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Writer's pictureWendy Sadler

Edward Rayner. Ty/Surgeon.


Edward was born on 10th September 1886 to parents Edward and Louisa, their first child and oldest son on the 1891 census. Edward was aged four and the family resided at 7 South Hill Park in Hampstead, London. Edward worked as a managing clerk and also employed two domestic servants within his household.

He was educated at Heddon Court and South Eastern College, Ramsgate where he was stated to excel at sports, as well as attending Pembroke College in Cambridge. He received his medical education at St Thomas’ Hospital, London, qualifying in 1912. When war broke out in 1914 he was House Surgeon in the isolation block at the hospital and also immediately offered his services to the Admiralty. He was appointed RN Surgeon on 16/09/1914 and initially served in Gallipoli with the Royal Naval Divisional Engineers from 25/04/1915 (Medical Officer Engineer Unit 26/9/14 ; Medical Officer Divisional Engineers MEF 1/3/15-6/2/16 to 2nd (RN) Field Ambulance Mudros, Pyrexia).


Edward was invalided home to the UK and admitted to Plymouth Hospital on 29/02/1916 suffering from influenza on 06/03/1916 and appointed Surgeon to the Vanguard in the autumn of 1916 after being released from Haslar Hospital, fit for duty on 14/08/1916.


Friends and comrades on learning of his death aboard HMS VANGUARD described him as “a splendid man, absolutely fearless, an excellent messmate. Always a most cheerful and excellent companion and a most able professional office. Personally I have lost a great friend”.


(#49 - 638/843)

Sources:


1891 England Census

England & Wales, Civil Registration Birth Index, 1837-1915 Free BMD

Great Britain, Royal Naval Division Casualties of The Great War, 1914-1924

British Army and Navy Birth, Marriage and Death Records, 1730-1960 National Archives of the UK; Kew, Surrey, England; Admiralty and predecessors: Office of the Director General of the Medical Department of the Navy and predecessors: Service Registers and Registers of Deaths and Injuries. Registers of Reports of Deaths

CWGC Register

De Ruvigny's Roll of Honour, 1914-1919

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