Robert Neil REILLY

REILLY, Robert Neil

Service Number: S36448
Enlisted: 11 November 1941, Woodside, SA
Last Rank: Not yet discovered
Last Unit: Not yet discovered
Born: Adelaide, South Australia, 6 September 1907
Home Town: Payneham, Norwood Payneham St Peters, South Australia
Schooling: Christian Brothers College and University of Adelaide, South Australia
Occupation: Medical Practitioner
Memorials:
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World War 2 Service

11 Nov 1941: Involvement S36448
11 Nov 1941: Enlisted Woodside, SA
11 Nov 1941: Enlisted S36448
Date unknown: Discharged S36448

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Biography contributed by Annette Summers

REILLY / O’REILLY Robert Neil MB BS DLO FRACS

1907 - unknown

Robert Neil O’Reilly, later Reilly, was born on 6th September 1907, in Adelaide, SA. He was the second son of Mr and Mrs CB O’Reilly.  His father was a newspaper journalist and proprietor of the Maitland Watch and the Kapunda Herald.  O’Reilly was educated at Maitland public school and won a government bursary, when he was twelve years old, which enabled him to go to Christian Brother’s College.   He studied medicine at the University of Adelaide, graduating in 1933. It appears that after he left university O’Reilly changed his name to Reilly, and on 6th October 1934, he married Margaret Anne Lunn using the name Reilly. 

Reilly was a captain in the AAMC, in the CMF and was called up for full-time duty on 5th October 1939. He was appointed OC AAMC training Cadre. He suffered an injury and was reclassified as medically unfit and returned to civilian practice. Reilly re-enlisted on 11th November 1941, naming his wife as his next of kin, and they were living in Payneham Road, Payneham at the time. He remained in Adelaide on part-time service during which time he was periodically placed on full-time duty at Woodside camp and carried out medical examinations in northern SA. Reilly was also appointed acting police medical officer to the Parkside Mental Hospital, in June 1942. He was for a short time posted to 101 AGH but returned to civilian practice in 1944.

Following the war, Reilly studied for his DLO at Melbourne University and gained his FRACS in 1954. Reilly pursued a distinguished career in ear nose and throat (ENT) surgery and was an honorary assistant surgeon to the ENT Department, at the RAH, from 1949 to 1958.  He became an honorary surgeon from 1958 until 1967 and then honorary consultant ENT surgeon. He lectured in diseases of ENT at the University of Adelaide from 1962 to 1967, was a consultant to Oral Department of Public Health and honorary ENT surgeon for the Royal Institute for the Blind. Reilly was a member of the AMA, sat on an advisory panel for the Minister of Education, and was on the Advisory Committee of Noise for the Department of Public Health.  He was on the post-graduate medical committee at the University of Adelaide. Reilly was also chairman of the Hearing-Impairment Committee Standards Association Australia.  Internationally he was chairman of the World Committee for the Care of Hearing-Impaired Children and the International Federation of Otorhinolaryngology Society. Reilly lived at Pembroke Street, College Park. No records can be found of Robert Neil O’Reilly’s death.

Source

Blood, Sweat and Fears III: Medical Practitioners South Australia, who Served in World War 2. 

Swain, Jelly, Verco, Summers. Open Books Howden, Adelaide 2019. 

Uploaded by Annette Summers AO RFD

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