Tom Scotland graduated in Medicine from the University of Edinburgh in 1971 and became a Fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh in 1975. He became Consultant Orthopaedic Surgeon with NHS Grampian and Honorary Senior Lecturer at the University of Aberdeen. He was lead clinician for the Scottish Sarcoma Managed Clinical Network for three years. He developed an interest in the Great War whilst a student, when there were still many veterans alive. His wife`s uncle was an “Old Contemptible”, one of the original small British Expeditionary Force which went to France in August 1914. He was killed on Ypres Salient in 1915. Since retiring from the NHS, the author has kept in touch with former colleagues by leading cycling expeditions to the Western Front. He has pursued his interest of the Great War by making a particular study of Aberdonian surgeon Sir Henry Gray, who played a pivotal role in the development of orthopaedic surgery on the Western Front. In retirement he has re-invented himself as a cycling orthopaedic historian. He co-edited a book “War Surgery 1914-18”, and has co-authored four further works, “Wars, Pestilence and the Surgeon`s Blade”, “Understanding the Somme 1916: An Illuminating Battlefield Guide”, "Understanding the Ypres Salient: An Illuminating Battlefield Guide” and “Henry Gray, Surgeon of the Great War, saving lives in a theatre of destruction”.
