Donald Gordon Duff

Donald Gordon Duff (1893 – 11 October 1968) was a Scottish surgeon and mountain rescue pioneer.

Formative years Duff was born in Edinburgh in 1893 and educated at The Royal High School of Edinburgh. He studied medicine at The University of Edinburgh, graduating in 1916.

Military service On graduating he joined the Royal Army Medical Corps and served at the Battle of the Somme. In 1918 he was awarded the Military Cross. His citation in the London Gazette reads, Capt. Donald Gordon Duff, M.B., R.A.M.C.,Spec. Res.For conspicuous gallantry and devotion to duty. He proceeded to an area that was being heavily shelled, and at once organised stretcher parties, superintended the conveyance of wounded to his dug-out, and returned to make certain that no casualties were left. His coolness and devotion to duty throughout have been most marked.

1919–1945 Donald Duff served in India in 1919-20. He worked in North Wales for 23 years and took charge of two Red Cross Hospitals and The Civil Defence Medical Services in Denbightshire. During The Second World War he became a Lt-Col in The Home Guard. The following year he patented his light weight mountain stretcher. The Duff stretcher rapidly became standard equipment in Scottish Mountain rescue until replaced by that designed by Hamish MacInnes. The Scottish Mountain Heritage Collection based at Roy Bridge has an example that was kept at the Steall Hut in Glen Nevis His S.M.C. obituary notes that a Duff stretcher was taken on the 1953 Everest expedition, something in which he took pride. In 1956 Duff received the M.B.E. for services to medicine. Surgeon’s Gully, once called Strawberry Chasm, on the Glen Nevis side of Ben Nevis is named in honour of Mr Duff who explored many of the Glen Nevis Gullies. thumb Surgeon's gully in Glen Nevis. Named in honour of Donald Duff

Character and personality In his obituary of Duff in the SMCJ Dr John Berkeley recounts how he first met him cycling in to work in the Belford on an old bike on a foul day. Scorning hardship, never wearing a coat in the coldest weather Duff never ceased to work on maintaining his own fitness. In the same journal Duff himself wrote Modelling ourselves on Hollywood as usual, we will soon spend our whole lives warmly enclosed and quiescent, mechanical transportation ensuring that our muscles atrophy even as we travel He regretted the passing of former generations of Highland people who had been at home on the hill and moved easily over the ground on foot. He was also concerned about modern eating habits and lifestyle, writing we deny ourselves the proper outlet of physical effort. No wonder, then, with toxic pollution of the air and over-eating (especially of sugar – unknown a generation or two back in the Highlands) our whole body chemistry is knocked awry. Berkeley noted, however, that Duff was always very approachable by his patients, not, apparently, a common trait at the time. thumb The hospital in which Donald Duff was the surgeonHe was appointed Hon Sheriff Substitute for Inverness-shire in 1945 and served as a member of the North Regional Hospital Board from 1954-1959.