Berry , Sir , James , 1860-1946 , Knight , surgeon

Sir James Berry was born in 1860; educated at Whitgift School, Croydon; received medical training at St Bartholomew's Hospital; was admitted Membership of the Royal College of Surgeons (English), 1882; elected a Fellow of the College, 1885; having graduated in the interval BS at London University with the University Scholarship and Gold Medal. Berry was employed as house surgeon at St Bartholomew's Hospital; demonstrator of anatomy; surgical registrar. In 1885 he became surgeon to the Alexandra Hospital for Diseases of the Hip, Bloomsbury and elected surgeon to the Royal Free Hospital, Gray's Inn Road. Berry became distinguished in general surgery, focusing on plastic work and then the operative treatment of goitre.

Berry travelled and had knowledge of French, German, Serbian and Magyar languages. In 1915, Berry organised a Red Cross Unit in Vrnjatchka Banja, Serbia. The hospital was confronted with an epidemic of Typhus, with Berry having to take on the role of physician. The German-Austrian invasion caused the hospital to fall into the hands of the Hungarians. Berry and other captives were treated well and during 1916-1917 Berry served as the head of a British Red Cross unit in Romania and Russia. Berry was made an Officer of the Star of Romania; decorated with the orders of St Sava of Serbia and St Anne of Russia. In 1917 Berry returned to England; became honorary surgeon to the military hospital at Napsbury and then Bermondsey. He was elected president of the Medical Society, 1926-1928 and Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society, 1918-1940. Berry was knighted in 1925 and died in 1946.

Publications include Diseases of the Thyroid Gland, 1901 and A Red Cross Unit in Serbia, 1916.