D ' Arcy Power Sir D ' Arcy Power , KBE , FRCS , FSA ( 11 November 1855 in Pimlico , London - 18 May 1941 ) was a British surgeon , medical historian , and contributor of some 200 articles on famous surgeons and other related figures to the " Dictionary of National Biography " . Medical career . The eldest son of a six boys and five girls , D ' Arcy was born on 11 November 1855 at 3 Grosvenor Terrace , Pimlico , in London , the son of Henry Power , himself a surgeon . He was educated at Merchant Taylors ' School , Northwood and entered New College , Oxford , before transferring to Exeter College . Though he wanted to be a physiologist , he ended up following his father into becoming a surgeon ( at St . Bartholomew ' s Hospital ) . In this vein , he because a Fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons in 1883 , serving as a member of its council from 1912 to 1928 , and being its vice - president for the years 1921 and 1922 . He gave the Bradshaw Lecture for 1918 , the Vicary lecture for 1920 , and delivered the Hunterian oration in 1925 . He was variously also the Mitchell Banks Memorial Lecturer in 1933 ; a member of the executive committee of the Imperial Cancer Research Fund ; President of the Medical Society of London ; President of the Harveian Society of London and President of the Section of the History of Medicine at the Royal Society of Medicine , 1926 to 1928 . Power also both taught and examined in medicine and wrote textbooks and articles for a number of medical journals . Army service . Commissioned as a surgeon in the Volunteer Medical Staff Corps on 25 April 1888 , Power was given the rank of major in the Royal Army Medical Corps when its Territorial Force section was created on 31 July 1908 , and was attached to 1st London General Hospital . He was mobilised with the outbreak of the First World War in August 1914 , and promoted lieutenant - colonel on 22 August . Until 1916 he was based at the officers ' hospital at Fishmongers ' Hall , and then rejoined the main body of 1st London General Hospital , serving until demobilisation in 1920 , Power was appointed Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire in recognition of his service in military hospitals during the First World War in the 1919 King ' s Birthday Honours . He retired from the army on 30 September 1921 . Personal life . He married Eleanor Fosbroke in 1883 ; she predeceased him in 1923 . They had two sons and a daughter . The older son , also called D ' Arcy Power , followed his father into part - time service in the RAMC in 1911 , and during the First World War became a captain and won the Military Cross . He transferred to the Medical Branch of the Royal Air Force on the formation of the new service on 1 April 1918 — taking a permanent commission as a flight lieutenant in 1920 — and ultimately reaching the rank of acting air vice marshal by 1945 when he was appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire . The younger son , George Henry Fosbroke Power , died at the Second Battle of Ypres in 1915 when he was serving as a lieutenant in 6th Battalion , Middlesex Regiment . Power ' s daughter died young of whooping cough . Power , who was presented on his 75th birthday with a bibliography listing 609 of his " selected writings " by a special committee of the Osler Club , was also a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of London ( where he was , for some time , a member of the council ) and President of the Bibliographical Society from 1926 to 1928 . After his home was damaged in an air raid in 1940 , Power moved in with his son at 53 Murray Road , Northwood , Middlesex , where he died on 18 May 1941 . Notable works . Power ' s more notable standalone works included :