Moynihan, Berkeley George Andrew (1856-1936), 1st Baron Moynihan, abdominal surgeon

Berkeley George Andrew Moynihan (1856-1936), 1st Baron Moynihan, was an eminent surgeon based in Leeds.

Moynihan pursued a career in medicine, undertaking his training at the Leeds School of Medicine from 1883 and graduating in 1887 with a degree from the University of London. He then took up the post of house surgeon at the Leeds General Infirmary under Arthur Fergusson McGill. He stayed at the Infirmary for the rest of his life, eventually becoming consulting surgeon from 1927. He specialised in abdominal, gastric and pancreatic surgical techniques.

Moynihan was demonstrator of anatomy for the Leeds School of Medicine (1893-1896); he went on to become a lecturer in surgery, and was the first professor of clinical surgery at the University of Leeds by 1910. He was President of the Royal College of Surgeons of England between 1921 and 1931.

In 1909 he set up The Moynihan Chirurgical Club as a society of clinical surgery. The aim was to form a group of a number of provincial surgeons to observe operations and discuss medical practice, and the group is still in existence today.

He was knighted in 1912, appointed a CB in 1917, a KCMG in 1918, a Baronet in 1922, and then first Baron Moynihan of Leeds in 1929.