Virtual
War Memorial
Australia

SHEPHERD John Wickham AM MB BS FRCS FACRRM Dip Obst RCOG Dip Obst RANZCOG

1943 –

John ‘Jack’ Wickham Shepherd was born, on 23rd July 1943, at the Memorial Hospital, Adelaide. He was the son of David Wickham Shepherd, a general practitioner, and Gwendoline Hope, nee Fullarton, an accomplished equestrian and a trainee nurse, at the ACH.  He had two sisters, Philippa and Margaret. His father served during WW2 in PNG.  He was the senior medical officer at the Loveday Prisoner of War Camp, near Barmera, South Australia, when Shepherd was born. His father was the nephew of the renowned WW1 medical officer, Colonel Arthur Edmund Shepherd CBE DSO VD, whose history was a great influence on both of their lives. He was educated at Hawker primary school until grade five, followed by St Peter’s College, in 1953 until 1961; here he joined the school cadets.  His family moved to Coromandel Valley in the Adelaide hills, in 1954, and his mother ran a small mixed dairy farm. He studied medicine at the University of Adelaide and graduated MB BS, in 1968 and undertook his residency at the RAH.

During his university years he joined the CMF and was posted to AUR from 1961 until 1966. He married Dianne Meyer, a nurse and midwife, on 12th January 1967.  She is the daughter of Padre Vernon Francis (Jerry) Meyer and Helen Doreen, nee Bennett. They were to have three children. Shepherd was seconded to 3 FdAmb from January 1967 until December 1968. The Indonesian and Malaysian confrontation, in 1963, over the creation of Malaysia, resulted in the requirement that all CMF officers, including those in University regiments, were placed on “three weeks ready stand by” for ARA enlistment.  Two weeks before completing his residency Shepherd was required to honour his commitment. After a course of vaccinations and one day of test firing at the Dean Range, he flew to Sydney on 2nd January 1969 and to Vietnam the next day. He was posted as an RMO and surgical registrar to Colonel Brian Cornish in 1 Aust FdHosp at Vung Tau. Shepherd, who always had a sense of fun, was a co-builder of the only sand-yacht in Vietnam. Its mast, boom and sails were made from the spare parts of a wrecked Corsair yacht. Metal piping was ‘acquired’ by the corporal co-builder. The wheels were   Mohawk ‘sniffer’ nose-wheels, obtained from the USAF, much to the great consternation of the CO.  The corporal first tried out the sand yacht, but a helicopter blew it onto a road amongst a convoy of vehicles, the brakes failed and he ended up in a fresh water dam, collecting two weeks in jail as punishment. Shepherd managed to have one go on the sand yacht, in his pyjamas, just prior to his medical evacuation from Vietnam with viral polyarthritis, on 21st April 1969. After recovery from his illness, he was posted as RMO to 3 Bn RAR, at Woodside Barracks in the Adelaide hills, from July to December 1969. Shepherd was released from his regular army commitment but continued in the Army Reserve.  He was posted as RMO to 43rd RSAR (Bush Rifles) from January 1970 to April 1972. Then, to compliment his civilian career, he was attached to 219 Wessex General Hospital in the Territorial Army Volunteer Reserve, England until June 1976. He continued in the Australian Army Reserve with postings in 3 FdAmb and 3 Fwd Gen Hosp until his discharge, in 1989, necessitated by his living at Jamestown in country South Australia. However, within a month of his leaving, he was asked to go on Exercise Kangaroo 89, to replace a Sydney orthopaedic surgeon who sadly had died. It was during this exercise that he infamously, but successfully, inserted inter-condylar, femoral shaft wires into the broken leg of a kangaroo.  The kangaroo was later to become the lead subject in a promotional film on the Kangaroo series of military exercises. He also served in Kangaroo 95 and was deployed, in October and November 2004, in Maliana, East Timor. It was in East Timor that he performed a lifesaving caesarean section on a mother with triplets.  She had been carried for 48 hours to their health facility, by villagers, after the first baby had been born.  This baby unfortunately did not survive but the mother and remaining babies survived and were discharged back to a civilian hospital. Shepherd finished his Army Reserve career in 2006 and was issued with; the Australian Active Services Medal 1945-1975 (clasp Vietnam), the General Service Medal 1962 (clasp Vietnam).the Australian Active Service Medal clasp East Timor and the Australian Defence Medal.

Shepherd travelled to England, in 1972, to undertake his postgraduate training at Swindon and then Winchester hospitals.  It was here that he gradually became known as ‘Jack’ to differentiate him from another John Shepherd at Winchester Hospital. He returned to Australia in 1976 and took up practice in Harden, NSW. He moved to Jamestown, in 1978, where he purchased and ran a 200 acre mixed farm as well as taking up a general medical practice.  Shepherd became a champion in promoting the provision of medical services in rural areas. He was involved in major disputes with the South Australian Health Commission, in 1988, concerning the closure of rural hospitals and stopping all advanced rural obstetrics.  Shepherd attributed this to the advent of Australian Specialist Colleges between 1968 and 1992, and the subsequent requirement of future rural GPs to seek their advanced procedural training overseas. Ray Blight, the CEO of the SAHC asked Shepherd, to produce a blue print for Rural Surgical services in SA in 1989. The Queensland Rural Doctors Association invited him to meet with them and the RACGP, in August 1989, to discuss the inadequate Diploma of Obstetrics RANZCOG training. This was followed by an invitation from Ray Blight, in December 1990 for a delegation from Queensland Rural Health to meet with the SAHC and all SA Rural doctors. He then requested Shepherd to co-produce a feasibility study for future training of SA rural general practitioners at Modbury Hospital which was adopted by the SAHC and began what Shepherd considers his greatest achievement in his medical career, being appointed the inaugural RDAA Vice President (training) and education). He was the primary author of three position papers, in 1991, proposing that rural GPs would receive appropriate advanced skills training for areas which required these services.  This proposition was agreed with immediately by the RACS, RANZCOG and, later, the newly formed ANZCA.  

This began a ten year debate with the RACGP who wanted to maintain training of these skills for all GPs. However, this was an untenable position for the metropolitan areas, as the specialist skills were increasingly serviced by medical specialists. After a concerted effort by rural GPs from all states, the Australian College of Rural and Remote Medicine (ACRRM) was formed in 1997, with Shepherd being the first president. He authored a proposal for national specific special training for rural GPs on behalf of the ACRRM, in 2000, which was requested by the Commonwealth Department of Health, General Practice Branch.  The RACGP relinquished control of general practitioner specialist training, in 2004, and the advanced skills training in multiple fields for all prospective rural GPs was introduced in all states of Australia as proposed by ACRRM. Shepherd was awarded the Centenary of Federation Medal in 2001 and awarded the Member of the Order of Australia in 2003 for his commitment to rural medicine. He continued with farming as well as his GP practice in Jamestown until 2006.  He then took up general practice in Moree NSW, followed by locum work across rural and remote Australia until 2012.   John Wickham Shepherd lives in retirement with his wife Dianne, in Millthorpe, NSW. His children are dispersed around Australia; his daughter Sarah Wiles, the IT support consultant for all SA rural general practitioners, lives in Jamestown, South Australia, his elder son Simon is principal of Scots PGC College in Warwick, Queensland, and younger son, David, is an orthopaedic surgeon in Melbourne. 

Source

Blood, Sweat and Fears II: Medical Practitioners of South Australia on Active Service After World War 2 to Vietnam 1945-1975.

Summers, Swain, Jelly, Verco. Open Book Howden, Adelaide 2016

Uploaded by Annette Summers AO RFD