.v.) and Luther Holden (q.v.) have also borne witness to his powers as a lecturer and to his genius as a clinical exponent. Sir James Paget (q.v.), who attended his lectures, did not at the time, he says, esteem them enough, but when he came to lecture himself he followed their method and thought it the best method of scientific speaking he had ever heard: "every word had been learned by heart and yet there was not the least sign that one word was being remembered. They were admirable in their well-collected knowledge, and even more admirable in their order, their perfect clearness of language, and the quietly attractive manner in which they were delivered." Brodie described William Lawrence as remarkable for his great industry, powers of acquirement, and inexhaustible stores of information. He had a considerable command of correct language, a pure style of writing free from affectation, was gifted with the higher qualities of mind, and possessed a talent seldom surpassed. He was a vigorous, clear, and convincing writer. In addition to many contributions to the *Lancet*, the *Medical Gazette*, and the *Transactions of the Medical and Chirurgical Society*, of which he was President in 1831, he published in 1833 *A Treatise on Diseases of the Eye*, which embodied the results and observations obtained in his large ophthalmic practice. Lawrence lived to a great age and enjoyed a high degree of physical strength combined with an intense mental activity. On one occasion a friend ventured to congratulate him on looking so well. "I do not know, sir," replied Lawrence, "why I should not look as well as you do." At the age of eighty he was photographed by Frank Hollyer, and the picture, now in the College Collection, well displays his magnificent physical qualities. He became Serjeant-Surgeon to H.M. the Queen in 1858, was created a Baronet on April 30th, 1867, and died in harness in July, 1867. As he was mounting the College stairs in his capacity of Examiner, he had a stroke of paralysis, which deprived him of the power of speech. He was helped down to the Secretary's office from the second landing on the main staircase, where the seizure took place, by Mr. Pearson (the College Prosector) and others. "When taken home, he was given some loose letters out of a child's spelling-box," says his biographer, Sir Norman Moore, "and laid down the following four: B, D, C, K. He shook his head and took up a pen, when a drop of ink fell on the paper. He nodded and pointed to it. 'You want some black drop, a preparation of opium,' said his physician, and this proved to what he had tried to express." He married Louisa, daughter of James Trevor Senior, of Aylesbury, and left one son and two daughters. His son, Sir Trevor Lawrence, became Treasurer of St. Bartholomew's Hospital, the daughters died unmarried at a very advanced age. His grandson, Sir William Lawrence, was for many years an almoner at St. Bartholomew's Hospital. Lawrence died on July 5th, 1867, at 18 Whitehall Place, S.W., where he had lived for many years. His children founded a scholarship and medal in his memory in 1873. The former was increased by his daughter to the annual value of £115 and is tenable at St. Bartholomew's Hospital as the chief surgical prize. The medal was designed in 1897 by Alfred Gilbert, R.A., and is a fine example of numismatic portraiture. A three-quarter-length portrait in oils by Pickersgill hangs in the Great Hall of St. Bartholomew's Hospital; it was painted by subscription and has been engraved. A bust by H. Weekes, R.A., is in the College; it was ordered in 1867 and is placed near the head of the staircase. It is a fine likeness. A crayon portrait by Samuel Lawrence is in the possession of the family. Lawrence was a masterful man who, by virtue of his energy and long life, impressed himself upon the growing Medical School at St. Bartholomew's Hospital, where, almost in spite of himself, he carried on the tradition of Abernethy; Paget, Savory, Humphry, and to a lesser extent Sir Thomas Smith and W. Harrison Cripps, fell under his sway and were influenced by him. He was a great surgeon, though not an operator equal to Astley Cooper, Robert Liston, or Sir William Fergusson; but his powers of speech and persuasion far exceeded the abilities of the rest of the profession. It was truly said of him that had he gone to the bar he would have shone as brilliantly as he did in surgery.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000014
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Young, Ian William (1929 - 2005)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-01-19
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/372374372374
Occupation Orthopaedic surgeon
Details Ian Young was a consultant orthopaedic surgeon based in Swindon. He was born in Rugby on 25 February 1929, the only child of George Sangster Young, an electrical engineer and Margaret Fenton Wright Breingan. He was educated at Rugby School and Merton College, Oxford. He then went on to University College Hospital, London for his clinical studies, qualifying in 1954. After house jobs at UCH he served in the RAMC with the 1/6th Gurkha Rifles in Malaya and Hong Kong. He returned to continue his surgical training at UCH as a registrar from 1960 to 1962, and then to the Radcliffe Infirmary, where he specialised in orthopaedics and became senior registrar there and at the Nuffield Orthopaedic Centre. He was appointed consultant orthopaedic surgeon at Swindon in 1967. He married Anne Martine Davies, another UCH medical graduate, in 1955. They had one son and one daughter. His hobbies included squash and bird-watching. He died on 30 August 2005 of a pulmonary embolism.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000187
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Hawkins, Caesar Henry (1798 - 1888)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-01-25 2012-03-22
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/372375372375
Occupation Anatomist General surgeon
Details One of the ten children of the Rev. Edward Hawkins, grandson of Sir Caesar Hawkins, Bart. (1711-1786), Surgeon to St. George's Hospital and Serjeant-Surgeon to George II and George III, who was descended from Colonel Caesar Hawkins, commanding a regiment of horse for Charles I. Caesar Hawkins was born on Sept. 19th, 1798, at Bisley, Gloucestershire, and, his father having died whilst he was still young, he was sent to Christ's Hospital (the Bluecoat School), where he remained from 1807-1813, when he had to be withdrawn as he was not destined for either Oxford or Cambridge. He was apprenticed to Mr. Sheppard, of Hampton Court, then the medical attendant of the Duke of Clarence, afterwards King William IV, who lived at Bushey Park. At the end of his indentures in 1818 he was admitted a student at St. George's Hospital under Sir Everard Home and Benjamin Brodie, and attended the chemistry classes of Michael Faraday at the Royal Institution. As soon as he had qualified he began to teach anatomy at the Hunterian or Windmill Street School of Medicine, having Sir Charles Bell as his colleague. He was elected Surgeon to St. George's Hospital on February 13th, 1829, and resigned in 1861, when he was appointed Consulting Surgeon. In 1862 he was gazetted Serjeant-Surgeon to Queen Victoria, and was thus the fourth member of his family to hold a like office. He was a Member of the Council from 1846-1863, and of the Court of Examiners from 1849-1866; was Chairman of the Midwifery Board in 1860; delivered the Hunterian Oration in 1849, when H R H the Prince Consort honoured the College with his presence; was Vice-President in 1850, 1851, 1859, 1860; President in 1852 and again in 1861; and Representative of the College on the General Medical Council from 1865-1870. In 1871 he was elected a Trustee of the Hunterian Museum. He was elected FRS on June 9th, 1856. He married: (1) Miss Dolbel, and (2) Miss Ellen Rouse, but left no issue by either. He died on July 20th, 1884, at his house, 26 Grosvenor Street. As a surgeon Hawkins attained eminence and achieved success, his opinion being especially sought in complex cases. For long he was noted as the only surgeon who had succeeded in the operation of ovariotomy in a London hospital. This occurred in 1846, when anaesthetics were unknown. He did much to popularize colotomy. A successful operator, he nevertheless was attached to conservative surgery, and he was always more anxious to teach his pupils how to save a limb than how to remove it. Long after he had become Consulting Surgeon to his hospital he continued to be a familiar figure on the wards, where he gave his colleagues the benefit of his lifelong experience. Caesar Hawkins was a man of sterling worth and merit, as well as of great capacity. His family was, indeed, distinguished for talent, as evidenced by the fact, above alluded to, that four of them rose to the rank of Serjeant-Surgeon. Two of Caesar Hawkin's own brothers were men of mark - Edward (1794-1877) the well-known Provost of Oriel who played so great a part in the life of Oxford during the Tractarian Movement, and Dr. Francis Hawkins, the first Registrar of the General Medical Council, who was known as one of the best classical scholars among the physicians of his time. His nephew Sir John Caesar Hawkins (1837-1929), Canon of St. Albans, was the author of the well known *Horae Synopticae*. Hawkins was not remarkable for graciousness of demeanour on a first acquaintance - in fact, most men complained of him as somewhat dry and repellent under these circumstances. But this vanished on a closer acquaintance, when his genuine kindness of heart and sincerity became recognized. Everyone knew how firm a friend he was to those who had earned his friendship, and how trustworthy a counsellor, and he ended his days amid the universal respect and regard of the many who had been his colleagues and pupils. One of the latter, when addressing students of St. George's at the opening of the session of 1885, thus concluded a reference to the examples left them by their predecessors in the school:- "I would point out to you, as an example of what I mean, the great surgeon who has lately passed away from us, full of years and honours, endeared to those who had the happiness of being his pupils by every tie of gratitude and affection, and reverenced by all who can appreciate stainless honour. Caesar Hawkins was rich in friends, who watched and tended the peaceful close of his long and brilliant career. They can testify how well he bore Horace's test of a well-spent life, '*lenior et melior fis accedente senecta*' (Epist. ii. 211). The old words involuntarily occur to everyone who contemplates an old age so full of dignity and goodness: 'The path of the just is as a shining light, which shineth more and more unto the perfect day'" (Proverbs v. 18). He has been described as one of the cleverest minds in the medical profession, a mind of unquestioned accuracy, unswayed by imagination, temper, or desire for renown. No one was more discreet and honest in council, or less influenced by self-interest. A bust by George Halse was presented to the College by Mrs Caesar Hawkins in June, 1855. Photographs are preserved in the College Collection. PUBLICATIONS:- Hawkins contributed largely to the medical journals, and reprinted his papers for private circulation under the title, *The Hunterian Oration, Presidential Addresses, and Pathological and Surgical Writings,* 2 vols., 8vo, 1874. Among these mention may be made of valuable lectures "On Tumours", and of papers on "Excision of the Ovum", "The Relative Claims of Sir Charles Bell and Magendie to the Discovery of the Functions of the Spinal Nerves", "Experiments on Hydrophobia and the Bites of Serpents", "Stricture of the Colon treated by Operation", etc.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000188
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Siegler, Gerald Joseph (1921 - 2005)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-06-21 2009-05-07
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000200-E000299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372436372436
Occupation ENT surgeon
Details Gerald Joseph Siegler, or ‘Jo’ as he known to colleagues, was an ENT consultant in Liverpool. He was born in London on 3 January 1921, and studied medicine at St Bartholomew’s Hospital. He held junior posts in Huddersfield, Lancaster, Nuneaton and Birkenhead, before completing his National Service with the RAF. After passing his FRCS he specialised in ENT, becoming a registrar at the Royal National Throat, Nose and Ear Hospital and then a senior registrar at Liverpool, where he was appointed consultant in 1958. He was past president of the North of England ENT Society and an honorary member of the Liverpool Medical Institute. After he retired in 1986 he continued to be busy, working for Walton jail until 1995. He died from the complications of myeloma on 4 October 2005, leaving a wife, Brenda, two daughters, Sarah and Pauline, and three grandchildren.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000249
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
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First Title value, for Searching Bowsher, Winsor Graham (1957 - 2004)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Simon, Sir John (1816 - 1904)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-03-01 2012-03-09
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/372391372391
Occupation Chief Medical Officer General surgeon Pathologist
Details Born in London on Oct. 10th, 1816, the sixth of the fourteen children of Louis Michael Simon (1782-1879) by his second wife, Mathilde Nonnet (1787-1882). His father, who had been a shipbroker and served on the Committee of the Stock Exchange from 1837-1868, was the son of an Englishman who had married a French wife, whilst his mother was the daughter of a Frenchman who had married an English wife. John Simon was christened at St. Olave's, Hart Street, E.C. - Pepys' church - and began his education at Pentonville, after which he was for seven and a half years at Greenwich under the Rev. Dr. Charles Parr Burney, son of Dr. Charles Burney and grandson of Johnson's friend, where he had John Birkett (q.v.) as a schoolfellow. He then lived with Leonard Molly, a pastor, for a year at Hohensolms, near Wetzler, in Rhenish Prussia, and acquired a good knowledge of German. He was apprenticed, on his return to England in the autumn of 1833, to Joseph Henry Green (q.v.) for the usual fee of 500 guineas. Green was Surgeon to St. Thomas's Hospital and Professor of Surgery at the newly founded King's College, and his pupil attended both institutions. In 1838, a year before the end of his apprenticeship, Green allowed Simon to obtain the M.R.C.S. that he might be appointed Demonstrator of Anatomy at King's College, having Francis Thomas MacDougall (q.v.) as his colleague, and in 1840 he was elected the senior of two Assistant Surgeons appointed on the opening of the Hospital founded in connection with King's College. The junior Assistant Surgeon was William Bowman (q.v.), with whom Simon formed an intimate friendship and from whom he learnt to work on scientific lines. The outcome was a paper read before the Royal Medico-Chirurgical Society on June 8th, 1847, on "Subacute Inflammation of the Kidney" (*Trans. Roy. Med-Chir. Soc.*, 1847, xxx, 141) which is illustrated with a plate showing the microscopic appearances described. In 1844 Simon gained the Astley Cooper Prize with a "Physiological Essay on the Thymus Gland" (4to, London, 1845), and contributed to the Royal Society "The Comparative Anatomy of the Thyroid Gland" (*Phil. Trans.*, 1844, cxxxiv, 295). He was elected F.R.S. on Jan. 9th, 1845, and was afterwards a Vice-President. Simon was invited in 1847 to accept the newly created Lectureship on Anatomical Pathology at St. Thomas's Hospital with charge of beds, and he thereupon resigned his demonstratorship of King's College, but retained the Assistant Surgeoncy. Green resigned his office of Surgeon, and on July 20th, 1853, Le Gros Clark (q.v.) and John Simon were elected "to do out-patients". Simon then severed all connection with King's College, and on July 6th, 1863, became full Surgeon to St. Thomas's Hospital in succession to G.W. Macmurdo (q.v.). He resigned his lectureship in 1871 and the office of Surgeon in 1876. As a surgeon Simon was not brilliant, for he was neither rapid nor graceful, but every operation he performed was carefully planned and prepared for. He was in the habit of going frequently to the dead-house and there performing every kind of operation, endeavouring to make improvements on old methods and to learn the exact landmarks and lines of section to be made in novel or unusual operations, particularly where bones were concerned. He repeated Syme's amputation in this manner many times before he performed it on the living patient, and he was the first surgeon in this country to undertake Pirogoff's method of removing the foot. He was particularly apt in the diagnosis of abscesses within bones, which he located with great accuracy. He was equally good in the treatment of difficult strictures of the urethra, and in passing a catheter he almost seemed to confer intelligence on the instrument. He was the first to open the membranous part of the urethra by the same route as was afterwards followed by Edward Cock (q.v.). Simon devised and practised the operation before Cock published his results and substantiated his claim to priority in the *St. Thomas's Hospital Reports* (1879, x, 139). A proof of the paper with Simon's corrections is in the Library of the Royal College of Surgeons. As a pupil of Joseph Henry Green he was an expert lithotomist, using a pointed and extremely stout knife, and a grooved staff. Simon was a great power in the Medical School at St. Thomas's, and it was in some measure due to his incisive and satirical pen that St. Thomas's Hospital was not converted into a country convalescent hospital at the time it was compelled to move from its old site at the foot of London Bridge. Without respect of persons he was active in removing abuses, in introducing reforms, and in extending the area and efficiency of instruction. In particular he was especially active in securing suitable accommodation for the treatment of diseases of the eye when Richard Liebreich (1829-1916) was appointed Ophthalmic Surgeon. At the Royal College of Surgeons Simon was a Member of the Council from 1868-1880, a Vice-President in 1876 and 1877, and President in 1878. Throughout his life Simon was interested in pathology. He was an original member of the Pathological Society in 1846, contributed several papers to its *Transactions*, and was elected President in 1867. The best exposition of his aims and methods in pathological teaching is to be found in his Inaugural Address delivered at St. Thomas's Hospital in 1847, which was afterwards published in his *General Pathology as Conducive to the Establishment of Rational Principles for the Diagnosis and Treatment of Disease,* 1850. Simon said of the latter work that as a result of its publication he woke up to find himself famous - not as a surgeon, but as a sanitary reformer. The judgement proved true; few now think of Simon as a surgeon, all know him as the maker of modern sanitary science in England. Simon was one of the illustrious figures in Victorian medicine. When he began his labours in the field of public health it was not thought to be the duty of the State to seek out and prevent the causes of disease and death in its citizens. There was no administrative authority in the country, central or local, that had any medical officer or medical adviser for sanitary purposes: the development of a science and practice of preventive medicine was quite unknown. In 1848 Simon was appointed the first Medical Officer of Health of the City of London. He was the first and for many years the only Medical Officer of Health in London. He was the head of the Medical Department of the Government from the years of its creation in 1855 to his retirement in 1876, and must be considered the founder and in some directions its creator. Simon's record of ability and industry was marvellous, whilst his imaginative faculty was of a very high quality. Cultivated as a linguist, as a student of Oriental literature, and as the friend of artists, poets, and philosophers, he was able to think grandly, to project his mind into the future, to discern the real meaning of social evils as well as their probable developments, and so to devise schemes of prevention and amelioration which could never have occurred to move plodding, if equally industrious, minds. One can scarcely estimate the importance to civilization and humanity of Simon's work. It may be briefly stated that he drained the city and rendered it healthy, abolished the pernicious system of central cesspools under houses, intramural slaughter-houses, and other malodorous trade establishments, and conducted an active crusade against smoke, intramural graveyards, Thames pollution, impure water, and overcrowded dwellings. To enumerate the full details of Sir John Simon's official career would be to write a history of hygienic reform. For many years after the close of his official life in 1876 as Chief Medical Officer to the Privy Council and afterwards to the Local Government Board, Simon occupied himself with public work and was a Crown Representative on the General Medical Council. In the latter part of his life he gradually and completely lost his sight. He married on July 22nd, 1848, Jane O'Meara, daughter of Matthew Delaval O'Meara, who had been Commissary-General in the Peninsular War. They had no children and she died on Aug. 19th, 1901. Lady Simon was a close friend of Ruskin, who used to call her "dear P.R.S." (Pre-Raphaelite sister and Sibyl). Simon died at his house, 40 Kensington Square, where he lived since 1867, on July 23rd, 1904, and was buried at Lewisham Cemetery, Ladywell. A bust by his friend Thomas Woolner, R.A., was presented to the College by the subscribers to the Simon Testimonial Frund on Dec. 14th, 1876. It is a remarkable presentation of a remarkable head. A photograph in late middle life faces pages 187 in MacCormac's *Address of Welcome*. An excellent likeness in extreme old age is appended to the obituary notice in the *Lancet* (1904, ii, 308) and is reproduced in the *St. Thomas's Hospital Reports* (1905, xxxiii, facing page 393). Sir John Simon was remarkable for the extent of his knowledge. The influence of Joseph Henry Green, to whom he had been articled, coupled perhaps with his early education in Germany, gave a philosophical basis to his thoughts and actions through life. In 1865 he edited the *Spiritual Philosophy* of his old master. He was widely read in the classics and in English literature and became an excellent writer of English prose. In youth he pursued a course of reading in metaphysics and in Oriental languages, and his general culture allowed him to value and to appreciate the friendship of such literary and artistic friends as Thackeray, Tennyson, Rossetti, Alfred Elmore, R.A., Sir George Bowyer, George Henry Lewis, William Morris, Edward Burne-Jones, Tom Taylor, Ruskin, Sir Arthur Helps, Thomas Woolner, R.A., and Robert Lowe, afterwards Lord Sherbrooke. He was mainly responsible with J. A. Kingdon (q.v.) for the establishment by the Grocer's Company of scholarships for the promotion of sanitary science. Considering his eminence Sir John Simon received little public recognition during his lifetime. He was decorated C.B., the ordinary reward of a faithful public servant, on his retirement in 1876, but it was not till Queen Victoria's Jubilee that he was promoted K.C.B. The Harben Medal of the Royal Institute of Public Health was awarded him in 1896, and the Buchanan Medal of the Royal Society in November, 1897. Publications: Simon's chief reports and writings on sanitary objects were issued collectively by subscription by the Sanitary Institution of Great Britain in two volumes in 1875. *English Sanitary Institutions Reviewed in their Course of Development and in Some of their Political and Social Relations,* 8vo, London, 1890. A charmingly written and fair-minded account of the development of public health in England from the earliest times. It appears now to be somewhat difficult to obtain. *Personal Recollections of Sir John Simon, K.C.B.* This was privately printed in 1898. It consists of 34 pages printed by Wiltons Ltd., 21 & 22 Garlick Hill, E.C., and is dated Oct. 4th, 1894. It was revised on Dec. 2nd, 1903, "in blindness and infirmity". The Library of the Royal College of Surgeons possesses a copy enriched by the author's corrections. Bibliography in the *Catalogues of the Surgeon General's Library,* series i and ii.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000204
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Holden, Luther (1815 - 1905)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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/372392372392
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born in his grandfather's house at Birmingham on Dec. 11th, 1815. He was the second son of the Rev. Henry Augustus Holden, who married his cousin Hyla Holden of Wednesbury in Staffordshire. His elder brother, Henry Holden, D.D. (b. 1814) , was Canon of Durham, a fine scholar and the editor with Richard Dacre Archer Hind of the *Sabrinœ Corolla*; the fourth brother, Philip Melancthon (1823-1904) was Rector of Upminster, Essex. Luther was educated with his father's pupils, at a private school in Birmingham, and at Havre, where in 1827 he learned to speak French fluently. He entered St. Bartholomew's Hospital in 1831 as an apprentice of Edward Stanley (q.v.), and in 1838 went for a year to study in Berlin and for a second year in Paris. An Italian student in Paris taught him to read and speak Italian. He was appointed Surgeon to the Metropolitan Dispensary, Fore Street, E.C., in 1843, and was then living in the Old Jewry, teaching anatomy to private pupils, one of whom was William Palmer, the poisoner. Holden presented himself at the first examination for the newly established diploma for the Fellowship, and was one of the twenty-four candidates who passed successfully on Christmas Eve, 1843. Appointed in 1846, with A. M. McWhinnie (q.v.), Superintendent (or Demonstrator) of Dissections at St. Bartholomew's Hospital, he was elected in 1859, jointly with Frederick Skey (q.v.), to lecture upon descriptive and surgical anatomy. He resigned the office in June, 1871. Elected Assistant Surgeon to the hospital in July, 1860, with Frederick Skey as his Surgeon, he became full Surgeon in August, 1865, with Alfred Willett as his Assistant Surgeon. He resigned his hospital appointments in 1880 on attaining the age of 65, and was made Consulting Surgeon. He then retired from his house, 54 Gower Street, which had a garden, moved to Pinetoft, Ispwich, and spent much of his life in travel. He visited at different times Egypt, Australia, India, Japan, and was entertained by the medical profession at Johannesburg in 1898. He was Surgeon to the Foundling Hospital from 1864 until his death. At the Royal College of Surgeons Holden was a Member of the Council from 1868-1884; an Examiner in Anatomy and Physiology, 1875-1876; a Member of the Court of Examiners, 1873-1883; and a Member of the Dental Board of Examiners, 1879-1882. He served as Vice-President for the years 1877 and 1878, was President in 1879 and Hunterian Orator in 1881. He married: (1) Frances, daughter of Benjamin Wasey Sterry, of Upminster, Essex, in July, 1851, and (2) Frances, daughter of Wasey Sterry, in 1868, who survived him. Both wives bore the same name and were of the same family. Both had independent fortunes. There were no children of either marriage. Holden died at Putney on Feb. 5th, 1905, and was buried in the cemetery of the Parish Church, Upminster. By his will he bequeathed £3000 to endow a scholarship in surgery in the Medical School at St. Bartholomew's Hospital; he also made handsome bequests to St. Bartholomew's and to the Foundling Hospitals. A three-quarter-length portrait in oils - an admirable likeness - by Sir J. E. Millais, R.A., hangs in the Great Hall at St. Bartholomew's Hospital. It was painted on the occasion of Holden's retirement from the active staff of the hospital and has been engraved. A crayon sketch by Gordon Stowers hangs on the walls of the College of Surgeons. It is dated 1881, and was exhibited at the Royal Academy. There is also a fine portrait by Maguire, dated 1851, in the College Collection. Holden was one of the last members of the school of surgeons who based their practice on anatomy, and for that reason he is remembered by his *Osteology* and *Surgical Landmarks* rather than by his surgical attainments. The imperfect treatment of syphilis in the mid-Victorian period allowed of the production of many aneurysms. Holden was a great advocate for the treatment of popliteal aneurysm by continuous digital pressure in preference to the Hunterian operation, which was often followed by secondary haemorrhage. He invented 'Holden's sausage', a cylinder of Gooch's splint containing a bag of shot. The cylinder was slung from a pulley above the bed, and was so adjusted as to press upon the fingers of the assistant who was compressing the femoral artery with one hand whilst the other was placed upon the aneurysm to make sure that the pulsation had ceased. The pressure was kept up for many hours by relays of students. The method was irksome to the students and painful to the patient, who had often to be kept under morphia. It was occasionally successful, but there was frequently so much chafing and bruising of the skin, that it fell into disuse. For many years he 'coached' students privately for their examinations, and no one possessed a stronger hold on the affections of his pupils, nor did anyone take greater pleasure in teaching, than did Luther Holdern. One thing he abhorred with all his might, and that was the modern specialist. He believed in the good general surgeon who knew his anatomy and physiology and their applications to surgery. He was an excellent operator, and devoted the greatest care to the work in the wards and to his clinical teaching. Years advanced, but they made little impression on Holden's marvellous physical vigour and lightness of heart. He was a very accomplished and courteous gentleman, with a charm of manner that gained the confidence of the most shy student. He cared little for private practice, but had a passion for teaching, and a patience that was inexhaustible, even when dealing with those whose mental capacities were least developed. He was the personal friend and confidant, as well as teacher, of all who experienced difficulty in acquiring what they had to learn, and he succeeded in teaching those whom no one else could teach. He was beloved alike by the students amongst whom it was his delight to work, and the colleagues with whom he was ever in harmony and affectionate relations. A fluent linguist and a good classic as well as a keen sportsman, he was a conspicuously handsome member of a handsome family, and it was interesting to notice that the older he grew the more handsome he became. He was seen at his best when he was riding to hounds. It is noteworthy, perhaps, that he was one of the few Presidents of the College who received no outside recognition in the form of honorary degrees or other decorative titles. A pencil sketch of his head is in the Royal College of Surgeons. PUBLICATIONS: - *A Manual of the Dissection of the Human Body*, in four parts without illustrations, London, 1850; 2nd ed., 1 vol., copiously illustrated, 8vo, 1851; 2nd ed., 1859; 5th ed., Philadelphia, 1885; 7th ed., 1901, 2 vols. *Human Osteology*, 2 vols., London, 1855; the later editions were in one volume; 8th ed., 1929. This work marked a distinct advance in the study of the human skeleton. It is written in an easy style by a master anatomist. The author drew the illustrations himself and they were etched on stone by Thomas Godart, Librarian of the Medical School at St. Bartholomew's Hospital, who afterwards died in Australia. These illustrations formed at the time a new feature in the teaching of anatomy, for the origin and insertions of the muscles are shown upon the figures of the bones by red and blue lines. *Landmarks Medical and Surgical*, first published as a series of papers in the *St. Bart.'s Hosp. Rep.*, 1866, ii, and 1870, vi. They were issued separately in a large and revised form in 1876; 4th ed., 1888; and were translated into Spanish by Dr. Servendo Talón y Calva, Madrid, 1894. The book is an application of anatomy to surgery and shows how much anatomy can be learnt by studying the surface of the body whilst yet the skin is unbroken. There were at first no illustrations to distract from personal observations, but woodcuts were added in the later editions.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000205
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Cheng, Koon-Sung (1966 - 2003)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Ogg, Archibald John (1921 - 2005)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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 Clarke, Samuel Henry Creighton (1912 - 2004)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-09-14
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/372224372224
Occupation Urological surgeon Urologist
Details Henry Clarke was a consultant urological surgeon in Brighton and mid Sussex until his retirement in December 1976. He was born in Derby on 1 January 1912, the son of Samuel Creighton Clarke, a general practitioner in Derby and the son of a gentleman farmer from Newtownbutler, Ireland, and Florence Margaret Caroline née Montgomery, a descendent of the Montgomery who accidentally killed Henry II of France in a jousting match in 1559. Clarke was educated at Monkton Combe junior and senior schools, and then went on to St Bartholomew’s medical school, where he was a medical clerk to Lord Horder and a surgical dresser to Sir James Paterson Ross. From 1937 to 1938 he was a casualty officer, house surgeon and senior resident at the Royal Sussex County Hospital, Brighton. He enlisted in July 1939, joining the 4th Field Hospital, as part of the British Expeditionary Force. In 1940, at Dunkirk, he organised the evacuation of men on to the boats, under aerial attack. He left Dunkirk on one of the last boats out. In 1942 he was sent out to North Africa, and was present at the Battle of El Alamein. At the end of the North African campaign, as part of the 8th Army, he took part in the invasion of Italy. He ended the war as a Major in the RAMC. After the war, he returned to Bart’s, where he was much inspired by A W Badenoch. After appointments at Bart’s, as a chief assistant (senior registrar) and at St Peter’s Hospital for Stone (as a senior registrar), he became a consultant in general surgery at the Luton and Dunstable Hospital in 1950. In 1956 he was appointed as a consultant urological surgeon to the Brighton and Lewes, and mid Sussex Hospital groups. He was a member of the council of the British Association of Urological Surgeons from 1961 to 1964, and a former Chairman of the Brighton branch of the BMA. He married Elizabeth Bradney Pershouse in 1947 and they had a daughter, Caroline Julia Creighton. There are three grandchildren – Rachel, Brittany and Alexander. He was interested in rugby, tennis and golf, and collected liqueurs and whiskies. He retired to St Mary Bourne, and became an active member of his parish. He died from heart failure on 15 September 2004.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000037
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Jones, Geoffrey Blundell (1915 - 2004)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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
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First Title value, for Searching Cronin, Kevin (1925 - 2005)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-09-22 2007-02-01
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/372443372443
Occupation General surgeon
Details Kevin Cronin was born on 24 July 1925, the son of M J Cronin, a general practitioner. He was educated at the Beaumont School, Berkshire, and entered the London Hospital Medical College in 1942. After qualifying, he completed house jobs in neurosurgery under Douglas Northfield, chest medicine under Lloyd Rusby, and ear, nose and throat surgery. His later training in surgery was at the Radcliffe Infirmary. During this time he spent a research year at the University of Oregon, as a result of which he obtained his masters degree in surgery. He was appointed as consultant surgeon to Northampton General Hospital. He was an Arris and Gale lecturer of the College. He married Madeleine and they had a son (Philip) and daughter (Caroline). They had four grandchildren - Sam, Chloe, Christian and Rory. He died on 20 May 2005.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000256
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Galloway, James Brown Wallace (1930 - 2005)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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/372444372444
Occupation General surgeon
Details James Galloway was a consultant general surgeon in Stranraer, Scotland. He was born on 26 March 1930 in Lanark, the son of William Galloway, a farmer, and Anne née Wallace, a secretary. He received his early education at Lanark Grammar, followed by McLaren High in Callendar when the family moved there after his father’s death. At an early stage he showed the academic bent that was to remain with him throughout his life. School was followed by Glasgow University, where he graduated MA before embarking on a medical degree. After gaining his MB Ch in 1956 he undertook his National Service as a captain in the RAMC, spending a large part of his time in Hong Kong. Returning to civilian life, he opted for surgery as a career, and received his training in Glasgow. In 1966 he moved to Ballochmyle Hospital in Ayrshire. Here he made an indelible impression. He was an outstanding doctor whose interest in his subject seemed insatiable, his knowledge of it being encyclopaedic. His practical skills were also of a very high order, and he gave of himself unstintingly. He could truly be said to be dedicated to his work, and he was held in the highest regard by his medical colleagues and nursing staff alike. Though a quiet man, even self-deprecating, he had a remarkable ability to get what he wanted; where his patient’s interests were concerned he could be tenacious, to say the least, and he provided a service second to none. His interest in new developments, and his enthusiasm for new devices, were infectious. He was a most likeable colleague and he was held in considerable affection by all. His time in Hong Kong had given him a taste for travel and during the 1970s, while working in Ayrshire, he answered an advertisement placed by the Kuwait Oil Company and spent three months there as a general surgeon. His work so impressed that he was invited back for two further tours of duty. In 1981 he was appointed consultant general surgeon at the Garrick Hospital in Stranraer. Ayrshire’s loss was Stranraer’s gain, and he quickly established himself there as he had at Ballochmyle, becoming a most valued member of the community. He believed firmly that medical services should be provided locally whenever possible, and fought hard to prevent the surgical service being transferred to Dumfries. James’s other great love was sailing, and he had a succession of boats, starting with a 14-foot dinghy and culminating in *Eliane*, a very capable traditional yacht which was his pride and joy. He happily related that all his boats had one thing in common – they were so full of his beloved gadgets and equipment that they all had to have their waterlines redrawn. He was a very relaxed skipper who, though a lifelong teetotaller himself, was not in the least put out by the occasional excesses of his crew members. There can be no part of the Clyde, and few parts of the Western Isles, that he had not sailed to, and he never ceased to be glad of his origins. After retirement in 1991 he remained as active as ever, embracing the computer age with typical enthusiasm. He was a very kindly, widely read and thoughtful man who made a most interesting companion. He took up scuba diving and continued to be a very active sailor, crossing the Minch to Eriskay in his last summer. Sadly this was to be his last cruise, and thereafter he became increasingly weak. Typically he preferred to discuss the differential diagnosis rather than to complain. He died in the Ayr Hospital on 11 December 2005. He was predeceased by Janet and Anne, his two older sisters. He is greatly missed by his many friends.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000257
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Grimshaw, Clement (1915 - 2005)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Hounsfield, Sir Godfrey Newbold (1919 - 2004)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-09-22 2008-09-11
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000200-E000299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372446372446
Occupation Research engineer
Details Godfrey Hounsfield, the inventor of the CT scanner, was the epitome of the brilliant boffin – modest, retiring and shunning the limelight. He was born on 28 August 1919, the youngest of the five children of Thomas Hounsfield, a steel engineer who took up farming in Newark-on-Trent, Nottinghamshire. There Godfrey grew up surrounded by farm machinery, with which he became fascinated. ‘In a village there are few distractions and no pressures to join in at a ball game or go to the cinema and I was free to follow the trail of any interesting idea that came my way. I constructed electrical recording machines; I made hazardous investigations of the principles of flight, launching myself from the tops of haystacks with a home-made glider; I almost blew myself up during exciting experiments using water-filled tar barrels and acetylene to see how high they could be waterjet propelled.’ At Magnus Grammar School he was interested only in physics and mathematics. At the outbreak of the Second World War he joined the RAF as a volunteer reservist and was taken on as a radar mechanic instructor, occupying himself in building a large-screen oscilloscope. His work was noticed by Air Vice Marshall Cassidy, who got him a grant after the war to attend Faraday House Electrical Engineering College, where he received a diploma. He then joined the staff of EMI working on radar and guided weapons, working with primitive computers. In 1958 he led a team building the first all-transistor computer, speeding up the transistors by providing them with a magnetic core. In 1967 he began to study aspects of pattern recognition and worked in the Central Research Laboratories of EMI. Contrary to the public relations story, which has been repeated so often that it has come to be accepted as true, his idea did not occur to him when out walking, and it was not supported by the full resources of EMI. His colleague, W E Ingham, pointed out that EMI were not interested: they were not in the medical business, and it was only covertly that a deal was done with the Department of Health and Society Security to fund the development of what became the first CT scanner. The first brain to be scanned was that of a bullock. The prototype was soon shown to be successful in 1971, when it was used to diagnose a brain cyst at Atkinson Morley’s Hospital and before long Hounsfield’s work had been plagiarised and developed all over the world, mostly overseas. Hounsfield was unaware that Cormack, of Tufts, had published theoretical studies on the mathematics for such a device. A whole-body scanner was introduced in 1975. Honours came thick and fast: CBE, FRS, the Nobel prize (shared with Cormack), a knighthood and an honorary FRCS. He remained a modest, retiring bachelor. His advice to the young was: ‘Don’t worry if you can’t pass exams, so long as you feel you have understood the subject.’ In retirement he did voluntary work at the Royal Brompton and Heart Hospitals. He died from a chronic and progressive lung disease on 12 August 2004. He was unmarried.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000259
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Johnson, Alan Godfrey (1938 - 2006)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Sir Barry Jackson
Publication Date 2008-02-07 2018-05-10
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000400-E000499
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372629372629
Occupation Gastrointestinal surgeon General surgeon
Details Alan Johnson was a leading gastro-intestinal surgeon and medical ethicist. He was born on 19 January 1938, at Epsom Downs, Surrey, the son of Douglas Johnson, a doctor. He was educated at Epsom College and Trinity College, Cambridge, with his clinical studies being carried out at University College Hospital Medical School, London. He graduated in 1963 and, after house appointments, trained in surgery at UCH with Anthony Harding Rains and at Charing Cross Hospital with Norman Tanner. In 1971 he was appointed senior lecturer and later reader in surgery at Charing Cross, before taking up the chair of surgery at Sheffield in 1979, an appointment which he held until his retirement in 2003. He specialised in surgery of the upper gastro-intestinal tract, in which he became a world authority. Over the years he published some 200 peer-reviewed articles and 35 book chapters on topics such as gastric motility, portal hypertension, highly selective vagotomy for peptic ulcer, Barrett's oesophagus, surgical treatment of morbid obesity and various aspects of biliary disease. His randomised clinical trial published in 1996 comparing cholecystectomy by either laparoscopy or mini open incision was heralded by The Lancet as setting a new gold standard for surgical research. This was later acclaimed as one of the five most important articles in gastro-enterology published worldwide in that year. He authored or edited ten textbooks and was in wide demand as an authoritative and lucid lecturer. He gave invited lectures in more than 20 countries ranging over five continents. He took an active part in surgical professional organisations and was elected president of the Association of Surgeons of Great Britain and Ireland, the British Society of Obesity Surgery and the National Association of Theatre Nurses. For several years he was chairman of the Standing Medical Advisory Committee to the Secretary of State for Health and he also served as chairman of the Specialty Advisory Committee in General Surgery. He chaired several Medical Research Council committees and, owing to his incisive critical faculty, was a much-valued member of the editorial board of a number of surgical journals. He was elected an honorary fellow of the American Surgical Association and was awarded an honorary doctorate from Sheffield University. Alan Johnson was an outstandingly popular colleague with his peers and a much-loved mentor to his junior staff and students. Gentle and compassionate, he had no enemies. Throughout his career he was keenly interested in medical ethics and wrote and lectured widely on this subject, in addition to his many surgical contributions. This interest stemmed from his deep Christian faith. His father had been founder of the Inter Varsity Fellowship and later became the first general secretary of the Christian Medical Fellowship. Following in his father's footsteps, at the time of his death Alan was president of the Christian Medical Fellowship, having previously been chairman. His lectures on medical ethics were legendary; they were always well-reasoned with a touch of humour and never table-thumping. One of them began: "Hitler and Mother Teresa each had 24 hours in every day - they just used them differently!" His last book, titled *Making sense of medical ethics: a hands-on guide* (London, Hodder Arnold, 2006) and written jointly with his son Paul, was completed a month before his death. In his youth he was a keen sportsman, playing hockey and cricket for his school, university and hospital. As he grew older he turned to wood carving and painting in watercolours and pastels. He was also enjoyed ornithology and country walking. He played the piano and the organ and was a patron of the Sheffield Chorale, in which his wife was a singer. Married to Esther, he had two sons, Paul, who became a paediatric surgeon, and Andrew, and a daughter, Fyona. During a routine medical check up two weeks before he died, his doctor jokingly said that Alan was so fit "he would live forever". His reply was typical: "I am going to live forever, but not in this life!" A fortnight later, he was due to preach on 'the place of compassion in modern medicine' at St John's Church, Wotton, near Dorking. There on 15 October 2006, in the churchyard, just before the service began, he had a massive myocardial infarction and died.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000445
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Halvorsen, Jan Frederik (1935 - 2003)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-09-22 2007-08-09
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/372449372449
Occupation General surgeon
Details Jan Frederik Halvorsen was director of the department of surgery and professor of surgery at the University of Bergen, Norway. He graduated from the University of Bergen Medical School in 1960, becoming a general surgical specialist in 1968 with a special interest in intestinal surgery. He gained a PhD for his work on blood pressure within the liver. His first appointment was at Stavanger Hospital, followed by the Rikshopitalet in Oslo. He also worked at the United Nations Hospital in Gaza. In 1964 he was appointed to Haukeland University Hospital in Bergen, where he remained until illness forced his retirement in 2001. He moved through the department of pathology and the gynaecology clinic, but his main focus was surgery. He initially specialised in endocrine surgery, but eventually developed his interest in GI surgery, particularly the diagnosis and treatment of bowel disorders. He published over 100 papers on diseases of the GI tract. He took a sabbatical, spending time at St Mark’s Hospital, London. He became professor of surgery at Bergen University and, as a result of his involvement with the Norwegian Medical Association, he was responsible for the coordination of postgraduate studies. His door was always open to students and colleagues. The organisation of training and the decentralising of courses were a demanding project. He organised the coordination of 1,100 courses involving 25,000 participants. In 1992 he was chosen to coordinate university exchanges between the Hanseatic towns of Lubeck in Germany and Bergen. His enormous experience, knowledge, friendly amiability and dynamism helped him to establish important international contacts and successful exchanges. He was a generous man and established great and permanent friendships with both the students and the specialists in both these cities. He also organised many visits of groups of surgeons from other countries, including the UK. He was a great communicator and spoke impeccable English. He was extremely interested in English literature. He belonged to a British surgical travelling club and was one of its most enthusiastic members. Even when he was suffering from serious cardiac problems he determinedly joined the group on a visit to Spain. In 1988 he was made an honorary Fellow of the College. This particular honour he cherished more than the other many honours he received. Jan Frederik Halvorsen was an extremely skilled surgeon, with vast theoretical knowledge and practical experience. In addition to the qualities he showed as a surgeon, his organisational skills in health management were used to great effect in improving postgraduate education in Norway. Patients and doctors benefited from these attributes. He left a great legacy. He was a strong family man. He leaves his wife Sissel and four children.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000262
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Addison, Norman Victor (1925 - 2003)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Rees, Richard Lestrem (1916 - 2004)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Richards, Brian (1934 - 2003)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Rickham, Peter Paul (1917 - 2003)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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/372305372305
Occupation Paediatric surgeon
Details Peter Rickham was one of a small group of pioneering surgeons who helped to establish the specialty of paediatric surgery in the UK. He was born in Berlin on 21 June 1917, where his father, Otto Louis Reichenheim, was professor of physics at Berlin University. His mother was Susanne née Huldschinsky. Peter was educated at the Kanton School and the Institute Rosenberg, St Galen, Switzerland. He then went to Queen’s College, Cambridge, and on to St Bartholomew’s for his clinical training, where he won the Butterworth prize for surgery. After junior posts, he joined the RAMC, where he had a distinguished career, taking part in the Normandy invasion and the war in the Far East, reaching the rank of Major. On demobilisation, he trained in paediatric surgery under Sir Denis Browne at Great Ormond Street and Isobella Forshall at the Alder Hey Children’s Hospital, Liverpool. After a year as Harkness travelling fellow, spent in Boston and Philadelphia, he was appointed consultant paediatric surgeon at Alder Hey in 1952. He became director of paediatric surgical studies in 1965 and in 1971 was appointed professor of paediatric surgery at the University Children’s Hospital in Zurich, Switzerland, where he remained until his retirement in 1983. He was intensely involved with research. His MS thesis concerned the metabolic response of the newborn to surgery. Later he devised the Rickham reservoir, an integral part of the Holter ventricular drainage system for hydrocephalus. His textbook, *Neonatal surgery* (London, Butterworths, 1969), remained the standard text for many years. At Alder Hey, he set up the first neonatal surgical unit in the world. It became a benchmark for similar units around the world, and resulted in an improvement in the survival of newborn infants undergoing surgery from 22 per cent to 74 per cent. He was Hunterian Professor at the College in 1964 and 1967, was honoured with the Denis Browne gold medal of the British Asosciation of Paediatic Surgeons, the medal of the American Academy of Pediatrics, the Chevalier Legion d’Honneur in 1979 and the Commander’s Cross (Germany) in 1988. Peter was a founder member of the Association of Spina Bifida and Hydrocephalus, the European Union of Paediatric Surgeons and of the British Association of Paediatric Surgeons, serving as its President from 1967 to 1968. He was a cofounder and editor for Europe of the *Journal of Pediatric Surgery*. Innovative, forceful and outspoken, he was passionately involved with his specialty. Shortly after his appointment in Liverpool he became so exasperated by the local paediatricians’ use of barium to diagnose oesophageal atresia that at Christmas 1954 he sent each one a card enclosing a radio-opaque catheter with which to make the diagnosis safely. He took great pride in the achievements of his many pupils who went on to become leaders in their specialty. He married Elizabeth Hartley in 1938 and they had a son, David, and two daughters, Susan and Mary-Anne. Elizabeth died in 1998 and he married for a second time, to Lynn, who nursed him through his final long illness. He had five grandchildren. He died on 17 November 2003.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000118
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Roddie, Robert Kenneth (1923 - 2004)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Ross, Sir James Keith (1927 - 2003)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-10-19 2007-09-13
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000100-E000199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372307372307
Occupation Cardiac surgeon
Details James Keith Ross was a leading cardiac surgeon, and one of the team that performed the first cardiac transplant in Britain. He was born in London on 9 May 1927. His father, Sir James Paterson Ross, was later to become professor of surgery at St Bartholomew’s Hospital, Surgeon to the Royal Household and President of the College. His mother, Marjorie Burton Townsend, had been a surgical ward sister at Bart’s. Keith was profoundly influenced by his maternal grandfather, Frederick William Townsend, who taught him to work in wood, a practical education in hand-eye coordination, which laid the foundation of his exceptional surgical skill. Another influence was his godfather, Sir Thomas Dunhill, who, whilst recuperating from a hernia repair, gave Keith a trout rod and insisted on demonstrating it whilst in his pyjamas in the middle of Harley Street. Keith attended the Hall School, Hampstead, and then St Paul’s, where he was the senior scholar. He went on to Middlesex Hospital medical school, where he won the Asher scholarship in anatomy and the Lyell medal in surgery. Qualifying in 1950, he became house surgeon to Thomas Holmes Sellors, won the Hallet prize in the primary FRCS and then did his National Service in the Royal Naval Reserve, mostly at sea. On returning to the Middlesex, he passed the FRCS in 1956 and began a training in cardiothoracic surgery at the Brompton Hospital and as a Fulbright scholar with Frank Gerbode in San Francisco, where his research into the fate of grafts in the heart led to a thesis for his masters in surgery and a Hunterian professorship. He was promoted to senior registrar in 1961 at the Middlesex and Harefield hospitals, and to part-time consultant at Harefield in 1964, and later at the Central Middlesex and Middlesex hospitals. In 1967, he gave up these posts, which involved a good deal of stressful travelling, to join Donald Ross at the National Heart Hospital. He was by now at the top of the tree, recognised both in Britain and abroad. His personal series of 100 consecutive homograft aortic valve replacements with only two hospital deaths was, at the time, unrivalled. It was with surprise that his contemporaries learned that he had moved to Southampton, though those who knew him better understood that he felt he was needed there, and it was his duty to go. Arriving in Southampton in 1972, he was joined the following year by James Monro, who had just returned from a year with Barrett-Boyes in New Zealand, and brought expertise in paediatric cardiac surgery. Together they built up a first rate team, accepting only the highest standards and insisting on a strict audit, both of the short-term results and of quality of life after cardiac surgery. The reputation of the department attracted young surgeons from abroad, in particular from Boston, to work in his unit and to support this he organised a cardiac surgical fellowship. Once the unit was well established, he started a second open heart programme at King Edward VII Hospital, Midhurst. He was postgraduate dean and then President of the Society of Cardiothoracic Surgeons. He was elected to the Council of the College in 1986. He was awarded a fellowship in 1989 and the Bruce medal of the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh. He succeeded his father to the baronetcy in 1980. Keith was a man of great personal charm, with a high sense of duty, fortified by a solid faith. He was perhaps at his happiest whilst fishing, be it on a Highland salmon river or on the Test. He was also a keen sailor and woodworker, and a talented artist – painting took up much of his time once he had retired. Twice he had pictures accepted for the Royal Academy summer exhibition and, to his glee, sold them both. In 1956, he married Jacqueline Annella Clarke, a Middlesex Hospital nurse. They had four children – a son, Andrew Charles Paterson, an officer in the Royal Marines who succeeds him as third baronet, and three daughters (Susan Wendy, Janet Mary and Anne Townsend). There are eight grandchildren. In 2000, he underwent an operation by his old team to replace his aortic valve. Ironically, it was a procedure he had pioneered. He made an excellent recovery, but nearly a year later developed a dissecting aneursym of the aortic arch: this too was treated with initial success, but he died suddenly on 18 February 2003 in his old hospital.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000120
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Roy, Arthur Douglas (1925 - 2003)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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/372308372308
Occupation General surgeon
Details In the course of his career, Douglas Roy held appointments as a professor of surgery on three continents. He was born on 10 April 1925, the son of Arthur Roy and Edith Mary (née Brown). Educated at Paisley Grammar School, he went to Glasgow University to study medicine. After house appointments, he was joined the RAMC in 1948 for his National Service. From 1950 to 1954 he distinguished himself in registrar posts in Glasgow and Inverness. He then went south of the border, to become senior surgical registrar in Oxford and Aylesbury. Returning to Scotland in 1957, he became consultant surgeon, honorary lecturer and first assistant to Sir Charles Illingworth and subsequently to Sir Andrew Watt Kay in the department of surgery at the Western Infirmary, Glasgow. In 1968, he was appointed foundation professor at the newly opened faculty of medicine at the University of Nairobi. As well as running a busy department, promoting both undergraduate and postgraduate education, he flew with the flying doctor service, visiting remote areas of the country. In 1973, he became head of Queen’s University department of surgery in Belfast, where he remained for 12 years. Here he stimulated, encouraged and wisely delegated responsibilities in administrative, clinical and research fields. A fine technical surgeon and a dedicated trainer, he was widely respected for his work in gastro-intestinal, breast and endocrine surgery, as well as the management of trauma. He was Chairman of the surgical training committee of the Northern Ireland Council for Postgraduate Medical Education for 11 years. He was on the council of the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh from 1979 to 1985, as well as serving on many other committees and advisory bodies. In 1985, he moved to the Sultanate of Oman, where he was chief of surgical services to the Ministry of Health and professor of surgery at the Sultan Qaboos University for three years. In Oman Roy was instrumental in planning a surgical training programme in the newly opened university medical school. Roy published papers on gastro-enterology, endocrine surgery and also wrote a supplement on tropical medicine in *Lecture notes in surgery*. He retired to Honiton, Devon, where he was a non-executive director of a community health trust and President of the Devon and Exeter Medical Society from 1994 to 1995. He was able to enjoy sailing and gardening. He also took up gliding, sharing a glider with a local general practitioner. He went solo on his 65th birthday. He was married twice, first in 1954 to Monica Cecilia Mary Bowley, by whom he had three daughters, and secondly, in 1973, to Patricia Irene McColl. There are three grandchildren. He died from Parkinson’s disease on 21 July 2003.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000121
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Ruddick, Donald William Hugh (1916 - 1997)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Rue, Dame Elsie Rosemary (1928 - 2004)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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/372310372310
Occupation Civil servant Physician
Details As regional medical officer for Oxford Regional Health Authority Rosemary Rue pioneered part-time specialist medical training for women doctors. She was born in Essex on 14 June 1928, the daughter of Harry and Daisy Laurence. The family moved to London when she was five, and during the Blitz she was sent for safety to stay with relatives in Devon, where she contracted tuberculosis and peritonitis, an experience which determined her to be a doctor. She was educated at Sydenham High School and entered the all-women Royal Free Hospital. In 1950 she married Roger Rue, an instructor in the RAF and was told by the dean that she could not stay on at the medical school if she were married. She was however accepted at Oxford, but took the examinations of London University. Her first job was at a long-stay hospital on the outskirts of Oxford, but was sacked when it was revealed that she was married and had a newborn son. She moved into general practice in 1952, and there contracted poliomyelitis from a patient in 1954, the last person in Oxford to catch the illness. This left her with one useless leg, which made it impossible to carry a medical bag. For a time she taught in a girls' school. By 1955 she and her husband had separated and she went to live in Hertfordshire with her parents, whose GP needed a partner. This was a success, and she combined the practice with being medical officer to the RAF, Bovingdon. In 1960 she became assistant county medical officer for Hertfordshire and five years later assistant senior medical officer for the Oxford region, proceeding to become regional medical officer in 1973 and regional general manager in 1984. She oversaw the building of new hospitals in Swindon, Reading and Milton Keynes, designing basic modules that could be incorporated into every hospital, so obviating architects' fees. Her most important contribution however was to set up a part-time training scheme for women doctors who wanted to become specialists. She discovered 150 women doctors in the Oxford region who were insufficiently employed. She sought them out, interviewed them and found jobs for 50 within a few months, and went on to set up a scheme for training part-time married women. This was a great success and spread from Oxford all over the country, and it was with Rosemary's active help that our College set up the Women in Surgical Training scheme. In 1972 she became one of the founders of the Faculty of Community Health (now the Faculty of Public Health). She was a founding fellow of Green College, Oxford, a President of the BMA and was awarded the Jenner medal of the Royal Society of Health. Small, birdlike, with an intense interest in everything and everybody, she had great charm as well as a formidable intellect. She died of bowel cancer on 24 December 2004, leaving two sons.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000123
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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 Travers, Eric Horsley (1910 - 2006)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2007-06-08
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/372548372548
Occupation General surgeon
Details Eric Travers was a consultant surgeon to Sedgefield and Stockton and Thornaby hospitals. He was born on 7 June 1910 in Brantingham, Yorkshire, where his father John (‘Jack’) Francis Travers was a solicitor. His mother was Beatrice Mary Horsley. The eldest of three, he and his two younger sisters (Mary and Rachael) grew up to enjoy riding and shooting. He was educated at Repton, where he was found to be a talented mathematician and woodworker, enjoying carpentry for the rest of his life. On leaving school he spent a few months in his father’s office, but found the work uncongenial. He told his father: ‘I never want to look at another damned deed again’. So he went to Edinburgh to study medicine, and qualified in 1936. He was house surgeon at Derby Royal Infirmary. He had joined the Territorial Army as a gunner, but found his medical work interfered with his training sessions and transferred to the RAMC. In 1939 he married Beryl Newby, and was about to take up the position of demonstrator in anatomy in Cambridge when the war broke out and he was posted to France, from which he was safely evacuated. He took the opportunity to sit and pass the FRCS. He was then posted to Singapore when news came of its surrender, and his ship was re-routed to the Middle East. There he found himself in a field hospital in Basra, where he practised his small arms skills by going wild fowling, and in the evenings became a fine bridge player. He ended the war as commanding officer of his field hospital. While at this posting a single dose of penicillin was received and he was asked which patient should be given it. He answered, the patient most in need. His staff remonstrated – this patient was an Italian prisoner of war. Travers repeated his orders. He was demobilised in 1945 and then worked as a registrar at the Westminster Hospital under Sir Stanford Cade until 1948, when he was appointed consultant surgeon to Sedgefield, and Stockton and Thornaby hospitals, their first non-GP specialist, retaining this appointment when the National Health Service was set up. He was particularly interested in abdominal surgery. From time to time he acted as medical officer to Sedgefield and Stockton racecourses. Outwardly shy, mild and well-mannered, in hospital he demanded the highest standards for his patients. Outside medicine, he learned to sail dinghies with his eldest daughter Jane and son John, and helped his other daughter, Mary, with her pony. He also bought a small farm. He retired at the age of 60 to a neglected Elizabethan cottage in Surrey, where he and Beryl transformed the interior and recreated the garden. He died after a prolonged illness on 2 September 2006.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000362
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Walker-Brash, Robert Munro Thorburn (1920 - 2006)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2007-06-08
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000300-E000399
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372549372549
Occupation General surgeon
Details Munro Walker-Brash was a consultant general surgeon at Orpington and Sevenoaks hospitals. He was born in London on 15 November 1920, the second son of John Walker-Brash, a general practitioner, and his wife Gloria Lilian née Parker. He was educated privately at Colet Court in Hammersmith and Cliveden Place School, Eaton Square, and then entered Westminster as a King’s scholar, remaining there from 1934 until 1939. He was a chorister for Royal events in Westminster Abbey, including the coronation of King George VI. From Westminster he went up to Christ Church, Oxford, and on to St Bartholomew’s for his clinical training in 1942, spending part of his time in Smithfield during the Blitz, and part at Hill End Hospital, a former mental hospital to which Bart’s students were evacuated. After qualifying, he was house surgeon to Sir James Paterson Ross and John Hosford, by whom he was greatly influenced. He did his National Service in the RAMC, rising to the rank of major, and returned to Bart’s to be junior registrar to Basil Hume. After six months at Great Ormond Street he returned to the surgical unit at Bart’s under Sir James Paterson Ross, and then went to Norwich as registrar to Charles Noon and Norman Townsley, and the Jenny Lind Hospital for Sick Children. He returned to Bart’s in 1954 as chief assistant to Rupert Corbett and Alec Badenoch, progressing after one year to senior registrar on the ‘Green’ firm. He was noted for his dexterity, clinical judgment and teaching ability. At this time senior registrars continued their training in Bart’s sector hospitals, in Munro’s case this was at Southend General Hospital, where he worked with Rodney Maingot, who was also at the Royal Free Hospital, and Donald Barlow, who also worked at the Luton and Dunstable and London Chest hospitals. In spite of spending so much time on the road, both were prolific writers and had thriving private practices. During this period Munro was much influenced by his namesake Andrew Munro, who later moved to the Royal Postgraduate Medical School. Munro’s definitive consultant posts were at Orpington and Sevenoaks hospitals, from 1960 until his retirement in 1984. He used his extremely wide general surgical training and admitted that ‘he was overworked at two peripheral hospitals’. Surgical Tutor at these hospitals for five years from 1970, he said he wrote ‘nothing of importance’. Despite his sizeable frame, his main hobby was riding: he was a show-jumping judge and an early supporter and helper of Riding for the Disabled. He married Eva Frances Jacqueline Waite, a Bart’s nurse in 1945. They had two children, Angela, who became a personal assistant in the legal department at Scotland Yard, and Robert, who emigrated to Auckland, New Zealand, to work as an insolvency accountant. Munro’s wife was diabetic and predeceased her husband, dying in 1985. Following her death, he was befriended by Pauline Smeed. Munro had a fall in May 2006 and died in hospital on 15 September 2006.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000363
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Scales, John Tracey (1920 - 2004)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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/372312372312
Occupation Orthopaedic surgeon
Details John Tracey Scales was a distinguished professor of biomechanical engineering at the Institute of Orthopaedics, University of London, who pioneered the use of biologically inert plastic materials in orthopaedic surgery. He was born an only child, in Colchester, on 2 July 1920. His family later moved to Stanmore, and he was educated a Haberdasher’s Aske’s School. He then went on to King’s College, London, before proceeding to Charing Cross Hospital for his clinical studies. He held junior appointments at Charing Cross Hospital and the Royal National Orthopaedic Hospital, before spending two years in the National Service as a captain in the RAMC. He then held further junior posts in London. He managed to convince H J Seddon, director of the Institute of Orthopaedics, of the need to develop biologically inert plastic for use in orthopaedic surgery, and a department of plastics was established under his direction. In November 1954 a knee prothesis made of stainless steel and acrylic polymer was successfully used to replace the diseased joint of a 20-year-old woman, the first operation of its kind in the world. Scales went on to develop the first Stanmore total hip replacement, made in collaboration with J N Wilson. With Alan Lettin he developed replacements for the knee, elbow and shoulder. In 1974 the department became the first university department of biomedical engineering in Britain, with Scales as its first professor. He also developed porous wound dressings, and created a low air loss mattress for use in the treatment of severe burns and severe pressure sores. This work led to his appointment as honorary director of research at the RAFT Institute for Plastic Surgery at Mount Vernon Hospital, Northwood. He continued his research work at the RAFT Institute after his retirement. From 1997 to 1998 he was a visiting professor at Cranfield University. Scales contributed 175 articles to professional journals and books. He was a member of various committees and professional bodies, including the European Society of Biomechanics and the Society for Tissue Viability. In 1986 he was awarded the OBE for his work, and was made a freeman of the City of London in 1995. He died in a nursing home on 30 January 2004. His wife died in 1992. They had two daughters. He is survived by his daughters and his partner, Phyllis Hampson.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000125
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Shaw, Hugh Michael (1919 - 2003)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-10-19 2007-08-02
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000100-E000199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372313372313
Occupation Orthopaedic surgeon
Details Hugh Michael Shaw was a consultant orthopaedic surgeon at Prince Henry Hospital, Melbourne. He was born on 18 January 1919, in London, the son of Charles Gordon Shaw, a consultant surgeon who had commanded the First Australian Field Ambulance in the First World War, was mentioned in despatches and had won the DSO. His mother was Rachel née Champion. Michael was educated at Geelong Grammar School, and then at Melbourne University, where he graduated with first class honours in surgery in 1943. He was a junior resident and then a registrar at Royal Melbourne Hospital, Victoria, from 1943 to 1945. He then enlisted, becoming a Captain in the Australian Army Medical Corps 23rd Training Battalion, based in Greta, New South Wales, and then in the 111th Australian General Hospital, Tasmania, and the 115th Australian General Hospital, based at Heidelberg, Victoria. He left the Army in January 1947. From 1947 to 1950 he was a surgical resident at Heidelberg Repatriation Hospital. He was then appointed as an associate surgeon at the Royal Melbourne Hospital, a post he held for two years. In 1953 he travelled to the UK, where he was a surgical registrar at Essex County Hospital, Colchester. On his return to Australia in 1954 he was appointed to the staff of Prince Henry Hospital, Melbourne, as a consultant orthopaedic surgeon. He retired in 1978. From 1954 to 1957 he was also a consultant for the Australian Department of Veteran’s Affairs. He enjoyed golf, carpentry, photography and music. He married Joan Fraser née Craigie. They had two children, Jennifer Joan and David Michael (who predeceased him). Hugh Michael Shaw died on 6 January 2003.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000126
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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/372466372466
Occupation General surgeon
Details Philip Henson qualified from St Bartholomew’s in 1939 and after junior posts became surgical registrar at New Cross Hospital, Wolverhampton, and senior registrar at the East Glamorganshire Hospital, Ponthpridd. He was senior hospital medical officer in Accident and Emergency at the Manor Hospital, Nuneaton. He died at the age of 91 in April 2005.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000279
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-11-09
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000200-E000299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372467372467
Occupation General surgeon
Details Gerald Nevill was a consultant surgeon in Kenya. He was born on 22 December 1915 in Nurney, County Carlow, Ireland, the son of Alexander Colles Nevill, Archdeacon of the Church of Ireland, and Rosettah Fitzgerald, a teacher of modern languages and one of the first women to graduate from the University of Dublin. He was educated at Kilkenny College, where he gained a scholarship to Campbell College, Belfast. He subsequently won the McNeil medal for mathematics and played rugby for his school. He won an entrance sizarship to Dublin University, won first class honours in all his examinations, came first in the final examinations, was awarded the Hudson medal and scholarship, and played rugby for the university. After qualifying, he was house surgeon at the Adelaide Hospital, Dublin, Salford Royal Hospital, St Mary’s Hospital, Portsmouth, and the Royal Children’s Hospital, Brighton. From 1940 to 1944 he served with the East African Forces. He went to London to do the Guy’s FRCS course and, having passed the FRCS, returned to Kenya as the successor to Roland Burkitt in Nairobi. He was appointed honorary consultant surgeon to the Native Civil Hospital, later the King George VI Hospital, and subsequently the Kenyatta National Hospital in Nairobi. He held honorary lecturer appointments at the Makerere University Hospital, Kampala, and the University of Nairobi Medical School, and was on the organising committee of the new medical school. He published many articles on general surgical topics in the *East African Medical Journal* and was a foundation member and later president of the Association of Surgeons of East Africa. Gerald Nevill married twice. His first wife was Hilda Francis Lurring, a school teacher, by whom he had three sons, one of whom became a doctor. His second marriage was to Mary Evelyn Furnivall née Brown. He continued on the rugby field for many years as a referee and was chairman of the Kenya Referees Society from 1965 to 1980. He was a keen fisherman and freemason. He died on 23 January 2003.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000280
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Banner, John Maurice ( - 1863)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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/372934372934
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born in Liverpool, the third son of J H Barendt. Educated at Liverpool College and St Petri School, Danzig. Received his medical training at the University of Liverpool, where he had a distinguished career, gaining honours in materia medica in the 1st MB, 1888, and the Roger Lyon Jones Scholarship in Pathology, a subject which interested him. After qualification he travelled in France, Germany, and Austria, studying under Hebra, Kaposi, Neumann, Max Joseph, and Lassar. Returning to Liverpool he became House Physician in the Royal Infirmary, Senior Medical Officer to the Bootle Borough Hospital, and Assistant Medical Officer to the Rainhill Mental Hospital. Specializing in dermatology, he was appointed Hon Surgeon to St George’s Hospital for Diseases of the Skin at Liverpool, and Physician to the Department of Diseases of the Skin at the Royal Southern Hospital, posts which he held to the end of his life. He won great distinction as a syphilologist, was one of the first practitioners in Liverpool to make use of intravenous injections of arsenical compounds, and was appointed to the charge of the special clinic for venereal disease at Bangor Infirmary. An admirable linguist, Barendt spoke French, German, and Russian, and often acted as a translator of foreign classics for the New Sydenham Society. He took an active part in medical societies and medical journalism, and was in turn Librarian, Editor of the Journal, and Vice-President of the Liverpool Medical Institution. He was also a strong supporter of the Medical and Literary Society. In his contributions he was minutely thorough and accurate, his German strain thus becoming apparent. His biographer says: “So German was he in what old writers would have called his genius, that he was apt to miss the wood for the trees”. He married a daughter of Dr Crowe, of Liverpool, by whom he had three sons and two daughters. One of his sons was studying medicine in 1926. He died suddenly at his residence, 65 Rodney Street, Liverpool, on Oct 28th, 1926. His publications, which were numerous, are mostly on dermatological subjects.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000751
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Belsey, Ronald Herbert Robert (1910 - 2007)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2008-02-07 2009-01-16
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/372631372631
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Ronnie Belsey was a consultant thoracic surgeon, known worldwide for his innovative techniques in oesophageal surgery. He was born on 2 April 1910 in London, the son of Herbert Robert Belsey, a dental surgeon, and Marie Martha Annie née Moller. He was educated at Woodbridge School, Suffolk. There he excelled, not only in his studies but also in a variety of sports, and was made head prefect in 1926. From Woodbridge he won an entrance scholarship to St Thomas’ Hospital where, in addition to medical studies, he played rugby and ice hockey. Among his memories of this period he recounted the two London hospitals cup finals against St Mary’s, both of which Tommy’s won. After qualifying with the conjoint diploma in 1934, he went on to sit the London MB BS examination, winning the coveted Beaney prize for surgery (with honours). During his training he was house surgeon on the surgical unit to Max Page, Hugo Romanis and Norman (Pasty) Barrett. In later years he could concede that Barrett had a major influence in moulding his interests in oesophageal surgery. In 1936 he moved to the Brompton Hospital as a resident surgical officer, working with the doyens of thoracic surgery - Tudor Edwards, J E H Roberts and Clement Price Thomas, not to mention the up and coming Russell Claude Brock. With Roberts he was closely involved in developing extrapleural pneumonolysis and artificial pneumothorax in the treatment of pulmonary tuberculosis. At the same time Brock was breaking new ground in our College in defining the anatomy of the bronchial tree. These influences by the giants of thoracic surgery kindled in Belsey a lasting interest in that field. In 1937 he was awarded the Dorothy Temple Cross scholarship, which enabled him to go to the USA as a research fellow at the Harvard Medical School, acting as clinical assistant to Edward (Pete) Churchill. The outcome of this collaboration was the outstanding contribution which they jointly made to pulmonary surgery: ‘Segmental pneumonectomy in bronchiectasis’ (*Annals of Surgery*, Vol.109, 1939, No.4, pp.481-499). He rounded this year off with a paper presented in Atlanta to the American Association of Thoracic Surgeons on extrapleural pneumothorax. On returning to England, he was appointed as a resident assistant surgeon at St Thomas’ Hospital, in time to witness the outbreak of the Second World War. With the evacuation of the medical school to locations outside London, Belsey was left with a skeleton surgical staff to cope with war casualties, an experience he cherished. In 1941 he was sent down to the West Country to establish a thoracic surgical service for the south west region. Having initially worked at a tuberculosis sanatorium in Kew Stoke, outside Weston-super-Mare, in 1944 he moved to Frenchay Hospital, which until then had been a Nissen-hutted evacuation hospital run by the US Army Medical Corps for war casualties. Here he established the south west regional thoracic centre, training surgeons to man units in Tehidi (for Cornwall and south Devon) and Bovey Tracey (for north Devon). From the outset he worked on the principle (to put it in his own words): “you cannot make friends and at the same time get things done”. True to his word, he went ahead and made several enemies. The result was an excellent thoracic surgical centre manned by two consultants, well known all over the world, training surgeons who went on to lead some of the best centres in Europe and North America. He received a constant stream of trainees from the USA and Canada, initially from the Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, and later from the Johns Hopkins Hospital, Baltimore. In reciprocation he made a visit each year to the USA to attend the annual meeting of the American Association of Thoracic Surgeons. It was on one such visit in 1966 that he delivered the honoured guest lecture to that association on the surgical treatment of functional diseases of the oesophagus, which to this day remains the authoritative paper on the subject. He will however be remembered for the Mark IV operation for control of gastro-oesophageal reflux. His interest in hiatal herniation was initiated during the year he spent in Boston, when Harrington presented his paper on the anatomical repair of hiatus hernia. Whilst working in Frenchay, Belsey made several attempts at a physiological repair constructing an anti-reflux valve mechanism. Having designated these attempts as Marks I to III, he came to the conclusion that a 270 degree partial inversion wrap produced the best result. This he called the Mark IV repair, the description and results of which were only communicated to the surgical world, not by himself but by his senior registrar, after a ten year follow-up of his patients. In the early fifties, with declining tuberculosis and bronchiectasis, and an increasing potential for cardiac surgery, the regional thoracic centre became the regional cardio-thoracic centre. Closed heart surgery flourished and with the advent of open heart surgery ‘the B’ (as Belsey came to be known) was invited to move the open-heart unit to the Bristol Royal Infirmary. Like the true researcher that he was, he set off to study cardiopulmonary bypass on animals at the Bristol University Veterinary School in Langford. He then took himself off to join his friend Charles Drew at the Westminster Hospital to learn the technique of profound hypothermia using quadruple cannulation. He returned to set up the cardiac unit at the Infirmary, devoting his time to the Children’s Hospital, Bristol Royal Infirmary and Frenchay. Despite his commitment to paediatric cardiac surgery, his main interest was in congenital tracheo-oesophageal fistula, atresia and other non-cardiac conditions in the newborn. He was a pioneer in the use of the left hemicolon in oesophageal replacement surgery and a firm believer in the place of stainless steel wire sutures in thoracic surgery, a conclusion arrived at in the tuberculosis era. Belsey was a meticulous technical surgeon, handling tissues with the utmost gentleness, and working with dexterity and complete economy of hand movement. “Doctor, remember you are dealing with human flesh, handle it with care, not macerate it,” he would tell his assistant if the latter was caught manhandling the organs. Even when confronted with a complex situation in the operating room ‘the B’ was in total command, and his assistants knew that he was. In 1973 he was awarded the Colles medal by the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland, and a year later the Sir Clement Price Thomas medal of our College. In 1983 he delivered the Tudor Edwards memorial lecture under the auspices of our College. He also collected medals from the universities of Leiden and Padua for services to thoracic surgery. Belsey retired from the National Health Service in 1975 and in the following year was invited to join the department of surgery at the University of Chicago, where he spent six months of each year participating in teaching postgraduates until 1988. He published extensively and co-edited a book on *Gastroesophageal reflux and hiatal hernia* (Little Brown, 1972) and in 1988 (with David Skinner) the monumental textbook *Management of esophageal disease* (Philadelphia, Saunders). He travelled worldwide, and held visiting professorships in several universities in Europe and America. He took great delight in spending short sojurns in Cairo, operating on children with corrosive strictures of the gullet. He was awarded honorary memberships and fellowships of several surgical societies both in Europe and America. He was an early member of Brown’s Club and a founder-member of the Esophageal Club in the United States. He was a past president of the Society of Cardiovascular and Thoracic Surgeons of Great Britain and Ireland. In 1996 during the presidency of the European Association for Cardio-Thoracic Surgery of his last registrar in Bristol, he was made an honorary member, the citation being presented by his last senior registrar and successor at Frenchay. Early in his surgical career, Belsey started planning for his retirement. He was an excellent shot, an aptitude he attributed to the genes he acquired from his father who had won several prizes at Bisley. He was a member of the Bristol Gun Club and was a collector both of long and short firearms. He was a keen fly fisherman and belonged to the Frenchay Fly Fishing Club, which met regularly on the Usk in Monmouthshire. When time permitted he would disappear into the depths of the Devon countryside with a local group of fly fishermen, delicately designing his own flies, and fishing on the Dart. In 1969 he acquired Combestone, an old farmhouse with a stretch of the river below Dartmeet. This was the family weekend retreat. Belsey married Pauline May Tilbury in October 1941, a graduate of the Florence Nightingale School of Nursing at St Thomas’. Pauline, who loved the farm and nursed many a delicate and feeble lamb into healthy adulthood, died in 2000. They had three daughters, one of whom, Gay, died in infancy. Annabelle trained as a nurse at St Thomas’, where she became a theatre sister and is married to an anaesthetist, Stuart Ingram: they have two sons. Gillian followed her father into medicine, became a senior partner in a general practice in north Devon and predeceased Ronald in 2002. With increasing inability to walk down to his beloved Dart, Belsey took to carving handles for walking sticks out of wood and bone, which he would give away to friends and visitors. Despite his reluctance to move out of his farmhouse, and the dedicated support of his nursing carer, Dorothy Steele, it became clear that a remote dwelling on Dartmoor was not the best place for a 94 year old. In March 2004 he agreed to move to a nursing home in Denbury, near Newton Abbot, where he remained with excellent mental facilities, able to converse intelligently until his last days. Ronald Belsey died on 22 May 2007. His funeral service at the church of St Mary the Virgin, Holne, was attended by members of his family, fishing and local friends, and several of his medical and surgical colleagues and former trainees, who later retired next door to the Church House Inn, a popular old haunt of his.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000447
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Maguire, William Brian (1925 - 2007)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2008-02-21
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000400-E000499
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372633372633
Occupation General surgeon
Details Received his professional training at St George’s Hospital. He practised at Salisbury, where he was Surgeon to the Infirmary from 1804-1847. He died at Salisbury on April 6th, 1848. Another Henry Coates seems to have been entered as six-months’ pupil to Benjamin Brodie at St George’s in August, 1830, and to have become MRCS in 1833 and LSA in 1834. Mr R R James, FRCS, Dean of St George’s, believes this Henry Coates to have been FRCS, 1844.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000449
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
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First Title value, for Searching Brown, John Andrew Carron (1925 - 2008)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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 Anikwe, Raymond Maduchem (1935 - 2008)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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 Davis, Neville Coleman (1924 - 2008)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by John Blandy
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/372737372737
Occupation General surgeon
Details Neville Coleman Davis was a leading surgeon in Queensland. He was born in Newcastle, New South Wales, on 30 January 1924, the son of Clyde Davis, a medical practitioner, and Vera née Phillips. He was educated at Sydney Grammar School and the University of Sydney, qualifying in 1945. He completed house posts at the Royal Prince Alfred Hospital, Sydney, and the Royal Hobart Hospital in Tasmania, before going to England in 1949 as a senior house officer at the City General Hospital in Sheffield. After passing the FRCS, he went on to Sheffield Royal Infirmary for two years and then served in the Royal Australian Army Medical Corps as a lieutenant colonel in Korea, where he commanded the British Commonwealth General Hospital in Japan from 1951 to 1952. He returned to Australia as surgical supervisor and part-time lecturer in clinical surgery at Brisbane General Hospital. In 1957 he was appointed visiting surgeon at Princess Alexandra Hospital. He was co-ordinator of postgraduate surgical education from 1980 to 1986 and was visiting surgeon at the Wesley Breast Clinic from 1982. A truly general surgeon, his main interest was in colorectal surgery, but he was one of the founders and later chairman of the Queensland Melanoma Project. He served in Vietnam as surgical specialist to No 1 Australian Field Hospital in 1969 and was honorary colonel of the RAAMC 1st Military District from 1987 to 1991. At the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons, he was a member of council from 1975 to 1979, honorary librarian and a member of the board of general surgery until 1982, and chairman of the section of colorectal surgery. Many public offices came to him including membership of the council of the Queensland Institute of Medical Research and of the medical and scientific committee of Queensland Cancer Fund. He was a member of the council of the Australian Medical Association and was made a fellow in 1979. He served on the National Health and Medical Research Council, the Menzies Foundation of Queensland, and was president of the Queensland Gastroenterological Society. Among his many awards was a Churchill fellowship in 1968, the Henry Simpson Newland medal in 1958, the Justin Fleming medal in 1977 and the John Loewenthal clinical medal in 1978. He was a member of the James IV Association of Surgeons, was the Bancroft orator of the American Medical Association in 1979, gained the Hugh Devine medal of the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons in 1988, and was an honorary member of the American Society of Colon and Rectal Surgeons and of the Colorectal Society of Australasia. Neville married Lois Tindale, a medical practitioner, in 1954. They had two daughters (Prudence and Catherine) and a son (Roger). He died on 6 March 2008.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000554
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Brun, Claude (1917 - 2007)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2008-09-11 2009-01-16
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/372738372738
Occupation General surgeon
Details Claude Brun was a consultant surgeon in Blackburn. He was born on 23 August 1917 in Mauritius. His father, René Brun, was a bank clerk in Port Louis who was descended from a captain in the Napoleonic navy. His mother, Jeanne Brun, was also of French descent. Claude was the eldest of six children. His early schooldays were with the Loreto nuns in a boarding school in St Pierre (which he hated). He was then educated at the Royal College in Curepipe. At the age of 17 he won a British Government scholarship which took him to England in 1934, where he was sponsored by Sir Percy Ezekiel. Having had a classical education, he had to study the necessary basic sciences before going to the London Hospital in October 1936 to study medicine. At the outbreak of the Second World War as a student he was sent to Poplar, Mile End and Highwood hospitals during the Blitz. After qualifying, he did house appointments at the Northern Fever Hospital and King George V Hospital, Ilford, before joining the RAMC in 1942. He was posted to Drymen on Loch Lomond, where he met a nurse named Barbara Limpitlaw, who later became his wife. He spent most of the war on a hospital ship in the Mediterranean. On demobilisation he returned to the London Hospital as a supernumerary registrar in the accident and emergency department and completed registrar posts at King George’s Hospital, Ilford, and then specialised in orthopaedics. For ten years he worked under John Charnley at the Salford Royal Hospital, during which time he passed the MS. He returned to Mauritius in 1957 as a surgeon in the Colonial Medical Health Service, where he developed an interest in anthropology and wrote Les Ancêtres de l’homme (Port Louis, 1964). He returned to England as a consultant surgeon in Blackburn in 1965, where he worked until his retirement in 1982. There he set up a mobile breast screening service, before the advent of mammography. He had many hobbies. In retirement he continued to paint and held several exhibitions, and read widely in the classics. At the age of 88 he taught himself Spanish. He was a keen bookbinder, botanist, woodworker and numismatist. He died peacefully in his sleep on 25 May 2007 leaving his widow, two daughters (Anne and Pauline), a son, Robert, who also became a doctor, and nine grandchildren.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000555
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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/372226372226
Occupation Oral surgeon
Details Frank Robert Coffin was an oral surgeon in London. He was born in Wandsworth, London, on 21 September 1915, the son of a printer. After qualifying at the Royal Dental Hospital in 1938, he completed house jobs at Leicester Square and at the Middlesex (then the only resident dental post in the country). During the war he organised the emergency oral surgery service in London. In 1941, he joined the RAF, where he gained experience of maxillofacial injury in the UK and abroad. After the war, he became a medical student at the Middlesex Hospital and completed an ENT house job there in 1949. He was appointed as a consultant at the Royal Marsden Hospital, where he became interested in head and neck oncology, and was subsequently appointed to the staff of the Royal Dental Hospital and St George’s, Tooting. He was a recognised teacher for the University of London, the Royal Dental Hospital, St Bartholomew’s and the Institute of Cancer Research, London. He was particularly interested in pharmacology and lectured on the subject at the Royal Dental Hospital during the fifties and sixties. He gave many lectures abroad, in Denmark, Holland, Spain, Portugal, Asia and North and South America. He served on many consultants’ committees, and was also President of the hospitals group of the British Dental Association in 1977, and was, for a time, honorary treasurer and Chairman of the Dentists’ Provident Society. A true workaholic, he gave a full commitment to his many NHS hospitals, but still found time to enjoy skiing, sailing, travelling, and furniture and clock restoration. He was also an enthusiastic gardener. He remained unmarried. He died from cardiac failure on 13 January 2004.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000039
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Hill, Ian Macdonald (1919 - 2007)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2008-09-11 2008-10-24
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/372741372741
Occupation Cardiothoracic surgeon
Details Ian Hill was a consultant cardiothoracic surgeon at St Bartholomew’s Hospital, London. He was born on 8 June 1919. When he was only five he developed diphtheria and was admitted to an isolation hospital for many weeks. There he was allowed no visits from his family and witnessed at close quarters the frequently unsuccessful attempts of surgeons to save the lives of other children with that terrible disease. This dreadful experience gave him the emotional drive to overcome disease and save lives, although later he maintained that he went into medicine because it was his father Tom’s own unfulfilled wish: indeed their house in Palmers Green was chosen to be near the railway that would eventually take him to Bart’s. His mother Annie was a gifted teacher and helped him with his homework, passing on to him the skills of patient and supportive clarity he used in his own teaching. He was educated at the Stationers’ Company School and St Bartholomew’s Hospital, where he had a brilliant career as a student, qualifying with honours in 1942. He was house surgeon to (later Sir) James Paterson Ross, whose testimonial stated “his academic record has been one of rapid and uninterrupted success, winning most for the prizes for which he was eligible. He is honourable, forthright, diligent and utterly trustworthy. He absorbs knowledge readily and applies theory to practice with good judgement and effect. He is a skilful, safe, and resourceful operator who can win the confidence of his patients, his colleagues and his students”. After serving as a demonstrator of anatomy he married Agnes Paice in 1944, having met her when both their hospitals had been evacuated. He joined the RAF medical branch in 1945 and was wing commander in command of the surgical division of No 1 RAF Hospital. He then specialized in cardiothoracic surgery, becoming senior registrar to Russell Brock at Guy’s Hospital in 1947, where he carried out experimental work on cardiopulmonary bypass and became surgical chief assistant at the Brompton Hospital. He returned to St Bartholomew’s as consultant surgeon in 1950 at the early age of 31, as second in command to Oswald Tubbs, where he continued to build up its cardiothoracic unit. He was a skilled operator who had ‘green fingers’. He was often described by his junior staff as a one-man band, for, apart from his operative ability he typed his own operation notes and wrote summaries of the patient after each operation. Surprisingly these records were never analysed and sadly they were destroyed after his death: they would have made a fascinating contribution to cardiothoracic archive material. He cared deeply about the training of his young doctors and for eight years served as sub-dean of the medical college (from 1964 to 1972). He was prodigiously well organised, kept meticulous records and was obsessed by time. He was both scrupulously logical and persistent in trying to solve problems. For several years he owned a vintage Rolls Royce car, which he maintained himself, having taken a course on its maintenance. When his junior staff telephoned his home for advice they were frequently told by his wife “I’ll get him from under his car!” Ian’s 40 years as a consultant surgeon were a period of explosive development in cardiothoracic surgery, but despite his brilliant mind and ability he wrote very little, and he made no definitive contribution to his specialty. He had a poor relationship with Oswald Tubbs, his senior consultant, who was disappointed in his subsequent career and thought that he had not fulfilled the potential implied in Ross’s glowing testimonial. He was a cutting surgeon rather than a writing surgeon and was, as many have said, an enigma. After he retired he continued to serve on the board of governors of St Bartholomew’s. Ian retired with Agnes to Fernham in 1984, where he lived the life he had always dreamed of in the countryside, creating his garden, running a prodigiously productive allotment, and indulging his fascination for fine engineering, old clocks, the fine arts, good food and wine. He upset his allotment neighbours by giving away much of his produce in competition to the many who sold for profit. Despite being an agnostic, he served as clerk to the parish council. Predeceased by his wife, he died on 22 September 2007 leaving three sons and a daughter, Alison, who is a general practitioner in London.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000558
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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
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First Title value, for Searching Denny, William Roy (1921 - 2008)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Wilson, John Samuel Pattison (1923 - 2006)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
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/372744372744
Occupation Plastic surgeon Plastic and reconstructive surgeon
Details John Samuel Pattison Wilson, or ‘Iain’, as he was generally known, was a plastic surgeon in London with a particular interest in head and neck surgery. He was born in Edinburgh on 16 October 1923, and at the age of six went away to boarding school at the Edinburgh Academy. He remained in Edinburgh to study medicine. Following his graduation, he spent his National Service in the RAF and rose to the rank of squadron leader. Whilst working at Halton he met Sir Archibald McIndoe, who persuaded him to train as a plastic surgeon. On demobilization, he completed registrar appointments in Leeds and Sheffield. He worked with Fenton Braithwaite and quite early in his training (1956) wrote papers, starting with the serial excision of benign lesions. His first consultant appointment was as a plastic surgeon in Newcastle, where he was famous for his hard work, his parties and his Jaguar car. After some years in Newcastle, he moved to St George’s Hospital, London, and Queen Mary’s, Roehampton, with honorary appointments at the Westminster and Royal Marsden hospitals. Although a general reconstructive surgeon, he had a special interest in head and neck surgery and will be remembered for his extensive repairs following major cancer resections, while the template he designed for breast reconstruction is still in common use. He was a great teacher and taught anybody who wanted to learn, not only those in this own specialty. His weekly seminars on a Thursday evening at his consulting rooms in Portland Place were of great benefit to surgical trainees, particularly those based in London. Among his many papers were those on the embryology and manifestations of the human tail. He was an examiner and was awarded honorary fellowships of various Colleges; he was an Apothecary and Freeman of the City of London. He travelled and talked all over the world, but, as a result of his experiences in the Far East and in the Japanese prisoner of war ward at Queen Mary’s Hospital, Roehampton, he refused to visit Japan or have anything to do with Japanese trainees. He was a man of great energy, yet was a very private man. Few knew about the model train set with a mock-up of Paddington station in the attic at Portland Place, or that he was a world expert on the philately of Canada. He was a kind colleague, giving good advice. He was always interested in trainees, especially what they were doing, who was teaching them and what they were writing. The last months of his life were borne with great fortitude, dignity and good humour as he battled cancer. He died on 27 September 2006.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000561
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Islam, Mohammed Shamsul (1937 - 2005)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2008-10-17
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/372745372745
Occupation General practitioner
Details Mohammed Shamsul Islam was born in Tangail, East Bengal, the former training station for ICS officers, on 7 June 1937. He qualified in Dacca and then went to England to specialise in surgery. Sadly, the college has no more information about his subsequent career until he settled down in general practice in Cheshire. He died on 24 February 2005.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000562
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Carr, William (1814 - 1877)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2010-02-11
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000800-E000899
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373036373036
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born at Leeds in 1814, became a pupil of Mr Needham, and studied at the York School of Medicine and at University College Hospital. He became assistant to Henry Barnett, of Blackheath, and afterwards joined him in partnership until his death in 1873. He then developed an extensive practice at the head of the firm Carr, Miller, and Carr. When Prince Arthur, afterwards Duke of Connaught, was residing at the Ranger’s House, Blackheath, Carr became his medical attendant. In 1867 the Prince was attacked by small-pox, and after Drs Sieveking and Munk ceased attendance Carr remained in charge. The vesicles were painted with collodion, no pitting followed. The Queen sent an autograph letter of thanks for his kindness and attention to her son, and he continued in attendance until the Duke left the neighbourhood. Carr was a staunch friend and supporter of the Royal Benevolent College at Epsom and collected a large sum to found scholarships. In 1865, on the exposure of the state of the Metropolitan Workhouse Infirmaries following the death of Gibson and Daly, Farnall, the inspector of the Poor Law Board, who conducted the inquiry, appointed Carr as his medical assessor. Shortly afterwards he was associated with Anstie and others on the *Lancet* commission for inquiry into the state of the Infirmaries. He was a keen volunteer in the early days; the first meeting to inaugurate the 3rd Kent Rifles was held at his house. He was Surgeon up to the time of his death of the 1st Battalion Kent Rifles (Volunteers) and attended Battalion Field Days. He was Surgeon to the Royal Kent Dispensary and to the Metropolitan Police. He was also an ardent gardener and President of the Horticultural Society. He died at his residence, Lee Grove, Blackheath, on March 22nd, 1877.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000853
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Bell, David Millar (1920 - 2006)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2007-07-25
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/372552372552
Occupation General surgeon
Details David Bell was a surgeon at Belfast City Hospital. The son of William George Thompson Bell, a farmer and mill-owner from Cookstown, Northern Ireland, and Emma Jane Bell, he was born on 20 June 1920. A great uncle, cousin and brother were all doctors. From the Rainey Endowed School he went to Queen’s University, Belfast, in 1939, qualifying in 1945. He completed his surgical training at St Bartholomew’s Hospital, Rochester, Guy’s and the Royal Victoria Hospital, Belfast. He spent the year 1956 to 1957 at the University of Illinois Research and Educational Hospital, Chicago, under Warren Cole. On his return he was appointed consultant surgeon to Belfast City Hospital. There he was involved in the modernisation of the old infirmary, insisting on setting up the casualty department and the intensive care unit. He was an active member of the Moynihan Club and was a former president. In 1956 he married Sheila Bell, a consultant anaesthetist. They had three daughters (Rosemary Margaret, Kathryn Ellison and Gillian Cecily) and a son (David William). A keen horseman, David Bell hunted with the North Down Harriers. He died suddenly at home on 24 September 2006.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000366
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Blumberg, Louis (1920 - 2006)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2007-07-25
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/372553372553
Occupation General surgeon
Details Louis Blumberg was a consultant surgeon in Cape Town and a respected medical historian. He was born in 1920 and educated in Cape Town, where he graduated in 1944. He went to England to specialise in surgery, passed the FRCS, and returned to South Africa, developing a private practice in Cape Town and becoming a consultant surgeon and senior lecturer at Groote Schuur and Somerset hospitals, as well as a part-time lecturer in the department of anatomy at the University of Cape Town. He subsequently became an associate professor at the Medical University of Southern Africa and principal surgeon at Ga Rankuwa Hospital. He wrote on a number of general surgical topics, including vascular surgery, the anterior tibial syndrome and traumatic pancreatitis, and produced a popular textbook for students *Introductory tutorials in clinical surgery* (Cape Town, Juta and Co., 1986). In the field of medical history he wrote on the war wounds in Homer’s *Iliad* and the diaries of J B S Greathead. He retired in 1994 to Pretoria, where he continued to pursue his interest in medical history. Towards the end of his life he developed Parkinson’s disease, and died in 2006, leaving his widow Hinda.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000367
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Brock, Bevis Henry (1922 - 2005)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2007-07-25
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/372554372554
Occupation Orthopaedic surgeon
Details Bevis Brock was a consultant orthopaedic surgeon in Salisbury. He was born in Cambridge in 1922, the son of H M Brock, a well-known cartoonist and illustrator. Bevis attended the Perse School in Cambridge and subsequently Cambridge University, before undertaking his clinical training at King’s College Hospital. After military service in the RAMC he returned to King’s as a registrar, first in general surgery and then in orthopaedics. After completing his orthopaedic training as a senior registrar at Guy’s Hospital, Bevis was appointed consultant orthopaedic surgeon to the Salisbury group of hospitals in 1961. He was a highly respected orthopaedic surgeon and a wise and thoughtful doctor. He married Margaret, the superintendent physiotherapist at King’s. In 1947 their son Christopher was born. During her pregnancy Margaret developed rubella, but declined termination. Sadly, Christopher was born deaf, dumb and blind. Margaret and Bevis later founded the Rubella Group (for which she was awarded an OBE). This developed into the charity Sense. A daughter, Elizabeth, was born in 1950, but after qualifying as a physiotherapist she died from multiple sclerosis in her early forties. Following his wife’s death in the early 1990s, Bevis married Mary, a long-serving sister in the Salisbury hospitals and the daughter of a local GP. She also predeceased him. He died on 7 November 2005.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000368
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Evans, Ivan Tom Gwenogfryn (1938 - 2006)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2007-07-25 2009-01-16
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/372555372555
Occupation ENT surgeon
Details Ivan Tom Gwenogfryn Evans, known to colleagues, friends and patients as ‘Og’, was a consultant surgeon in Newport, Gwent. He was born in London on 11 November 1938, in a house between Battersea Power Station and the Dogs Home. His parents Evan Evans and Margaret née Jones were Welsh and kept a family general store. Like many other children living in the heart of the capital at the time of the Blitz, the infant Og was evacuated to an aunt in west Wales and when time and circumstances permitted after the war he was joined by his parents, who returned permanently to Wales to live near Newcastle Emlyn in Cardiganshire. He was educated at the local Aberbanc Primary School and Llandysul Grammar School, and then won a place at the Welsh National School of Medicine in Cardiff in 1957, where for a time he trained with Cardiff City Football Club. He did house officer posts in Cardiff, where he married his childhood sweetheart, Marion, who was a teacher in Cardiff. He trained in general surgery before selection for a training post in ENT in Cardiff. His mentors in ENT were Hector and Alun Thomas, and he especially enjoyed the variety of surgical skills in this specialty, whether it was the exacting microsurgery of the middle ear or the use of the knife in the head and neck. Also in Cardiff was Stephen Richards who had worked with Hal Schucknecht in Boston. He persuaded Og to take up a fellowship in Detroit in 1974 with Ted McGee, one of the doyens of ear surgery at that time. His appointment was to the Providence Hospital, Southfield, Michigan. This proved to be a very fulfilling professional experience for Og and a happy year for Og, Marion and their young son, Andrew. After a year they returned to Cardiff and Og was appointed consultant surgeon in Gwent with appointments at the Royal Gwent Hospital, Newport, Nevill Hall in Abergavenny, and Pontypool and District Hospital. At the Royal Gwent he established a first class otological service for the county of Gwent in collaboration with audiology colleagues Gavin Davies and Ann Thomas. Due to his wide training he was an all-round surgeon in his specialty and was as comfortable with delicate ear surgery as with the demands of major head and neck work. He was widely read and meticulously conscientious in his standards and care for patients, and he enjoyed teaching, so that he attracted trainees. He was appointed College surgical tutor for ENT in south Wales. His colleagues elected him chairman of the Gwent Medical Society and he served for several years with distinction as secretary to the Welsh Otolaryngological Society. He enjoyed family life with Marion, and especially their grandson Dylan, in their favourite location, Newport Pembrokeshire, where they had a second home. Og was passionately proud of his Welsh language and heritage. A practical man, he did all the do-it-yourself jobs around the house and, until the advent of electronics, serviced his cars himself. He had been a keen cricketer and continued to follow soccer. Og had a remarkable gift of communication with people and could speak as easily and kindly to a child as to an old person. He died in September 2006 from metastatic cancer of the pancreas that only revealed itself two months before his death.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000369
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Barton, Samuel (1790 - 1871)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Jonasson, Olga (1934 - 2006)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2007-07-25
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/372557372557
Occupation General surgeon
Details Olga Jonasson was professor of surgery at the University of Illinois at Chicago and a pioneer in organ transplantation. Born in Peoria, Illinois, the daughter of a Swedish Lutheran pastor and a nurse, she was first attracted to medicine by following her father round on his hospital visits. After Lyman Trumbull Elementary School and North Park Academy, she attended Northwestern University as an undergraduate, and won honours for her MD from the University of Illinois, a tough medical school whose practice included the notorious Cook County Hospital. She did her residency under Warren Cole at the Illinois Research and Education Hospital at a time when the department was devoted to the hunt for cancer cells in the venous blood draining cancers, many of those being actually monocytes. Exceptionally tall and blonde, she stood out from her fellow residents for her fearless and outspoken criticism of her peers and her seniors. After her residency Olga did a fellowship in immunochemistry at the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research, which was followed by a second fellowship in transplantation immunology at the Massachusetts General Hospital. In 1969 she did the first renal transplant in Illinois. She was one of the first to realise the importance of HLA (human leukocyte antigen) matching, setting up a nationwide matching scheme. In 1967 she became chairman of the department of surgery at Ohio State University College of Medicine, the first woman in the United States to become head of a department of surgery. She served as director of education and surgical services at the American College of Surgery from 1993 to 2004. Her interests were not limited to transplantation: she studied inguinal hernia, pointed out that watchful waiting was appropriate in many cases, and carried out clinical trials comparing open versus laparoscopic repair. She was also a determined advocate of helmets for motorcycle riders. Despite having a formidable reputation as an ‘ice queen’, she was highly regarded by her peers, and went out of her way to encourage young women to take up careers in surgery, although she warned them not to marry or, if married, to get divorced. However, this did not stop her from being a sympathetic friend to them and their spouses. She was involved in the Episcopal Church of the Epiphany, Chicago, raising huge sums of money to repair its fabric, and was an expert cook and a lover of opera. She was made an honorary FRCS in 1988. She died on 30 August 2006.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000371
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Bass, Frederick (1852 - 1899)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Bassett-Smith, Sir Percy William (1861 - 1927)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2009-11-25
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000700-E000799
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372969372969
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born at St Albans, the son of William Bassett-Smith, and educated at St John’s College, Hurstpierpoint. He then entered the Middlesex Hospital, and after acting as House Physician passed into the Navy in 1883. He was promoted to Staff Surgeon in 1895; Fleet Surgeon in 1899, Surgeon Captain in 1917, and retired with the rank of Surgeon Rear-Admiral on April 1st, 1920. During the Sudan campaign of 1884-1885 he served at Suakim as Surgeon on HMS Rambler, receiving the Egyptian medal and the Khedive’s bronze star. During this commission he made valuable reports on the geology and biology of coral reefs, and many of the specimens which he collected were transferred to the British Museum. He served in the surveying ship Penguin from 1891-1893, made valuable reports on subjects of natural history, collected many specimens, and received the thanks of the trustees of the British Museum. In 1899 he was specially promoted to Fleet Surgeon and was awarded the Gilbert Blane Gold Medal for his journal “evincing the proofs of skill, diligence, humanity and learning in the execution of his professional duties”. He was also Cragg’s Research Prizeman at the London School of Tropical Medicine in 1906. Bassett-Smith lectured on tropical medicine and bacteriology at Haslar from 1912-1921, when he became Professor of Clinical Pathology at the Royal Naval Hospital, Greenwich. He did most valuable work in this position, and on his retirement received a letter from the Lords of the Admiralty expressing appreciation of his services. He practised as a consultant in tropical diseases at 61 Queen Anne Street, W, after retiring from the Navy, and was elected Physician to Out-patients at the Hospital for Diseases of the Chest, Victoria Park, and at St John’s Hospital, Lewisham. He was Naval Secretary of the Section of Epidemiology at the Royal Society of Medicine from 1912 until his death, having also served as Vice-President of the Section of Tropical Disease at the annual meetings of the British Medical Association in 1903 and 1912, and of the Army, Navy, and Ambulance Section in 1910. He became a member of the Naval and Military Committee of the British Medical Association in 1921 and served continuously on the Council. In 1922 he was appointed a member of the Committee to consider the expansion of the Army Medical Service in time of national emergency. He married Constance Brightman (d. 1925), daughter of the Rev F Hastings, and by her had two daughters. For her services during the war she was decorated MBE. He died at his home, 8 Aberdeen Terrace, Blackheath, SE, after a short illness on Dec 29th, 1927. Bassett-Smith was for many years the authority on all things pathological in the Royal Navy, combining clinical teaching with his scientific knowledge. He was quiet and somewhat retiring in manner, with a charming personality, but so enthusiastic in advancing scientific knowledge in the Navy that he imperilled his promotion by preferring the laboratory and the hospital to service afloat.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000786
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Kindersley, Hugh Kenyon Molesworth, Second Baron Kindersley of West Hoathly (1899 - 1976)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2007-07-25
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/372560372560
Occupation Businessman
Details Lord Kindersley was born in 1899, the son of the first Lord Kindersley and Gladys Margaret Beadle. Educated at Eton he served in the first world war in the Scots Guards, where he won the Military Cross in 1918. During the second world war he rejoined his old regiment and served with the 6th Airborne Division with the rank of Brigadier, and won the MBE and CBE (military. After the war he succeeded to his father in 1951, became chairman of Rolls Royce (from 1956 to 1968) and a director of Lazard Brothers (1967 to 1971). He was chairman of the Review Body on Doctors’ and Dentists’ Remuneration from 1962 to 1970, and President of the Arthritis and Rheumatism Council. In the College he was a very successful chairman of the Appeal Committee, from 1958, with Sir Simon Marks as his vice-chairman: together they collected £3.6 million in the next 15 years, by which means the College was rebuilt. During this time old fellows were invited, and new fellows obliged, to make an annual subscription. A valued and highly respected member of its Court of Patrons, the College acknowledged his services with their honorary gold medal in 1975. He died on 6 October 1976.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000374
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Al-Sheikhli, Abdul Raazak Jasim (1936 - 2007)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2007-07-25 2008-11-28
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/372561372561
Occupation ENT surgeon
Details Abdul Razaak Jasim Al-Sheikhli was an ENT consultant at the Mayday Hospital, Croydon. He was born on 20 November 1936 in Baghdad, the son of Jasim Al-Sheikhli, an Imam, and his wife, Sabria. He was educated at the Al-Risafa Intermediate School and Adhamiya Secondary School, in Baghdad, before going on to Baghdad Medical College. During his residency period at the Republic Teaching Hospital of Baghdad he witnessed and treated the victims of revolutions, and saw the body of the recently murdered president, General Kasim, and his body guards, lying in the mortuary. After doing his National Service as a lieutenant in the Iraqi Air Force, where he served in Basra, he went to England with a scholarship from the Iraqi Ministry of Health, to train in surgery. He was a senior house officer at Ipswich and Clare Hall, and was subsequently a registrar at Southampton Chest Hospital. In 1970 he returned to Iraq, as a general and thoracic surgeon in the Hilla district and Mirjan, Al-Shaab, Al-Tuwithw and Labourers hospitals. He returned to England in 1973 to specialise in ENT, becoming a senior house officer at Farnborough Hospital and registrar at Ipswich and the Royal Ear Hospital, where he was greatly helped by Bill Gibson. He was then a senior registrar at Aberdeen Royal Infirmary for nearly two and a half years. In 1981 he was appointed ENT consultant at the Mayday Hospital. He published on talc granuloma of the vocal cords following intubation, pain in the ear, and the microbiology of the adenoids. He married Sheila née Page, a nurse, in 1968. They had two sons, Peter, an artist, and Stephen, a musician. He died on 4 February 2007 of acute myeloid leukaemia.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000375
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Magri, Joseph (1926 - 2005)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-11-09
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000200-E000299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372475372475
Occupation Urological surgeon Urologist
Details Joe Magri was a consultant urologist at Oldchurch Hospital, Romford. He was born in Valletta, Malta, on 2 March 1926, the son of Francesca and Tancred Magri. He was educated at the Jesuit College and Malta University, where he qualified in 1949. He then moved to England to specialise in surgery. He was a house surgeon in orthopaedics and accident surgery at the City Hospital, Sheffield, and then a surgical registrar in Barnsley, where, with the help of only an anaesthetist and a house physician, he dealt with all the emergencies that arose in that busy mining town. He went on to become an anatomy demonstrator in Sheffield, passed the primary and final FRCS, and became a surgical registrar in Leicester. He was RSO (senior registrar) at St Peter’s Hospital in 1959 and was appointed consultant urologist, Oldchurch Hospital, Romford, in 1963. There he published a review of partial cystectomy for bladder cancer and a few years later a ‘no-catheter’ technique for prostatectomy. A genial, friendly man, Joe Magri’s many interests included bridge, sailing, skiing and the opera. He attended Covent Garden regularly. He also built his own Gilbern car from a kit. He met his Swedish wife Margareta Johansson while on holiday in Malta, where she was working as a private secretary in an architect’s office. Together they refurbished a house in Mill Hill. They had no children. He died of metastatic carcinoma on 6 April 2005. He is survived by his widow.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000288
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Carr, William (1829 - 1905)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Carter, Charles Henry (1817 - 1897)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Carter, Henry Freeland (1821 - 1894)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Carter, James (1814 - 1895)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2010-02-11
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000800-E000899
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373040373040
Occupation General surgeon
Details Studied at St Thomas’s and Guy’s Hospitals, and after qualifying practised in Cambridge. He opened a discussion in 1860, at the Cambridge Branch of the British Medical Association, upon the treatment of acute inflammatory diseases. Antiphlogistic measures were considered undesirable; some would use them to a slight degree, some abolish them altogether. Dr Todd, recently dead, had gone to the opposite extreme of employing stimulants, alcohol in particular. He invited members to give the results of their experience. Carter became well known from his devotion to the study of geology and palaeontology, and he was the local secretary of the Palæontological Society. He became an authority upon fossil decapod crustacea, and left in manuscript a monograph upon the subject. Further he published many papers in the *Geological Magazine* and the *Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society*, of which he was a Fellow. He presented a collection to the Woodwardian Museum. He lived at 30 Petty Cury, Cambridge, where he died on Aug 30th, 1895. Publications:– In addition to the papers mentioned above, Carter also wrote:– “On the Newly Proposed Treatment of Acute Inflammatory Disease.” – *Brit. Med. Jour.*, 1860, 647.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000857
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Carter, John Collis ( - 1866)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Crowfoot, William Henchman (1780 - 1848)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2008-02-21 2011-09-07
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/372640372640
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born on Sept 9th, 1780, at Kessingland, a village on the Suffolk coast, where his father occupied a large farm. His mother, who was a daughter of the Rev J Henchman, died while he was an infant, and he was placed in charge of his uncle by marriage, the Rev W Clubbe, Vicar of Brandeston. Mr Clubbe, an elegant Latin scholar, taught him to love classical studies. In 1794 he was apprenticed to his uncle, Mr Crowfoot, of Beccles, who was a second father to him, and in 1799 he came to London and entered as a pupil at the Borough hospitals under Cline and Astley Cooper, the latter of whom became his friend in after-life. Sir Astley Cooper in his work on *Dislocations* (1842) refers to Crowfoot as one who, "to high professional skill, adds all the amiable qualities which can become a man." Crowfoot hoped to obtain through his patron's influence a medical appointment in India, but he failed in this and settled at Framlington. In 1803, his practice being limited there, he removed at his uncle's suggestion to Beccles, and in 1805 became his partner, thenceforward obtaining high professional credit and success. It was in the December of 1805 that he accidentally met a party bearing the body of a soldier who had been thrown on the beach at Kessingland and lain for several hours apparently dead. Finding that the precordia still retained some warmth, he caused the body to be carried to a house, and persevering in the means of restoration which his professional skill suggested, he at length revived the sufferer. For this action the Royal Humane Society awarded him a silver medal. He died, after an illness of only four days, on Nov 13th, 1848, of typhus fever, contracting the disease from a post-mortem on a typhus patient. At the time of his death he was Consulting Surgeon to the Beccles Dispensary. Publications:- Crowfoot's publications record the remarkable results of his own experience and are characterized by strong good sense. They include:- "On Carditis." - *Edin Med and Surg Jour*, 1809, v, 298. He stressed the connection between rheumatism and carditis before that connection was so much insisted upon as at present. "Surgical Cases." - *Ibid*, 1825, xxiv, 260. "On the Use of Extension in Fractures of the Spine." - *Jour Prov Med and Surg Assoc*, 1843, xi, 337. In this paper he showed the value and success of the treatment in cases too often regarded as hopeless.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000456
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Bryce, Alexander Graham (1890 - 1968)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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/372641372641
Occupation General surgeon
Details Graham Bryce was born in Southport, Lancashire, the son of Elizabeth Dodds and Alexander Graham Bryce who was the managing director of a calico printing firm. He went to school at the Southport Modern School for Boys until the age of 11 when he proceeded to complete his secondary education at the Bickerton House School until he was 16. When he was 16 he matriculated and went very early to the Manchester University Medical School so that he graduated at what was a very tender age, at 21. He proceeded to the Degree of MD in 1913, and to the Diploma of Public Health in 1915. He gained his Fellowship of the Royal College of Surgeons of England in 1923. At the University of Manchester, he was a diligent and successful student, obtaining distinctions and exhibitions in anatomy, physiology, pharmacology and medicine, and a host of prizes and medals. As house physician to Dr E M Brookbank, a cardiologist of high national repute, he was early acquainted with diseases of the heart. This served him well later in life when he entered the practice of thoracic surgery. His subsequent years of postgraduate study indicated that he practised what he subsequently preached, namely that hard experience in general medicine and surgery is an essential basis for later devotion to a specialty; as a house officer in medicine, he studied the problem of cancer of the stomach, to form the basis of his thesis for a doctorate which he obtained in 1913. Further postgraduate experience was gained as a resident medical officer at the Manchester Children's Hospital, and in 1914 as senior resident in the Manchester Tuberculosis Hospital. Like so many surgeons of his generation he served in the RAMC in artillery, infantry, and cavalry medical units, from 1915 to 1919. During this period he decided to enter the practice of surgery and held surgical house appointments from 1919 to 1921 at the Blackburn Royal Infirmary. He journeyed south to work as senior house surgeon at the Royal Dock Hospital for Seamen and subsequently at St George's Hospital. In 1923, having obtained his English Fellowship, he returned to Manchester as senior surgical registrar at the Royal Infirmary, where subsequently he was appointed resident surgical officer, holding the post for two years. At that time a galaxy of surgical stars, known throughout the world, held appointments on the staff of the Manchester Royal Infirmary, and fierce competition for places existed. His potential was recognized by his election as surgical tutor until 1927 when he moved to the Manchester Victoria Memorial Jewish Hospital as a consultant surgeon. An additional appointment as honorary assistant surgeon at Salford Royal Hospital placed him in the company of men as distinguished as Geoffrey Jefferson and J B Macalpine. Although in private practice, he found time and energy to commence a study of thoracic surgery and obtained appointments in sanatoria in the Manchester area. He published several papers on general surgery in 1913-1932 and in 1934, together with James E H Roberts, Sir Clement Price Thomas and a spontaneous pneumothorax and pulmonary lobectomy. In those early days of thoracic surgery, like many men of that era entering this specialty, he visited surgical centres in Great Britain and overseas; he studied in Berlin, Montreal, Toronto, Chicago, and during these tours he made abiding friendships amongst thoracic surgeons. In 1934 he achieved a cherished ambition when appointed to the honorary staff of the Manchester Royal Infirmary. His quiet, gentle and self-deprecatory manner did not decieve his many friends, as underneath a gentle exterior was a dogged determination to pursue the craft and science of surgery successfully. He established thoracic surgery in his district; at a meeting of the Association of Surgeons in Manchester in 1934, together with the late J E H Roberts, Sir Clement Price Thomas and a few others, he formed a small club over a drink in the Midland Hotel. He was the first secretary of this club which rapidly became known as the Society of Thoracic Surgeons of Great Britain and Ireland. For many years he held this post and the large and flourishing present day Society of Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgeons owes much to him. Young men of the generation just behind his, know how much they are in debt to him. To them in particular he showed a real sympathy and encouragement which is not easily forgotten. Graham Bryce was happy in his family life. His wife Isabel Bryce was the daughter of the distinguished Professor James Lorrain Smith, FRS and she herself achieved success and fame, particularly in the field of sociology, with particular reference to medicine. At the time of his death, she was chairman of the Oxford Regional Hospital Board. For her work in the field of hospital administration she was awarded the DBE in 1968. To many thoracic surgeons her friendliness and human sympathy are widely recognised. It was always pleasant to think of her working in her garden while her husband attended to his main hobby, namely bee-keeping. Surgery owes much to both of them. Bryce died suddenly at his home in Upper Basildon near Reading, on 24 October 1968, leaving a widow and two sons.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000457
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Golding-Bird, Cuthbert Hilton (1848 - 1939)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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/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
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First Title value, for Searching Morris, Sir Henry (1844 - 1926)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-05-11 2012-03-13
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Occupation Urological surgeon Urologist
Details Born at Petworth on January 7th, 1844, the son of William Morris, surgeon of that place, and grandson of a Morris practising in North Wales. The surname Morris has been traced in particular to families of mixed Welsh and Jewish descent who settled on the Welsh border after the explusion of the Jews from England by Richard I. Morris in his prime, black-haired, fresh-complexioned, dignified, and a fluent speaker, seemed to point to a mixed Welsh and Jewish descent. He was educated at Epsom College, being one of the first hundred boys admitted to that Institution under the Rev. Dr. Thornton. He then went to University College, London, where he graduated B.A. in 1863 with philosophy (i.e., the philosophy dominant in the early part of the eighteenth century) as his special subject. He proceeded M.A. in 1870, and was throughout life ruled by opinions acquired during this philosophic studies. He studied at Guy's Hospital, where he was House Surgeon after graduating M.B. Lond. For a short time he was Resident Medical Officer of the Dispensary, Stanhope Street. In January, 1870, he was appointed Surgical Registrar at Middlesex Hospital; in August, 1871, was elected Assistant Surgeon, and Surgeon in the Out-patient Cancer Department; from 1879 until 1889 he was Surgeon to the Hospital and was in charge of the Cancer Department. He retired at the age limit in 1905. He was appointed Lecturer in Practical Surgery in 1871, but it was as Lecturer in Anatomy from 1872-1881 that he distinguished himself the most. It gave origin to his most original and permanent publication, *The Anatomy of the Joints of Man* (8vo, 43 plates, 1879; 8th American edition, Philadelphia, 1925). He followed this up later by acting as the editor of *A Treatise on Human Anatomy*, by various authors, 1893. Morris wrote on "The Articulations", other contemporaries contributing. The work ran through a number of editions. In 1881 he became Lecturer on Surgery. In 1880 a domestic servant, aged 19, was diagnosed by the physician, Sydney Coupland, to have a calculus in an undilated kidney, the diagnosis being made from the signs of pain and hæmaturia only. Morris removed the stone on Oct. 22nd, 1880, and the case was reported, as the first designed operation of its kind in this country, in the Clinical Society's *Transactions* (1881, xiv, 30), the stone being preserved in the Hospital Museum. The patient made a complete recovery. This brought him an extended practice and gave him the opportunity of publishing a number of books on genito-urinary surgery; he was for a time the leading authority, until examination by X-rays and the cystoscope expanded the methods of diagnosis. In the latter part of his life he was known outside Middlesex Hospital as a medical educationalist and politician. He became dogmatic and dictatorial in manner, long-winded in speech, influenced by rather an antiquated philosophy, and unsympathetic with novelties which could not be squared with his ingrained views. He believed that the Middlesex Medical School should continue to teach all the subjects of the curriculum, and he opposed with a donation of £1000 the Medical Schools Amalgamation University of London scheme in 1906. Great efforts were made to endow the Medical School and the fund amounted in 1927 to £130,000. He took a lifelong interest in his old school, Epsom College, was for many years Treasurer, and by visiting constantly was practically Manager. As the Surgeon-in-charge of the cancer wards at Middlesex Hospital, he wrote much on the subject, including the Bradshaw Lecture, 1903, before the experimental and radiological developments of the subject. The Imperial Cancer Research Fund was originated in his house, No. 8, at the north-east corner of Cavendish Square, and he acted as Treasurer and Vice-President. In connection with the British Medical Association he was Secretary of the Section of Surgery at Manchester in 1877, and in 1889 Vice-President at Leeds. In 1895 he was President of the Section of Anatomy and Histology in London. In 1893 he delivered the Cavendish Lecture, and in 1908 the Sir William Mitchell Banks Memorial Lecture. At the College Morris held the following posts: 1884-1889, Examiner in Anatomy for the Fellowship; 1893-1914, Member of Council; 1894-1904, Member of the Court of Examiners; 1898, Hunterian Professor (three lectures on Renal Surgery); 1899, Examiner in Dental Surgery; 1903, Bradshaw Lecturer; 1904-1917, Representative on the General Medical Council, and was for ten years (1907-1917) Treasurer; 1906, Member of the Committee of Management of the Conjoint Board; 1906, 1907, President; 1909, Hunterian Orator. He took for the subject of his oration John Hunter in his relation to eighteenth-century philosophic literature, and delivered it in the presence of T.R.H. the Prince and Princess of Wales, shortly after King George V and Queen Mary; in 1918 he was elected a Trustee of the Hunterian Collection. He also examined in Anatomy at the University of Durham and in Surgery at the University of London. During his last years he led a lonely life; his wife, a Russian dancer, predeceased him and bore him no children. After leaving his house in Cavendish Square he lived at 42 Connaught Square, ailing and afflicted by a slight facial tic. He was definitely ill for some three weeks, and died on June 14th, 1926. He left estate to the value of £44,000. A fine portrait of him in his prime and in the full-dress President's gown by W. W. Ouless, R.A., hangs on the College staircase. There are others at different ages in the College Collection. PUBLICATIONS:- In addition to those already noted Morris wrote: - *Surgical Diseases of the Kidney*, 12mo, 6 plates, 1885. *Injuries and Diseases of the Genital and Urinary Organs,* 8vo, London, 1895. *Hunterian Lectures on Renal Surgery*, 8vo, London, 1898. *Surgical Diseases of the Kidney and Ureter*, 2 vols., 1901. *The Profession of Medicine: Introductory Address at the Middlesex Hospital Medical College, 1st October,* 1873, 8vo, London. "Clinical Lecture on Rupture of the Bladder and its Treatment." - *Med. Times and Gaz.*, 1879, ii, 603. "Remarks on Epithelioma and Ichthyosis of the Tongue." - *Med. Soc. Proc.*, 1881-3, vi, 194. *On the Treatment of Inoperable Cancer*, 8vo, London, 1902. *Essentials of Materia Medica*, 7th ed., Philadelphia, 1905. *The Etiology, Symptoms and Treatment of Gallstones, *1896. "Statement of Further Evidence proposed to be given before the Committee on the London Ambulance Service by the President R.C.S.," fol., London, 1908. "Statement prepared for the Royal Commission on Vivisection by the President R.C.S.," fol., London, 1908. "The Darwin Centenary - an Address from the Royal College of Surgeons to the University of Cambridge, 1909," 8vo, 1909. "On the Need of the Medical Representation in Parliament." - *Outlook*, 1918, Oct.5.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000219
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Butlin, Sir Henry Trentham (1845 - 1912)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-05-11 2012-03-22
Unknown
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URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372407372407
Occupation General surgeon
Details The fourth son and fifth child of the Rev. W. Wright Butlin, M.A., of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, who died in 1902 at the age of 88. His mother was Julia Crowther Trentham, a clever and strong-minded woman coming of an evangelical Northamptonshire family who, in spite of delicate health, lived to be 84. The Butlins were a Rugby family who carried on the business of Butlin's Bank which was established in 1791 and was absorbed by Lloyds Bank in 1868. The Rev. W. W. Butlin was Curate of Camborne, then held the joint living of Cury and Gunwalloe, Cornwall, and was finally Victor of Penponds, near Camborne, where he is said to have been instrumental in building the church. Later in life he came into some property at Rugby which had been left to his father - a medical man - by Mr. Benn, a cousin. It had belonged to Mrs. Anne Butlin, who carried on Butlin's Bank after the death of her husband. Henry Trentham Butlin was born on Oct. 24th, 1845. He was educated at home with his brothers by a resident tutor until he entered St. Bartholomew's Hospital in October, 1864, where he lived in the residential college of which Dr. James Andrew was Warden. The appointment of House Surgeon to Sir James Paget (q.v.) became vacant unexpectedly in 1868 by the resignation of William Square (q.v.), of Plymouth, and Butlin was appointed in his place from April to October. When the House Surgeoncy ended Butlin went to Charing, in Kent, with a view to partnership with Charles Wilks, who had taken his M.R.C.S. in 1825 and was a devoted adherent to this old medical school. An agreement was drawn up but never signed, as Butlin felt himself unsuited for a country practice after the stimulus of acting as House Surgeon to Sir James Paget, and had determined to settle in London as a surgeon. He was appointed Medical Registrar to the Hospital for Sick Children in Great Ormond Street and held the post until July, 1872. It was generally recognized on his resignation that he could have been elected an Assistant Physician had he chosen to apply. Whilst he was Registrar he passed the F.R.C.S. examination, and was appointed Surgical Registrar at St. Bartholomew's Hospital in December, 1872. The duties were arduous, for the Registrar had to examine every patient admitted to the surgical wards and write a note with his own hand in specially kept books. He had to attend in the operating theatre, verify the diagnosis of tumours by microscopical examination, and conduct the surgical post-mortems. All these duties Butlin performed to the entire satisfaction of the staff, and soon made such a reputation for himself that he was co-opted to the Morbid Growths Committee of the Pathological Society, of which he was Secretary from 1884-1886. Being as poor as Job, he married in 1873 Annie Tipping, daughter of Henry Balderson, merchant, of Hemel Hempstead, took a house, No. 47 Queen Anne Street, and kept the wolf from the door with resident pupils who paid £126 a year apiece. The marriage was singularly happy, and Butlin rightly attributed much of his success in life to the sterling qualities of his wife, who relieved him of all domestic anxieties. By her he had two daughters and a son. The elder daughter, Olive, married Percy Furnivall, F.R.C.S., only son of F. J. Furnivall, the well-known Shakespearean scholar; the younger married Norman Morice, of the firm of J. C. & C. W. Moore, stockbrokers. The son, Henry Guy Trentham, survived his father, volunteered whilst still at Cambridge, and was reported missing and wounded from the Cambridgeshire Regiment near Beaumont Hamel, France, on Sept. 16th, 1916. Whilst acting as Surgical Registrar Butlin was elected Assistant Surgeon to the Metropolitan Free Hospital, a post he resigned on becoming Assistant Surgeon to the West London Hospital, where he remained from 1872-1880, having a few beds of his own, learning to do major emergency operations, and having Sir Alfred Cooper (q.v.) as his chief. He was also Surgeon to the Alexandra Hospital for Children with Hip Disease which then occupied a single house in Queen Square, Bloomsbury. He was appointed Demonstrator of Practical Surgery in the Medical School attached to St. Bartholomew's Hospital in 1879, and in the following year he was elected Assistant Surgeon in the vacancy caused by the unexpected death of George W. Callender (q.v.). He was immediately put in charge of the Out-patient Department for Diseases of the Throat upon the resignation of Sir T. Lauder Brunton, M.D. He held the post for twelve years, and with the help of Dr. F. de Havilland Hall raised the department to as high a pitch of excellence as could be obtained in the cramped quarters assigned to it. He also made for himself a leading position amongst contemporary laryngologists, though he never pretended to specialize in surgery of the throat, and with Felix Semon and de Havilland Hall he was a principal founder of the Laryngological Society, which is now a section of the Royal Society of Medicine. He became full Surgeon to St. Bartholomew's Hospital when Morant Baker (q.v.) resigned in 1892, and was appointed joint Lecturer on Surgery with John Langton (q.v.) in 1896. He resigned the office of Surgeon in November, 1902, before he had reached the age limit, and was elected Consulting Surgeon and a Governor of the Hospital. He was placed on the Visiting Governors Committee in 1909. Butlin's connection with the Royal College of Surgeons began in 1873, when he won the Jacksonian Prize with his essay on "Un-united Fractures". He delivered the Sir Erasmus Wilson Lectures on Pathology in 1880 and 1881. The lectures were published in 1862 under the title *Sarcoma and Carcinoma, their Pathology, Diagnosis and Treatment.* In 1892 he lectured, as Hunterian Professor of Surgery and Pathology, "On Chimney Sweeps' Cancer". He delivered the Bradshaw Lecture in 1905, and in 1907 he gave the Hunterian Oration without a note or a falter - a feat which had only been accomplished in recent years by Sir James Paget, Sir William Savory, and Henry Power. He was a Member of the Council, 1895-1912. In 1909 he became President, was re-elected in 1910, and again in 1911. Failing health prevented him from completing his third year; he resigned, and Sir Rickman J. Godlee (q.v.) acted in his stead. Butlin had an equally brilliant career in the British Medical Association. A Vice-President of the Section of Pathology at the Worcester Meeting in 1882, he was President of the Section of Laryngology at the Leeds Meeting in 1889, and at the Portsmouth Meeting ten years later he was President of the Surgical Section. He delivered the General Address in Surgery at the Exeter Meeting in 1907, speaking of the "Contagion of Cancer in Human Beings". In 1910, as President of the Association, he spoke on the "Evolution of the British Medical Association and its Work". He was Treasurer of the Association from 1890-1893, and again from 1893-1896, being the only person who had been re-elected to that important and responsible office. At the University of London he was the first Dean of the Faculty of Medicine. He was President of the Pathological Society of London 1905-1907, during which he gave the Jubilee Address; and President of the Laryngological Society. During the latter years of his life he had the pleasure of acting as a Governor of Rugby School and thus renewing his ancestral ties with the County. He died after a long period of failing health due to laryngeal tuberculosis on Jan. 24th, 1912, and was cremated at Golder's Green. Butlin was a man of rather frail and slender physique, slightly above medium height, but possessed of such vitality, nervous energy, and endurance that after a long morning of private practice he would never leave the operating theatre at the hospital until the list was finished, so that he often remained standing from 1.30 to 7.30, when he was left in a state of profound exhaustion. He loved horses took his exercise in riding, and would often ride to St. Bartholomew's Hospital on a Sunday morning. His holidays were usually spent in travelling through France, Spain, and Italy. His carriage, always painted an olive green decorated with his coat-of-arms, and drawn by a well-groomed pair of excellent horses, made him recognizable everywhere, for, thanks to Lady Butlin, he always had a very smart turn-out. He was a good and fluent speaker, and it was clear that he had deliberately modelled his style on that of Sir James Paget. As a teacher of students both in the wards and in the lecture theatre he was excellent. He leant to the pathological side of surgery and was always much interested in tumours and their structure. As a surgeon he was bold, and undertook very extensive operations for the complete removal of malignant growths, so that he may be said to be one of the pioneers in England who adopted the radical cure of cancer and was not contented with the local removal practised by his predecessors. His practice was extensive and lucrative - beginning with nothing he left the sum of £90,996. He would have been equally successful had he gone into business, for he was far-seeing, had large ideas, was very careful in detail, and from a business point of view was one of the best occupants of the Presidential Chair at the Royal College of Surgeons. Honours came to him from many sources. He was created a baronet in 1911; he was an honorary D.C.L. of Durham (1893), and a LL.D. of Birmingham (1910). Butlin stood at the parting of the ways when Sir W. Mitchell Banks (q.v.) drew attention in 1877 and again in 1882 to the good results obtained by removing the axillary glands with the breast in cases of cancer. He had followed the example of his seniors, and especially of Sir James Paget, in adopting local removal. For a while he followed the new teaching, but it was breaking away from tradition and for a time he went back to the old methods. In the end he became a whole-hearted adherent, and, like a true convert, he practised larger and larger extirpations in every case of malignant disease, more especially of the tongue, and followed up the results with unusual energy. His lectures on diseases of the tongue were published in 1885 and were illustrated with water-colour drawings made by T. Godart and Dr. Leonard Mark. The original drawings are preserved in the Museum of St. Bartholomew's Hospital. This excellent manual was reprinted in Philadelphia in 1895, was translated into German in 1887 by Julius Beregszaszy and into French by Douglas Aigre in 1889. Large additions were made when a new edition was published in 1900. The patients seen by Butlin in his private practice came in a much earlier stage of the disease than the ordinary hospital patient. He was therefore able to state that in 197 cases where he had removed the tongue for cancer quite 30 per cent were alive and free from recurrence three years after the operation. He recommended local removal as soon as possible, with subsequent excision of any leucoplakic patches. He foresaw that treatment by radium was likely to be serviceable, but before his death he had attained to a degree of success which remained unsurpassed until the treatment by radium came into general use. Of his portraits the best is the photograph in the obituary notice in the *British Medical Journal.* A three-quarter length in oils by the Hon. John Collier hangs in the Museum Hall at the Royal College of Surgeons. This is a replica of the picture exhibited in the Royal Academy. PUBLICATIONS:- *Sacroma and Carcinoma, their Pathology, Diagnosis and Treatment,* 8vo, London, 1882. *On Malignant Diseases (Sarcoma and Carcinoma) of the Larynx*, 8vo, 1883. *Diseases of the Tongue,* 12mo, London, 1885. An excellent manual on the subject. It was reprinted and an American edition was published in Philadelphia, 1885; it was translated into German (Vienna, 1887) and into French (Paris, 1889). The original water-colour drawings by T. Godart and Leonard Mark are in the Museum of St. Bartholomew's Hospital. 2nd ed. (with W. G. SPENCER), 1900. *On the Operative Surgery of Malignant Disease,* 8vo, London, 1887. *On Cancer of the Scrotum in Chimney Sweeps,* 8vo, 1892.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000220
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Godlee, Sir Rickman John (1849 - 1925)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-05-11 2012-03-22
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Occupation General surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details Born of Quaker parents in Queen Square, London, W.C., on February 15th, 1849, the second son of Rickman Godlee, a barrister of the Inner Temple who had married Mary Lister, the only sister of Joseph, Lord Lister. Marcus Beck (q.v.), therefore, was a cousin, and Lord Lister his uncle. Godlee was brought up in the prosperous and quiet environment of which he afterwards gave so charming an account in the *Life* of his uncle. He was sent to Mr. Abbott's school at Grove House, Tottenham, where most of the Friends' children were educated, and here he learnt to become a field botanist and ornithologist, for natural history was prominent in the curriculum. He graduated in Arts at the University of London before he embarked on medicine, and entered University College in 1867, where he soon attracted attention as a neat dissector. He graduated M.B. and M.S. at the University of London, winning a Gold Medal at each examination. He served the office of House Surgeon to Sir John Eric Erichsen (q.v.), and at the end of the year 1872 he went to live with his uncle, who was then Professor of Clinical Surgery in the University of Edinburgh. He studied his methods, and published the results of his observations in the *Lancet* (1878, i, 694, 729) with the title, "The Antiseptic Treatment in Edinbugh". Godlee then returned to London and was appointed Surgical Registrar at University College Hospital. Whilst acting in this capacity, on May 20th, 1874, he opened an abscess connected with acute necrosis of the tibia. He made careful drawings of the microscopic appearances of the pus with the aid of a camera lucida, and observed "certain curious minute bodied which were arranged in rows or chains". They were streptococci, but he failed to name them. It was not until the International Congress of 1881 that Koch showed photographs of the micro-organisms he had found at the margins of erysipelatous lesions. Godlee afterwards wrote on the drawing, "This was, so far as I know, the first time that organisms were seen in the pus of an abscess immediately it was opened". The drawing is now in the Lister wall case in Room I of the College Museum. He was elected Assistant Surgeon to Charing Cross Hospital and Lecturer on Anatomy in the Medical School in 1876, and resigned both offices in 1878. He was also Surgeon to the North-Eastern (now the Queen's) Hospital for Children in the Hackney Road from 1876. He was elected Assistant Surgeon to University College Hospital in 1877. The post was a new one and carried with it an Assistant Demonstratorship of Anatomy in University College. As a demonstrator of anatomy Godlee was able to make use of his great artistic powers. He began the drawings for *An Atlas of Human Anatomy* in 1876, with the design of illustrating most of the ordinary dissections and many not usually practised by the student. The *Atlas* was accompanied by an explanatory text. Over one hundred dissections were made for its preparation, mostly by himself during the years 1876-1880, the years during which he waited for patients. He drew each dissection in pencil, giving the vessels and nerves their distinctive colours, and the drawings were then reproduced on stone. The lithographer was able to retain the clarity of the originals but lost much of their softness. Parts I-V of the *Atlas* were published in 1877-1878, and the whole appeared with 48 plates in 1880. Godlee also made the drawings for Quain's *Anatomy* and Erichsen's *Science and the Art of Surgery*. He drew them on wood himself and they were then beautifully engraved by the elder Butterworth. There appears to be very little doubt that Godlee inherited his artistic powers and tastes through his mother from the Lister side of the family. The collection at the Royal College of Surgeons contains drawings made by Sir Joseph Lister in 1862-1864 when he was planning his operation for the excision of the wrist. Some are in black-and-white, some in water-colour, and some in oils. They all show that Lister could have made his name as an artist and draughtsman. Godlee's style resembles that of his uncle, but his work is rather more accurate and delicate. He was appointed Surgeon to the Brompton Hospital for Consumption and Diseases of the Chest on Nov. 6th, 1884, and retained the office until June 6th, 1900, when he was nominated Consulting Surgeon. The post was a new one; his predecessors, Robert Liston, Sir William Fergusson, John Marshall, and Sir Joseph Lister, had only been called in occasionally. Godlee soon justified the appointment. He began to lecture, and published in the *Lancet* for 1885 and 1887, "The Surgical Treatment Empyema and of Pulmonary Cavities", and in 1890 there appeared, "On the Surgical Aspect of Hepatic Abscess, being three Lectures delivered at the Hospital for Consumption and Diseases of the Chest, Brompton", with 7 illustrations. In 1898 he joined Sir James Kingston Fowler in writing the surgical portion of *The Diseases of the Lungs*, in which they were assisted by Drs. Percy Kidd and A.E. Voelcker. Godlee acted as private assistant to Lord Lister for some years whilst he was waiting for promotion at University College, and on November 25th, 1884, he came prominently before the public as a pioneer in cerebral surgery. The patient, a man of 25, was diagnosed by Dr. Hughes Bennett as having a tumour of the brain. He was admitted into the Hospital for Epilepsy and Paralysis, Regent's Park, and the position of the tumour was located by the recent experimental work of Ferrier as being situated in the cortical substance near the upper third of the fissure of Rolando. The patient expressed a strong desire to have it removed, and Rickman Godlee was called upon to operate. The localization proved to be accurate and the glioma was extirpated without difficulty, but the patient died of secondary surgical complications. An outcry at once arose that the operation was unjustifiable, but *The Times* published two sensible leading articles and it was generally agreed that an advance had been made in regard to surgical interference with the human brain. The details of the case appear in the *Lancet* (1884, ii, 1090). Godlee became full Surgeon at University College Hospital in 1885 and resigned on April 1st, 1914. He succeeded his cousin, Marcus Beck, as Professor of Clinical Surgery in 1892, and was appointed Holme Professor of Clinical Surgery in 1900 in succession to Christopher Heath (q.v.). At the Royal College of Surgons Godlee held many honourable offices. He was an Examiner in Anatomy in 1884, a Member of the Court of Examiners from 1893-1903, Bradshaw Lecturer in 1907, and Hunterian Orator in 1913. He was elected a Member of the Council in 1897, and as Vice-President filled the place of President during the year 1911 when Sir Henry Butlin died in office. He was re-elected President in 1912 and again in 1913. One of his last acts as President was to deliver an address in the United States on the occasion of the Foundation of the American College of Surgeons, of which he was elected an honorary Fellow. He then reviewed the history of the English College in such a spirit of brotherhood that his address on the eve of the Great War formed a valuable link between the medical activities of the two countries. At the Royal Society of Medicine Godlee acted as one of the honorary librarians from 1907-1916, having filled the same post in the Royal Medico-Chirurgical Society from 1895, and was President in 1916-1917. During the War (1914-1918) he worked steadily to maintain medical efficiency, and was a constant attendant of the Central Medical War Committee, whose duty it was to recommend methods by which our armies abroad could be adequately supplied with medical officers without depleting the medical service at home. He was also Chairman of the Belgian Doctors' and Pharmacists' Relief Fund, and in this position was instrumental in bringing to the notice of the General Medical Council the advantage of allowing Belgian practitioners to qualify in England and thus to place them in a position to earn their living. Early in 1916 it became possible to relieve the medical men and pharmacists in Belgium itself, and for some months sums of money were sent to Brussels every week through the agency of the International Commission for Relief until the amount disbursed had risen to £25,000. Godlee carefully investigated the amounts paid out and made himself acquainted with the details of each grant and the destination of every cheque. In 1920 he retired to Combe End, a farm which he had long cultivated at Whitchurch in Oxfordshire. It overlooked the Thames and the grounds ran down to the river. Here he made many improvements and additions to the house, acted as a gentleman farmer, took part in the affairs of the village, and wrote a history of it in the Parish Magazine. He did not, however, lose interest in the College, and was enabled to carry out a project which had been long in his mind - the worthy display of Lord Lister's instruments and manuscripts. It was proposed at first to place the memorial in the Library, but when this was found inappropriate, a cabinet made from the design of the College architect - Mr. Freer - was placed in the Museum and was formally inaugurated on the occasion of the First Lister Memorial Lecture, May 14th, 1925. Godlee married in 1891 Juliet Mary, daughter of Frederic Seebohm, LL.D., D.Litt., of the Hermitage, Hitchin, but had no children. He died at Whitchurch on Sunday, April 18th, 1925, with the diagnosis of ruptured abdominal aneurysm, but there was no post-mortem examination. He was buried at Whitchurch. Lady Godlee survived him. Many honours fell to Rickman Godlee. He was surgeon to the Household in the time of Queen Victoria, and Surgeon in Ordinary to King Edward VII and to King George V. He was created a baronet in 1912 and was decorated K.C.V.O. in 1914. He was a Fellow of University College, London, an Hon. LL.D. of the University of Toronto, a Fellow of the American College of Surgeons, and an Hon. M.D. of Trinity College, Dublin. A striking portrait in oils was presented to the College by Lady Godlee in 1925. Godlee retained to the last many traces of his Quaker ancestry. Absolutely honest, downright, and somewhat sarcastic, he took nothing for granted that was capable of demonstration. Whatever he undertook was done thoroughly, and he thus became an expert oarsman, for he loved the river; a good carpenter; an excellent farmer; and a field naturalist. His artistic tastes extended beyond drawing, for he made a fine collection of etchings and was an expert in books, their paper and their binding. Courteous in manner and easy of address, he filled the office of President of the College with great dignity. He was a good teacher, but not so good as Marcus Beck, and he left no school as did his cousin. He operated well and did much to improve the surgery of the chest, and more to ensure that his uncle's methods were carried out in their entirety. He left about £94,000, and, after making certain specific bequests, directed that the residue should be divided between University College Hospital and College, £10,000 being devoted to the foundation of Travelling Scholarships. PUBLICATIONS:- Godlee has a permanent place in the history of surgery both for his *Life of Lister* and for the part he took in collecting and publishing Lister's writings:- (i) *Lord Lister*, 8vo, portraits, illustrations, etc., London, 1917; 3rd ed., revised, 8vo, Oxford 1924. This biography is written, like all Godlee's works, in excellent idiomatic English. It is written, too, in the spirit dictated by Lister himself, who said that "a scientist's public life lies in the work that is his". That is to say, the main part of the biography is a history of antiseptic surgery written by one who was intimately associated with Lister in his experimental work and its developments, and who for many years, in association with Sir W. Watson Cheyne, assisted him in his operative practice. It includes, therefore, a graphic sketch of Victorian medicine in Edinburgh, Glasgow, and London, as well as on the Continent. It shows how the revolutionary doctrines were received and the spirit in which they were interpreted. (ii) *The Collected Papers of Joseph, Baron Lister*, 2 vols., 4to, Oxford, at the Clarendon Press, 1909. These volumes were prepared for the Press by a committee consisting of Sir Hector C. Cameron, Sir William Watson Cheyne, Bart., Rickman J. Godlee, C. J. Martin, M.D., and Dawson Williams, M.D. The volumes are illustrated throughout and must always remain the classical corpus of Lister's work. Amongst his other publications are: - *An Atlas of Human Anatomy illustrating most of the Ordinary Dissections and many not usually Practised by the Student*, 8vo, London, 1880. Parts I-V were published in 1877-8. "Cases of Intussusception treated by Operation." - *Lancet*, 1898, ii, 1262. "Case of Rare Fracture of the Radius," 8vo, London, 1884; reprinted from *Clin. Soc. Trans*., 1883, xvi, 120. "Nephrectomy for Tumour in an Infant," from *Clin. Soc. Trans.*, 1885, xviii, 31. "On a Case of Obstruction of One Ureter by a Calculus, accompanied by Complete Suppression of Urine," 8vo, London, 1887; reprinted from *Med.-Chir. Trans.*, 1887, lxx, 237. "Surgical Treatment of Empyema" and of "Pulmonary Cavities," Lectures, *Lancet*, 1886, i, 51; 1887, i, 457. "Reflections suggested by a Series of Cases of Renal Calculus." - *Practitioner*, 1887, xxxix, 241, 329. "Some Cases of Abdominal Cysts following Injury," from *Clin. Soc. Trans*., 1887, xx, 219. *Introductory Address in the Faculty of Medicine at University College, London, October,* 1889, 8vo, London, 1889. "On the Surgical Aspect of Hepatic Abscess. Being three Lectures delivered at the Hospital for Consumption and Diseases of the Chest, Brompton," 8vo, 7 illustrations, London, 1890; reprinted from *Brit. Med. Jour.,* 1890, i, 61, etc. *The Past, Present and Future of the School of Advanced Medical Studies of University College, London:* being the Introductory Address at the Opening of the Winter Session, October, 1906, 8vo, illustrated, London, 1907. *The Bradshaw Lecture on Prognosis in Relation to Treatment of Tuberculosis of the Genito-urinary Organs,* delivered before the Royal College of Surgeons of England, December, 1907, with portrait of Dr. William Wood Bradshaw, 8vo, London, 1908. *The Hunterian Oration* delivered at The Royal College of Surgeons, 1913, with portraits of John Hunter and of the several conservators, plates of the Museum, John Hunter's death-mask, etc., 8vo, London, 1913. *Birmingham and Midland Institute. Our Attitude towards Modern Miracles.* A Presidential Address, 1919, 8vo, portrait, 1919. "Thomas Wharton Jones," with portrait, and bibliography of Wharton Jones, 8vo, London, 1921; reprinted from *Brit. Jour. Ophthalmol*., 1921, v, 97, 145. *The Diseases of the Lungs* (with JAMES KINGSTON FOWLER), 8vo, London and New York, 1898. Godlee revised the 6th and 7th editions of Heath's *Practical Anatomy*, 8vo, 24 coloured plates, London, 1885 and 1888. Appendix, "Superficial and Surgical Anatomy" (with G.D. THANE), in Quain's *Anatomy*, 10th ed., 8vo, London, 1896. *Two Cases of Bronchiectiasis,* etc (with Charles Theodore Williams), 8vo, London, 1886. "Stretching of the Facial Nerve for the Relief of Spasm of the Facial Muscles" (with W. ALLEN STURGE), 8vo, London, 1881; reprinted from *Clin. Soc. Trans.*, 1881, xiv, 44. "The Doctors and Mr. Lloyd George. Reply of the Royal Colleges" (with Sir THOMAS BARLOW), a letter in *The Times*, 1912, Feb. 15. *Six Papers by Lord Lister, with a Short Biography and Explanatory Notes by Sir Rickman J. Godlee, Bt., K.C.V.O.* (Medical Classics Series), 8vo, portraits, coloured plates, etc., London, 1921. *See also* Holmes and Hulke's *Surgery*. A further list of pamphlets is contained in a volume of *Pamphlets and Reprints*, presented to the Library by Lady Godlee after Sir Rickman's death. Among the 37 titles are a number not mentioned in the foregoing bibliography.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000221
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Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Story, Harold Frederick Rowe (1924 - 2009)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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/373231373231
Occupation Urologist
Details Harold Story was a urologist at the Royal Melbourne Hospital and at the Austin Hospital, Heidelberg, Victoria. He was born in Melbourne on 8 November 1924 and was educated at Melbourne University High School and Melbourne University, where he was awarded a prosectorship and Dwight’s anatomy prize. On qualifying, he was a resident medical officer at the Royal Melbourne Hospital (from 1947 to 1948) and then became a demonstrator in anatomy while studying for the primary, at which he won the Gordon Taylor prize in 1949. He did junior posts at the Royal Melbourne Hospital, as a demonstrator in clinical surgery, in anatomy and in pathological histology. He then went to England to study for the final FRCS. Having passed the fellowship, he became a urological registrar at the Whittington Hospital and was later a clinical registrar and then a senior surgical registrar (resident surgical officer) at St Peter’s Hospital for Stone (from 1955 to 1956), where he worked under Alec Badenoch, John Sandrey and David Wallace. He then returned to the Royal Melbourne Hospital, at first as an associate assistant to J B Somerset and later as an honorary surgeon. He was the first urologist at the Austin Hospital, where he set up a urological department and remained its head for more than 40 years, becoming an expert in the treatment of urological tuberculosis and spinal injuries, and in particular the treatment of the large staghorn stones, which occurred in these patients. He was also the first urologist at the Peter MacCallum Clinic (Cancer Institute). He was a wing commander in the Specialist Reserve for the Royal Australian Air Force He married Jean Lesley McKenzie and they had two sons, Rowan (an oral and maxillofacial surgeon) and Ian. His many interests included the history of surgery and of surgical instruments, and he was the honorary curator of the collection at the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons. In 2005, a Harold Story Memorial annual lecture was inaugurated. He died on 12 July 2009.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001048
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Tainsh, John McNeill ( - 2007)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2010-10-14 2012-03-09
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/373232373232
Occupation General surgeon
Details John Tainsh passed the FRCS in 1946 and returned to Vancouver, where his death on 3 January 2007 was notified to the College by his daughter.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001049
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
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First Title value, for Searching Tooms, Douglas ( - 2007)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Weisl, Hanuš (1925 - 2007)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by K M N Kunzru
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/373234373234
Occupation Orthopaedic surgeon Trauma surgeon
Details Hanuš Weisl was a consultant orthopaedic and trauma surgeon in South Glamorgan, Wales. He escaped his native Prague in the last kindertransport to London in June 1939. His parents, Alfred, a dentist, and Marie née Mandler, a doctor, eventually joined him in England after the Second World War. After qualifying from Manchester, he acquired British citizenship. He was appointed as a house officer in Manchester Royal Infirmary in 1948 at the inception of the NHS. After serving as an assistant lecturer in anatomy at his medical school, he worked as a surgical registrar at Rhyl, and became a senior registrar in orthopaedics at Cardiff and at Prince of Wales Orthopaedic Hospital, Rhydlafar (near Cardiff). Working with Dilwynn Evans, he developed a special interest in children’s deformities. He was appointed as a consultant orthopaedic surgeon in Bolton in 1963, and returned to Wales in 1969 to Cardiff and Rhydlafar as a consultant, specialising in club feet, and later in deformities caused by spina bifida. He published on many subjects, mostly children’s orthopaedic problems, including papers on skull caliper tractions and hip problems in spina bifida. He died on 17 July 2007 from a cerebral haemorrhage after a fall at home. His wife, Reba, predeceased him in 1997. He left a daughter and a grand-daughter.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001051
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Wolfson, Leonard Gordon, Baron Wolfson of Marylebone in the City of Westminster (1927 - 2010)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Wyatt, Arthur Powell (1932 - 2009)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Christopher Russell
Publication Date 2010-10-14 2012-03-08
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/373236373236
Occupation General surgeon
Details Arthur Powell Wyatt was a consultant surgeon in the Greenwich health district. He was born in Hornsey, Middlesex, on 14 October 1932. His father, Henry George Wyatt, a medical missionary in China, died as a neutral during the Sino-Japanese War in 1938. His mother, Edith Maud née Holden, also a missionary, was a teacher. Arthur spent his early childhood in China, before returning to England in 1940 to attend Eltham College, then the school for the sons of missionaries. During the war it was evacuated to Taunton School and afterwards returned to Eltham. Wyatt entered St Bartholomew's Hospital, qualifying in 1955 with the Walsham prize in surgical pathology. After junior posts, he passed the FRCS in 1960 and became a lecturer in surgery at St Bartholomew's for two years. He then became a senior registrar at King's College Hospital, from which he was seconded to the post of postgraduate research surgeon at Moffat Hospital, University of California, San Francisco (from 1965 to 1966). In 1967, he joined Austin Wheatley at the Brook General Hospital to establish a vascular service, his experience at St Bartholomew's under Taylor, in San Francisco and at King's making him almost uniquely qualified for such a position. Austin Wheatley died prematurely in 1969 and was replaced by Arthur Wyatt, Mervyn Rosenburg and Ellis Field in 1970. They soon established the Brook as one of the places in London in the 1970s for young surgeons to establish their credentials in surgery. The hospital provided a wide range of experience with a heavy emergency workload. Arthur proved a master at difficult and complex operations, having wide experience in pneumatosis coli, oxygen therapy, transhiatal oesophagectomy for carcinoma, thoracic sympathectomy for axillary hyperhidrosis and introducing new methods of fixation for rectal prolapse. He took a full and active part in hospital management, as well as being a regional adviser in general surgery for the South East Thames Region. He was an active member, secretary and president of the surgical and proctological sections of the Royal Society of Medicine. He was a member of the Court of Examiners of our College. He was well recognised locally and became president of the West Kent Medico-Chirurgical Society. Like his parents, Arthur was a committed Christian, and was active in the Christian Medical Fellowship. After retirement, he retraced his Chinese experience to re-establish links with that country. He developed his long term interest in gardening. It was while establishing his new garden that he became aware of the tumour which eventually proved fatal. He accepted the diagnosis with calm bolstered by his Christian faith. He died on 11 October 2009 and was survived by his wife, Margaret Helen née Cox, whom he married in 1955, and their three sons, John, Robert and Andrew. A son, David, predeceased him.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001053
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
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First Title value, for Searching Harvey, John Scott (1946 - 2010)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by N Alan Green
Publication Date 2010-11-11
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001000-E001099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373237373237
Occupation General surgeon
Details John Harvey was appointed as a consultant general surgeon at the Llandough Hospital in 1982. The hospital later became an integral part of Cardiff Medical School, and was renamed 'University Hospital Llandough' in 2008 during the celebrations marking the 75th anniversary of the hospital and 125 years of Cardiff University. Harvey was born on 5 April 1946 in Manchester into a non-medical family, the son of Arthur Harvey, a clerk who worked for the Manchester Ship Canal Company, and his wife Eliza Jane née Scott, a coalminer's daughter. After secondary schooling at Manchester Grammar School, where he was a foundation scholar, he entered the University of Leeds for his medical training. Qualifying in 1968, he held house appointments at the Leeds General Infirmary. He obtained his MPhil when he was a university lecturer in physiology and passed the FRCS when working on rotating appointments in the Leeds area. To gain more practical experience, he proceeded to a surgical registrar appointment at the Clayton and Pinderfield hospitals in Wakefield. Most of his higher surgical training took place in Wales, as a senior registrar in South Glamorgan, and he acquired a specialist interest in vascular surgery during this period. Over the years he became the respected 'anchorman' of the Cardiff vascular service. He was active in many aspects of Welsh surgical practice, becoming president of the Welsh Surgical Society and also an excellent chairman of the Welsh Surgical Travelling Club. Fond of teaching both undergraduates and postgraduates, in a student yearbook he was quoted as saying: "if you want to pass the exam you need to use the correct words: to gain a distinction you need to put them in the right order". He was a very private man in many ways, but had a keen sense of humour. He would never flout his learning, but when he took an interest in a subject his knowledge took many by surprise. There were many family holidays to the USA, and he became interested in the American Civil War and was an ardent fan of baseball. He staggered and entertained all his colleagues with a verbatim recitation of all 13 stanzas of the famous baseball poem 'Casey at the Bat' at one of the local surgical society meetings. His colleagues described him as "one of the most self-deprecating and caring surgeons" they knew. In 1968 John Harvey married Maureen Grayson: they had one daughter, Rachel Elizabeth, and a son, James. A sufferer from diabetes, he withstood the rigours of treatment for leukaemia and maintained the unique ability of never being rude to anyone, even during the final days when aplastic anaemia developed and his suffering was great. He died on 6 January 2010 in South Glamorgan.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001054
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
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First Title value, for Searching Pyrah, Leslie Norman (1899 - 1995)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2008-03-11 2014-07-18
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000400-E000499
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372650372650
Occupation General surgeon Urological surgeon Urologist
Details Leslie Norman Pyrah was born at Farnley, near Leeds, on 11 April 1899, the son of a headmistress. Unfortunately no further details of his forbears are available. He was educated at Leeds Central High School and served in the army during the final stages of the first world war. He then read medicine at Leeds University, interrupting his course to take an honours degree in physiology. On qualification he did a wide variety of resident training posts during the next five years, notably with Berkeley Moynihan at the Leeds General Infirmary, where he became surgical tutor. In 1932 he secured a travelling scholarship to visit urological centres in Berlin, Vienna, Copenhagen, Innsbruck and Paris, and was then appointed assistant surgeon to the Leeds Infirmary and Public Dispensary in 1934. He was also visiting surgeon to a number of neighbouring hospitals and lecturer in surgery to Leeds University. Following appointment as consultant surgeon to St James's Hospital in 1940 and to the Infirmary in 1944 he built up a large general surgical practice. In 1948 he was elected to the council of the British Association of Urological Surgeons (BAUS) which had only formed three years earlier. He then co-founded the Urological Club, comprising urologists from the teaching hospitals. His consuming interest in urology led him to give up his general surgical practice and start a department of urology in Leeds. By 1956 he was appointed professor of urological surgery in his outstandingly successful department which had attracted researchers of the highest calibre. In the same year he became director of the Medical Research Council Unit in Leeds and set up the first renal haemodialysis unit in the UK with Dr Frank Parsons as its head. He and Professor Bill Spiers persuaded the Wellcome Foundation and other benefactors to fund a four storey research building for the Infirmary which was completed in 1959. Pyrah did outstanding and tireless work in promoting urology and urological specialist centres throughout Britain. He was President of the Urological Section of the Royal Society of Medicine in 1958; President of BAUS from 1961 to 1963; a member of College Council from 1960 to 1968 and was appointed CBE in 1963. In his youth Leslie Pyrah was a gifted pianist (at one time considering a possible career as a concert pianist) as well as a formidable tennis player. He enjoyed good food and wine and was an excellent cook with a particular taste for sauces. He also collected Chinese porcelain and Dutch paintings. Affectionately known as 'Poppah Pyrah' he had a somewhat portly figure and, even in the hottest climate, he always wore a mackintosh and a crumpled grey felt hat. He was a true Yorkshireman of rugged independence, friendly and approachable, never pulling rank and notably hospitable at all times. Pyrah married Mary Christopher Bailey in 1934. She died in 1990 and they had a son and a daughter who survived him when he died on 30 April 1995, another son having predeceased him.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000466
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Potts, William (1816 - 1896)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Pounds, Thomas Henderson (1859 - 1904)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Powell, Lewis (1797 - 1867)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Power, Henry (1829 - 1911)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2012-10-10
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E002000-E002999/E002900-E002999
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/375169375169
Occupation Anatomist Ophthalmic surgeon Physiologist
Details Born on September 3rd, 1829, the son of John Francis Power, a Captain in the 35th (Royal) Sussex Regiment, by his second wife, Hannah, the youngest daughter of Henry Simpson, a banker at Whitby, Yorkshire. His father, who received his commission at the age of 14, had served through the Peninsular and Baltic campaigns as a Cornet in the 3rd Dragoons, King's German Legion, and is mentioned in the regimental history as having been beaten black and blue with sabres at the Sahagun skirmish in 1808. He was also present at Waterloo as a Lieutenant in the 3rd Regiment of Hussars in the King's German Legion. Henry Power was born at Nantes when the service companies of the 35th Regiment were under orders for Barbadoes, and narrowly escaped death in the great West Indian hurricane of August 11th, 1881, when two sergeants and five privates were killed, the baby being buried unhurt in its cradle. The same hurricane nearly killed Haynes Walton (qv), who afterwards became Ophthalmic Surgeon to St Mary's Hospital. Captain Power retired on half-pay as a Major in 1833, and led a wandering life in England until he was appointed Lieutenant-Colonel commanding the depot of the British Foreign Legion at Shorncliffe in August, 1855. Henry Power, therefore, had a desultory education at several schools, amongst others at Cheltenham College, which he entered as a day-boy at Easter, 1842, the College having been opened at Bays Hill Terrace with 100 boys on July 29th, 1841. There he remained until he was apprenticed in 1844 to Thomas Lowe Wheeler, the son of Thomas Wheeler (1754-1847), Apothecary to St Bartholomew's Hospital and one of the great field botanists of his generation. Henry Power learned nothing from his master, who soon died, when he was transferred to his son Thomas Rivington Wheeler, but formed a boyish friendship with "Thomas Wheeler the old gentleman", then aged 90. From him he learnt some Latin and Greek and the field botany which enabled him to win the Galen and Linnean Silver Medals at the Society of Apothecaries in 1851. Power seems to have drifted into medicine by accident. His father, his father's father, and his great-grandfather had all been in the Army, and they knew of only two classes of doctors, the regimental surgeon and the man who kept an open shop. There was, at any rate, no money to buy a commission, and Major Power had not sufficient influence to obtain one for his son as had been done in his own case. In October, 1844, he entered St Bartholomew's Hospital and soon became intimate with William Scovell Savory (qv), who like himself was a friendless lad without introductions. At Savory's instigation Power was induced to matriculate at the University of London. He was, however, under pledge to return to his master's house as soon as the early morning lecture was finished, and consequently never saw much of the clinical side of the hospital work. He spent his spare time in reading Shakespeare and such poets as were on the shelves of the Wheelers' library. He married on December 21st, 1854, his first cousin and playmate Ann Simpson, the youngest daughter of Thomas Simpson, of Meadowfield, Whitby, Yorkshire, on the strength of becoming a Demonstrator of Anatomy at the Westminster Hospital. The marriage proved a great success, and with his wife he survived to celebrate the fiftieth anniversary of the wedding. A living was made at 3 Grosvenor Terrace (now 56 Belgrave Road), SW, by coaching and taking resident pupils, and the London University Scholarships which produced £100 for two years "were a godsend". The hard work and strain led to a severe attack of pleurisy in 1855, for which he was nursed at Shorncliffe Camp under the supervision of William S Savory, who sent him to convalesce at St Helier's in Jersey. In June, 1855, he was elected Assistant Surgeon to the Westminster Ophthalmic Hospital, where he came under the notice of G J Guthrie (qv), who dissuaded him from accepting the post of assistant in the anatomical department of the University of Edinburgh, which was subsequently filled by Sir William Turner. He retired from the Westminster Ophthalmic Hospital in 1889 and was then elected Consulting Surgeon and a member of the Board of Management. In 1857 he became Assistant Surgeon to the Westminster Hospital, where he lectured for ten years, first on comparative anatomy and afterwards on human anatomy and on physiology. His teaching was appreciated by the students, who presented him with an address and a silver salver at the end of the session 1859-1860. He remained an Assistant Surgeon until 1867, by which time he had determined to devote himself entirely to ophthalmology. He was elected Ophthalmic Surgeon to St George's Hospital in 1867, and on July 27th, 1870, he was appointed to the newly made post of Ophthalmic Surgeon at St Bartholomew's Hospital, with Bowater J Vernon (qv) as his junior. The two colleagues worked together in the greatest harmony for twenty-four years and raised the department to a state of high efficiency. During the whole of this time they had but one Ward Sister - Miss Mary Davies - known to many generations of house surgeons and students as 'Sister Eyes'. Power also acted for twelve years as Ophthalmic Surgeon at St Bartholomew's Hospital, Chatham, leaving London every Wednesday at two o'clock and returning by the boat train at six - visits which he enjoyed because he always made friends with his fellow-passengers on the journey, many of whom were returning from service abroad. An original member of the Ophthalmological Society of the United Kingdom, Power was Vice-President from 1882-1885, Bowman Lecturer in 1887, and President from 1890-1893. He also served as one of the Vice-Presidents of the Section of Ophthalmology at the Seventh International Congress of Medicine held in London in 1881. At the Royal College of Surgeons Power was a member of the Board of Examiners in Anatomy and Physiology from 1875-1880, again from 1881-1884, and as an Examiner in Physiology from 1884-1886. He was a Member of Council from 1879-1890 and Vice-President in 1885. He delivered the Arris and Gale Lectures on anatomy and physiology in 1882-1883; was Hunterian Professor of Surgery and Pathology, 1885-1887; Bradshaw Lecturer in, and, like Paget, Savory, Butlin, and Moynihan, delivered the Hunterian Oration without a note in 1889. He was active as an examiner in physiology at the Universities of Oxford, Cambridge, London, and Durham, having as his colleagues Rolleston, Michael Foster, Huxley, and Hare Philipson, with all of whom he long maintained the most friendly relations. At the Royal Veterinary College in Camden Town he served as Professor of Physiology from 1881-1904, and the students treated him as a trusted friend and adviser. His former pupils in England presented him with a testimonial on his retirement, whilst those practising in South Africa sent him a handsome silver lamp. At the Harveian Society of London he was elected for two consecutive terms of office as President in 1880 and 1881. He was a Vice-President of the Royal Medico-Chirurgical Society in 1892-1893, and was several times a Member of the Council and of the Library Committee. At the British Medical Association he was President of the Home Counties Branch, and held office as Secretary, Vice-President, or President of the Sections of Ophthalmology, Physiology, and the combined Section of Ophthalmology and Otology at various periods between 1869 and 1895. He was also President of the Society for employing the blind as masseurs, Surgeon to the Linen and Woollen Drapers' Benevolent Fund and to the Artists' Benevolent Fund. Power was engaged in literary work throughout his life. With a competent knowledge of German derived from his father and from his grandmother, who was a Dutch woman, he did much for the New Sydenham Society. He translated *The Aural Surgery of the Present Day*, by Wilhelm Kramer, in 1863; in 1870 he translated Stricker's *Manual of Human and Comparative Histology*, and from 1865-1874 he was co-editor for the Society of *A Biennial Retrospect of Medicine, Surgery, etc*. From 1879-1899 he carried out in conjunction with Dr Leonard Sedgwick *The Lexicon of Medicine and the Allied Sciences based on Mayne's Lexicon*. It was planned on too large a scale and the editors only finished to the letter O, the rest of the alphabet being completed by George Parker, a son of Professor William Kitchin Parker, FRS. Power also translated in 1876 Professor Erb's article "On Disease of the Peripheral Cerebrospinal Nerves" for Ziemssen's *Cyclopoedia of the Practice of Medicine* - a particularly difficult piece of work as it was written in involved and provincial German. From 1864-1876 he edited the sixth, seventh, eighth, and ninth editions of Carpenter's *Principles of Human Physiology* - a perfect mine of information. Each edition had to be literally rewritten, as physiology was then leaving the traditional lines and was becoming a new experimental science. The book was finally displaced by the text-books of Michael Foster and Herman translated by Arthur Gamgee. He also published in 1884 a small but useful *Elements of Human Physiology* which had a widespread popularity and ran through several editions. Having considerable talent as a painter in water-colours, he made many drawings of the interesting ophthalmic cases which presented themselves in the Out-patient Department of the Westminster Ophthalmic Hospital. These were embodied in his *Illustrations of Some of the Principal Diseases of the Eye* published in 1867. The book was one of the first English text-books containing coloured drawings of the fundus of the eye as seen with the ophthalmoscope. They were reproduced by chromolithography, which did not do justice to the original drawings, and are now preserved at St Bartholomew's Hospital. From 1881 onwards he busied himself in reconstructing Bagdale Hall, Whitby, a house built about 1540, which had long been in the possession of his wife's family. Here he spent his holidays, and here, in 1898, happened the tragedy which threw a shadow over the rest of his life. Whilst watching a summer storm on the unprotected east pier, his artist daughter and a grandchild were swept by a wave into the sea at a time when no boat could leave the harbour. The two girls were drowned though both were expert swimmers, and he himself escaped with the greatest difficulty. He left London shortly afterwards and retired to Whitby, where he cultivated friendships and gave popular lectures to the townspeople on a variety of subjects. In November, 1910, he strained his heart one Sunday morning whilst mounting the 199 steps to the parish church, which is situated on the edge of the cliff close to the Abbey. The effects never passed off, he suffered many distressing attacks of dyspnoea, and died at Bagdale Hall on January 18th, 1911, survived by his wife, four sons, and three daughters out of a total family of eleven children. He was buried in the cemetery which lies between the sea and the high moors, the town showing its sympathy by closing the shops, although it was market day. Henry Power was a good instance of heredity. His versatility, friendliness, and courtesy showed his South Irish ancestry; his dogged perseverance in the production of such monumental undertakings as Carpenter's *Physiology and the Lexicon of Medical Terms* was derived from the Dutch and Quaker strain; his agnosticism - for he neither affirmed nor denied - his carelessness of money, and his want of business aptitude were the outcome of several generations of military forbears, who, being always on active service, lived from hand to mouth and accumulated nothing. The business capacity derived from the long line of bankers on his mother's side missed him indeed, but appeared in the person of one of his grandchildren, Mr F D'Arcy Cooper - who became the successful Chairman of Levers, a soap company dealing with many millions of capital. His artistic ability - derived entirely from his father - was markedly transmitted to two of his daughters, one of whom was an excellent portrait painter, the other a beautiful bookbinder. As an ophthalmic surgeon Henry Power was a younger member of the band who made ophthalmic practice a specialty, having first been trained in general surgery like Bowman and Critchett. He was a good and careful operator, more especially in the extraction of cataract; as a clinical teacher painstaking, and as a lecturer fluent and interesting. There are two oil paintings by his daughter Lucy Beatrice Power, both of which were exhibited at the Royal Academy. The earlier one is at Melbourne, Victoria, in the possession of his grandchildren; the other, three-quarter-length, seated with a perimeter, belongs to Sir D'Arcy Power, KBE, FRCS. It was painted by subscription and was engraved. Both are excellent likenesses in a characteristic attitude. A speaking likeness is reproduced in the Centenary number of the *Lancet* (1923, ii, 751), for it reflects the kindliness he always showed to students. Power also appears in Jamyn Brookes's portrait group of the Council in 1884, and the *Brief Sketch* also contains a portrait reproduced by Emery Walker.
Resource Identifier RCS: E002986
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Charleton, George Washbourn ( - 1881)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Chater, George (1812 - 1883)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Chavasse, Charles Allen ( - 1863)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Chavasse, Pye Henry (1810 - 1879)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-04-20 2018-03-05
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/373333373333
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born at Cirencester, was apprenticed to his cousin, Thomas Chavasse (qv), then in practice at Old Square, Birmingham. Later he studied at University College Hospital, and having qualified began practice in Birmingham, especially among women and children. He was a regular attendant at the meetings of the Birmingham Branch of the British Medical Association; also at one time he was President of Queen's College Medico-Chirurgical Society. Frank and genial, he was a good colleague. Five years before his death he retired, suffering from cerebrospinal sclerosis, and died at Edgbaston on September 20th, 1879. His photograph is in the Fellows' Album. Publications: He was the author of popular works on motherhood, subjects which ran through many editions, and were translated into nearly all European and many Asiatic languages, as also American editions. They include: *Advice to a Mother on the Management of her Children, and on the Treatment on the Moment of some of their more pressing Illnesses and Accidents*, 9th ed, Philadelphia, 1868; 18th ed, 1878. *Counsel to a Mother*, being a continuation and completion of *Advice to a Mother*, Philadelphia, 1871. *Advice to a Wife on the Management of her own Health, and on the Treatment of some of the Complaints incidental to Pregnancy, Labour, and Suckling*, 12th ed, Philadelphia, 1871. *Physical Training of Children, or Advice to Parents*, Philadelphia, 1571. *Aphorisms for a Mother*, 2nd ed, 1877. "A Chart of Auscultation and Percussion." - *Lancet*, 1881-2, ii, 260. "Treatment of Scarlatina Anginosa." - *Assoc. Med. Jour.*, 1856, 210. Different editions of these works show certain changes of title, as do also the American editions. In his particular branch of medical authorship he may be said to have been the successor of Conquest and Bull. "The Mental Culture and Training of Children." - *The Mother's Book*, Philadelphia, 1880.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001150
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Chavasse, Thomas (1800 - 1884)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-04-20
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001100-E001199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373334373334
Occupation General surgeon
Details Thomas Chavasse, originally of French extraction, came of a family who had practised for generations at Burford, Oxfordshire. His father, who had qualified before there was a vacancy in the family practice, started in Walsall, where Thomas Chavasse was born in 1800. He went to a Kensington School, and at 16 was apprenticed as resident pupil for five years in the General Hospital, Birmingham. After that he became a student at St Bartholomew's, and a follower of Abernethy. On returning to Birmingham in 1822, he quickly obtained the largest general practice. Working early and late, in 1850 his health gave way; he moved to Leamington and purchased property at Wylde Green. After a rest of three years he was able to recommence consulting practice, acquiring a wide county connection, and attending on two days a week at the Minories, Birmingham. At Sutton Coldfield, near which is Wylde Green, he was a member of the Corporation, and for three years Warden, or Mayor. He was one of the first members of the Provincial Medical and Surgical Association which enlarged into the British Medical Association, and a Trustee of the Medical Benevolent Society. He married twice and left ten children, his sixth son being Sir Thomas Chavasse (qv). He died at Wylde Green House on October 19th, 1884, and the *Birmingham Daily Post* published an appreciation of him as a family practitioner.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001151
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Pinker, Sir George Douglas (1924 - 2007)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2007-11-08
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000400-E000499
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372608372608
Occupation Obstetrician and gynaecologist
Details George Pinker, Surgeon-Gynaecologist to the Queen from 1973 to 1990, was born in Calcutta on 6 December 1924, the son of Ronald Douglas Pinker and Queenie Elizabeth née Dix. Like so many English children in those days, he went to England at the age of four, and was educated at Reading School. He went on to St Mary’s Hospital in 1942 to study medicine. He had a fine baritone voice and, having played Pish-Tush in a school production of *The Mikado*, he was offered a contract with the D’Oyly Carte Company, but decided to continue in medicine. After junior posts he did National Service in the RAMC, serving in Singapore, and returned to specialise in obstetrics and gynaecology at St Mary’s and the Radcliffe Infirmary, Oxford. He was appointed consultant gynaecologist and obstetrician at St Mary’s in 1958, and this was followed by appointments at King Edward VII Hospital for Officers, the Middlesex Hospital, and Queen Charlotte’s and Bolingbroke hospitals. He succeeded Sir John Peel as Surgeon-Gynaecologist to the Queen and attended nine royal births, insisting on each occasion that the deliveries would take place in St Mary’s Hospital rather than at home, on grounds of safety. He received many honours, was president of the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists from 1987 to 1990, and president of the Royal Society of Medicine from 1992 to 1995. His many publications included contributions to Gynaecology by ten teachers, *Obstetrics by ten teachers* (both London, Edward Arnold, 1980 and 1985) and *A short textbook of gynaecology and obstetrics* (London, English Universities Press, 1967). George Pinker was a man of unusual charm. He had many interests, most notably music (he was vice-president of the London Choral Society in 1988), skiing, gardening and sailing. He married Dorothy Emma Russell, who predeceased him after a long illness, when he cared for her. They had three sons and one daughter. His last days were marred by the development of Parkinsonism, which he suffered with great stoicism. He died on 29 April 2007.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000424
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Stevens, Hugh Edward George (1934 - 2006)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2007-11-08
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000400-E000499
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372609372609
Occupation Orthopaedic surgeon
Details Hugh Stevens was an orthopaedic surgeon in New Zealand. He was born in Invercargill, on the South Island, where his father was a schoolmaster. The family eventually moved to Oxford, in North Canterbury, where Stevens was educated. He also went to school at Sumner and attended Christchurch Boys’ High School. He studied medicine at Otago University, graduating in 1958. He was one of the first house surgeons at the new Princess Margaret Hospital in Christchurch. In the early 1960s he went to the UK to specialise in orthopaedics, training in London, Southampton and at Oswestry. He gained his FRCS in 1964. In 1966 he returned to Christchurch as a full-time surgeon to the North Canterbury Hospital Board. Three years later he gained his fellowship of the Australasian College, and in 1970 spent three months at Melbourne’s Royal Children’s Hospital. In Christchurch he established the first paediatric clinic in the region for children with musculo-skeletal disorders, while also working as a consultant surgeon in the public hospital system. From 1970 he was a surgeon at the artificial limb centre. He was an orthopaedic examiner for the FRACS and then senior NZ orthopaedic examiner from 1991 to 1993. From 1989 to 1991 he was vice president of the New Zealand Orthopaedic Association, and president of the Paediatric Orthopaedic Society of New Zealand from 1995 to 1997. He was married twice. He had five children from his first marriage, which broke up in 1973. Three years later he married Marie South. In 1980 they moved out of Christchurch, to Prebbleton. He became interested in horses, and was a committee member of the New Zealand Metropolitan Trotting Club, and was the successful part-owner of a race horse. He also bred poll dorset sheep. He died in December 2006.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000425
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Chesshire, Edwin (1819 - 1903)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Kmiot, Witold Andrzej Wladyslaw (1959 - 2006)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Sir Barry Jackson
Publication Date 2007-11-22 2018-05-10
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000400-E000499
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372611372611
Occupation Colorectal surgeon
Details Wit Kmiot was a consultant in general and colorectal surgery at St Thomas' Hospital, London. He was born in London on 15 August 1959, to Polish parents. He was an undergraduate at King's College, London, and Westminster Medical School, qualifying in 1983. House officer appointments in Poole and King's Lynn were followed by an accident and emergency post at Charing Cross Hospital. He then moved to the Midlands and spent his registrar and senior registrar years in different hospitals in Birmingham. During this time he developed an interest in colorectal surgery and was awarded a travelling fellowship to the Cleveland Clinic in Florida, where he gained special coloproctological experience. He spent time as a research fellow in the academic department of surgery in Birmingham, where he studied the aetiology of acute reservoir ileitis after restorative proctocolectomy. In 1991 the resulting thesis was accepted for the degree of master of surgery, and in the same year he was awarded a Hunterian Professorship by the college for this work. In 1994 he returned to London as senior lecturer and honorary consultant in colorectal surgery at the Royal Postgraduate Medical School, Hammersmith, working with Robin Williamson. He remained in this post for two years, before moving to an NHS consultant appointment at the Central Middlesex Hospital. A year later, in 1998, he was appointed consultant in general and colorectal surgery to St Thomas' Hospital, where he worked until his untimely death at the age of 47. By the time of his death he had already established himself at the forefront of academic coloproctology, with a stream of published papers in peer reviewed journals, chapters in textbooks and oral presentations at meetings at home and overseas. His early research interests were in molecular biology and clinical immunology, but he later became particularly involved with anorectal physiology and 3-D endoanal ultrasound. He supervised the research of several trainees, all of whom gained a higher degree. He was a co-editor of the *International Journal of Colorectal Disease*. Married to a nurse, he had two sons to whom he was devoted. He was a gourmet and every year entertained his firm at St Thomas' to Christmas lunch at an exclusive private dining establishment. As an undergraduate he had been a first class rugby player, playing in the Wasps first 15 and representing Middlesex as well as the United Hospitals. Perhaps, therefore, it is no surprise that he was a large man physically. He also had a big personality and could at times be somewhat outspoken, a trait which did not always endear him. Very sadly, he was found to have a malignant brain tumour after being involved in a minor road traffic accident caused by impaired vision which he had not recognised. Despite surgery and chemotherapy he died within a few months of diagnosis on 17 November 2006.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000427
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Renton, Charles James Crawford (1930 - 2007)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2007-11-22
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/372612372612
Occupation General surgeon
Details Charles Renton was a consultant general surgeon in Hereford, specialising in vascular and breast surgery. He was born on 22 September 1930 in Glasgow, where his father and grandfather had been surgeons. He father was James Mill Renton, who worked at the Western Infirmary. His mother died three days after he was born and he was brought up by his grandmother, aunt and a governess, who became his stepmother. Charles was educated at Glenalmond College and Glasgow University. After house physician and house surgeon posts at the Western Infirmary and the Royal Hospital for Sick Children, Glasgow, Charles completed his National Service, as RMO to the 4/7th Dragoon Guards in Germany, being briefly recalled for the Suez crisis. Following his National Service, he held posts at the Southern General Hospital in Glasgow. He was a surgical registrar in Glasgow and Dumfries, and then senior surgical registrar at the Southern General Hospital, Nottingham General Hospital and at the Royal Hospital, Sheffield, where he was also a clinical tutor in surgery at Sheffield University. In 1969 he was appointed as a consultant surgeon in Hereford, with a special interest in vascular and breast surgery. Following his retirement, the oncology unit at Hereford County Hospital was named after him. He was president of the Herefordshire Medical Society and the local branch of the BMA. Always active, he played golf, fished and sailed, and in his retirement wrote and researched two books, *The story of Herefordshire’s hospitals* (Almeley, Logaston, 1999) and *The story of Hampton Park Church* (Wooton Almeley, Logaston Press, 2004). He married Margaret, also a Glasgow graduate, specialising in obstetrics and gynaecology, in 1959 and they had four daughters. He died on 9 February 2007 from complications following an atypical pneumonia.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000428
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Cheyne, Robert Romley (1811 - 1886)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Chicken, Rupert Cecil (1850 - 1925)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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

First Title value, for Searching Ross, Sir James Paterson (1895 - 1980)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-05-25 2012-03-09
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000200-E000299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372420372420
Occupation General surgeon
Details James Paterson Ross, the eldest of four sons of James Ross, an official in the Bank of England, and of May (née Paterson), was born in London on 26 May 1895. After early education at Christ's College, Finchley, he entered St Bartholomew's Hospital Medical School in 1912, with an entrance scholarship in science. He was an outstanding student and was awarded the Treasurer's Prize and a junior scholarship in anatomy and physiology. His studies were interrupted during the first world war when he served as a sergeant dispenser to the 1st London General Hospital but was released and returned to Bart's in 1915. He qualified with the Conjoint Diploma in 1917 and, after three months as a house surgeon to Cozens Bailey and Girling Ball, he entered the Royal Navy as a Surgeon-Lieutenant and was demobilised in 1919. After the war, Paterson Ross, as he was generally known, graduated in 1920 with distinction in surgery and forensic medicine and was awarded the Gold Medal. At Bart's he served as a demonstrator of physiology in 1920 and pathology, 1921-22. He passed the FRCS in 1922 and the MS in 1928. Shortly after he went to Boston for neurosurgical training under Dr Harvey Cushing by whom he was received almost as a member of the family. Returning to London in 1923 he joined Professor George Gask's newly established surgical professorial unit at Bart's. Together with Gask there developed a special interest in surgery of the sympathetic nervous system and Ross was awarded the Jacksonian Prize in 1931 for his essay on this subject. In the same year he gave a Hunterian Lecture on the treatment of cerebral tumours with radium. In 1933 he gave a second Hunterian Lecture on *Sympathectomy as an experiment in human physiology*, and was Hunterian Professor for the third time in 1939 when he lectured on *The effects of radium upon carcinoma of the breast.* During the period between the two world wars he was greatly influenced by Sir Thomas Dunhill who served first as assistant director and then associate surgeon to the professorial unit. Ross also influenced by Geoffrey Keynes's work on breast carcinoma and succeeded Keynes as private assistant to Lord Moynihan for the latter's London practice. On George Gask's retirement in 1935 Ross succeeded to the Professorial Chair at the age of 40. He had never been entirely happy in private practice and was admirably suited to this academic appointment, being an excellent teacher of undergraduates. He was a most competent clinician and a sound operator in his special fields though never entirely at ease with difficult technical work. On the outbreak of the second world war he moved with his unit to the Bart's sector hospital at Hill End, St Albans, and moved house there. He sometimes remarked with envy, though without rancour, on the excellent and undisturbed conditions under which his colleague Learmonth worked in his Edinburgh professorial unit during the war. However, at St Albans, he did conduct investigations into the bacteriology of war wounds and war injury of blood vessels. Before and at the beginning of the war Ross was responsible for organising the neurosurgical casualty service in London and East Anglia, though neurosurgery at Hill End was done by John O'Connell. After the war his unit was re-established at Bart's, but by then his time was increasingly occupied by committee work with little opportunity for research and publication. He was appointed civilian consultant surgeon to the Royal Navy and consulting surgeon to King Edward VII Convalescent Home for Officers, at Osborne, and the Papworth Village Settlement. He had been elected to the Council of the Royal College of Surgeons in 1943, became Vice-President, 1952-54, Bradshaw Lecturer in 1953 and President, 1957-60. From 1954 to 1957 he was Dean of the Institute of Basic Medical Sciences at the College and Arthur Sims Travelling Professor in 1957. In 1949, when King George VI had developed signs of serious ischaemic symptoms in one leg, at the suggestion of the then Sergeant Surgeon, Sir Thomas Dunhill, Paterson Ross and James Learmonth were called into consultation and then undertook a lumbar ganglionectomy operation. Both surgeons were created KCVO. Sir James Paterson Ross subsequently attended Sir Winston Churchill, assisting Dunhill with the repair of a large inguinal hernia. Dr Langton Hewer was the anaesthetist on that occasion and has related with piquant relish that Ross was treated by Dunhill as though he was still a house surgeon! Ross was appointed Surgeon to H.M. Queen Elizabeth II in 1952. Subsequent to this he received many honorary fellowships and degrees in the U.K., the Commonwealth and the U.S.A. On terminating his Presidency and vacating his Chair at Bart's he was created a Baronet. In the same year he succeeded Sir Francis Fraser as Director of the British Postgraduate Medical Federation, where he stayed until 1966. He remained actively interested in the College Court of Patrons and served as a Hunterian Trustee for the rest of his life. His obituarist in *The Times* was Sir Geoffrey Keynes who stated that Ross would be remembered as an outstanding technician and that it was his mental capacity, sound judgement and sympathetic understanding of patients which marked him out. He was not a prolific writer, but shared with Sir Ernest Rock Carling the editing of *British surgical practice*, a work in several volumes. Jim, as he was known to his friends, gained the affection of many of his colleagues, students and patients; but there were some people with whom he did not establish a warm relationship and easy rapport, and whom he judged badly. This was possibly due to an innate shyness and reserve, for he was a man of high ideals, humanity and selflessness. He married a Bart's ward sister, Margaret Townsend, in 1924. She was a great supporter of him throughout his career though she predeceased him in 1978. They had three sons, the first of whom died in infancy. The elder surviving son, Keith, is a cardiothoracic surgeon at Southampton, and the younger is a general surgeon at the Royal Berkshire Hospital, Reading. Sir James died in Oxford on 5 July 1980, during a convivial gathering of fellow professors, and is survived by his sons, the elder of whom inherited the Baronetcy.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000233
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Porritt, Arthur Espie, Baron Porritt of Wanganui and Hampstead (1900 - 1994)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-05-25 2012-03-13
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000200-E000299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372421372421
Occupation General surgeon
Details Arthur Espie Porritt was born in Wanganui, New Zealand, the elder son of E E Porritt, VD, MD, FRCS, and of Ivy Elizabeth, née Mackenzie, whose father was also a medical practitioner. After education at Wanganui Collegiate School and Otago University, where he had an outstanding athletic record, he secured a Rhodes scholarship to Magdelen College, Oxford, in 1923. He went on to St Mary's Hospital, London, with an Oxford scholarship, qualifying MRCS LRCP London and MB BCh Oxford in 1928, and becoming FRCS in 1930 and later MCh Oxford. After house surgeon and registrar jobs at St Mary's he was appointed assistant director of the surgical unit there before becoming assistant surgeon and then surgeon to his teaching hospital. He was later also consultant surgeon to King Edward VII Hospital, the Royal Masonic, St John and Elizabeth, Paddington General, the Royal Chelsea, Princess Louise, Kensington Children's and Hitchin Hospitals. Porritt was an essentially general surgeon with a special interest in breast and abdominal surgery. An ever kind and considerate doctor much loved by his patients, he was a tireless worker, an expert teacher and a true leader. Always cheerful and optimistic, and supremely practical, he was an ideal member of staff for an undergraduate hospital. He was always popular with students, nurses and resident staff who found him most approachable, and he had a wonderful capacity for getting on with people of all ages. In the operating theatre he was quick, decisive, and never out of temper. His busy life did not allow him to publish many papers but his book, *Essentials of modern surgery*, written with the late R M Handfield-Jones, was popular and widely read and went into six editions between 1939 and 1956. In 1929, with D G A Lowe, he had also written a book on athletics. Shortly after the outbreak of the second world war he joined the RAMC as a lieutenant-colonel in charge of the surgical division of a hospital with the BEF. After the withdrawal from France he served in Egypt for two years. Recalled to the UK in 1943 he joined 21 Army Group with the rank of brigadier and became a consultant surgeon to Montgomery's army in north-west Europe. On demobilisation he returned to his pre-war work, having been made OBE in 1943 and advanced to CBE in 1945. From his early school days, Arthur Porritt had made his mark in swimming, riding, rugby and, most notably, in athletics, where his performance soon reached the highest international level. He was already an athlete of national standing before leaving New Zealand: he was a member of the Oxford University athletic team in 1923 and became president in 1925. His sprint record of 9.9 seconds for the 100 yards in the Oxford v Cambridge event remained unbroken for many years. He also achieved records in the 100 and 220 yard hurdles at Oxford before going on to represent his country in the Olympics in Paris in 1924, where he took a bronze for the 100 metres, and in Amsterdam four years later. He again acted as team manager in 1936. Knee trouble in 1928 compelled him to give up competitive running but he became a member of the Olympic International Council, and a member of the Commonwealth Games Federation, of which he was chairman from 1945 to 1966, and later vice-president. He rode with the Burghley hunt until he was 50. Outside the ambit of his hospital and private work Porritt gave himself unstintingly to many important activities. He served on the College Council from 1950 to 1966 and was President 1960 to 1963. He was honorary Fellow of the Faculties of Dental Surgery and of Anaesthetics, Hunterian orator, Webb-Johnson lecturer and a patron of the College. He was a member and vice-chairman of the trustees of the Hunterian Museum until his death. The very first year of his Presidency of the College he was also President of the British Medical Association, a unique distinction. He performed a notable task as chairman of the Medical Services Review Committee of the BMA: what became known as the 'Porritt Report' put forward a number of valuable ideas and recommendations, some of which were to be subsequently fulfilled. For these services he was awarded the gold medal and honorary fellowship of the BMA, though he had twice resigned his membership in the past. He was a man of integrity who made close and firm friendships with all manner of people. Not surprisingly, he became an honorary Fellow of every Royal Surgical College in the Commonwealth, as well as the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland and the College of Surgeons of South Africa. He also held the United States Legion of merit and was a Knight of the Order of St John. He had a particular love for some of the other medical bodies, notably the Worshipful Society of Apothecaries, of which he was Master, and of the Hunterian Society, over which he twice presided. He had been President of the Association of Surgeons of Great Britain and Ireland and was a Fellow of the American Surgical Association and of the French Academy of Surgery. In addition he was patron and past President of the Medical Council on Alcoholism, and had been President of the Medical Commission on Accident Prevention and of the Company of Veteran Motorists. In 1973 he was appointed Chairman of the Arthritis and Rheumatism Council; the African Medical and Research Foundation (amongst other things sponsoring the flying doctor service in East Africa) and also Chairman of the Royal Masonic Hospital. Prior to the second world war Porritt had been appointed Surgeon-in-Ordinary to the Duke of York. Shortly after the war he became Surgeon to the Royal Household and then Serjeant-Surgeon from 1952 to 1967. He was awarded the KCMG in 1950; the KCVO in 1957 (later advanced to GCMG, 1967 and GCVO, 1970) and a baronetcy in 1963 on completing his period as PRCS. After finishing service on the Council of the College he became President of the Royal Society of Medicine for two years. He considered it fortuitous that his appointment as Governor-General of New Zealand in 1967 compelled him to give up active surgery for he did not think it wise for most surgeons to continue long after retirement from hospital work. He and Lady Porritt then had a very happy and fulfilling five years in the country of his birth. On his return to Britain Lord Porritt of Hampstead and Wanganui he made a nmber of sincere and thoughtful contributions to the work of the Upper House and continued to attend there until the end of his life. He was a keen Freemason, had been Master of several lodges and became Senior Grand Deacon in 1951 and Junior Grand Warden in 1964. He was a founder member and vice-President of Lord Horder's Fellowship for Freedom in Medicine, which was dedicated to the highest standards of medical care and very much concerned with the freedom of patients as well as doctors. Porritt was a great ambassador. Apart from his many overseas trips on athletic business (and he attended the Commonwealth Games and Olympics into his ninth decade), he had ranged far and wide for surgery and was a powerful advocate of Britain's finest medical brains and skills being freely available abroad. He was also anxious that foreign medical graduates should be encouraged to study here and, as chairman of the medical advisory committee of the Ministry of Overseas Development, he was well able to further these aims. His first marriage to Mary Frances Wynne in 1926 was dissolved; in 1946, he married Kathleen Peck who had served as a sister in the QAIMNS during the war. They had two sons and a daughter. Fully active until a few weeks before his death, Lord Porritt died peacefully at his home in St John's Wood on New Year's Day 1994, aged 93. A portrait by Sir James Gunn hangs in the College. The Hon Jonathon Espie Porritt, formerly director of Friends of the Earth and one-time Ecology Party parliamentary candidate, inherited the baronetcy and gave the address at his father's service of thanksgiving in St Margaret's Church, Westminster Abbey, on 26 April 1994. The service was attended by the Governor General of New Zealand, the Lord Chancellor, representatives of seven members of the Royal Family, the President and Council of the College, the Chairman and members of the Board of the Hunterian Trustees, the Court of Patrons and a large congregation. This was followed by a reception at New Zealand House.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000234
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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

First Title value, for Searching Pritchard, Thomas (1806 - 1870)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Wilkes, Frank Roger (1934 - 2006)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2008-01-24
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000400-E000499
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372628372628
Occupation General surgeon
Details Roger Wilkes had a distinguished career in the Royal Navy as an officer and surgeon serving at home and at sea in aircraft carriers. In 1982 he was the senior surgeon at sea on SS *Canberra* during the Falklands War. Later he was surgeon commodore and dean of naval medicine. Roger was born in Smethwick on 3 August 1934, the son of Frank Arthur and Gwendoline Alice Wilkes, who were both pharmacists. He attended Alexandra House School and King Edward IV School, Stourbridge, Worcestershire, from which he entered Birmingham University Medical School in 1952. There he played regularly for the second rugby XV, and as a student did nightshifts at Cadbury’s chocolate factory and worked as a ward orderly at Wordsley Hospiral, where he was inspired by Maurice Hershman and Sister Jarvis and her ward. After house jobs, he joined the Navy as a surgeon lieutenant and served at sea in HMS *Ark Royal* in the Mediterranean and North America. Two years surgical training took place at Royal Naval Hospital (RNH) Haslar, with further service at sea to follow on HMS *Victorious* in the Far East, Japan, East Africa with the Fleet Air Arm. It was during this tour that he was to operate on an unusual accident which took place at sea when a naval air mechanic was trapped in a closing mechanical canopy on a fighter aircraft, and sustained a severe crush injury with a stove-in chest, which required urgent resuscitation and surgery, followed by intermittent positive pressure respiration. Nylon traction sutures gave stabilisation. The patient was then evacuated by air to Singapore. After further stabilisation the patient made a full recovery and returned to duty. Roger was awarded the MBE for his initiative and skill at sea. His next posting was to the RNH Haslar for further surgical training, from where he passed the FRCS in 1966. He was soon at sea again on the aircraft carrier HMS *Eagle*, serving in South Africa and Singapore. After a short tour at RNH Plymouth, he joined HMS *Albion* as surgeon commander. In 1970 the Armed Services Consultant Advisory Board at our College appointed him a consultant in surgery. He was given a sabbatical year at the professorial unit in Aberdeen, returning to be head of the surgical unit at RNH Plymouth as surgeon captain. In 1982 the Falklands War saw him at sea again as the senior surgeon on SS *Canberra* ‘the great white whale’, for which he was awarded the Falklands medal. After hostilities ceased he returned to the UK and was appointed director of naval surgery, and in 1984 became chairman of the Defence Surgical Board, the senior surgeon of the three armed services. In 1988 he was promoted to surgeon commodore and appointed dean of naval medicine. In 1989 he became the Queen’s honorary surgeon. Retiring from the Royal Navy in 1992, he joined the National Blood Transfusion Service, and then worked for a while in general practice. He was the guest of honour at his old school and was written up in a local journal as a ‘Black County personality’. After a very good life, he retired finally in 1996, but developed dementia with Lewy bodies and was admitted to Bickleigh Down Nursing Home in Plymouth, where he died on 18 November 2006. He was survived by his second wife Marion, a former Queen Alexandra’s Royal Naval Nursing Service theatre sister, whom he had met over the operating table, and their daughter, Helen. There are also three children from his first marriage - Stephanie, Nicholas and Fiona.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000444
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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/372673372673
Occupation General surgeon
Details In 1843 was a Fellow of the University of London and a Member of the Senate. He was one of the 300 original Fellows, for officials of other institutions, including the University of London, were thus honoured by the Royal College of Surgeons. At one time he was a member of the Court of Examiners of the Society of Apothecaries. He died of bronchitis on April 26th, 1855, at 10 Montagu Street, Russell Square, London, WC.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000489
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Hardy, Eric Gordon (1918 - 2010)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by N Alan Green
Publication Date 2011-07-07 2013-12-06
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/373440373440
Occupation General surgeon
Details Eric Hardy was a hardworking general surgeon who spent his consultant career in Chester and was awarded emeritus status when he retired in 1982. He was born on 21 July 1918 in Royton, Lancashire. His father was Frank Stanley Hardy, a typewriter mechanic, and his mother Jean née Leslie. Eric was the only son of a short-lived marriage and was brought up in the Scottish Glens by his mother, a talented if irascible teacher. Overcoming the circumstances of his upbringing, Eric excelled at Banff Academy, winning school prizes. As a classical scholar with little or no science training, he decided to study medicine. He qualified with honours in 1940 at Aberdeen University and at a later date completed his medical doctorate. After house appointments in Aberdeen he moved south, first to Chester and then to Norwich. He entered wartime National Service as a flight lieutenant in the RAFVR, one of his postings being in Norfolk. There he met and married Shirley née Cook, a staff nurse. Eric went to Norwich after the war as a registrar, and he gained considerable experience with Charles Noon, a surgeon of the 'old school', and Norman Townsley, who had just come back from Army service in Norway and India. Two of his three sons were born in Norwich. John, now an IT consultant, was born in 1949 and Peter, a local government officer in Norfolk, in 1951. The family lived in 'Pull's Ferry', a delightful house owned by the dean and chapter of Norwich Cathedral, that fronts the River Wensum. In 1953 the family emigrated to the USA when Eric obtained a post as a fellow and instructor in surgery at Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, Texas. He worked in the famous cardiovascular unit with Michael DeBakey and Denton Cooley at the Jefferson Davis Hospital. Notwithstanding a stimulating professional environment and the prospect of rapid career advancement, in 1955 Eric and Shirley decided to take the children home to England. He was then appointed resident surgical officer at the Norfolk and Norwich Hospital and associated hospitals, working with his former 'chiefs' and in addition 'Monty' Ridley Thomas, a good general surgeon with a urological interest, and Alan Birt. Working for all four surgeons, including his former chiefs, Noon and Townsley, he obtained good paediatric training, some neurosurgical experience, vascular training, as well as exposure to the full range of general surgical procedures. Eric Hardy then proceeded to Newcastle, perhaps on the recommendation of Norman Townsley who held him in high regard and knew the professor there well. He became first assistant in the department of surgery at Durham University and to the surgical professorial unit in Newcastle. Under the guidance of the dynamic Andrew Lowden his surgical skills were further increased. He returned to his studies and passed the English fellowship in 1958, under the impression that this was essential at consultant interviews. He was appointed to the Chester Royal Infirmary as a consultant general surgeon the following year. Eric and the family moved there in July 1959 just after the birth of their third son, Michael, who is now a technical consultant in the oil industry. He published on 'Acute ischaemia in limb injuries' and did experimental work on 'The role of bacteria in irreversible haemorrhagic shock', and the use of trypsin on experimental thrombotic and inflammatory conditions. He was an avid correspondent to the broadsheets and was respected for his comments on medical and world matters. His MD thesis was accepted in 1954 but in 1987, after he had retired, he wrote a letter to the editor of the *Journal of the RSM* based on this thesis. An article on Meigs' and pseudo-Meigs' syndrome had been published suggesting the role of 'lymphatic stomata' in the diaphragm in the benign ovarian tumour producing both ascites and pleural effusion. Eric Hardy, based on his early work, felt that frequent shock waves produced by coughing, for example, could easily explain the diffusion of fluid in the abdomen to a sub-atmospheric pressure zone of the pleural cavity and through an attenuated diaphragm. There was no need to implicate lymphatic stomata. In Chester he gained a superb reputation as a fine diagnostician, an excellent teacher who 'did not suffer fools gladly', but who was extremely supportive to his staff and much appreciated for his support of medical colleagues. Many of his trainees still use and pass on some of Eric's techniques. He was a founder and president of the Liverpool and North West Society of Surgeons and was honoured by his peers when elected president of the Chester and North Wales Medical Society. He retired from his busy surgical life in 1982, and for the next ten years became a 'hobby' farmer in west Cheshire. After his wife, Shirley, died in 1994 he moved back to Norfolk and lived for some 15 years in Surlingham near Norwich. He was very active up to the last, and was shopping in Norwich a few days before his death following a fall. Eric Gordon Hardy died on 9 July 2010, and left three sons and five grandchildren.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001257
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Sahoy, Ronald Rabindranath (1940 - 2008)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2008-11-14 2009-05-01
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/372755372755
Occupation Cardiothoracic surgeon General surgeon
Details Ronald Sahoy was a pioneering cardiothoracic and general surgeon in the Caribbean. He was born on 3 January 1940, in Essequibo, British Guiana (now Guyana). His father was Kunandan Ramdial Sahoy, a business man who owned a trucking service, and his mother was Baidwattee née Narayan, who had worked as a clerk in the civil service in London in the sixties. Ronald was educated at the Modern Educational Institute, which had been founded by a cousin, Ongkar Narayan, the Central High School, Guyana, and Queen’s College, Guyana, where he won the Guyana Government intercollegiate scholarship. He studied medicine at the University of the West Indies, where he qualified in 1965, winning the Wilson-James surgery prize. He completed internships at the University Hospital of the West Indies in general surgery and general medicine and cardiology, followed by a senior house officer post in general and cardiothoracic surgery and a casualty officer post. He then did a general surgical rotation for two years, from which he won a Commonwealth scholarship in 1969, which took him to London to study for the FRCS. In 1970 he was clinical assistant to Norman Tanner at St James’s Hospital, Balham. Having passed the FRCS, he returned to the University Hospital of the West Indies, where he was a senior registrar in general and cardiothoracic surgery for the next three years. In 1973 he became a consultant surgeon to the National Chest Hospital, formerly the George V Memorial Hospital. There he headed the cardiothoracic team. In 1976 he entered private practice at the Medical Associates Hospital, where he was the senior surgeon and medical director. He married Pauline Rohini Samuels in 1965. Their two sons both became airline pilots. He died suddenly on 6 April 2008.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000572
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Christie, William Ledingham ( - 1920)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Christophers, John Crowde (1813 - 1883)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-05-25 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/373355373355
Occupation General surgeon
Details Educated at the Middlesex Hospital and in Paris. He practised at various places: 38 York Street, Portman Square, W; Wadebridge in Cornwall; Cliff House, Bruton, Bath; and towards the end of his life at 22 Westgate Terrace, South Kensington, where he died on February 26th, 1883. Publications: *Observations on Syphilis, and on Inoculation as the Means of Diagnosis in Ulcers and Discharges invading the Genital Organs, comprising also a brief outline of the anoient and modern treatment of syphilis and pointing to new views and to a new method of treating that Disease*, 8vo, London, 1853. "A New Mode of Applying Ligatures to Naevi." - *Lancet*, 1845, i, 676. "Operation for Radical Cure of Hernia." - *Ibid.*, 1846, i, 216. "Anaesthesia treated by Electro-Galvanism." - *Ibid.*, ii, 144.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001172
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Churchill, Frederick (1843 - 1916)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-05-25
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/373356373356
Occupation General surgeon
Details Son of John S M Churchill, JP, of Wimbledon. He received his professional training at the University of Edinburgh and at St Thomas's Hospital, where he was Surgical Registrar. He was at one time Pathological Assistant at the Royal Infirmary, Edinburgh, and was also Resident Medical Officer at the York Road Lying-in Hospital. He was for many years in practice at 4 Cranley Gardens, South Kensington, and was Surgeon to the Victoria Hospital for Children, Chelsea, from 1871-1889. He was also for a time Hon Surgeon to the Young Women's Home, Sloane Street. He died at Cranley Gardens on June 22nd, 1916. His father was the well-known medical publisher. Publications: "Statistics of Limb Amputations, 1862-9." - *St Thomas's Hosp. Rep.*, i, 503. *St Thomas's Hospital Statistical Reports (Medical)*, 1868-70, 8vo, London, 1868-70. Translation of Liebreich "On the Use and Abuse of Atropine." "Report of Private Obstetrical Practice for Thirty-nine Years," 8vo, Dublin, 1872; reprinted from *Dublin Jour. Med. Sci.*, 1872. "The Complications of Hernia." - *St Thomas's Hosp. Rep.*, iii, 159. *Face and Foot Deformities: with illustrations of new appliances for the cure of birthmark, club-foot, etc.*, 8vo, 14 plates, London, 1885; American ed., 1885. *High-pressure Education, being an Exposition of the Evil Effects upon the Rising Generation of Hurry and Worry at School*, 12mo, London, 1885. *Causation and Treatment of Congenital Club foot*, 8vo, London, 1887. "On a New Mode of Arresting Haemorrhage by Temporary Compression." - *Lancet*, 1865, ii, 510, 556, etc. "The Therapeutic Value of the Hypophosphites Combined Soluble Tonic for Children." - *Brit. Med. Jour.*, 1880, i, 472. "Mechanical Distortion of the Spine." - *Ibid.*, 1871, i, 638. A memoir of considerable merit based on an instance of curvature of the spine dependent upon an inequality in the length of the lower extremities, and associated with hypertrophy of the right patella.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001173
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Church, William John (1798 - 1886)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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/373357373357
Occupation General surgeon
Details Educated at St Bartholomew's Hospital. He practised at 22 Circus, Bath, and latterly was Consulting Surgeon to the Bath Lying-in Charity. Removing late in life to Weymouth, he practised for a time at 7 Victoria Terrace, and after his retirement resided at Rodwell Lodge, where he died on February 1st, 1886. His photograph is in the Fellows' Album.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001174
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Clapp, William (1814 - 1888)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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/373358373358
Occupation General surgeon
Details Educated at Guy's and St Thomas's Hospitals. He was at one period Resident Surgeon on the Seamen's Hospital Ship *Dreadnought*, and then practised at Exeter, where he was in 1848 the first Surgeon-Apothecary (House Surgeon) to the Devon and Exeter Hospital. He petitioned soon after his appointment that he might be relieved of much of the book-keeping work to enable him to devote more time to professional work in the wards. He died at his residence, Southernhay Place, Exeter, on May 27th, 1888.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001175
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Seyal, Nur Ahmad Khan (1920 - 2008)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Masud Seyal
Publication Date 2008-12-05 2008-12-12
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000500-E000599
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372758372758
Occupation Obstetric and gynaecological surgeon Obstetrician and gynaecologist
Details Nur Ahmad Khan Seyal was professor of obstetrics and gynaecology and a former principal of King Edward Medical College, Lahore, Pakistan. He was born on 16 July 1920 and received his early education in his home town of Jhang (Punjab). In 1936 he went to study medicine at Glancy Medical College, Amritsar, qualifying in 1940. He then went to Iran, in 1942, and joined the medical department of the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company in Abadan. Over a period of ten years he held various surgical appointments in the 500-bed Abadan Hospital and gradually rose to the status of a consulting surgeon. During this time he twice spent time in the UK, gaining his FRCS in 1951. A year later, in 1952, he returned to Pakistan, where he was appointed clinical assistant to the professor of obstetrics and gynaecology at the King Edward Medical College, Lahore. In 1954, when Nishtar Medical College was established in Multan, Seyal was selected to take up the new chair of obstetrics and gynaecology, the first professorial appointment on the clinical side. He went on to establish a department that was recognised as “outstanding” by Sir Hector MacLennan, president of the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, who visited in 1961. C M Gwillim, professor of obstetrics and gynaecology at St George’s Hospital Medical School, London, also visited the hospital and recognized the department as easily comparable to the best abroad, and called Seyal’s devotion to duty “saintly”. In 1967 N A Seyal was appointed as professor of midwifery and gynaecology at King Edward Medical College and medical superintendent of Lady Willingdon Hospital Lahore. He completely reorganised the hospital and very markedly improved the clinical facilities available there. He took over as principal of the King Edward Medical College in 1969 and reorganised the teaching programme and formulated a number of schemes for the improvement of this premier institution. Seyal was nominated as a founder fellow of the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Pakistan in 1962, and was elected to serve on its council. He was also a member of the Pakistan Medical Research Council for over six years. In recognition of his service to the medical profession, the government of Pakistan awarded him the Tamgha-i-Imtiaz, followed by the Sitara-i-Khidmat. After his retirement, Seyal was involved in the establishment of the Fatima Memorial Hospital and was the leading consultant for obstetrics and gynaecology. He retired to California in the early 1980s to be closer to his children. He died on 19 July 2008, just after his 88th birthday. He is survived by his wife (Iran Shafazand Seyal), his sons (Masud Seyal, professor of neurology at the University of California, Davis, and Mahmood Seyal, a business executive) and by his daughters (Mahnaz Ahmad, a scholar, and Farnaz Seyal Shah, a psychologist). He had seven grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000575
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Brodie, William Haig (1857 - 1910)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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 Crouch, John (1810 - 1872)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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 Burrows, Sir John Cordy (1813 - 1876)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2010-11-11
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001000-E001099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373266373266
Occupation General surgeon
Details Eldest son of Robert Burrows, silversmith, of Ipswich, by his wife Elizabeth, daughter of James Cordy, of London, was born at Ipswich on August 5th, 1813. He was educated at the Ipswich Grammar School and apprenticed to William Jeffreson, surgeon, of Framlingham. He completed his medical education at the United Borough Hospitals, and directly after he qualified acted as assistant to Edward Dix at Brighton from 1837-1839, and then commenced practice in Old Steine on his own account. He soon began to take part in the public life of Brighton, and in 1841 he projected with Dr Turrell the Royal Literary and Scientific Institute. He also took part in founding the Brighton Mechanics Institute, of which he was Secretary from 1841-1857 and afterward Treasurer. In 1849 he was one of the Town Committee who bought the Royal Pavilion from the Commissioners of Woods and Forests for the sum of £53,000; and when a Charter was granted to Brighton he was returned at the head of the poll for Pavilion Ward. His services were recognized on October 13th, 1871, when his fellow-townsmen presented him with a handsome carriage and a pair of horses. Two years later, on February 5th, 1873, he received the honour of knighthood as a result of a petition that his great services to Brighton might receive some recognition. Burrows was Brigade Surgeon of the Brighton Artillery Corps and Chairman of the Lifeboat Committee. He was one of the two promoters of the Extramural Cemetery, and at his own personal expense he obtained the order for discontinuing burials in the churches, chapels, and graveyards of the town. He also directed attention to the sanitary condition of Brighton, and under his advice the Health of Town Act was adopted. In 1846 he raised money for erecting a fountain on the Steine, and there laid out and planted the enclosures near it entirely at his own cost. His pet aversions were street-organ players and itinerant hawkers. He died at 62 Old Steine, Brighton, on March 25th, 1876, and was buried in the Extramural Cemetery. He married on October 19th, 1842, Jane, daughter of Arthur Dendy, of Dorking. She died in 1877, leaving one son, William Seymour Burrows, who succeeded his father in practice.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001083
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Burt, George (1789 - 1874)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Burton, John Moulden (1817 - 1886)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Sellors, Sir Thomas Holmes (1902 - 1987)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-06-01 2012-03-09
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000200-E000299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372424372424
Occupation Cardiothoracic surgeon
Details Thomas Holmes Sellors, the only son of Dr Thomas Blanchard Sellors, a general practitioner and of Anne Oliver Sellors (née McSparron) was born on 7 April 1902, at Wandsworth. A few years later his father moved his practice to Southend-on-Sea and Tom, as he was always known, went to Alleyn Court Preparatory School at Westcliff-on-Sea, before moving to Loretto School, Musselburgh, and then to Oriel College, Oxford. He secured a university entrance scholarship to the Middlesex Hospital and qualified there in 1926. Following resident medical and surgical appointments at the Middlesex and Brompton Hospitals, he was surgical registrar to Gordon Taylor at the Middlesex. During this period he was the first recipient of the G.H. Hunt Travelling Scholarship, awarded by Oxford University in 1928, and was able to spend some time at surgical centres in Scandinavia. After a thorough grounding in general surgery, during which period he later recorded his indebtedness to Sir Gordon Gordon-Taylor, R.V. Hudson, Tudor Edwards and the physicians R.A. Young and Evan Bedford, he decided to specialise in chest surgery. He was an excellent technician and, with the contemporary rapid developments in anaesthesia, he was keen to devote himself to the specialty. He surprised some of his seniors when his book *Surgery of the thorax* was published in 1933. In the early 1930's few of the London teaching hospitals, or the large general hospitals, offered opportunity for the newly emerging surgical specialties. But opportunity came with his appointment to the staff of the London Chest Hospital in 1934, followed by further appointments to the Royal Waterloo Hospital and Queen Mary's Hospital, Stratford. He also secured appointments at various London County Council hospitals and sanatoria, and started chest units at the Radcliffe Infirmary, Oxford, and at Leicester Royal Infirmary which entailed much travelling by car and an immense workload. Such was the peripatetic and scattered character of thoracic practice in a period when tuberculosis was principal preoccupation of a chest surgeon. On the outbreak of the second world war he was appointed adviser in thoracic surgery to the North West Metropolitan Region, based on Harefield Hospital, Middlesex, where he worked most happily and productively until his retirement. Shorttly after the war, in 1947, he was appointed thoracic surgeon to the Middlesex Hospital where he developed close and cordial relationships with the cardiologists Evan Bedford and Walter Somerville, to whose skilful assessment of cardiac problems he always paid warm tribute. From this time onwards, both at Middlesex Hospital and Harefield, cardiac surgery progressively displaced most of his earlier pulmonary and oesophageal work. As a result of this, in 1957, he was appointed as consultant surgeon to the National Heart Hospital when cardiac surgery became a rather belated funcition of that institution. In the second half of his surgical life he set up open heart surgery units at these last three hospitals. But he never allowed cardiac surgery at the Middlesex to threaten the work of other departments, such was his concern for the interests of his colleagues. A number of the other hospitals to which he had previously been attached provided opportunity for several of his trainees to establish thoracic and cardiac surgical centres. Ever courteous in the operation room, he was superb craftsman and a master of sharp dissection. He was never known to raise his voice, nor did he ever blame anyone else when things went wrong. A clumsy assistant might received his favourite admonition "Juggins!". But he had a devoted and enthusiastic band of trainees, some of whom became internationally renowned and several of whom predeceased him. To all of them he was affectionately known as "Uncle Tom." He was up at daybreak, or earlier, often visiting a ward before the residents or day staff were around. His gentlemanly style and good manners ensured excellent rapport with nursing staff and gave immense confidence to his patients. He worked with deceptive rapidity and economy of effort, seldom wasting time with idle chatter, so much so that an astute trainee - anxious to secure his shrewd advice under rather pressing conditions - once hopped into his car and took an unplanned trip from Harefield to London with him. Despite being in the forefront of cardiac surgery in this country, he showed a healthy conservatism in avoiding frankly experimental procedures. Nevertheless, having set out to do a Blalock operation, which proved quite impossible due to dense lung adhesions in a man with bilateral pulmonary tubercule, and noting the tightness of the valvular obstruction, he calmly borrowed a tenotomy knife from a nearly orthopaedic theartre and did the first direct operation for the relief of pulmonary stenosis. It is worthy of report that, on hearing of this operation, one of his rivals then emulated him and got into print first. He learnt his hypothermic technique from Henry Swann and then closed some five hundred atrial septal defects, in which procedure his results were unrivalled at that time. He next unashamedly learnt his cardiopulmonary by-pass technique from John Kirklin, by which time his rapid technique became relatively less essential to a successful outcome. He had retired before coronary artery by-pass was established and later frankly admitted that he had believed the successful anastomosis of such small vessels to be impracticable. From the inception of the National Health Service in 1948 he was active in the medico-political field. This was almost an inadvertent development, surprising in a man who was so deeply involved in his surgical work, but largely due to his public spiritedness and readiness to serve his colleagues. He was chairman of the North West Metropolitan Consultants' and Specialists' Committee for some years; was a member of the Central Consultants' Committee form its inception and its chairman for five years. He was elected to Council of the Royal College of Surgeons in 1957. The following year he became Chairman of the Joint Consultants' Committee in succession to Lord Brain, a demanding task which he undertook for eleven years, having received the accolade of Knight Bachelor in 1963. A year after demitting office as chairman of JCC, and having been Vice-President for one year, he was elected President of the Royal College of Surgeons from 1969 to 1972. Earlier at the College he had been Tudor Edwards and Gordon-Taylor lecturer, and was then Bradshaw lecturer in 1968 and Hunterian Orator in 1973. He also served as President of the British Medical Association and was awarded its Gold Medal. After demitting office at the Royal College of Surgeons he was elected a College Patron and an Honorary Fellow of the Faculty of Dental Surgery. He was also a member of the Board of Trustees of the Hunterian Collection and ultimately its Chairman. Despite his intensely busy surgical life he travelled widely abroad, lecturing and demonstrating in Europe, India, Russia and South America. He also visited the United States, Canada, Japan and South Africa, becoming an honorary fellow of the surgical colleges of South Africa and America, the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh and the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland. He was elected to the FRCP London and to honorary membership of the European Cardiological Society, the Academy of Medicine in Rome and the Royal Academy of Medicine in Belgium. Whilst giving a number of eponymous lectures in the course of his travels he received honorary degrees at Groningen, Liverpool and Southampton, as well as the Medaille de la Reconnaissance Française, and became an officer of the Order of Carlos Finlay, Cuba. He had a strongly international outlook and did much for the generality of surgery and in particular for the International Society of Surgery, of which he was President from 1977 to 1979. Well after retirement from hospital and private practice he supported many good causes. He was Chairman of the Royal Medical Benevolent Fund for five years; Chairman of the National Heart Foundation; Chairman and later President of the Medical Council on Alcoholism. Apart from the publication of his textbook at an early age, he wrote many papers and edited a number of other cardiothoracic works. He had a capacity for graceful living and was a keen gardener and a proficient painter in water colours. Few were privy to the personal tragedies he suffered during a long life of service. In 1928, aged 26, he had married Brenda Lyell, who died of appendicitis a few weeks later. In 1932 he married Elizabeth Cheshire by whom he had a son and a daughter; but, when both children were in their 'teens their mother developed a stroke and hypertension. She died in 1953 when Tom was at one of the most demanding periods of his life. He married his secretary, Marie Hobson, in 1955, a union which was to last thirty years. Ironically, as the non-smoking wife of a thoracic surgeon, she developed lung cancer and died nearly two years before him. When he died on 13 September 1987 he was survived by his daughter, Susan, and by his son, Patrick, who is a fellow of the College and Surgeon-Oculist to Her Majesty the Queen. A service of thanksgiving was held at St Clement Danes Church, on 2 December, 1987 when the address was given by Sir Reginald Murley, PPRCS.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000237
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Muir, Sir Edward Grainger (1906 - 1973)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-06-01 2013-11-25
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/372425372425
Occupation General surgeon
Details Edward Grainger Muir was born on 18 February 1906 in North China where his father was a medical missionary. He was educated at Eltham College, and the Middlesex Hospital Medical School where he distinguished himself by winning the Senior Broderip Scholarship and qualifying with the Conjoint Diploma at the early age of 21, and graduating MB, BS (Lond) in 1928. After resident appointments he passed the FRCS examination before he was old enough to receive the diploma, and in 1932 he won the gold medal in the London University MS examination. At Middlesex Hospital was influenced particularly by Lord Webb Johnson, Sir Gordon Gordon-Taylor and Sir Eric Riches, and after junior clinical appointments there he spent two years between 1930 and 1932 in the laboratories of the Royal College of Surgeons as the Bernhard Baron Research Scholar. He then returned to the Middlesex Hospital as assistant pathologist, and later surgical registrar, which prepared him for the appointments of consultant surgeon to King's College Hospital, the Queen Victoria Hospital, East Grinstead, and King Edward VII Hospital for Officers. From 1940-1945 he served in the RAMC with the rank of Lieutenant-Colonel and was later consultant surgeon to the Army. Muir was a general surgeon with a special interest in the surgery of the colon and rectum. He regarded the training of his house surgeons and registrars as one of his principal tasks, and he made a significant contribution to post-graduate education when he was a member of the Council of the Royal College of Surgeons and was appointed Dean of the Institute of Basic Medical Sciences. Edward Muir's association with the College extended over the greater part of his professional life, dating from his Bernhard Baron Scholarship, then Hunterian Professorship in 1934, membership of the Court of Examiners and finally of the Council, becoming Vice-President in 1971 and President in July 1972, just over a year before he died. Besides his College activities he held many other distinctions, having been President of the Harveian Society and of the Medical Society of London, and in the Royal Society of Medicine he was President of the Proctological Section and of the Section of Surgery. In 1954 he was appointed Surgeon to the Royal Household, in 1964 Surgeon to the Queen, and shortly before his death Sergeant Surgeon. He was knighted in 1970. In spite of all these distinctions Muir was a modest, retiring person, a hard worker entirely dedicated to the care of his patients and the advancement of the science and art of surgery. He was devoted to his family, very fond of music, and took a special delight in driving motor cars, even in London. In 1929 he married Estelle Russell and they had two sons; the elder, a consultant pathologist and microbiologist was tragically killed in a road accident, and the younger became the professor of cardiology at the Welsh National School of Medicine. He died in the National Hospital, Queen Square, after a subarachnoid haemorrhage on 14 October 1973.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000238
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Parks, Sir Alan Guyatt (1920 - 1982)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-06-01 2012-03-13
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Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000200-E000299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372426372426
Occupation Colorectal surgeon
Details Alan Parks became President of the College but died while in office. He was born on 19 December 1920. After education at Sutton High School and Epsom College he proceeded to Brasenose, Oxford, in 1939, graduating BA in 1943. He was due for enrolment at Guy's for clinical training, but was one of a small wartime group selected for further training in America, becoming a Rockefeller Student at Johns Hopkins, Baltimore, in 1943. He was medical intern there and graduated MD in 1947 before returning to Guy's to complete his BM, BCh in the same year. He served as house surgeon to Sam Wass and Sir Heneage Ogilvie, passed the MRCP in 1948 and FRCS in 1949. There followed two years in the RAMC, when he was a graded surgeon and served in Malaya, Japan and Korea. On returning home he was resident surgical officer at Putney and then registrar and senior registrar at Guy's from 1953 to 1959, having obtained his MCh in 1954. Parks was an only child, and himself believed that this made it difficult for him to adjust socially. At an early age he developed a wide interest in crafts and hobbies, his later attraction to surgery was largely attributable to this. He was head boy at Epsom and a good athlete who earned his place in the rugby XV. He was a big man and at wartime Oxford, when blues were not awarded, he was captain of athletics and a forward in the university XV. Early in his career he decided which field of surgery was to become his life's work. At Guy's Hospital his study of 'thick sections' of the anal canal enhanced the knowledge of anatomy, leading to papers on fistulas, the development of the submucosal plane of dissection, and submucosal harmorrhoidectomy. His first published work appeared in 1954 with the anatomical study of the anal canal in the *Proceedings of the Royal Society of Medicine*. This was followed with a thesis on the surgical treatment of haemorrhoids for the degree of Master of Surgery at Oxford University. Alan's interests at this stage also included fibroadenosis of the breast, in which he collaborated with Sir Hedley Atkins, when he was research assistant, and the lymphovascular systems of the leg. His main interest, however, remained in the lower bowel; papers on submucous haemorrhoidectomy (1959) were followed by others on fistula-in-ano (1961), pelvic floor physiology (1962), pharmacokinetics of the intestinal wall musculature (1963), per-anal removal of rectal tumours (1970), techniques of colo-anal anastomosis (1976) and the 'pelvic pouch' operation after pan-proctocolectomy (1980): each of these introduced a new field or altered surgical practice. It is a truly astonishing list and a full bibliography was published in a commemorative supplement by the *Annals of the Royal College of Surgeons of England* 1983. He joined St Mark's in 1959, the only consultant surgeon to be appointed without having been a resident. Soon after this his interest switched to a better understanding of anorectal physiology in relation to continence. Parks gathered around him experts, neurophysiologists and neuropharmacologists and young men clamouring to work with him. He left a devoted band form all parts of the globe with a better understanding of the function of pelvic-floor muscles. He perfected the technique of colo-anal anastomosis and ileoanal anastomosis with a reservoir (Parks' pouch) - a technique dependent upon his work on sub-mucosal dissection and an understanding of pelvic physiology. In these two procedures his technique as a master surgeon is well exemplified, it was perhaps in the operating theatre that he was able to teach at his best, demonstrating his special techniques and instruments. In addition to his demanding clinical commitments he undertook a heavy load on behalf of the profession and shortly after being elected to Council in 1971 he became an honorary secretary of the Joint Consultants' Committee, being elected Chairman the following year. Few but those closest to him realised how much time, energy, and personal expense he devoted to this work; for this and his seminal contributions to surgery he received the accolade of knighthood in 1977. He was elected President of the Royal College of Surgeons in 1980 having previously been Hunterian Professor in 1965; he was to be Hunterian Orator in 1983. He was consultant surgeon to the Army, had been President of the Section of Proctology at the Royal Society of Medicine, an examiner for Cambridge University, and chief medical adviser of BUPA. He was particularly proud and delighted by the award in 1980 of the Ernst Jung Prize in medicine in recognition of his signal contributions to colorectal surgery and physiology. In 1981 the University of Geneva awarded him the Nessim Habif Prize and he was later awarded Honorary Fellowships of the Edinburgh, Australasian, and American Colleges of Surgeons and of the Royal Colleges of Physicians and Surgeons of Glasgow and Canada. He was corresponding member of the German Surgical Society, and honorary member of the American Society of Colon and Rectal Surgeons, and, only a few days before the onset of his fatal illness was admitted to Honorary Fellowship of the Italian Surgical Society. He possessed a deep faith which pervaded all his activities. He was at the time of his death President-elect of the Christian Medical Fellowship. He would always do what he conceived to be his duty, even when exhausted, Sir Alan was blessed by a supremely happy marriage to Caroline Cranston, herself a medical graduate, who survived him with their four children. They much enjoyed visits to their seaside home in Dunwich, Suffolk, bird watching. Parks' own hobbies included craftwork with old books, binding and particularly engraving. In October 1982 Sir Alan suffered a myocardial infarct when in Rome. Later he was moved to London and died on 3 November after emergency cardiac surgery at St Bartholomew's Hospital.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000239
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Phillips, Hugh (1940 - 2005)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-06-08 2012-03-13
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000200-E000299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372427372427
Occupation Orthopaedic surgeon
Details Hugh Phillips, the first surgeon from Norfolk to become president of the Royal College of Surgeons, died within his first year of office. A past president of the British Orthopaedic Association and the orthopaedic section of the Royal Society of Medicine, Hugh influenced every aspect of orthopaedic surgery. Voted Trainer of the Year in 1990 by the British Orthopaedic Trainees Association, he was committed to surgical training and later became chairman of the Orthopaedic Specialist Advisory Committee. Hugh earned a reputation for fairness both as an examiner and in the arrangements for rapid response teams reporting on major concerns in hospital practice. He was appointed vice-president of the College in 2003 and elected president the following year. Hugh's principal clinical interest was surgery of the hip. He founded the British Hip Society, was influential in establishing the National Joint Registry, and was said to have carried out over 6,000 joint replacements in his career. Hugh's family came from Treorchy in the Rhondda, where his grandfather and father were miners during the depression of the 1930s. His father, Morgan Phillips, a member of the Treorchy Male Voice Choir, resolved not to produce another generation of miners and walked to London where he became a manager at UGB Charlton, a thermoplastics company in south east London that made Bakelite. His mother, Elizabeth Evans, came from north Wales and contributed to Hugh's rather strict upbringing. Hugh was born on 19 March 1940 in Blackheath, the youngest of three children in a Welsh-speaking family. His older brother and sister returned to Wales during the Blitz, but his father's work was important to the war effort and Hugh remained with his parents. His earliest memories were of bombs and air raid shelters. While proud of his Welsh roots he considered himself a Londoner and commented once that he had "only been to Wales twice and it rained both times". He attended Henwick Primary School and the Roan Grammar School in Greenwich, where he became a prefect. He was a Queen's Scout. Hugh followed his eldest brother into medicine, winning a state scholarship to Bart's and completing a BSc in physiology. The life of a medical student in the 1960s was relaxed by the standards of later years and Hugh embraced it to the full. An all-round sportsman, he played cricket for Bart's, was captain of soccer and a member of the Vicarage Club. For a short period he generated additional income by working as a waiter on the liner *Pendennis Castle*, an experience that left him with a fund of anecdotes. Surprisingly, this most gregarious of men later listed "avoidance of all clubs" among his recreations in *Who's Who*. In 1966 he married Trish (Patricia Ann Cates Kennard), a physiotherapist at Bart's who later became chair of the Chartered Society of Physiotherapists. They had three daughters, Jane, Katie and Susie, and at the time of his death they had six grandchildren. Hugh owed much to his Welsh background, including a love of music. He was an excellent pianist and a former head choirboy at St James, Kidbrooke, often performing as a soloist at the Royal Festival Hall and elsewhere. He also inherited a strong sense of social justice and a dogged determination that did not permit him to leave a task unfinished, a trait he once described as "a black streak of Celtic bloody-mindedness". In 1970 he was appointed to the new higher surgical training programme in orthopaedics at Bart's and in the same year was found to have Hodgkin's lymphoma, which in those days had few survivors. After a harrowing period of intensive chemotherapy under the care of Gordon Hamilton Fairley, a pioneer of chemotherapy, Hugh Phillips became one of those few. The treatment, always at weekends so that he could be back at work on Monday, lasted two and a half years, when Hugh decided it should be terminated because nobody could tell him how long it should be continued. He never sought special consideration because of his illness and took a full share of workloads that would now be considered unacceptably heavy even for healthy people. In 1975 Hugh Phillips was appointed as the fifth orthopaedic consultant at the Norfolk and Norwich Hospital, where he is remembered as a hard worker, a loyal colleague and an outstanding surgeon. A man of great personal charm with a disarming sense of humour, Hugh was held in the highest regard by his patients, colleagues and trainees. He also displayed a natural flair for the politics of medicine and was a great exponent of the 'Delphic process', which allowed him to implement important changes at astounding speed without pointless discussion on the assumption that changes for the better would not be reversed. Although a Londoner, Hugh loved Norfolk and was intensely proud of his association with the county and its people. In 1996 he was appointed Deputy Lieutenant of Norfolk. Hugh Phillips was elected president because of his unrivalled understanding of training and education and his ability to achieve change, but his presidency was tragically curtailed. In the last minutes of a social occasion in Norwich on 26 June 2004 to celebrate both his achievement in becoming president and his retirement from clinical practice, a trivial injury caused a fracture that proved to be pathological. The incident occurred less than four weeks before he assumed office. Many would have taken the easy path and stepped aside but despite debilitating treatment, increasing ill health and the exhortation of friends and colleagues, Hugh chose to continue the task he had been elected to complete. He confronted a number of major professional issues with characteristic determination and scored some notable successes but his unavoidable absences for treatment were to make this a difficult year for the College. In his last presidential letter for the *Bulletin* he wrote, "I had not anticipated that my presidency would last only one year but, sadly, ill-health has determined that I should stand down, a matter of immeasurable personal regret." He may also be remembered for a casual remark in another presidential letter to the effect that surgeons might avoid a great deal of confusion if they called themselves 'Dr' rather than 'Mr', a comment that attracted much media attention. During April 2005, he completed a physically demanding College visit to every hospital in Wales by road within one week, the warmth of his personality making a great impression in hospitals where the College had been seen as remote and unapproachable. A few days after his return he suffered a pulmonary embolus and, despite intensive treatment, including thrombolysis, he did not recover and died at home in Norfolk on 24 June 2005, less than one year after the condition came to light. His funeral service, which filled Norwich Cathedral, was attended by representatives of the Colleges, orthopaedic surgery, hospital colleagues and staff, the County Lieutenancy, the Department of Health, patients and the people of Norwich. The presidential gown covered the coffin as the Lord Bishop of Norwich, a personal friend, gave the address and spoke warmly of both Hugh's humanity and his contribution to surgery.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000240
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Botting, Terence David John (1934 - 2005)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-06-21 2012-03-22
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Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000200-E000299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372428372428
Occupation Orthopaedic surgeon Trauma surgeon
Details Terry Botting was an orthopaedic and trauma surgeon. He was born on 3 January 1934 in Birmingham. His father, Royston Eric Jack Botting, was a machine tool setter, and his mother was Jessica Sarah née Tidmarsh. He was educated at Bablake School, Coventry, and Birmingham University. He became consultant and senior lecturer in orthopaedic and trauma surgery at Selly Oak and Birmingham Accident Hospitals. He was somewhat unconventional in appearance, with a penchant for wearing jazzy ties and white shoes: his patients would often place bets as to what he would be wearing on his ward rounds. He married Diane Kathleen née Walsgrove in 1956, by whom he had three sons (Adrian Royston, Trevor George and Stephen David St John). She predeceased him in May 1986 and in 1987 he married for a second time, to Eunice Ann née Burrows. He retired in 1992, spent six months in France and then a year on a philosophy course at Warwick University. He also made frequent visits to Australia to visit his grandsons. He was a keen watercolourist and enjoyed golf and fly-fishing. He died suddenly at home on 28 July 2005.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000241
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Bower, David Bartlett (1929 - 2007)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2009-01-30 2014-06-30
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Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000500-E000599
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372767372767
Occupation Obstetrician and gynaecologist
Details David Bower was a consultant gynaecologist and obstetrician at St Stephen's Hospital, Chelsea, later amalgamated into Chelsea and Westminster Hospital. He was born on 1 July 1929 in northwest London, the eldest son of Bartlett St George Bower, a successful lawyer, and Vera Bower née Luson. He went to the Hall School, Hampstead, from which he won a bursary to Oundle. He suffered considerably from asthma in the days before Ventolin and antibiotics, and concentrated on school work rather than sports. He shone academically and won an exhibition to Trinity College, Cambridge, to read law, as his father wished him to join his legal practice. However, David quickly decided that his real preference was medicine and he transferred to the medical faculty at Cambridge, whilst continuing his study of the law, and bought a motorbike so that he could commute between the Middle Temple and Cambridge. After being called to the Bar in 1950, he never in fact practised law. He completed his medical training at St Bartholomew's Hospital and obtained his FRCS in 1958. After a registrarship at Oldchurch Hospital, Romford, he became a senior lecturer at Charing Cross and Westminster, from which he gained the Berkeley research fellowship to Toronto General Hospital. Whilst in Canada, he went to rural Newfoundland, where he practised mainly gynaecology, frequently visited patients by snow cat, and operated on the kitchen table. After returning to London, he was appointed consultant gynaecologist at St Stephen's Hospital, Chelsea, which later joined with the Chelsea and Westminster Hospital. David's research interests included vaginal surgery, where his skills became legendary. He was a patient and supportive teacher, and passed on his techniques to future generations until he retired at the age of 68. Unpretentious, pragmatic and compassionate, David was ideally suited to caring for women with reproductive health problems, and his help was sought by nurses and others who worked with him. Outside his professional life, David enjoyed music and at one time toured post-war Germany playing jazz on the piano for the US troops. At the end of his life he was learning to play the organ, having borrowed the keys to his local church. He was a keen sailor and for years took his boat to Cowes Week. Perhaps his greatest self-indulgence was big motorbikes and his holidays were spent touring abroad. Dressed in leathers and with a tangled beard, he was the original hairy biker, proud to be viewed with suspicion and even disallowed entry into country inns until he had proved his credentials. Enjoying a pint or two of local ale at lunchtime with him was a treat as he was singularly affable and philosophical. David was married with three children, however much of his later life was spent with his partner Maureen Sands, with whom he retired to The Barley Mow, a 15th century former alehouse in Oxfordshire. David struggled bravely with progressive complications from renal carcinoma and died at home on 18 March 2007, at the age of 77.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000584
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Hockley, Anthony David (1943 - 2009)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by T T King
Publication Date 2010-05-20 2012-03-22
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/373177373177
Occupation Neurosurgeon
Details Tony Hockley was a neurosurgeon in Birmingham. He was born at Hampton Court on 4 October 1943, the son of Charles Hockley, a businessman, and Freda née Dubovie, a fashion designer. He was educated at Brighton College, where he was an exhibition scholar. He entered the medical college of the London Hospital in 1961, graduating in 1966 proxime accessit in his final year. His house surgeon appointments were to the professorial medical unit at the London Hospital, and to the neurology and neurosurgery departments. He was influenced in the last of these posts by D W C Northfield. Subsequent appointments included posts at the Birmingham Accident Hospital and at St Mary Abbot's Hospital, London. He began his neurosurgical career at the Institute of Neurological Sciences, Glasgow, where he was a senior house officer from 1970 to 1971. From 1972 to 1978, he was a registrar and senior registrar in neurosurgery at Addenbrooke's Hospital, Cambridge, with a period of one year (in 1974) as a visiting fellow at the Hospital for Sick Children, Toronto. There he came into contact with the noted neurosurgeons, Hendrick and Hoffman, with whom he remained friends for the rest of his career. He was appointed as a consultant neurosurgeon at Queen Elizabeth Hospital, Birmingham, in 1978, doing both adult and paediatric work, but later he devoted himself to the latter specialty, establishing the craniofacial surgery unit in Birmingham, which became one of the four designated units in Britain for that subspecialty. The treatment of intracranial and spinal tumours and the understanding of the cause of raised intracranial pressure in craniosynostosis were other important interests. In 2001, he carried out a successful operation for the separation of Siamese twins. He gained his fellowship of the Royal College of Surgeons ad eundem in 1999. Hockley was prominent in the International Society for Pediatric Neurosurgery, of which he was president in 1997, the European Society for Pediatric Neurosurgery and the International Society of Craniofacial Surgery. He wrote on craniofacial surgery and a wide variety of other topics and was co-editor of the volume *Paediatric neurosurgery* (London, Churchill Livingstone, 1999), to which he contributed the chapter on tumours. He was interested in medical ethics, and the medieval Jewish physician Maimonides, and he established a West Midland group for the study of Jewish medical ethics. Tony Hockley was a modest, self-effacing man whose quiet, kindly personality and devotion to his subject, his patients and the training and interests of his of junior staff left a strong impression on those who came in contact with him. He and his wife, Heather, an optometrist, had three sons (Nicholas Charles, Andrew James and Richard Mark), none of whom went into medicine. His interests outside medicine were tennis, music and the theatre. He died of heart failure on 21 June 2009, aged 65.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000994
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Burton, Samuel Herbert (1854 - 1929)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Bury, George ( - 1886)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Bury, George William Fleetwood (1836 - 1918)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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/372675372675
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born in August, 1780, and was gazetted to the Bombay Army as Assistant Surgeon on Nov 23rd, 1805, joining up on May 7th, 1806. He was promoted to Surgeon on July 4th, 1818, to Superintending Surgeon on Jan 11th, 1826, and became a Member of the Medical Board on May 1st, 1832. He retired on May 1st, 1835. He saw service at the recapture of the Cape of Good Hope, under Sir David Baird, in 1806. He died at his residence, 6 Chester Place, Hyde Park Gardens, W, on Oct 20th, 1853.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000491
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Edwardes, George ( - 1859)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Edwardes, Thomas ( - 1896)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Edwards, Charles ( - 1887)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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/373732373732
Occupation General surgeon
Details Educated at Trinity College, where he held a scholarship, and at hospitals in Dublin. He had in 1832 gained the Vice-Chancellor's prize for a Greek Essay on Cholera. He practised at Cheltenham, was a frequent contributor to the *Lancet*, and died on November 17th, 1887. Among his numerous observations the one which appears to have a permanent interest is his description of the method of ligating the third part of the left subclavian, and the first part of the left common carotid. In making the incision for the subclavian, he drew down the skin over the clavicle and cut down along the bone. In this way the external jugular vein as it passes under the clavicle escaped division. In ligaturing the first part of the left internal carotid, after retracting the sternomastoid outwards and the sternothyroid inwards towards the trachea, he avoided wounding the internal jugular vein by pushing it outwards, and the pneumogastric nerve, the termination of the thoracic duct, and the oesophagus, by hooking forwards the artery whilst pushing back these structures towards the longus colli (*Lancet*, 1837-8, I, 581). The operation was successfully performed, first by Charles Stonham, and then by William S Halsted, both Fellows of the College (qv).
Resource Identifier RCS: E001549
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Choudhury, Abdur Rashid (1936 - 2010)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Sarah Gillam
Publication Date 2011-11-10 2022--8-30
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001500-E001599
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373733373733
Occupation Neurosurgeon
Details Rashid Choudhury was a consultant neurosurgeon at the Riyadh Armed Forces Hospital, Saudi Arabia. He was born in a remote village in the district of Hailakandi, Assam, India, the son of Imran Ali Choudhury and Sumsun Choudhury. He came from a humble background and had to work hard to become a surgeon. He matriculated in 1952 and studied medicine at Assam Medical College, Dibrugarh, qualifying in 1960. He completed a masters degree in surgery and became an assistant professor in the general surgery department at Assam Medical College when, in 1968, he was awarded a scholarship by the government of Assam to train in neurosurgery in the UK. He gained his fellowship of the Royal College of Surgeons of England in 1970, and of the Glasgow and Edinburgh Royal Colleges in 1971. In 1973 he was awarded a ChM in neurosurgery by the University of Aberdeen. He worked as a neurosurgeon in Edinburgh, Newcastle and Aberdeen and, from 1973 to 1978, in Derby. In 1973 and 1978 he returned to Assam to set up a neurosurgical centre, but a lack of proper facilities meant these plans had to be abandoned. From 1982 to 1995 he was a consultant neurosurgeon at the Riyadh Armed Forces Hospital Saudi Arabia. His final medical post was as a medical assessor of retired miners receiving benefits in the UK. He was married to Amyna and they had two sons. Rashid Choudhury died on 24 October 2010.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001550
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Dawson, Alexander Skeath (1926 - 2007)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Tina Craig
Publication Date 2011-11-10 2013-11-12
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/373734373734
Occupation Orthopaedic surgeon
Details Alexander Dawson was an orthopaedic surgeon who devoted much of his professional life to being one of the pioneers and exponents of modern hip replacement surgery. He was consultant orthopaedic surgeon at the Queen Elizabeth II Hospital in Welwyn Garden City. He died on 2 February 2007 aged 91, survived by his wife of 65 years, Marjory Allan, son, Sandy and two grandchildren, Claire and Frances.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001551
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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

First Title value, for Searching Coombe, Robert Gorton (1818 - 1909)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Cooper, Sir Alfred (1838 - 1908)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-07-14
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/373444373444
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born at Norwich on December 28th, 1838, the son of William Cooper, Recorder of Ipswich, by his wife Anna Marsh. He entered Merchant Taylors' School, then in Suffolk Lane, in April, 1850, and was afterwards apprenticed to W Peter Nichols, Surgeon to the Norfolk and Norwich Hospital. He entered as a student at St Bartholomew's Hospital in 1858; went to Paris in 1861 to improve his knowledge of anatomy in company with Sir Thomas Smith (qv), and on his return was appointed Prosector at the Royal College of Surgeons. He started practice in Jermyn Street and soon acquired a fashionable private connection. He was Surgeon to St Mark's Hospital for Fistula, to the West London Hospital from 1867-1884, to the Royal Hospital for Diseases of the Chest, and to the Lock Hospital in Soho. He visited St Petersburgh as medical attendant to King Edward VII, when Prince of Wales, on the occasion of the marriage of the Duke of Edinburgh in 1874. He was decorated by the Tzar, Chevalier of the Order of St Stanislaus of Russia. He was appointed Surgeon in Ordinary to the Duke of Edinburgh in 1893, and was knighted at King Edward VII's Coronation in 1902. At the Royal College of Surgeons of England he was a Member of the Council from 1895-1905 and served as Vice-President. He married in 1882 Lady Agnes Cecil Emmeline Duff, third daughter of the Duke of Fife, by whom he had three daughters and one son, Alfred Duff Cooper, DSO, MP, who afterwards distinguished himself in political circles. He died at Mentone on March 3rd, 1908, and was buried in the English cemetery. Cooper was gifted with great social qualities which were linked with fine traits of character and great breadth of view. He gained in the course of his life a wide knowledge of the world, partly at Courts, partly in Hospitals, and partly in the exercise of a branch of the profession which more than any other reveals the frailty of mankind, for he is now chiefly remembered as one who treated syphilis. The possession of a competence limited, but did not wholly destroy, his professional activity. Appointed early in life Surgeon to the Inns of Court Volunteers - 'The Devil's Own' -he cherished a deep interest in the reserve forces throughout his life. He was decorated with the volunteer medal for long service and became Surgeon Colonel to the Duke of York's Loyal Suffolk Hussars. Freemasonry appealed to him. He held high rank in the United Grand Lodge of England, and was instrumental in founding the Rahere Lodge No 2546, the first masonic body to be associated with St Bartholomew's Hospital in London. The portrait of him by Spy in *Vanity Fair*, 1897, is rather a likeness than a caricature. Publications: *Syphilis and Pseudo-syphilis*, 1884; 2nd ed., 1895. *A Practical Treatise on Disease of the Rectum*, 1887. The second edition (with F. SWINFORD EDWARDS) is entitled, *Diseases of the Rectum and Anus*, 1892.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001261
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Cooper, Bransby Blake (1792 - 1853)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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/373445373445
Occupation General surgeon
Details The fourth of the twelve children and the eldest son of the Rev Samuel Levick Cooper, the elder brother of Sir Astley Cooper and grandson of Dr Cooper, Vicar of Great Yarmouth. Born in Great Yarmouth on September 2nd, 1792, he went to school at Bungay under the Rev Robert Page, and afterwards to the Grammar School at Yarmouth. In 1805 he was sent to sea as a midshipman in the Stately (64 guns) by the interest of Admiral Russell, then the Port Admiral at Yarmouth, and was placed under the care and instruction of the first lieutenant, who afterwards became Admiral Fisher. Nostalgia combined with sea-sickness soon made him give up all idea of becoming a sailor, and he was sent to school for the next two years at North Walsham, Norfolk, where the Rev Mr Spurdens was head master. A visit to his uncle, Sir Astley Cooper, led him to desire a medical training, and he entered the Norfolk and Norwich Hospital as a pupil under Edward Rigby and Edward Colman, P M Martineau, who was a brilliant operator, being his teacher in surgery. He came to London in 1811, entered the United Borough Hospitals, lodged with Joseph Hodgson (qv) in King Street, Cheapside, and became his uncle's pupil. On May 20th, 1812, he joined the Ordnance Medical Department as Temporary Assistant Surgeon, becoming 2nd Assistant Surgeon on December 2nd, 1812, and retiring on half pay on April 1st, 1816. During this period he was present at the battles of Vittoria, the Pyrenees, Nivelle, Orthez, and the sieges of St Sebastian and Toulouse. In 1814 he went to Quebec on the secret expedition, and for these services he was decorated. Returning to England in 1815, he found that his brother Henry had been apprenticed to Sir Astley Cooper, and as such apprenticeship usually carried the right of succession at the Hospital, Bransby determined to abandon surgery. He proceeded to Edinburgh with the intention of taking a degree in medicine. During his short residence there he was elected President of the Royal Medical Society of Edinburgh, and married Miss Keeling, a daughter of John Keeling, of Broxbourne, Herts, by whom he had a son who died before his father. Henry Cooper having died unexpectedly of fever in February, 1816, Bransby returned to London, and it was arranged that with his wife he should live in his uncle's house, for Mrs Astley Cooper disliked London and preferred to live in the country house at Gadesbridge. From June, 1818, until 1827 this arrangement was continued to the mutual advantage of uncle and nephew. Bransby assisted in the dissecting-room, where there was a class of 400 students, and in February, 1823, was appointed Demonstrator of Anatomy conjointly with John Flint South (qv) on the resignation of Charles Aston Key (qv). Astley Cooper was ceasing to teach, and it became a part of the duty of the demonstrators to deliver some of the anatomical lectures for him. The appointment of Bransby Cooper was made by Sir Astley Cooper without previous consultation with his colleagues, and brought to a head a long-simmering dissension between the governors of Guy's and St Thomas's Hospital. An acrimonious dispute took place, and it was decided by the autocratic Treasurer - Benjamin Harrison - that Guy's Hospital should be separated from St Thomas's, with which it had hitherto been joined for administrative and teaching purposes. A new medical school thus came into existence and Bransby Cooper took the Chair of Anatomy, was elected Assistant Surgeon in 1825, becoming full Surgeon in the same year, and retaining office until his death in 1853. He lectured on surgery in the medical school and was also Consulting Surgeon to the Western Infirmary. The Lancet of March 29th, 1828, contained a highly sensational description, written by James Lambert, a surgeon in general practice at Walworth, of a lithotomy operation performed by Bransby Cooper in the theatre of Guy's Hospital. The account was written in a most unfriendly spirit, and was indirectly an attack upon Sir Astley Cooper. Bransby Cooper brought an action for libel against Thomas Wakley as proprietor of the Lancet. The trial began at Westminster in the Court of Queen's Bench on Dec. 12th, 1828, and became a cause célèbre in the course of which this squib was quoted:- "When Cooper's 'nevey' cut for stone His toils were long and heavy: The patient quicker parts has shown He soon cut Cooper's 'nevey'." The jury found for Bransby Cooper with damages assessed at £100, but it left a lasting mark upon him, and throughout the remainder of his life he was unduly emotional. He was elected FRS on June 18th, 1829. At the Royal College of Surgeons he was Arris and Gale Professor of Human Anatomy and Surgery from 1841-1845, a Member of the Council 1848-1853, and Hunterian Orator in 1853. He died suddenly in the Athenaeum Club on August 18th, 1853, from a large haemorrhage due to ulceration at the base of the tongue, and was buried at St Martin's-in-the-Fields. There is a fine portrait by Eddis which was engraved by Simmonds. A copy of the mezzotint hangs in the Library of the Royal College of Surgeons. There is also a lithograph by J Bizo. Bransby Cooper paid the penalty of his relationship to Sir Astley Cooper, whom he idolized. He would perhaps have done better, and he would certainly have been happier, had he remained an army surgeon. He was warm-hearted, sympathetic, and jocular, but had little confidence in himself. He never had a large practice, and towards the end of his life interested himself in the chemistry of the human body, analysing animal fluids and calculi. As a man he was well made, muscular, a good oarsman and pugilist, and a good shot. It is told of him that, when Demonstrator of Anatomy, he came to the rescue of his pupils during a fight between St Bartholomew's and Guy's, and thrashed the enemy. On another occasion he was unable to operate because he had rowed himself from Westminster Bridge to the Hospital and felt his hand was unsteady. He was beloved of his pupils and was never referred to otherwise than as Bransby. Publications: *A Treatise on Ligaments*, 4to, 18 plates, fol., 1825; 2nd ed., London, 1827; 4th ed., 1836. In this work Cooper is said to have discovered more ligaments than actually exist. *Lectures on Anatomy, interspersed with Practical Remarks*, 4 vols., 8vo, 13 plates, London (published by the author), 1829-32 ; again, London, 1830-5. This work is said to have been the first in this country to contain lithographs. *The Anatomy of the Human Bones*, comprised in a series of lithographic drawings carefully taken from nature and arranged for the purpose of illustrating the Lecture, by Henry J. Shrapnell, fol., 30 plates, London, 1833. *Surgical Essays; the Result of Clinical Observations made at Guy's Hospital*, 8vo, 4 plates, London, 1833; republished in German at Weimar in 1837. *The Life of Sir Astley Cooper, interspersed with sketches from his Notebooks of Distinguished Contemporary Characters*, 2 vols., 8vo, a portrait, London, 1843. This is an unbalanced work, which might have been turned into a philosophical history of contemporary surgery as well as of a great surgeon's career. *Lectures on Osteology, including the Ligaments which connect the Bones of the Human Skeleton*, 8vo, 10 plates, London, 1844. "Observations on Lithotomy," 8vo, nd; reprinted from *Guy's Hosp Rep*, 1843 and 1844, N.S. i and ii. "On the Pathology and Treatment of Fracture of the Neck of the Thigh Bone," 8vo, London, 1845; reprinted from *Guy's Hosp Rep*, to which at different times Cooper contributed a large number of papers. *Lectures on the Principles and Practice of Surgery*, 8vo, London, 1851; reprinted in Philadelphia, 1852. *The Hunterian Oration, delivered at the Royal College of Surgeons, February 14th*, 1853, 8vo, London, 1853. The Oration is said to have been a great failure, and the auditors were sorry for the Orator as, like all his distinguished family, he was a great favourite. Cooper also edited Sir Astley Cooper's *Treatise on Dislocations*, "with additional observations and a memoir," 8vo, 1842. (Philadelphia and also Boston, 1844. Published also by the Massachusetts Medical Society in the "Library of Practical Medicine").
Resource Identifier RCS: E001262
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Cooper, Clarence (1830 - 1924)

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First Title value, for Searching Cooper, George (1792 - 1877)

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First Title value, for Searching Cooper, George Lewis (1810 - 1875)

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

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First Title value, for Searching Cooper, Percy Robert ( - 1925)

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First Title value, for Searching Cooper, Thomas Henry (1813 - 1881)

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First Title value, for Searching Cooper, Thomas Sankey (1818 - 1898)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-07-21 2013-08-07
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001200-E001299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373452373452
Occupation General surgeon
Details Practised in Canterbury, his birthplace. His practice was extensive, but he retired at the early age of 50 (1867), after being Surgeon, Vaccinator, and Officer of Health to the Canterbury Corporation, and Medical Officer and Vaccinator to three Districts of Bridge Union. He resided at 3 Bridge Street. He was Trustee of City Charities and Mayor of Canterbury in 1866 and 1875, and from 1874 to the time of his death was Chairman of the Commissioners of Income Tax. He was courteous but firm, of a generous disposition, and always ready to help in cases of genuine necessity. He died on March 13th, 1898, at Thanington House, Canterbury, and was buried in Thanington churchyard.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001269
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Coote, Holmes (1815 - 1872)

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

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

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

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First Title value, for Searching Da Costa, Francis Xavier (1863 - 1928)

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First Title value, for Searching Daglish, George (1793 - 1870)

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First Title value, for Searching Dalby, Sir William Bartlett (1840 - 1918)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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/373549373549
Occupation ENT surgeon
Details Born at Ashby-de-la-Zouch and came of an old Leicestershire family. He was educated at Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge, and at St George's Hospital, where as resident he occupied rooms in the Wellington Arch at Hyde Park Corner. He practised first in Chester, but finding his life uncongenial, returned to London, bent on studying diseases of the ear. To this only a few medical men were at that time devoted, the chief being Toynbee, Allen, and Hinton, who had almost a monopoly of aural practice. Dalby became assistant to James Hinton, then practising as an aural surgeon in Savile Row, and succeeded to the practice on Hinton's death in 1874. He soon began to make a large practice, and was a pioneer in the education of the deaf and dumb by means of lip-reading and articulation. He published a book with this title in 1872, and another *On the Educational Treatment of Incurably Deaf Children* in 1880. For his educational labours Dalby received a knighthood in 1886. In 1872 he became Aural Surgeon to St George's Hospital, this being the first time any such appointment was made. His practice steadily increased; in the twenty years from 1875 to 1895 it was very large, and in the eighties his waiting-room was overfull. Dalby was a link between the periods of non-operative and operative aural surgery; he never performed the complete mastoid operation, though he was one of the first to remove exostoses from the external auditory meatus by means of a dental drill. Sir William Dalby was a man of fashion, well dressed, a clubman, fond of society, literature, and the arts. He retired from practice soon after reaching the age of 60, and died at his London residence, 14 Montague Place, on December 29th, 1918. By his marriage in 1878 with Hyacinthe, the daughter of Major Edward Wellesley, he had two sons and three daughters. The eldest son was drowned in a boating accident at Sandhurst; the second was seriously wounded in the Great War. He was survived by his widow, his son, and three married daughters. His portrait accompanies his life in the *Provincial Medical Journal*, 1894; it is also in the College Collections and the *Vanity Fair* Album. Early in 1923 Lady Dalby handed to the Royal Society of Medicine the sum of £500, the interest on which, after accumulating for five years, was to form the Dalby Memorial Prize to be awarded to the person who during that period has done or published the best original work for the advancement of otology. Publications: *Lectures on Diseases and Injuries of the Ear*, 12mo, London, 1873; 4th ed., 1893. *The Education of the Deaf and Dumb by means of Lip-reading and Articulation*, 8vo, London, 1872. *On the Educational Treatment of Incurably Deaf Children*, 8vo, London, 1880. "On the Influence of the Study of Science upon the Mind: Being the Introductory Address delivered at St George's Hospital on 1st October, 1879," 8vo, London, 1879; reprinted from *Lancet*, 1879, ii, 525. Article on "Diseases of the Ear" in Holmes and Hulke's *Surgery*, 3rd ed., 1883. Article on "Diseases of the Ear" in Quain's *Dictionary of Medicine*. He edited Oscar Dodd's translation of 3rd ed of Adam Politzer's *Lehrbuch der Ohrenheilkunde*, 8vo, illustrated, London, 1894. "Short Contributions to Aural Surgery," 8vo, London, 1887; reprinted from *Lancet*, 1875-86. The same. Reprinted from *Lancet*, 1875-89, and the *Brit. Med. Jour.*; 2nd ed., 8vo, London, 1890. The same. From *Lancet*, 1875-96, 8vo, 3 illustrations, London, 1896. "Bubble Remedies in Aural Surgery," 8vo, London, 1891; reprinted from *Lancet*, 1891, i, 815. "Foreign Bodies and Osseous Growths in the External Auditory Canal, including Neoplastic Closure" in *System of Diseases of the Ear, Nose, * etc. Philadelphia, 1893. "Strange Incidents in Practice," 12mo, London, 1893; reprinted from *Lancet*, 1893, i, 240. "Dr Chesterfield's Letters to his Son on Medicine as a Career," 12mo, London, 1894; reprinted from *Longman's Magazine*. This contains amusing and rather cynical advice to a medical student. "Non-purulent Catarrh of Middle Ear." - *Trans Med.-Chir. Soc.*, 1873, lvi, 1. "Diseases of Mastoid Bone." - *Ibid.*, 1878, lxii, 233. "Cases in which Perforation of the Mastoid Cells is Necessary." - *Ibid.*, 1885, lxviii, 115.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001366
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Dale, Frederic (1857 - 1913)

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First Title value, for Searching Dale, George Cornelius (1822 - 1897)

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First Title value, for Searching Dale, George Peckitte (1821 - 1893)

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First Title value, for Searching Dalrymple, Archibald (1811 - 1863)

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First Title value, for Searching Dalrymple, Donald (1814 - 1873)

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First Title value, for Searching Dalrymple, John (1803 - 1852)

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First Title value, for Searching Dalton, Henry Gibbs (1818 - 1874)

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First Title value, for Searching Dalton, William ( - 1873)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Drysdale, Charles Robert (1830 - 1907)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-10-06
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001400-E001499
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373632373632
Occupation Physician
Details Educated at University College, London, where he was Obstetrical and Ophthalmic Assistant, and in Paris. He was connected for a long time with the Metropolitan Hospital, and became Consulting Physician. He was also at one time Physician to the North London Hospital for Consumption and to the Farringdon Dispensary, and was Consulting Physician to the latter at the time of his death. Early attracted to the study of syphilis, he was led to investigate prostitution. These studies converted him to Malthusianism, of which he was an apostle. He was President of the Malthusian League, and he held his opinions honestly and defended them stoutly; a meed of respect cannot be withheld from one who sacrificed much in fighting for a cause which did not commend itself to the majority of his profession. He was also Physician to the Rescue Society of London. He died at his residence, 28 Carson Road, West Dulwich, SE, on December 2nd, 1907. Publications: "Alpine Heights and Climate in Consumption." - *St. Andrews Med. Grad. Jour.*, 1868. *On the Treatment of Syphilis and other Diseases without Mercury: being a collection of evidence to prove that mercury is a cause of disease, not a remedy*. 8vo, London, 1863. French translation of foregoing, 1864. German translation (Vienna), 1868. *Remarks on the Antecedents and Treatment of Consumption*, 8vo, London, 1865. "Prostitution Medically Considered: with some of its Social Aspects." A Paper read at the Harveian Society of London. With a Report of the Debate. 8vo, London, 1866. *On Cholera: its Nature and Treatment*. Being the Debate in the Harveian Society of London, edited by Dr. C. DRYSDALE, 8vo, London, 1866. *Recent Views as to the Causes and Nature of Pulmonary Consumption*, 8vo, London, 1868. "On the Inadequacy of Emigration as a Remedy for European Overcrowding and Destitution." Paper read before the London Dialectical Society, May 28th, 1869. London, 1869. *Medicine as a Profession for Women*, 16mo, London, 1870. *Syphilis: its Nature and Treatment. With a Chapter on Gonorrhea*. 8vo. London, 1872; 4th ed., 1880. German translation of 4th edition, 1882. "The Population Question at the Medical Society of London; or, the Mortality of the Rich and Poor." A Paper read at the Society, with the Debate, edited by CHARLES R. DRYSDALE, 12mo, London, 1879. "Debate on Infanticide, at the Harveian Society of London," May 17th, 1866, edited by C. DRYSDALE, 12mo, London, 1866; reprinted from the *Med. Press and Circ*. "Overpopulation considered a sa Prominent Cause of Misery and Early Death" (nd). "Report of the Committee for the Prevention of Venereal Diseases" (with J. BRENDON CURGENVEN ) read before the Harveian Society of London, July 1st, 1867. 8vo, London, 1867.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001449
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Dampier, Nathaniel John (1821 - 1857)

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First Title value, for Searching Daniel, George (1813 - 1861)

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First Title value, for Searching Daniel, James Stoke (1804 - 1884)

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First Title value, for Searching Dudley, William Lewis (1821 - 1902)

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First Title value, for Searching Dudley, Benjamin (1808 - 1888)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-10-06 2013-08-08
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001400-E001499
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373635373635
Occupation General surgeon
Details Studied at Guy's Hospital, and practised at Wellingborough, Northamptonshire, where he was for some time in partnership with Joseph Brampton Wright, and died there after retirement on May 30th, 1888.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001452
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Druitt, Robert, junior (1814 - 1883)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-10-06
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001400-E001499
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373636373636
Occupation General surgeon
Details Son of Robert Druitt, senr, surgeon, of Wimborne, Dorsetshire. He was a pupil for four years of Charles Mayo, Surgeon to the Winchester Hospital, and in 1834 entered as a medical student at King's College, London, and Middlesex Hospital. He took up general practice, living in Bruton Street, Berkeley Square, where he was successful and rapidly became known as a medical writer. He is best known for his *Surgeon's Vade-Mecum*, which was first published in 1839, ran into eleven editions, was translated into several European languages, and in all more than forty thousand copies were sold. Druitt was much engaged in literary work and was a versatile writer. For ten years he edited the *Medical Times and Gazette*; in 1845 he wrote a "Popular Tract on Church Music"; he wrote, too, a small work on "Cheap Wines, their use in Diet and Medicine", which appeared in the *Medical Times and Gazette* in 1863 and 1864 and was twice reprinted in an enlarged form in 1865 and 1873. In 1872 he contributed an important article on "Inflammation" to Cooper's *Dictionary of Practical Surgery*. In addition to his literary activities Druitt took an active interest in Public Health matters. He wrote in the *Transactions of the Royal Institute of British Architects* (1859-1867) on "The Construction and Management of Human Habitations". From 1858-1867 he was one of the Medical Officers of Health for St George's, Hanover Square, and from 1864-1872 he was President of the Metropolitan Association of Medical Officers of Health, before which he delivered a number of addresses. He retired in 1872 on account of ill health, and went for a time to Madras, whence he wrote some interesting "Letters from Madras" to the *Medical Times and Gazette*. On his retirement he was presented with £1215 in a silver cup as a mark of sympathy from 370 medical men and other friends. He was one of the few recipients of the MD Lambeth, granted by the Archbishop of Canterbury. He married a Miss Hopkinson in 1845, by whom he had three sons and four daughters, all of whom survived him. He died at Kensington on May 15th, 1883, after an exhausting illness. There is an engraved portrait of him by R B Parkes in the College Collection. His younger brother was William Druitt (qv).
Resource Identifier RCS: E001453
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Davenport, Cecil John (1863 - 1926)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-09-14
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/373566373566
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born in Adelaide, South Australia, in 1863, the son of Robert Davenport, of Adelaide, and his wife, Dorothea Fulford, daughter of John Fulford, of London; he was the grandson of George Davenport, of Oxford. He was educated at St Bartholomew's Hospital, where he was House Surgeon. After taking the Fellowship he went to China as a medical missionary of the London Missionary Society. He established a medical mission in Chungking, and after some years of pioneer work there was moved to Wuchang. Here he carried on the medical work till the time of the Boxer Rising, when he was invalided home. In 1905 he received the appointment of Medical Superintendent of the Chinese Hospital, Shantung Road, Shanghai, and held this post for the rest of his life. Originally this was a mission hospital, but, under the control of local committees, in 1905 the hospital was in straits from lack of a qualified staff. Under Davenport's superintendence it rose to a high standard of efficiency, many thousands of poor Chinese being treated yearly in the wards and out-patient departments, and many doctors and nurses being trained. The hospital was founded in 1846 by Dr William Lockhart and is under the London Missionary Society, from whose missionaries its staff is derived. In 1925, owing to local disturbances, the hospital went through a revolutionary period, many of the Chinese staff and patients deserting. Davenport's report for 1925 gives an interesting account of the work done during this troublous crisis, and contains also curious details, furnished by Dr Agnes Towers, of 'women opium suicides'. During 1926 the hospital, which with the help of Davenport and others had continued to hold its own against all odds, received a vast accession of fortune under the terms of the will of Henry Lester, merchant, and an old resident in Shanghai. This magnificent gift was in the form of £350,000 in money and land. With these funds it was proposed to reconstruct the hospital on modern lines, to build a convalescent home, and to form an endowment fund. Davenport's retirement had been planned to take effect in 1927, but he was now urged to stay in China to help and advise in the rebuilding of the hospital and the founding of its medical school. He was therefore fain to stay and take up administrative duties so heavy that he had with regret to give up much of his surgical work. Doubtless he overstrained his capacities, for he died quite suddenly in the midst of his labours on September 4th, 1926. He had no wish for personal advancement or distinction, but as a President of the China Medical Missionary Association and the recipient of a decoration from the Chinese Government, he was shown some formal recognition. Davenport's life was given up entirely to the forwarding of his work; his keenness, upright character, and kindliness endeared him to the many of all nationalities with whom he was brought into contact. The chaotic state of the China he loved, and the events of the few years prior to September, 1926, were causes of much anxiety and grief to him, but his efforts to improve the conditions of medical work in that country were maintained to the end. In 1890 he married Miss A Miles, at one time 'Sister Martha' of St Bartholomew's Hospital. She was one of the first fully trained British nurses to go to China, and was from the beginning one of her husband's chief helpers. The children of the marriage were two daughters and a son, Robert Cecil Davenport, FRCS, ophthalmic surgeon.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001383
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Davey, Henry W. Robert ( - 1870)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-09-14 2013-08-07
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001300-E001399
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373567373567
Occupation General surgeon
Details Educated at the Middlesex Hospital and at the Great Windmill Street School. He was at one time Assistant Surgeon to the 7th Royal Fusiliers, and then, settling in Suffolk, was Surgeon to the Beccles Dispensary. He was at the same time a member of the Suffolk Institute of Archeology, and of the Norfolk and Norwich Archaeological Society; he was also President of the Norfolk and Norwich Pathological Society. At the time of his death he was living in retirement at 13 Steyne Road, Worthing, and was President of the Local Board of Health, and a member of the Sussex Archeological Society. He died at Worthing in 1870.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001384
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Davies, Benjamin ( - 1895)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Cundall, Robert Davies (1924 - 2009)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by David B Cundall
Publication Date 2010-05-20 2012-03-22
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/373178373178
Occupation General practitioner Missionary surgeon Missionary doctor
Details Robert Davies Cundrall was a missionary surgeon and a general practitioner. He was born in Wuhan, China, on 26 August 1924, where his parents, Edward and Mary Cundall, were Methodist missionaries. His parents had to make the very difficult decision to send him home to school in England at the age of 8, while they remained in China. Bob went to Nottingham High School and gained a scholarship to study medicine at Emmanuel College, Cambridge, going on to the London Hospital for his clinical training. After qualification, he was a house surgeon on the surgical unit under Victor Dix. Bob had originally intended to work in China, like his parents, but that country was closed to missionaries. Bob was advised by Ralph Bolton, the medical secretary of the Methodist Missionary Society, that it was essential that Bob passed his fellowship, which he did in 1953, before he started work as a missionary. Bob worked at Ituk Mbang Hospital, Nigeria, for the next six years, where the medical superintendent was Harry Haigh. Bob enjoyed the challenge of surgery in this environment, turning his hand to many unusual cases, as well as countless hernias and caesarean sections. He enjoyed teaching the nurses, both in formal lectures and at the bedside. Bob entered general practice in Harrogate, North Yorkshire, in 1959, joining an old friend from college days, George Johnson, as the second partner in the practice. He missed operative surgery, but for many years was clinical assistant to Graham-Stewart in his rectal clinic at Harrogate General Hospital. The general practice expanded and, when George Johnson moved on to a career in public health, Bob became a senior partner and made the partnership into a teaching practice. In his medical work, Bob was a highly regarded as a meticulous clinician, supportive colleague and excellent teacher. He had met Monica Pritchard, an English student at Girton College, Cambridge, and they married in 1948. They moved to Nottingham, where his maternal uncle, Jack Davies, a senior surgeon at Nottingham City Hospital, was a mentor. Bob and Monica were devoted to each other and, in his later years, Bob took on the role of caring for Monica when she developed a progressive ataxia. They celebrated their diamond wedding in December 2008. Bob had experienced a major cognitive decline over the preceding year and died, following a major stroke, a few months later. Of their four children, Edward is a tropical plant breeder, David, a community paediatrician, while Ruth and Margaret are both teachers. Two of their 10 grandchildren intend to be doctors. Bob and Monica were active members of the Methodist Church and were committed to ecumenical and inter-faith initiatives. In retirement, Bob was able to indulge his passions for walking, natural history and photography. Although by nature reserved, Bob as a TV rugby supporter was a wonder to behold! He had a lively sense of fun and a quick wit. He died at Hampden House, Harrogate, on 25 May 2009.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000995
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Seymour-Jones, John Anthony (1911 - 2008)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Neil Weir
Publication Date 2010-05-20 2012-03-09
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/373179373179
Occupation ENT surgeon
Details Tony Seymour-Jones was an otolaryngologist to the Portsmouth and South East Hants Health District. He was born in Edgbaston, Birmingham, on 7 April 1911, the son of Bertrand Seymour-Jones, a consultant otolaryngologist, and Hilda Katherine née Poole, the daughter of a mining agent. Educated at West House Preparatory School, Edgbaston, Birmingham, Seymour-Jones proceeded as an exhibitioner to Shrewsbury School and from there as a classics scholar to Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge. Whilst at Cambridge he switched to natural sciences as he decided to pursue a career in medicine. He undertook his clinical studies at St Thomas' Hospital, London, where on qualifying he became a house surgeon and later a clinical assistant to the ear, nose and throat department. Here he was influenced by Walter Howarth, Geoffrey Bateman, and by the general surgeon Sir Heneage Ogilvie. After gaining his FRCS in 1940, Seymour-Jones joined the RAMC as a consultant otolaryngologist with the rank of temporary major and served in the Italian Campaign and at the Cambridge Military Hospital, Aldershot. He made a life-long friendship with a captured Italian surgeon. At the end of the Second World War, Seymour-Jones became a registrar to the Portsmouth, Southsea and Cosham Eye and Ear Hospital, before being appointed as a consultant otolaryngologist to the Portsmouth Group of Hospitals. He was also on the staff of King Edward VII Hospital, Midhurst. He served as chairman of the British Medical Association Portsmouth division and of the South Western Laryngological Association.He represented Wessex on the council of the British Association of Otolaryngologists and served on the council of the section of laryngology of the Royal Society of Medicine. He sailed, and became commodore of the Royal Albert Sailing Club. Musical evenings were a source of enjoyment, and he had a repertoire of songs which he sang in Italian, French and German. Tony Seymour-Jones met his future wife, Elizabeth Irving Pinches, daughter of H I Pinches, a physician at the Royal Masonic Hospital, whilst she was a staff nurse at St Thomas'. They were married on 15 June 1940. She predeceased him, in 2003, as did his son Nicholas, an architect. At the grand age of 97, Tony Seymour-Jones died on 28 June 2008 at Queen Alexandra Hospital, Portsmouth, shortly after a massive stroke and myocardial infarction. He is survived by his daughters Carole and Louise, six grandchildren, and four great-grand children.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000996
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Brown, Sir Robert Charles (1836 - 1925)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2010-05-26
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/373180373180
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born on October 2nd, 1836, in the house in Preston (27 Winckley Square) where his father had practised and where he himself died. His father was Alderman Robert Brown (1801-1858), (qv), for thirty-five years a leading Preston practitioner. Robert Charles Brown was educated at Preston Grammar School till the age of 17, when he became a pupil of his father’s colleague, Thomas Dixon. In 1855 he entered King’s College Medical School, and was afterwards House Surgeon at the General Lying-in Hospital, Lambeth. His father died on February 1st, 1858, shortly before the son had obtained his first qualifications. It was necessary for him to earn his own living at once, and he became House Surgeon to the old Preston Dispensary. He held this post till 1863, but from time to time was enabled to put in periods of study in London, Edinburgh, and Dublin. In 1863 he began private practice, and was appointed Hon Medical Officer to the Dispensary, having been previously Senior Medical Officer. On the opening of the Preston and County of Lancashire Royal Infirmary in 1870 he was transferred to its staff as House Surgeon, afterwards becoming Physician and Consulting Physician. He was thus identified with its fortunes, having at the time of his death been for a long time the sole survivor of his original colleagues there. During a lifetime of practice in Preston he held a number of other appointments, and was Certifying Factory Surgeon, Medical Officer to the Lancs. County Constabulary, local Medical Officer for fifty years to the LNWR and Lancs and Yorks Railway Companies. He was also Consulting Medical Officer to the Orphanage and Deaf and Dumb School, and in the sixties was Assistant Surgeon to the 3rd Royal Lancashire Militia. He often had it in mind to proceed to the MD degree, and worked hard in preparing for it, once when he was 27 and again at the age of 64. On the first occasion he failed in logic and moral philosophy, then obligatory subjects; on the second, “although I had put down my name and paid the fees, I took fright and returned to Preston two days before the examination commenced, intending to go up in 1901, but I could never muster up courage to do so.” He referred to these events as ‘stupidity’, but was able to console himself with the many honours received in after-years from other quarters, such as a knighthood, the election to the Fellowship of the Royal College of Physicians, the Cambridge Honorary Degree of MA, and the Freedom of Preston. This last honour was conferred upon him in recognition of his professional services and munificence to the Royal Infirmary and other institutions. He was also thrice elected by his local colleagues President of the Lancashire and Cheshire Branch of the British Medical Association, and was re-elected Chairman of the Preston Division for thirteen consecutive years. He had joined the Association in 1859, and at the Manchester Meeting of 1902 was Vice-President of the Section of Medicine. Sir Charles Brown’s benefactions in Preston were numerous and generous. He assisted in collecting funds towards the building of the original Royal Infirmary. After inspecting various operating theatres, writes Dr F W Collinson, Consulting Surgeon to the Infirmary, “He built, entirely at his own expense, a most up-to-date operating theatre, with all the necessary appurtenances. He also provided isolation wards, conservatories, and many other things, e.g., billiard tables for the comfort and welfare of the patients. When X rays were first introduced he defrayed the cost of an outfit, which was the best procurable at that time. From the year 1889 to the date of his death his gifts to the Infirmary amounted to more than £10,000. His great beneficence also showed itself in many other charitable organizations. Outside his native town he was ever ready to help in what he felt to be a good cause. Thus he generously supported the Cambridge Research Hospital.” From the first he had been intimately concerned in the work of the Cambridge Committee for the Study of Special Diseases, and his personal services to the hospital established by that committee in Hills Road, Cambridge, under the direction of Dr Strangeways, were unremitting. Besides a very complete X-ray installation, he provided a microphotographic apparatus of the latest type, and founded a studentship for pathological research. It was in recognition of these gifts that the University of Cambridge, on May 23rd, 1912, conferred on him the degree of Master of Arts *honoris causa*. The Public Orator, in presenting him for the degree, aptly described him as “medicus modestus, medicus munificus”. This honour from the University, of which his two brothers were members, gave him particular pleasure. On the following day the newly built Research Hospital was opened by him in the presence of a distinguished assembly of nearly five hundred people. After speaking with pride of the progress in the field of medicine which he had been privileged to see in his own lifetime, he said: “The future depends on research, and research into special diseases is not only important in itself for those diseases, but may throw new light and open new vistas everywhere.” Sir Charles Brown was somewhat of an ascetic. His self-discipline and self-denial, which arose from a religious conviction, were greatly to be admired. Yet he practised a delightful hospitality, and was most popular in his town and with his colleagues. He was full of interesting reminiscences of his early life, could remember the stage coach, and many professional changes. He was a keen lover of music, believing in its therapeutic value, and often woke his guests in the early morning with diapason notes of his organ. Much confined latterly to the house, which he only left now and then in a bath chair, he retained his mental clearness to the last, and died where he had lived on November 23rd, 1925. He never married. In his will he says: “I bequeath my body to the Directors of the Research Hospital, Cambridge, and authorize them to retain such parts of it as they consider may be suitable additions to their Pathological Museum.” Publications: Sir Charles Brown published some interesting reminiscences, at the age of 86, under the title, *Sixty-four Years a Doctor*. The work was dedicated to his old friend, exact contemporary, and correspondent Sir Clifford Allbutt, and the proceeds of its sale he gave to the Infirmary.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000997
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Coultate, William Miller (1814 - 1882)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Coumbe, John Batten (1853 - 1924)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Couper, John (1835 - 1918)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-08-19
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001200-E001299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373474373474
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born in Glasgow on November 7th, 1835, the son of John Couper, Professor of Materia Medica in the University of Glasgow, and Charlotte, daughter of Charles Tennant, of the St Rollox Chemical Works. The family of Couper is of ancient lineage in Scotland, and the name is the northern variant of the English 'Cooper' or 'Cowper'. After the death of Professor Couper in 1855, John Couper, who had begun his education at Glasgow Academy and at the University, went to Paris to perfect himself in French. He then returned to Glasgow and graduated in 1858, having been one of Lister's pupils at Edinburgh, where he also studied anatomy and physiology under Allan Thomson. After graduation he came to London and continued his study of anatomy at University College under Professor Viner Ellis (qv). Later he studied operative surgery under Langenbeck at Berlin. On his return to London he was appointed Demonstrator of Anatomy at the London Hospital Medical College largely through the influence of Professors Sharpey and Ellis. Turning his attention to ophthalmology, he also became Assistant to George Critchett (qv) at the London Ophthalmic Hospital in Moorfields. His researches in ophthalmology enabled him in 1883 to produce a 'magazine ophthalmoscope' which facilitated the measurement not only of errors of refraction, but of degrees of astigmatism. At the London Hospital his career was one of unswerving and upward progress. He was successively Demonstrator of Anatomy, Professor of Physiology, Assistant Surgeon, and full Surgeon and Professor of Surgery. As Professor of Physiology at the London Hospital he lectured conjointly with Hughlings Jackson, who was wont to say of his colleague that "no man had more knowledge worth communicating". It is probable that some of this knowledge was shown in communicating to Hughlings Jackson the value of the ophthalmoscope in diagnosis. As Professor of Surgery Couper gave a special course of lectures on diseases of the eye. On retiring under the time limit he was appointed Consulting Surgeon, and went to live at Ellesborough in the Chiltern Hills, whence he afterwards removed with his family to Falmouth. His death occurred on April 30th, 1918, and he was buried at Falmouth. He was survived by a widow, three daughters, and one son, Colonel Duncan Campbell Couper, RE. He left £178,000. Couper was amongst the last of the general surgeons who practised ophthalmology. A pupil of Lister, he introduced the use of the spray and dressings at the London Hospital before Lister came to King's College Hospital. He was a good but slow operator and was a pioneer in operations on the kidney and liver; he did much to popularize the use of the ophthalmoscope, more especially in estimating errors of refraction by the direct method of examination. Shy and somewhat retiring in manner, he wrote no books, though he made many contributions to the medical periodicals. He practised for many years at 80 Grosvenor Street, Grosvenor Square, W, and at the time of his death was Consulting Surgeon to the London, the Royal London Ophthalmic, and the Scottish Hospitals. He married in 1868 Helen Macfarlan, daughter of Alexander Campbell, Surgeon to the 1st Life Guards, and his wife Helen, daughter of the Rev Duncan Macfarlan, DD, Principal of Glasgow University, and Minister of the Cathedral. There is an excellent bust of Couper by Miss Anna Dabis and a three-quarter length portrait in oils, both in the Medical College of the London Hospital, and his coat of arms - two laurel branches inclining towards each other -appears in one of the College windows. Publications:- "Wounds of the Intestines." - *Trans. Pathol. Soc. Lond.*, xiv, 160. "An Attempt to Reduce a Dislocation of the Lower Jaw which had lasted nearly Four Months." - *Lond. Hosp. Rep*., 1864, i., 177. "The Diagnosis of Astigmatism by the Ophthalmoscope." - *Brit. Med. Jour.*, 1870, ii, 804. "A Magazine Refraction Ophthalmoscope." - *Trans. Ophthalmol. Soc.*, 1883, iii, 297.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001291
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Courtenay, John (1808 - 1854)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Courtney, Sydney (1805 - 1879)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Cousins, Edward (1823 - 1868)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Cousins, John Ward (1834 - 1921)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-08-19
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001200-E001299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373478373478
Occupation General surgeon
Details The second son of the Rev Thomas Cousins, an Independent Minister at the King Street Church, Portsmouth. He was apprenticed to E J Scott (qv), Surgeon to the Royal Portsmouth Hospital, and received his professional training at St Thomas's Hospital, where he was Cheselden Medallist in 1856 and held resident appointments. He was for a time Resident Surgeon at the Victoria Park Hospital (City of London Hospital for Diseases of the Chest), and then returned to Portsmouth, where he soon devoted himself entirely to surgery. He was appointed Assistant Surgeon to the Royal Portsmouth Hospital in 1860, and remained on the active staff as Senior Surgeon till 1908, when he was elected Consulting Surgeon and a Vice-President. He was one of the founders of the Portsmouth and South Hants Eye and Ear Infirmary, making ophthalmic surgery his specialty whilst still practising as a general surgeon. He was also latterly Senior Surgeon of the Eye and Ear Infirmary and of the Medical and Surgical Home for Women. "If I were asked to state Dr Ward Cousins's outstanding characteristic as a surgeon," wrote his intimate friend and colleague, Charles P Childe (qv), "I should say it was his thoroughness - no time was too long, no trouble too great for him to spend over any case, no care too exacting in the performance of any operation. The number of hours he devoted to his hospital work was prodigious." Ward Cousins was the outstanding figure at the Royal Portsmouth Hospital, which he served for nearly half a century. Popular and helpful among his colleagues, he has been described as the backbone of the institution, where his aim was to foster esprit de corps, broad-mindedness, and tolerance. He was fond of reading and study, and was the mainstay, as Hon Secretary, of a local literary and scientific institution. His labours on behalf of the British Medical Association were life-long. For a number of years he was Hon Secretary of the Portsmouth Division, and then President of the Division and of the Southern Branch. He was a member of the old Committee of Council of the Association in the early eighties, and was President of the Central Council from 1898-1895. At the Portsmouth Meeting in 1899 he was President of the Association, and his good qualities and generous hospitality were then greatly in evidence. At the Royal College of Surgeons he was a well-known figure - a little, very baldheaded, genial gentleman. From 1895-1899 he was a Member of Council and represented the College on the Central Midwives Board. Dr Ward Cousins, as he was always known locally, died at his house - Riverside, Kent Road, Southsea - on September 22nd, 1921, being survived by his widow and a daughter. He was twice married - the second time to Miss Waters, the head mistress of a school for girls in Southsea. He was a medical inventor of great originality and mechanical skill, the following being a list of the appliances devised or improved by him: Tapering metallic catheter with flexible beak; capillary catheter; gag with throat guard; Eustachian catheter; pelvic tourniquet for amputation at hip-joint; aural apparatus for alternate injection and evacuation of air; fixing forceps; ovariotomy trocar; convertible stethoscope; surgical pin with handle; aspirator; needle-holder with rotatory action; safety eye-irrigator; dilator after colotomy; empyema trocar and knife; antiseptic artificial drumhead, etc. For these inventions he was awarded a prize medal by the British Medical Association in 1884 and a gold medal at the International Inventions Exhibition. He was awarded a prize of £20 by the British Medical Association for one of his inventions; this money, however, he did not himself receive, but offered it as a prize for the best essay on abortion. The list of inventions made by Ward Cousins differs in the *Provincial Medical Journal* from that quoted above, the latter being from the *Medical Directory* and apparently that which he wished to place on record. He was for many years engaged in the development of the Portsmouth and South Hants Eye and Ear Hospital and of the Surgical Home for Women, and in the reconstruction of the Royal Hospital, where in 1889 there were 130 patients. Ward Cousins was distinguished for his singular calligraphy, and his prescriptions were a puzzle to many dispensers. Among the 'illegible prescriptions' represented in *The Art of Dispensing* and published at the offices of the *Chemist and Druggist*, a facsimile of his handwriting will be found. His portrait is in the Fellows' Album. Publications: "Case of Soft and Foetid Calculus." - *Clin. Soc. Trans*.. 1888, xxi, 259. *New Antiseptic Artificial Membrana Tympani. With Remarks on the Treatment of Perforation and other Disorders of the Middle Ear*, 12mo, London, 1889. "Ectopic Gestation, and Conditions favourable for its Advance to Full Term" - *Brit. Med. Jour.*, 1903, ii, 181. "Tuberculous Diseases of Joints; Arthrectomy and Excision." - *Ibid.*, 1896, ii, 1040. "Excision of Knee-joint in Middle Life; Jamming the Bone." - *Ibid.*, 1896, ii, 177.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001295
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Coutts, David Kirkpatrick (1881 - 1911)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Covey, Edward ( - 1861)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Davies, David (1821 - 1910)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Browne, Cornelius Harrison ( - 1853)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Browne, James ( - 1880)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Browning, Benjamin ( - 1876)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Browning, Charles (1805 - 1878)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Brownless, Anthony Colling (1815 - 1897)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2010-05-26 2013-08-07
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001000-E001099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373188373188
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born about the year 1815 and was the son of Anthony Brownless, Esq, a connection of the Maitland and Lauderdale families. He was educated at home by private tutor and then in the house of the Rev C E Smith, of Badlesmere, Kent. He was apprenticed to Mr Charles Wilks, surgeon, of Charing, Kent, and, while diligently continuing his classical studies, showed great aptitude for medicine and made himself thoroughly conversant with pharmacy and the structure of the human skeleton. While at Charing an accident happened which greatly handicapped his education: a horse fell on him and he received such an injury to the right knee that chronic disease of the joint was set up. In the summer of 1834 his health had so suffered that he was sent for a long voyage to St Petersburgh, Norway, and Denmark, and in 1835 he visited New York, other parts of the United States, and Canada. He was then able to return to Charing, where until October, 1836, he saw much of an extensive Poor Law practice. He became a student at St Bartholomew's Hospital in 1836. At the end of the session he was considered one of the best anatomists in the school, and, notwithstanding a severe attack of fever with delirium which kept him in bed for weeks before the examinations, he came out second in anatomy and physiology. Study and ill health had pulled the indomitable student down considerably, and issues around his knee-joint compelled him to limp on crutches during the greater part of the session. He now made another voyage in search of health to Portugal and Spain, and spent the summer at Malaga, Cadiz, and Seville. In the autumn of 1837, his knee being still very painful, he gave up his hospital work, hired a farm from his father at Goudhurst, and amused himself with agriculture and the study of diseases of animals. Returning, though still on crutches, to St Bartholomew's in 1839, he continued his studies there and at the Royal General Dispensary. He acted as Clinical Assistant in the out-patients' department of the hospital and made the post-mortem examinations. In 1840 he obtained a certificate of honour for midwifery and the first prize for forensic medicine at St. Bartholomew's. After qualifying in 1841 he began to practise in Islington in 1842, but soon became assistant to John Painter Vincent (qv) at his old hospital, and gave his whole time to the wards for the next two years. He prepared himself to become a consulting and operating surgeon, and after practising as such at 4 Albion Place, Lonsdale Square, from 1843-1845, repaired to Liège and entered the University, where he devoted himself to anatomy and pathology - subjects for which that university was famous. He made his mark at Liège and became the friend of the well-known Professor of Anatomy, Dr Spring. He returned to London early in 1846 and look a house in Charterhouse Square, continuing to study for the College Fellowship. Fearing, however, that it would be long before he obtained an appointment on a hospital staff, he took the MD degree of St Andrews, and in February, 1847, was elected Physician to the Metropolitan Dispensary in Fore Street. His rise was now rapid, for he was kind and attentive to patients, accurate in diagnosis, and successful in treatment. In September, 1847, he was elected Physician to the Royal General Dispensary, Aldersgate Street, with which he had been previously connected, and continued to hold his other post. He not only acquired a large practice, but was an admirable teacher of anatomy, pathology, and practical medicine. Dr Protheroe Smith retired from the office of Assistant Teacher of Practical Midwifery at St Bartholomew's Hospital in 1848, and the post was offered to Brownless, who, however, declined it. In August, 1849, in consequence of the refusal of the Committee of the Metropolitan Dispensary to reform the Apothecary's Depart¬ment, in which there had long been gross neglect of the patients, Brownless tendered his resignation of the office of Physician, and upon his leaving it almost all his patients followed him to the Royal General Dispensary. He resigned his post at the Royal General Dispensary in September, 1849, on account of ill health, and retired temporarily from private practice. His popularity at the Dispensary had been so great that the patients presented him with a testimonial at a public meeting of the subscribers, held at the Literary and Scientific Institution, Aldersgate Street, on October 9th, 1849. A large body of the Governors of both Institutions followed this good example, and voted 'a splendid testimonial' in acknowledgement of Brownless's public services. This was presented to him on May 7th, 1850, by the High Bailiff of Southwark, presiding over a public meeting at the Clarence Hotel, Aldersgate Street. The testimonial consisted of a finely illuminated memorial on vellum and a piece of plate, weighing upwards of 200 oz. Brownless afterwards went out to Australia, where he was elected Physician to the Melbourne Benevolent Asylum. In 1854 he was elected Physician to the Melbourne Hospital, and held that post until 1866, when he was appointed Consulting Physician and a Life Governor. He was a founder of the Medical School of the University of Melbourne and its first MD. For twenty-nine years in succession he was elected Vice-Chancellor of the University, and succeeded Dr Moorhouse, afterwards Bishop of Manchester, as Chancellor in 1887. He was a member of several important Government Commissions, and in 1870 was made a Knight of St Gregory the Great, and in 1883 a Knight Commander of the Order of Pius by successive Popes, who thus conferred on him papal nobility. At the time of his death, or not many years before, he was Medical Referee to the Victoria and Intercolonial Assurance Companies, and, besides his other offices, at one time held those of Physician to the Industrial and Reformatory Schools, to the Magdalen Asylum at Abbotsford, and to the Orphanage of St Vincent de Paul. His death occurred at Melbourne, where he had practised at 2 Victoria Parade, on December 3rd, 1897. He had married twice: (1) in 1842 to Ellen, daughter of W Hawker, MD, of Charing, and (2) in 1852 to Anne, daughter of William Hamilton, Captain, Rifle Brigade, of Eden, Co Donegal. Publications: "On the Treatment of Diseases of the Joints." - *Lancet*, 1846, ii, 241; 1847, i, 434. *The Merits of Mr. J. Painter Vincent: an Address*, 8vo, London, 1847. This pamphlet, which is in the College Library, is a eulogy of John Painter Vincent (qv), Surgeon to St Bartholomew's Hospital. *An Address delivered at a Public Meeting of the Subscribers to the Vincent Testimonial*, 8vo, London, 1847. *Addresses delivered in the University of Melbourne*.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001005
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Bruce, Alexander (1842 - 1869)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Brush, John Ramsay (1817 - 1891)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2010-05-26
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/373190373190
Occupation General surgeon
Details Born February 27th, 1817. Educated at St Bartholomew’s Hospital and in Paris. He was gazetted Assistant Surgeon to the 26th Foot on June 8th, 1841, was transferred to the St Helena Regiment on August 4th, 1843, and to the 2nd Dragoons on October 13th of the same year. He became Staff Surgeon (2nd Class) on April 2nd, 1852, was transferred to the 93rd Foot on May 14th, was further transferred to the 2nd Dragoons on July 21st, 1854, and joined the Staff once more (2nd Class) on January 18th, 1856, being placed on half pay on October 11th, and restored to full pay on September 21st, 1860, on receiving an appointment. He retired on half pay on August 16th, 1861. He was at one time Surgeon to the 17th Depot Battalion at Limerick, and at the time of his retirement Surgeon to the Military Prison at Gosport. He saw much active war service, being Assistant Surgeon to the 26th Cameronians during the first Chinese War (1841-1842), for which he was awarded a Medal. In Turkey he was Surgeon to the 93rd Highlanders and to the Scots Greys during the Crimean Campaign, and was present at Balaklava, Inkermann, Tchernaya, Sebastopol, etc. For this service he was awarded a Medal with three Clasps, the Turkish Medal, and was made a Chevalier of the Legion of Honour. In his latter years he lived at Newton Abbot, South Devon, and then at 2 Eaton Villas, Duchess Road, Clifton, where he died, November 18th, 1891. Publications:- “Observations on Glanders,” a paper read before the Paris Medical Society and printed in *Prov. Med. and Surg. Jour.*, 1841, ii, 222, 241. “Successful Treatment of Poisoning by One Ounce of Oxalic Acid.” – *Lancet*, 1861. “Cancer of the Pylorus.” – *Lond. Med. Gaz.*, 1851, xlvii, 980.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001007
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Bryan, Edward Langdon ( - 1872)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Bryan, John Morgan (1809 - 1894)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2010-05-26
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/373192373192
Occupation General surgeon
Details Was apprenticed to Dr Clark at the age of 19, after which he completed his medical training at St Bartholomew’s and Guy’s Hospitals. Settling in practice in Northampton, he became well known locally. He was a strong supporter of the British Medical Association, and from 1860-1877 was Co-Secretary and from 1880-1883 Treasurer of the South Midland Branch. He was President of the Branch in 1873, and represented it for a time on the General Council and on the Parliamentary Bills Committee of the Association. On retiring from the secretary-ship in 1877 he was presented with a testimonial (a silver salver with inscription) by his fellow-members. His whole heart and soul were in his Association work, for which his social qualities peculiarly fitted him. He was for seven years Surgeon to the Northampton Royal Victoria Dispensary, and at the time of his death was Hon Local Secretary to the Birmingham Medical Benevolent Association, Medical Officer and Public Vaccinator for the All Saints’ District of the Northampton Union, and Medical Examiner for Govern¬ment and other Insurance Societies. He died in April, 1894. Publications: “Case of Poisoning by Strychnia: Recovery.” – *Brit. Med. Jour*., 1857, 604. “Protracted Miscarriage.” – *Ibid.*, 1858, 885. “Cynanche Trachealis vel Stridula.” – *Ibid.*, 1860, 519.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001009
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Bryant, Walter John (1813 - 1888)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2010-05-26
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/373193373193
Occupation General surgeon
Details Was apprenticed to his father, Dr John Bryant, for many years a successful practitioner in the Edgware Road. He was entered as a student at University College Hospital in 1834, where he studied under Liston, Samuel Cooper, Jones Quain, and Elliotson, and among his fellow-students were Richard Quain, Morton, Erichsen, and W Wood. He was House Surgeon under Liston, with whom he formed a strong and enduring friendship. He married in 1840 the daughter of Major Parris, entered into partnership with his father, and on the retirement of the latter in 1843 moved to Sussex Square, where he acquired a large and remunerative practice. Bred up in the old school, he had great faith in the value of drug treatment, whilst leaving no stone unturned to benefit his patient in every other direction. His ingenuity in contriving means of relieving pain, and in the general management of the sick-room, was of striking value to him. At the bedside he was always cheerful and optimistic, and socially he made his mark as a well-informed man possessed of a fund of anecdote. He was especially successful as an obstetrician and in the care of children, but unfortunately has left no records of his great experience. He withdrew from practice little by little, and about the year 1870 took up his residence at a house which he had built at Burghfield, near Reading. He came up to town thenceforward three or four times a week in order to see patients. He suffered from chronic cystitis, and in March, 1888, developed senile gangrene. He died on May 14th, 1888, leaving a widow and six children, of whom the eldest, John Henry Bryant, MRCS, was at the time Medical Officer of Health in Gibraltar. Walter John Bryant's addresses were 23a Sussex Square, and High Woods, Burghfield Hill, Reading. At the time of his death he was Hon Local Secretary of the Medical Benevolent College and Medical Officer of the Great Western Hotel, and was for some years Consulting Physician to the Home for Incurable Children, Maida Vale, as well as Surgeon Major to the Royal Bucks Yeomanry.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001010
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Cass, Henry ( - 1899)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Cass, William Reader (1804 - 1876)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Castellote, Raan Horace (1870 - 1899)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Cathrow, William (1806 - 1869)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Cattlin, William Alfred Newman (1814 - 1886)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Cautley, Henry (1798 - 1874)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Dunn, Louis Albert (1858 - 1918)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-11-02
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001400-E001499
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373660373660
Occupation General surgeon
Details The youngest son of J Roberts Dunn, JP, DL, Stone House, Warbleton, Sussex. At Guy's Hospital he gained the Ormerod Scholarship and qualified in 1882, passed with honours the MB BS in 1884, also the FRCS, and in 1888 the MS, gaining the Gold Medal, acting meanwhile in hospital resident appointments. It was the time of the Zulu War, of Rorke's Drift and Isandula; the British Agent, John Dunn, was in everyone's mouth as the trusted British Representative. His fellow-students recognized thus early Dunn's character and transferred to him the name of 'John', and as John Dunn he came to be styled throughout the hospital. He held in succession the posts of Demonstrator of Anatomy, Surgical Registrar, Warden of the College, Assistant Surgeon, Joint Lecturer on Surgery, and Surgeon to the hospital. It is as Warden of the College and all that relates to it that Dunn is especially remembered. A Rugger leader and yet the hardest worker, he saw the good points of everybody; in a quiet and friendly manner he influenced the wayward, criticized eccentricities, put a stop to tiffs and quarrels. Among numerous stories is this one: Dunn was looking out of the College window when he saw three students emerging from the College in quick succession in the direction of a public house where was a billiard saloon. He caught a fourth student as he was going out and invited him in to tea, pressing on him many cups with whimsical persistence as an insurance against alcohol thirst. On the first day of holding a class he learnt names without fail, and within a week or two knew all about the individual's achievements at school and in sport. The football team and all its matches and successes were subjects of constant talks. On the Court of Examiners he showed an intimate knowledge of every Guy's candidate; success of each was a matter of rejoicing, and if the candidate's marks scarcely reached the border line, Dunn had always on the tip of his tongue some pertinent suggestion. On the other hand, Guy's student or not, the idle and careless received no sympathy. As a surgeon Dunn was a very accurate clinical observer with a great memory for cases, frequently recalled when a difficulty in diagnosis was under discussion. He was a careful and assured operator, who kept continually in mind the duty of a teaching surgeon to exhibit to his students what was safe and trustworthy, and to impress upon them that brilliant feats of surgery by individuals were not to be taken as normal procedures. Dunn was for a long while Surgeon to the East London Hospital for Children, and, associated with this interest in the surgery of children, he was Consulting Surgeon to St Mary's Children's Hospital, Plaistow; to the Royal Asylum of St Anne's Society, Red Hill; to the Children's Nursing Home, Barnet; St Alban's Hospital; Emsworth Cottage Hospital; and Tower Hamlets Dispensary. At the Royal College of Surgeons he was a Member of Council (1913-1918) and of the Court of Examiners (1907-1917), having been previously an Examiner in Anatomy. He was also Examiner in Surgery to the Universities of Cambridge and Leeds, and to the Royal Naval Medical Service. He and his two elder brothers remained unmarried, and his special joy was to rejoin them at their home and birthplace, and to enjoy shooting in the surrounding woods. In later years he practised in Park Crescent, Portland Place, and a sister resided with him. To his great distress, as she was going on well after an operation for appendicitis, fatal pulmonary embolism supervened. This loss told severely on his health. Kidney trouble obliged him to submit to operation; the diseased kidney proved to be irremovable, and only continuous drainage could be instituted. Dunn continued active as a surgeon and examiner in spite of inconvenience which would have stopped anyone less brave. He had hoped for a prolongation of life, and had moved to a house on the Buckinghamshire Hills, but the disease made progress, and he died in Bright's Ward, Guy's Hospital, on June 8th, 1918. A portrait accompanies the notice in the *Guy's Hospital Gazette* Obituary.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001477
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Buchanan, Andrew ( - 1877)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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

First Title value, for Searching Pringle, Robert (1927 - 2009)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Rey, Charles Humphrey Jules (1915 - 2010)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2010-06-10
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001000-E001099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373197373197
Occupation General surgeon
Details Charles Humphrey Jules Rey was a general surgeon in Guernsey. He was born on 15 August 1915, in Bognor Regis, into a family of French origins. His father, Jules Frederick Rey, was a general practitioner. His mother was Bertha Maud née Bevan. He was sent as a boarder to his preparatory school and from then to Harrow as an entrance scholar. He enjoyed his schooldays and was a regular visitor to anniversary dinners. During his time there a petition allegedly signed by 400 boys called for a reduction in the excessive number of parades. This aroused considerable press coverage, not least in Germany. A question was asked in Parliament, and Eton offered to send a platoon to restore order. He went on to Guy’s Hospital in 1933, where he was noted for his elegant morning dress and carnation, and qualified in 1939. After house jobs at Guy’s, he joined the RAMC. He served at first with a searchlight unit and was then posted to Burma. There he rose to the rank of major, serving as a surgeon in casualty clearing stations and military hospitals, but he also took on the responsibility of a deputy assistant director of medical services, arranging for the evacuation of some 180,000 casualties in 21 months. Years later, while waiting to receive the Burma Star in Guernsey, he found himself sitting next to a soldier whose life he had saved from a gunshot wound in the shoulder. On demobilisation, he decided to specialise, completed registrar jobs at Guy’s and in other hospitals, and passed the FRCS in 1952. During this time he made friends with Jim Dickson, another Guy’s man, who had gone to Guernsey. He told Charles of an impending vacancy in the practice of Bostock and Webber, and there Rey moved in 1957. He worked closely with Dickson to provide a surgical service, but was also on call for general practice, the police doctor rota and became the divisional surgeon of the Guernsey division of St John Ambulance Brigade. He played a major part in planning the Princess Elizabeth Hospital. He was exceptionally courteous, dignified and self-disciplined. He made his calls in a Rolls-Royce and a three-piece suit. He married Thelma, who had studied at the same college of art as his sister. They had no children. He kept fit by a daily swim, which he continued even after undergoing cardiac surgery. He died at the age of 94 on 16 January 2010 from a lung abscess.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001014
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Somervell, James Lionel (1927 - 2009)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2010-06-10
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001000-E001099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373198373198
Occupation General surgeon
Details James Somervell continued his family’s tradition of missionary work in India. He was born on 23 April 1927 in Kodaikanal, southern India. His father, Theodore Howard Somervell, was a surgeon and mountaineer, who took part in the ill-fated 1922 and 1924 Mallory expeditions to conquer Everest. He became superintendent of the Neyyor Hospital and of the South Travancore Medical Mission, and, in the later phase of his career, was based at Vellore Christian Medical College. James’ mother, Margaret Hope Simpson, was also from a missionary background. He was educated at the Downs School, Colwall, and then Peekskill High School, New York (during the Second World War). He then studied at Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge, going on to University College Hospital for his clinical studies. He qualified with the Trotter medal in surgery and the Yellowes medal in medicine. He became a house surgeon to R S Pilcher and then completed a house physician appointment at the North Middlesex Hospital. He was subsequently a casualty officer at the Royal Surrey Hospital. He then became a registrar at the Vellore Christian Medical College, southern India, under Paul Brand. In 1956, he joined the London Missionary Society, which sent him to work in the CSI Campbell Hospital in Jammalamadugu, southern India, where he stayed for the next 12 years. In 1968, he returned to England as a senior registrar at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital, Birmingham. He published on neonatal and infantile intestinal obstruction in India, on family planning by salpingectomy, with a record of 500 cases, and on leiomyosarcoma of the rectum. Like his father, his main interest outside medicine was mountaineering. In 1952 he married Mary Stapleton and they had two sons and one daughter. He died on 20 August 2009.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001015
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Wooler, Geoffrey Hubert (1911 - 2010)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Raymond Hurt
Publication Date 2010-06-10
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001000-E001099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373199373199
Occupation Cardiothoracic surgeon
Details Geoffrey Wooler was a consultant cardiothoracic surgeon at Leeds General Infirmary and a pioneer of open heart surgery. He was born in 1911, the son of a successful Leeds businessman. He was educated at Leeds Grammar School and Giggleswick School, before going up to Cambridge to read law. After two terms, he switched to medicine and went on to the London Hospital for his clinical studies. After qualifying in 1937, he was house surgeon to Tudor Edwards, who stimulated his interest in thoracic surgery and arranged for him to visit the Charité Hospital in Berlin, where the bold and pioneering surgery of Ernst Ferdinand Sauerbruch attracted visiting assistants from all over the world, even though Sauerbruch, who was both a Nazi and a bully, treated them abominably. Wooler had already joined the Territorial Army and, after passing the FRCS, became a graded surgeon and served in the 70th General Hospital RAMC in North Africa from the Algerian landings to Italy, rising to the rank of lieutenant colonel. He was mentioned in despatches after the battle of Casino. After the war, he returned to the London Hospital to become first assistant to Tudor Edwards and Vernon Thompson, meanwhile completing an MD thesis on his surgical experiences in the Middle East. Almost immediately Philip Allison invited him to join him as a consultant thoracic surgery at the General Infirmary in Leeds. When Allison moved to Oxford, Wooler was joined by John Aylwin. In 1957 he set up an open heart unit with one of the first heart lung machines, designed by Denis Melrose at the Hammersmith Hospital. For a time Leeds and the Hammersmith were the only two units doing open heart surgery in the United Kingdom. Later he was joined by Marian Ion Ionescu, a refugee from Romania, and together they developed the use of pig valves to replace damaged mitral valves, a technique which did not require post-operative anticoagulants. This new method established Wooler’s reputation in Leeds. His reputation was further enhanced when Lord Woolton collapsed at the Conservative Party conference in Scarborough. He was thought to have pulmonary oedema from heart failure, even though the sputum was pure pus. Wooler was called in. The X-ray showed an elevated left diaphragm. Wooler diagnosed a subphrenic abscess which had ruptured into the lung. He drained the abscess and Woolton recovered. Wooler and Aylwin both owned Rolls-Royces, the former being chauffeur-driven. Such was the thoracic social scene in the 1950s. Geoffrey retired in 1974, to run a restaurant. This turned out to be a disaster and after a year he sold it to the chef, though he continued to live next door. He was a born bon viveur and raconteur, and recorded his adventures in a delightful and amusing memoir entitled *Pig in a suitcase* (Otley, Smith Settle, 1999), which modestly left out any reference to his considerable achievements in surgery, not least of which were his development of biological tissue heart valves and his experience of 50 cases of drainage of subphrenic abscesses. He died on New Year’s Day 2010, in his 99th year.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001016
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Allamand, Pablo Juan Bautista (1909 - 2009)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2010-09-09
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/373200373200
Occupation General surgeon
Details Pablo Juan Bautista Allamand was the doyen of surgery in Chile. Born on 5 August 1909, he was made an honorary fellow of our College in 1972 during the presidency of Sir Edward Muir. He died on 27 July 2009.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001017
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Attard, Joseph (1932 - 2009)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2010-09-30
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/373201373201
Occupation General surgeon
Details Joseph Attard (known to all as ‘Pep’) was a consultant general surgeon in Malta. He was born on 14 September 1932 in Senglea, a town in the Grand Harbour area of Malta. His father was Caesar Attard, a general practitioner and junior surgeon at the main civil hospital of Malta in Floriana. His mother, Gabriella Tenaglia, was the theatre nurse at the private Blue Sisters’ Hospital. His education at St Joseph’s School, Valletta, was interrupted by the air raids of 1940, when the family was evacuated to Birkirkara, where part of the Jesuit College had been transformed into a hospital where Caesar Attard became the chief surgeon. Joseph completed his secondary education in the College and matriculated in 1948. He entered the medical school at the Royal University of Malta, graduating in 1955. He then did house jobs at St Luke’s University Hospital in Malta and went on to England to specialise in surgery, working in various hospitals in London, Gulson Hospital in Coventry and Southampton General Hospital. In 1961 he married Maureen Brown, a nursing sister at the Temperance Hospital in London. By the time they returned to Malta in 1970 they had two boys and one girl, none of whom followed in their parents’ footsteps. On settling down in Malta, Joseph set up in private practice, soon developed a large clientele and introduced cosmetic surgery to Malta. In 1974 Malta became a republic. The Royal Navy withdrew from the dockyard, and by 1977 there was turmoil. The two private hospitals were closed by the Maltese Government and Joseph worked abroad in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, and in various hospitals in England. Finally political stability returned and he was able to go home. He published on traumatic injuries of the pancreas. He was a keen violinist and enjoyed cooking. His wife, Maureen, died in 2006. He was still working when he developed a sudden homonymous hemianopia and was found to have a brain tumour from which, despite intensive treatment, he died on 11 April 2009.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001018
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Black, Sir James Whtye (1924 - 2010)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2010-09-30
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/373202373202
Occupation pharmacologist
Details Sir James Black was a distinguished pharmacologist who developed not only beta-blockers but also cimetidine, which transformed the management of peptic ulcer. He was born on 14 June 1924, in Uddingston, Strathclyde, the fourth of five sons of a mining engineer from whom he inherited a love of music and singing. He was educated at Beath High School, Cowdenbeath, where he at first studied music and then later mathematics. At the age of 15 he won the Patrick Hamilton residential scholarship to St Andrews University, and then followed an elder brother into medicine, qualifying in 1946. He then became an assistant lecturer in physiology, and a year later went to the University of Malaya in Singapore as a lecturer, returning as a senior lecturer to Glasgow Veterinary School in 1950. From 1958 to 1964 he worked for ICI Pharmaceuticals and then went on to Smith Kline & French Laboratories, before being appointed as professor of pharmacology at University College, London. He was director of therapeutic research at Wellcome Research Laboratories (from 1978 to 1984) and was then appointed as professor of analytical pharmacology at King’s College Medical School, a post he held until he retired in 1993. Between 1992 and 2006 he was chancellor of the University of Dundee. The university built the Sir James Black Centre in his honour. In 1988 he won the Nobel prize for physiology or medicine for his work on the discovery of beta-blockers. In 2004, he was awarded the gold medal of the Royal Society. He was knighted in 1981 and appointed to the Order of Merit in 2000. In 1993 he was awarded an honorary fellowship of our College. He married first, Hilary Vaughan, who predeceased him, and secondly Rona MacKie in 1994. He died on 22 March 2010, leaving his second wife and a daughter from his first marriage.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001019
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Brown, Michael Meredith (1918 - 2009)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Raymond Hurt
Publication Date 2010-09-30
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/373203373203
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Michael Meredith Brown was a consultant thoracic surgeon at Midhurst Hospital. He was born on 1 May 1918 in Croydon, the first son of Bernard Meredith, an analytic chemist in the brewing industry, and Doris née Cortazzi, a bank clerk. He was educated at St Anselm’s Preparatory School, Croydon, Bradfield College, Berkshire, Jesus College, Cambridge, and then St Thomas’ Hospital, London, qualifying in 1942. Three years later, he obtained his fellowship of the College. He served in the RAF Volunteer Reserve as a squadron leader. After demobilisation and junior hospital posts, he was appointed as a consultant thoracic surgeon at Midhurst Hospital and to the Army at the Cambridge Military Hospital, Aldershot. His most important publication was a chapter on oesophagoscopy in Rob and Smith’s *Operative surgery* (London, Butterworth, 1978). He married a Miss Woodward in 1942. They had two sons and two daughters.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001020
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Clippingdale, Samuel Dodd ( - 1925)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Close, Anthony William ( - 1863)

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First Title value, for Searching Clover, Joseph Thomas (1825 - 1882)

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First Title value, for Searching Clutton, Henry Hugh (1850 - 1909)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Dickin, Oswald ( - 1865)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-06-07 2013-08-21
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/373387373387
Occupation Public health officer
Details Was Surgeon Inspector of Factories and Printing Works, External Medical Officer of Oldham Union, and a member of the British Medical Association. He died at Middleton, Manchester, in 1865.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001204
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Coates, John (1878 - 1911)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Coates, Matthew ( - 1911)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Coates, William Henry (1771 - 1853)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Coates, William Martin (1812 - 1885)

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First Title value, for Searching Coats, George (1876 - 1915)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Cock, Edward (1805 - 1892)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2011-06-07
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001200-E001299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373393373393
Occupation General surgeon
Details The third son of John Cock, junr, an underwriter at Lloyd's, by his marriage with Maria, daughter of Baron Hesse, of Potsdam in Prussia, was born at Tottenham, Middlesex, on January 26th, 1805. The family of Cock was connected with that of Henry Cline, Surgeon to St Thomas's Hospital, and it was through Cline's introduction that Sir Astley Cooper met his wife at Tottenham. Lady Cooper was the daughter of John Cock, senr, a wealthy merchant, and was consequently aunt to Edward Cock. He was educated at the school of Dr Schwabe, a German, at Stamford, where, as well as from his mother, he learnt sufficient French and German to undertake translations for English medical journals. He was apprenticed to his uncle, Astley Cooper, in 1821, and began his studies at St Thomas's Hospital. When the separation of medical teaching at Guy's and St Thomas's Hospitals took place in 1825, in consequence of the appointment of J Flint South (qv) as Lecturer on Anatomy at St Thomas's Cock followed his uncle to Guy's, where he was appointed Demonstrator of Anatomy before he had finished his apprenticeship, and consequently before he had been admitted MRCS. He worked assiduously in the dissecting-room until 1838, when he was elected Assistant Surgeon to Guy's Hospital, becoming full Surgeon in 1849 and retiring as Consulting Surgeon in 1871. On the occasion of his retirement the past and present students presented him with a silver epergne, and some years later his former colleagues defrayed the cost of a portrait. When the Pupils' Physical Society was established at Guy's in 1836, Cock was elected the first Honorary President, and he continued to preside at the first and last meeting of each session for a period of forty years. He became President of the Hunterian Society in 1849. He was for many years Consulting Surgeon to the London and Brighton Railway Company, to the Asylum for the Deaf and Dumb, to the Philanthropic Society, to the Royal Medical Benevolent Society at Epsom, and to the Kingston Cottage Hospital. He was also Surgeon to the 12th Surrey Rifle Volunteers, and did much to encourage accurate shooting by liberal donations to the prize fund. Cock lived for the greater part of his life in St Thomas's Street and in Dean Street, Southwark, which are in the immediate neighbourhood of Guy's Hospital; but in spite of his remoteness from a fashionable centre he acquired a substantial surgical practice. He suffered severely from a poisoned hand in 1858, from which he made a very prolonged convalescence at Canbury House, Kingston, under the care of W Sudlow Roots (qv). He went to live in one of Roots's houses in that borough in 1860, and died there on April 1st, 1892. He had remained a bachelor until the age of 62, when he married Marianna, a daughter of Roger S Nunn, MRCS, of Colchester. There were no children, but the marriage was a happy one. His wife died in 1886, and for the rest of his life he was looked after by a daughter of Roots, his old friend and fellow-student. Cock was elected to the Council of the Royal College of Surgeons in 1856, was re-elected in 1862, and retired in 1871. He was a member of the Court of Examiners from 1867-1872, Chairman of the Midwifery Board in 1868, Vice-President 1867-1869, and was elected President in July, 1869. The first meeting of Fellows and Members was held at the College on March 24th, 1870, when owing to his tact and conciliatory manner in the Chair, as President, the meeting passed off much more harmoniously than some of the subsequent ones. Cock was an excellent anatomist, and he published in 1839 *Practical Anatomy of the Nerves and Vessels supplying the Head, Neck and Chest*, which had a considerable sale and was known to the students as 'Cock's Head and Neck'. The book is noteworthy as it was the first anatomical treatise in which the parts were described as they are successively met with by the dissector. The plan was afterwards carried out more elaborately by G Viner Ellis (qv) in his *Demonstrations of Anatomy*. In 1836 Cock described in the *Guy's Hospital Reports* (i, 47, 62) two elaborate dissections, many years after ligature, of a large artery in its continuity, the one of the external iliac, the other of the subclavian. The dried and varnished specimens are still preserved in the Museum of Guy's Hospital. Cock also did some good work on the comparative anatomy of the internal ear to discover the pathological changes which lead to congenital deafness. In surgery his name is connected with the treatment of extreme cases of impermeable urethral stricture threatening extravasation of urine. He shares with Sir John Simon (qv) the merit of inventing the operation of perineal urethrotomy without a staff. The operation consisted in stabbing through the perineum with a lithotomy knife guided by the forefinger in the rectum touching the apex of the prostate. The description of Cock's operation was published in the *Guy's Hospital Reports* (1866, 3rd ser. xii, 267). It was also due to his teaching that gradual dilatation with flexible bougies replaced forcible dilatation with rigid instruments in treating permeable strictures. He was the first in this country to perform pharyngotomy with success, and thus removed a tooth-plate impacted in the gullet. He was, too, one of the first surgeons successfully to trephine for middle meningeal haemorrhage, his operation dating back to 1842. As a man Cock was certainly the best beloved of the Surgeons who have been attached to Guy's Hospital. In his youth he was always known as 'Old Cock', in old age as 'Teddy Cock'. Innumerable stories were fathered upon him, many exaggerating the slight stammer with which he always spoke. He was absolutely honest in thought and deed, full of spirits to the end, and as fond of a harmless practical joke as his uncle, Sir Astley Cooper. In appearance he is described as somewhat below the average height, wearing spectacles, and having a slight stoop which made him appear prematurely old. His grand head and face with a pleasant expression more than atoned for his somewhat diminutive frame. A delicate, pale complexion, a good but not excessive forehead, sloping gently to a pair of arched eyebrows, blue eyes, a firm well-chiselled aquiline nose, and a most attractive smile created an impression not easily forgotten. His white hair remained thick to quite old age, whilst his short beard was confined to his lips and chin. In dress he was peculiar and quite indifferent to all conventional ideas. In early life, like other surgeons, he visited his patients on horseback; in later life he drove a single brougham with a fast-trotting horse, which was well known because it bore for arms on the panels a cock rampant with the motto, "Whilst I live, I'll crow". He used to follow the hounds when he could find time, hunting from Kingston with Garth's, the Surrey Union, and the Surrey staghounds. Like other surgeons, he had an army of pensioners to whom it was his custom to give a fee rather than receive one when they came to visit him. In 1875 he was put on the Commission of the Peace and was unfailing in his attendance when on rota. It is said that when he had fined a man he would sometimes pay the fine himself and tell the culprit not to repeat his offence. In London, living as he did for the greater part of his long life close to the slums of Southwark, he became known to the thieves and rogues who frequented the out-patient room of the hospital, and it is to their credit that they never attempted to deceive or molest him. He was a man of cultivated taste and he possessed an excellent collection of pictures ; his literary style was good, and his clinical lectures were models of precision and distinguished for their practical aim. There is a portrait of Cock as a young man by T Senties; it was engraved by W T Davey. There is another portrait by G R Black painted in 1876. It hangs at the top of the Grand Staircase at Guy's Hospital; there is a lithograph of it. There is also a photograph in the Fellows' Album.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001210
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

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

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Coe, Robert William (1822 - 1910)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Coe, Thomas (1816 - 1884)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Colborne, William Henry (1822 - 1869)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z

First Title value, for Searching Cooper, Sir William White (1816 - 1886)

2025-06-18T21:57:22Z