Surgeon Vice-Admiral Godfrey Milton-Thompson KBE KStJ

VICE-ADMIRAL SIR GODFREY MILTON-THOMPSON

            Godfrey Milton-Thompson’s naval medical career spanned forty-five years and saw him rise to the important posts of Medical Director General of the Navy and Surgeon General, Ministry of Defence. He always regretted his lack of sea time, but his service in hospitals, in management appointments and in research was immensely valuable.  His specialist interest was gastroenterology and he was awarded the Royal Navy’s Errol-Eldridge Prize in 1974, and in 1976 the Gilbert Blane Gold Medal, founded in 1830 by Sir Gilbert Blane, and conferred annually for contributions to improvements in the health or living conditions of naval personnel. 

            In this case the problem was the incidence of peptic ulcers in naval people, some twice the average, possibly a life-style effect, painful and occasionally fatal.  Milton-Thompson and his team of researchers worked with volunteer naval guinea-pigs to determine the best treatments and dosages to inhibit the production of acid in the gut.  Teamed with civilian physicians from the clinic of the gastro-enterologist Sir Francis Avery Jones, he was involved in the early use of cimetidine and ranitidine, this last becoming Glaxo’s Zantac in 1981 and by 1988 the world’s biggest-selling prescription drug. Between 1973 and 1981 he and colleagues published many papers on aspects of gut disease in journals including The Lancet, the British Medical Journal and the specialist journal Gut.

            Born in April 1930, Milton-Thompson was the younger son of the vicar of St Mark’s near Birkenhead, raised in the vicarage and imbued with the strong Christian principles which informed the rest of his life. He graduated from his preparatory school, Woodcote House near Ascot, with a scholarship to Eastbourne College where he excelled at science and captained the rugby team. He went to Cambridge University in 1948 to study medicine at Queen’s College where he admitted to more play than study, but still achieving his MB.

            He was offered a place at St Thomas’ Hospital for clinical training where in 1952 he married Noreen, daughter of Colonel Sir Desmond Fitzmaurice CIE, a marriage that was to last sixty years.  As a medical student he had been able to defer his National Service; however, once a fully registered practitioner, he decided in1955 to follow a long family tradition and join the Royal Navy.

            After a series of general service and hospital appointments at home and abroad, he became Consultant Physician at the RN Hospital, Plymouth, having achieved membership of the Royal College of Physicians.  From 1969 to 1971 he was also Honorary Research Fellow at St Mark’s Hospital, London, and Professor of Naval Medicine until 1980 when he became the first medical officer to attend the prestigious Royal College of Defence Studies, Belgrave Square, in 1981.

            His subsequent rôles in higher management saw him as deputy Medical Director General from 1982 to 1984, a period encompassing the Falklands crisis which imposed on his broad shoulders the hurried provision of sufficient people and supplies to deal with the casualties of a shooting war.  On promotion to Rear-Admiral in 1984, he was placed in charge of operational medical services, then deputy Surgeon General in charge of research and training until his two final senior posts from 1985 to 1990.  While Surgeon General to the MoD with responsibility for all three services, he fought for retention of dedicated military hospitals at home and abroad against the cheese-paring policies of successive governments, eventually without success – Britain’s oldest purpose-built military hospital and then the largest brick building in England at Haslar, Gosport, was the last to close in 2009, the wisdom of these decisions being questioned again today.

Milton-Thompson was appointed KBE in 1988.  A particular honour was to have been Honorary Physician to HM the Queen from 1982 to 1990.

            In retirement from the navy, he maintained his membership of the Medical Research Society and the British Society of Gastroenterology.  From 1993 he was Vice-President of the British Digestive Foundation.  Amongst his many charitable activities were Warden of St Katherine’s House, Wantage; chairman of the governors, St Mary’s school, Wantage, and chairman of the Cornwall Community Healthcare Trust.

            But his major interest in which he was justifiably proud was his involvement with the Order of St John for some thirty-four years, giving distinguished service across a wide field of activities, tirelessly promoting its interests as Order Hospitaller for the St John Ophthalmic Hospital in Jerusalem and later as chairman of St John Council, Cornwall.  He was a valued member of the English Priory Chapter until his death and was invited in 1989 to be a Knight of this Most Venerable Order.

A colleague described Milton-Thompson as ‘aristocratic’ and certainly he was well-known for his urbane, unflappable and courteous style with, not least, a marked tenacity in argument.

            He is survived by his wife Noreen and their three daughters.

Surgeon Vice-Admiral Sir Godfrey Milton-Thompson KBE KStJ,  Naval Medical Director General and Surgeon-General, Ministry of Defence 1985-90 was born on April 25, 1930.  He died on September 23 aged 82.