Henry Minto
Strover

Minto Strover came from a world where medicine was already in the house before he was born. His father was a GP in West Hartlepool — and more than that, the Honorary Surgeon to the West Hartlepool St John's Ambulance Brigade, responsible for organising first aid and nursing classes across the Hartlepools. His mother was Matron of the West Hartlepool Voluntary Aid Detachment Hospital, set up in the Masonic Hall during the years of the First World War. From an early age Minto accompanied his father on medical rounds through the town and to the infirmary. Medicine was not chosen. It was simply what the family did.

On December 16th 1914 — the day after his eighth birthday — German destroyer shells struck the West Hartlepool coast, destroying houses and hitting part of the hospital where his mother was Matron. While his parents tended the wounded, Minto and his elder sister Madge ran backwards and forwards from their home to the VAD Hospital, carrying soup and food to the civilians and soldiers wounded in the bombardment. He was eight years old. It was, in retrospect, his first deployment.

The family moved to Bristol after the Great War and Minto studied medicine at the Bristol Royal Infirmary, qualifying in 1928. He served briefly as a junior medical officer in Bulawayo under Dr Maitland, then returned to Bristol and joined his father in general practice. The transmission ran in both directions — son working alongside father, the same pattern that would repeat in every generation that followed.

Whilst Minto was a medical student in Bristol, his younger sister Mary was at Clifton Girls High School. She befriended a young Rhodesian girl — Ethelwyn Curtis Everett — and brought her home one weekend. Minto was immediately and permanently infatuated. At the end of the weekend he took Ethelwyn back to school on the pillion of his motorcycle.

Thus began a long and highly successful relationship. They married in 1933. And because Ethelwyn was Rhodesian, it was no surprise when the young couple settled in Southern Rhodesia, where Minto became a Government Medical Officer. A younger sister brought a friend home for the weekend. A medical student put her on the back of his motorcycle. Everything that followed — the 30,000 square miles, the drought, the five years of bills not sent, the operating lists starting at six in the morning — traces back to that ride.

In 1935 Minto was given charge of Fort Victoria Hospital. He was the only doctor in the town — and served the community across an area of approximately 30,000 square miles. He set up a network of Government clinics throughout this massive territory and taught his African and European nursing staff to take responsibility for the diagnosis and management of the common conditions: malaria, bilharzia, tuberculosis, worm infestations, smallpox, leprosy. The clinics dealt with accidents and emergencies, burns, fractures, animal bites. Most obstetrics were handled by trained midwives in the clinics.

All major medical and surgical conditions were sent to Fort Victoria Hospital, where Minto and a handful of nursing staff provided definitive management. His operating lists started promptly at six o'clock in the morning. The slate was usually twelve to sixteen cases and would finish at lunch. It included eye operations, orthopaedics, abdominal procedures, gynaecology and ENT. He was an amazingly versatile surgeon and kept current across almost all fields of surgery. His sons Roger and Angus, when they were medical students at Cape Town, used to assist him with his operating lists during the holidays — and were amazed at what they saw.

Anaesthetics throughout the war years were administered by one of his senior nurses, or by Dr Steyn of Morgenster Mission twenty miles away, or by Dr Agristi — an Italian prisoner of war from the internment camp five miles out of town. He operated with whoever was available. He operated because there was no one else.

From 1939 to 1947 — eight years spanning the entirety of the Second World War — he took no leave. When he was finally ordered to take six months off in 1947, his father was dying of cancer of the throat in England. Minto left the family at the coast in South Africa and flew to England to be with his father for part of his terminal illness. Even his first leave in eight years was a medical duty.

Severe, unremitting drought hit Fort Victoria from 1945 to 1950. It impoverished the local community completely. Minto hadn't the heart to send out any bills during that period. He wrote down patients' names and treatments on pieces of paper which he would forget to give to his bookkeeper. He was never a good businessman, and most of the time he neglected to send out accounts. During the drought years he did not send out a single one.

In 1951 to 1955 he took a government post in Bindura which offered better pay. In 1956 Fort Victoria was upgraded and Minto returned — back to Silveroaks, his beloved small farm outside the town, and back to the threads of his previous professional and social life as if he had never left. Roger and Angus were at Cape Town University by this stage, studying medicine, coming home in the holidays to assist him in theatre. He was in his prime, and published articles — in particular on the treatment of snake-bite in the Central African Journal of Medicine.

Colin Saunders, who joined Minto in 1961 as a young Government Medical Officer at Fort Victoria and later became his partner at Triangle Sugar Estate, wrote in his tribute: "He was an immensely practical fellow, very good with his hands — carpentry, plumbing, motor mechanics. He built his own home, and was constantly effecting improvements and extensions to the house, stables, and workshops."

"He was also an accomplished artist, and produced several fine paintings of the granite hills of Chibi which particularly appealed to him."

"He was a great horseman, and was responsible for introducing the game of polocrosse into this country. He was an authority on equine diseases and injuries. He revelled in the countryside, and every day rode his horses through the veld and vleis."

"He was a very pleasant and understanding boss, and the twinkle in his eye correctly hinted that he had a first class sense of humour."

At the age of sixty, having completed a long career with the Rhodesian Government, he took a post with Hulett's Sugar Company to commission a new hospital and set up a health service at Triangle Sugar Estate. He continued working until he was 73, then retired to the sea in South Africa in 1979. Ethelwyn developed Alzheimer's disease in 1992. Despite his own progressive spinal stenosis, Minto nursed and looked after her. A successful spinal decompression operation relieved him of the worst of the pain, but he remained unsteady on his legs. He and Ethelwyn came daily for lunch with Sheila and Angus during the week, and went out with them on weekends.

He had written down a great part of his memoirs, which were to be edited and published. He had experienced most of the medical changes of the whole of the twentieth century — the slaughter of two world wars, the advent of blood transfusion, skin grafting and the antibiotic era, the conquest of smallpox, leprosy, tuberculosis and poliomyelitis, cardiac surgery, transplant surgery, chemotherapy. Through his sons he had seen major advances in plastic and reconstructive surgery, joint replacement and arthroscopy. He had never seen a knee replacement operation and was looking forward to attending one — when he had a stroke, which brought him to the end of his life three weeks later.