Peter Michael Burton - 05/31/2009

Peter Michael Burton, MB, BS, MRCS, LRCP, MD. Physician. Died peacefully on May 30, 2009, Peter was for 55 years the loving and much loved husband of Rachel (nee Greaves). Born in London on March 7, 1916, Peter was educated at St. Martin’s Preparatory School, Epsom College, and at the Medical College of St. Mary’s Hospital, London, where he studied under Sir Alexander Fleming while Fleming was undertaking the first trials of penicillin. Peter enlisted as a medical officer in the RAF in 1940. After the war, he returned to St. Mary’s for postgraduate work. In 1954, he and Rachel were married at St. Michael’s, Chester Square, and decided to come to Canada. While Peter was on the staff of the Civic Hospital in Ottawa for 35 years, he was primarily a family physician and, in the custom of the day, made house calls every morning and evening. An immensely elegant, kindly, and reassuring figure, he was completely free of pretence, had a wonderful sense of humour, and a talent for putting children at ease. Uninterested in politics, he was a favourite of politicians of all parties who enjoyed his easy good nature and sympathetic ear. (He was, for example, a confidant of successive Prime Ministers, and Household Physician to the Governors General of Canada from the 1950s to the 1970s). But his heart lay with poor elderly people living alone, to whom he was especially attentive. He was respected and loved by his patients, family and friends. He is survived by his wife Rachel; sons Prof. Charles (Brock University) and the Rt. Rev. Anthony (Diocese of Dallas); daughters-in-law Mary and Anna; grandchildren Lucy, Caroline, Peter and Geoffrey. A Requiem Eucharist will be held at St. Bartholomew’s Anglican Church, 125 MacKay St., Ottawa on Wednesday, June 3, 2009 at 11 a.m.