King's Eye Man

In London last week a modest Scotsman tucked away the symbol of his monarch's deepest gratitude: the Knight Commander's cross of the Royal Victorian Order. Then he went back to work on his ponderous, four-volume Textbook of Ophthalmology.

Sir Stewart Duke-Elder, Presbyterian minister's son who rose to become one of Britain's top eye specialists and Surgeon-Oculist to the King, had just come back from Buckingham Palace. His royal patient had added his personal honor to Sir Stewart's already impressive collection of medals and awards. The King, who reads through horn-rimmed glasses because of farsightedness, could thank Britain's foremost glaucoma expert for many a service to the Empire as well as to royal eyes. (Sir Stewart had also treated the Duke of Windsor, operated successfully on the Duchess of Kent in 1941.)

At the Front. Jolly, dapper Sir Stewart, 48, has kept an eye on Britain's eye troubles since he matriculated at St. Andrews University in 1915. He won high favor with Downing Street circles in 1932 when he saved Fellow Scotsman Ramsay MacDonald from blindness, with two delicate operations on his glaucoma-affected eyes. In 1934, he performed the operation which staved off blindness for the King of Siam.

When war came, Sir Stewart and his pretty blonde wife, Phyllis, herself a doctor, promptly joined up. Lady Duke-Elder took over management of a servicemen's hospital; Sir Stewart was commissioned a brigadier, appointed consulting ophthalmic surgeon to administer the British Army's program of eye-wound treatment. He sent eye surgeons up front to do on-the-spot operations, decreasing the chances of blindness from eye wounds from World War I's seven in ten to three in ten. Tommies who wore glasses were equipped with two pairs (tankmen got three); repair units were set up in forward areas.

His maroon collar tabs and swagger stick exchanged for the traditional black morning coat, Sir Stewart is back in the operating theaters and wards of St. George's Hospital. Stored away with King George's decoration is the Nettleship Medal for three years' original experimental work in ophthalmology. This June Sir Stewart will visit San Francisco to receive the Howe Medal, top U.S. decoration for ophthalmology.

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