Popular Northampton GP dies at the age of 82
Dr Lyons, Sheep Street GP (obit Feb 2012)
A GP from Northampton town centre, who was an Army doctor in Africa during the Suez Crisis, has died.
Ian Lyon, who passed away aged 82, was a family doctor in the town from 1961 until 1994, but few of his patients would have known he was once an obstetrics specialist with the Royal Army Medical Corps in Africa during one of the most dramatic post-war episodes in British history.
His son, Neil, said: “It was a very exciting time to be a soldier in the British Army. It was a very tense period and I remember him saying quite often that they had set up large temporary wards for the soldiers because they were expecting so many casualties.
“Luckily for everyone that scenario was averted.”
The 1956 Suez Crisis, when British Forces tried to capture the Suez Canal but were forced to withdraw following an international outcry, was not the only drama Dr Lyons was involved in his military career.
He served in Libya, where he met his wife, Queen Alexandra Army nurse Katie, as well as Cyprus from 1956 to 1957, where the couple married, in the midst of the island’s fight for independence.
Neil said: “Cyprus was an incredibly dangerous place for them to work, what with the threat of freedom fighter snipers.”
Born in London in 1929, Dr Lyon went to school at Clifton College, in Bristol, and studied medicine at St John’s College, Cambridge and St Thomas’s Hospital in London.
After his army service, he worked alongside doctors John Phillips, David Williams and Alastair Bantock building up the medical practice in Sheep Street – which later moved to the Mounts Medical Centre – and set up a now-closed surgery in Kings Heath, where the couple lived.
A small practice in terms of doctors, but with some 7,000 patients, Dr Lyon was on duty at weekends and his call-outs were often eventful.
He served with the practice as the senior partner from 1980 to 1993, taking a special interest in Nazareth House care home in Harlestone Road, Dallington, despite not being a Catholic, which he offered free medical services.
Neil said: “He was very community-minded and had a very strong sense of public duty that probably came from his grandad and uncle being qualified GPs.
“He loved the NHS, even to the extent he didn’t particularly like dealing with private patients. But he had great affection for the town and county and after retiring in 1994 he loved nothing better than walking in the local countryside.”
Dr Lyon leaves his wife, sons Neil and Graham, and daughter Ann.
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Thursday 24 May 2012
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