A History of West Bar Surgery – prepared by Brian Owen, a former member of the Patient
Participation Group and the Editor of the Surgery Newsletter
West Bar Surgery started around 1872 when Dr Boissier practised from Shrublands, No 3 West Bar
Street, which is the red brick house by the DVSA Test Centre. He lived in the entire house, and had a
tiny annexe in which he saw patients. He had a groom and a gardener who had cottages in the
garden, and stables for his horses and his trap.
Dr Bossier was a single handed GP and many of his visits were done on horseback, or by horse and
trap. One of his relatives, the Rev F S Boissier, was the second Headmaster of Bloxham School from
1886-1898, and so there is a very long connection between the practice and the school.
The social life in Banbury at the time the practice was initiated was mid-Victorian. As the practice
grew all the formalities were observed, as far as the medical profession was concerned, e.g. a junior
partner’s wife was expected to call on the senior partner’s wife and leave a card, with the normal
custom of turning the corner down to indicate that she was a new arrival; the senior wife would then
visit her or invite her to tea.
Sunday was still a Victorian Sabbath, this being a town with a very strong Quaker tradition and
consequently the social life of Banbury was really fairly strict. On market day the country folk used to
come into town, a lot of them with their produce, usually on privately owned buses which were based
in their villages.
1908 Dr Neville Penrose and Dr Faulkner bought the practice from Dr Boissier.
Dr Penrose kept horses, sometimes rode to hounds, and occasionally visited patients on horseback,
or on a very high bicycle:
Over the years a succession of doctors joined the practice, being attracted to the very high standards
there.
1925 During the 1914 to 1918 war Dr CJ “Jimmy” Wells had been a dental officer. He came from a
family of Plymouth brethren. Jimmy Wells, as he was always known, achieved his medical
qualifications after the war, left the army Dental Corps and joined Dr Penrose at West Bar Surgery.
1932 West Bar Surgery had a small purpose-built consulting suite with an operating theatre and
dressing room between; two consulting rooms, a dispensary, small office, urine testing room and
waiting room, an X-ray room and X-ray apparatus.
Dr Wilfred Hudson had experience of radiology and started the X-ray department at the Horton where
he eventually became the consultant radiologist.
The partners ran a club for the poorer patients whereby they paid a modest sum each week and in
return received any medical advice, treatment and medicines they required. The "Practice" really
survived on a sort of "Robin Hood" system whereby those who could afford paid adequate fees
subsidising those who could not. It may be of interest that the top asking fee in Banbury was ten
shillings and sixpence and in a village such as Turweston or Kineton two guineas.
Although the Practice did not have a "manager" in name it employed for many years a wonderful
woman by name Miss Savage, always referred to by Dr. Well as "La Belle Savage", designated as the
Dispenser as West Bar Surgery did all its own dispensing until the start of the NHS in 1948.
Miss Savage, a martinet by nature not only "did" the dispensing but with the aid of a young girl took
and dealt with all the incoming telephone and other calls, ensured that they were dealt with and in
addition managed the total finances of the partnership telling us when there was sufficient money in
the bank for "a divide"! In addition Miss Savage kept all the patients accounts and the partners would
meet at 11am on the first Sunday each quarter when she would present the ledgers and patients
accounts all ready to be posted, they all disliked this particular Sunday each quarter when the affair
continued until about 6pm with an hour's interval for lunch. sometimes the exhortations to the bad
payers such as Please Remit, ASWOB (a settlement will oblige). One long overdue account owed by
a thought to be well off hunting country gentleman had had all the usual messages to no avail when
Dr. Penrose wrote on his account "Hope you get a winner soon" which produced the necessary
cheque within a week. Mrs. Penrose helped the West Bar on these occasions by addressing
envelopes.
1939 Dr CJ “Jimmy” Wells was 45 years old, too old to re-join the army but he did re-enlist in spite of
everything. He joked that he had to keep his cap on so nobody saw how bald he was, and he had his
knee massaged before he went to his interview, so that they couldn’t see how stiff that was! He was
accepted as a Captain Regimental Medical Officer to the 63rd Anti-tank Regiment which was an
Oxfordshire unit. He was sent out to Belgium in the autumn of 1944, after the bridgehead was firmly
established and somebody then discovered how old he was. He was obviously too old for a
Regimental Medical Officer and so he was pulled back to Montgomery’s rear army headquarters. As
he was going on home leave to the UK, Capt. Jimmy Wells was ordered to report to the Police
Headquarters. Capt. Wells was to recall that, "Police Headquarters was an odd place to be wanted
urgently at 10 o'clock at night”. He was met by Sgt Maj Edwin Austin who, after going through the
usual process of identification, asked if he knew why he had been sent for, but Capt. Wells had no
idea. He was ordered to examine the prisoner Reichsfuhrer SS Heinrich Himmler, the second most
powerful man in the Nazi Reich, It was close to midnight on 23rd May 1945 when Himmler bit down on
the cyanide capsule hidden in his mouth, it was all over, and Capt. Jimmy Wells’s was the last face
seen by Reichsfuhrer SS Heinrich Himmler. After the war Dr Jimmy Wells did not come back to West
Bar but went for a while into practice in Oxford. He didn’t settle down so went then to the Radcliffe
Infirmary and became the first medical officer to the nurses and medical students there. He did this
until he was 70 when he was pensioned off, after which he joined one of the oil companies as a ship’s
doctor on an oil tanker. Not satisfied with this he came back ashore, studied for holy orders and
became a priest when he was 84.
1946 The junior partner was expected to live over the Surgery, and this was more hard work than
many people would realise today. The junior partner and his wife lived above the surgery where the
flat upstairs had 6 bedrooms. They were entirely responsible for the surgery, for manning the
telephone, taking messages, for repeated ringing of the front doorbell, and also both handing out all
the medicines and pills which people continually came for out of surgery hours; in fact, there was no
question of discipline in patients, they had to be encouraged in case they left and went to the
opposition, because there was strong competition among doctors in those days. The surgery staff
were only there from 9-00.a.m. until 12-00.noon, 2-00.p.m. until 4-00.p.m. and 6-00.p.m. until 800.p.m. Week-ends, public holidays and out of hours, the doctor and his wife had to man the place.
The partnership gave the doctors a servant allowance, as long as they could find one, and when they
went on holiday they had to find someone to live in and take on these duties.
1967 the bulldozers moved into Shrublands, what was then Dr Gilchrist’s garden, it was time to move
out. That marked the end of an era in which the Junior Partner was expected to live in the flat over the
practice premises.
A new state of the art West Bar Surgery was built in the garden of the old practice, and conveniently
took the unused number, 1 West Bar, it was the pride and joy of the senior partners who had helped
designed and create it.
When the building was opened it was felt that they had moved into an enormous palace.
But by the early 1970's they were beginning to feel that there were certain areas where they had
under-estimated their needs.
1971 Dr Gilchrist was appointed as clinical assistant in the Chest clinic when Richard Adam came, he
did mainly follow-up and he & Dr Gilchrist agreed on a discharge policy for old treated TB patients. In
the past they had been kept on forever. The result was that he started with about 25 patients in a
clinic and ended up after about 3 years with two.
Dr Robert Gilchrist decided that he would like to get in to teaching and took the MRCGP and passed,
was made College tutor and in 1972 set up the vocational training scheme, and then ran it for the next
20 years.
1976 Computerisation was still a thing of the future so everything was done by hand, including writing
prescriptions and making appointments, and of course all letters were typed on typewriters!
The partnership at this time consisted of seven male doctors. The surgery itself was relatively new but
had already been extended upwards to accommodate the Health Visitors. Having a treatment room
staffed by nurses was still a relatively new concept at the time. The work expanded into the space so
it wasn’t long before they needed to start thinking of expanding again. Being a training practice was
always a stimulus to keep up to date. The surgery was at the forefront of GP education and
development in the area.
The Partners started clinical meetings every Wednesday at 8 a.m. This “journal club” was the means
of keeping each other well informed of new developments and made a major contribution to patient
care.
1980 West Bar Surgery was the first surgery in the area to employ a Practice Manager, Mrs Kathleen
Robinson. When she started there were seven partners and one Trainee (now called Registrars), as
West Bar was considered a very innovative Training Practice.
There were no Christian names used at this time at the surgery – it was always “Mrs Robinson”;
however after a few years this became a friendlier “Mrs R”, but the doctors were never called by their
Christian names, Dr Tasker was the first who wanted to be known by his first name, so was called “Dr
John.
Mrs Robinson was responsible for the complete running of the practice, together with the Partners.
she did all the administration as well as all the finances and I was responsible for liaising with the
bank manager, and the accountants, as well as the FPC, as it was known then, she had to keep up to
date with all the changes in legislation in all areas of the NHS, including Employment Law which
meant having Contracts for all members of staff which had to be agreed and signed.
When she began in 1980 the staff were paid in cash, weekly! That had to be changed as soon as
possible, but needed the co-operation of all the staff, some of whom hated to make any changes,
Salaries were worked out on the Kalamazoo system – very upmarket then, there was 44 staff at that
time, including Treatment Room Nurses, plus attached staff.
Computerisation was still a thing of the future so everything was done by hand, including writing
prescriptions and making appointments, and of course all letters were typed on typewriters! When the
computers were first introduced into the reception area, all the receptionists felt that their jobs would
disappear, as they would be “a paperless practice” and there would be no need for filing into the A4
folders which took up so much room in the reception area.
1983 By this time space was getting a bit tight so a second new extension was added to 1 West Bar,
the opening of new extension was on Monday 5th July 1983.
People attending:
Lady Williams, Mr Roy Wilkins - Retired Administrator of the FPC, Mr Peter Target - Present
Administrator of the FPC, Mrs J Tewson - Nursing Officer, Mr Malcolm Gate - Consultant Obstetrician
and Gynaecologist (Horton General)
Building People involved:
David Gregory - Architect for Keevil & Gregory Architects, Alan Gage - Director of Simcock & Usher
(Builders) Stuart Williamson - Accountant for Dr Gilchrist & Partners, Frank Rayner - Bank Manager,
National Westminster Bank PLC.
Doctors within the area:
Dr D Hyslop - Windrush Surgery, Dr G J Biggam - Horsefair Surgery, Dr Veronica Fisher - Hightown
Surgery, Dr P H Middleton - Byfield Surgery, Dr L Sharma - Romney Road Surgery, Dr Irene Mawby Cropredy Surgery, Dr H F O'Donnell – Deddington, Dr George Mason - Orchard Health Centre
Present Partners, Dr Robert and Elisabeth Gilchrist (Senior Partner), Dr Michael and Hilary Aldous, Dr
Jamie and Rosie Martin, Dr David and Nikki Baugh, Dr Brendan and Sarah O'Farrell, Dr Roger and
Gill Shapley, Dr John and Carol Tasker.
Past Partners:
Dr Ken and Mary Kilpatrick, Dr Pat and Brab Hewlings, Dr John and Judy Long.
Employed Staff:
Kathleen Robinson and John - Practice Manager, Janet Baker – Receptionist, Sarah Blackwell –
Receptionist, Betty Brown – Receptionist, Diane Coleman – Receptionist, Kay Eleanor – Secretary,
Mary Martin - Filing Clerk and Receptionist, Jean Matthews – Receptionist, Gillian Park –
Receptionist, June Reddy - Staff Liaison Officer and Receptionist, Doreen Russon – Receptionist,
Gladys Swepson - Registration Clerk and Receptionist, Ivy Vinall – Secretary, June Smith –
Receptionist.
Nurses - Sisters in Treatment Room:
Wendy Andrews, Margaret Gray (Senior Sister), Paddy Mills (Senior Sister), Beth Perham, Judith
Thomas.
Attached Staff District Nurses:
Jenny Attkins, Marjorie Harris, Gay Hayward, June Herbert.
Health Visitors:
Mary Henderson, Dorothy Irvine, Sue Evans, Barbara Thompson, Lyn Lammert (H/V Secretary)
Auxiliaries:
Judith Willis, Janet Curtis, Mid-wife, Rita Gascoigne
Dr Robert Gilchrist gave an opening speech. Before Lady Williams officially opened the building.
1988 Dr Sarah Wookey was the first female doctor to join West Bar Surgery after the move to 1 West
Bar Street.
1995 Mrs Kathleen Robinson retired from the practice, Mrs Jane Hasting joined West Bar as Practice
Manager.
1996 Dr John Tasker, Lorraine Pengilley, Dr John Derry, Graham Smith and Ian Beach went to
Kemerovo in Siberia, to work with the doctors and nurses from two pilot practices and they now have
purpose built general practices. The Siberian doctors, nurses and managers visited England for a
month and visited West Bar Surgery and The Nuffield Health Centre in Witney which at the time was
John Derry's practice.
1997 Mrs Lorraine Pengilley took over as practice manager from Mrs Jane Hastings. She was a GP
appraiser in that she would perform 10 appraisals a year with GPs from throughout Oxfordshire, and
she was also part of Oxford Deanery visiting team who assess practices against criteria for training
the GPs of the future.
1998 The opportunity arose for West Bar Partners to take over the Hardwick practice from Dr Lotika
Sharma who was operating out of a Portakabin on Hardwick Arcade, Ferriston. West Bar doctors
rented the current building in which to hold their surgeries.
1999 Dr Ann Sanders joined West Bar Surgery as a trainee/registrar after her hospital experience and
liked it so much that she wanted to stay. She was then lucky enough to become a partner following
the retirement of Dr Roger Shapley.
The practice moved over to the Windows based Vision system. From then all clinical notes were
entered directly onto the computer i.e. paperless.
2002 West Bar had to close Hardwick surgery, as the landlord refused to renew the lease.
2004 West Bar Surgery started the (PPG) Patient Participation Group, where patients were invited to
attend the first meeting and to join the group.
Dr Stephen Haynes cycled from Aswan to Luxor with a group known as ‘The Lardies’ and raised
£75,000 for Macmillan Nurses in memory of their friend Paul Bithell who was the late editor of the
Banbury Guardian.
2005 West Bar reopened Hardwick Surgery after the local council bought the building and agreed to
renew the lease, and the Hardwick community was very grateful.
2007 Once again the building was becoming out dated and too small with no more room to expand.
Various options were considered as to how the surgery could expand and improve.
Eventually South Bar House was chosen and the long process of modifying the building to suit an
ever-growing doctors’ surgery began. Mrs Lorraine Pengilley was due to retire but postponed her
retirement until after the big move to the new surgery.
Nurse Julia Knight & Nurse Maggie Davies both did a Minor Illness Course, later passing as Nurse
Prescribers. Nurse prescribing is an area of professional development that has made huge steps
forward in the past several years. Prescribing of medicines by nurses has been a historic move for the
nursing profession and has proved itself in West Bar Surgery to be an important part of the solution in
improving access for patients. In 2013 Nurse Prescriber Sandra Neal joined the team.
2009 Mrs Lorraine Pengilley moved West Bar Surgery to South Bar House, Oxford Road, following
two years of planning. After many achievements, the biggest having been part of the team to
Kemerovo, building and maintaining a fantastic team and moving the surgery to South Bar House,
Mrs Pengilley decided it was now time to retire.
The practice could now do more as they had the space. Dr Sarah Wookey set up a programme
whereby the teachers at our local state schools were asked to nominate bright pupils from
backgrounds where studying medicine isn’t a usual career choice. They are then given a weeks' work
experience which they can then use on their medical school application forms. At least one pupil has
gone on to medical school.
2012 Dr Sarah Wookey accompanied a group of trekkers who climbed to the top of Kilimanjaro in
September 2012, raising £50,000 for the British Heart Foundation.
Mr Paul Butterworth, the present Practice Manager, was appointed.
On the 6th March 2012 West Bar Surgery was the first practice in the county to initiate electronic
prescribing, giving the patient the choice of chemist prescriptions should be sent to. It also meant that
if changes need to be made during the lifetime of a prescription the doctors are able to electronically
make alterations directly with the pharmacist.
This once small Doctors’ surgery has led the way on many occasions and continues to do so,
trying to improve the efficiency of the practice - eg. updating software, also, increasing the
experience and resources within the nursing team, chronic disease management etc.
West Bar Surgery is recognised as an excellent training practice, which requires them to meet a high
standard of clinical care and pass numerous inspections.
The West Bar doctors specialise in Dermatology, Paediatrics, Musculoskeletal Sports Medicine, GP
training, School Health, Heart Disease, Stroke, Learning Disabilities, Women’s Health, Obstetrics,
Gynaecology, Family Planning, Child Health, Respiratory Medicine, Teenage Health, Dive
Medicine, Medical Student training & ENT.
West Bar Surgery has always attracted doctors of the highest standard and continues to do so today.
Here is a chronological list of Doctors, you might remember:
Dr Bossier
Dr Neville Penrose
Dr Faulkner
Dr Jimmy Wells
Dr Wilfred Hudson
Dr Chris Wharton
Dr Pat Hewlings
Dr Alec Fergusson
Dr Margaret Fergusson
Dr John Long
Dr Anne Davies
Dr Ken Kilpatrick
Dr Roy Meadow
Dr Andrew Brockman
Dr Robert Gilchrist
Dr Michael Aldous
Dr David Owen
Dr James Martin
Dr David Baugh
Dr Brendon O’Farrell
Dr Roger Shapley
Dr John Tasker
Dr Sarah Wookey
Dr Melanie Patton
Dr Stephen Haynes
Dr Gwyneth Rogers
Dr Ann Sanders
1872
1908
1908
1925
1929
1932
1937
1940
1940
1946
1948
1949
1963
1963
1964
1964
1965
1970
1973
1976
1977
1983
1988
1991
1994
1999
1999
Dr Simon Bentley
Dr Barry Tucker
Dr Theresa Curtin
Dr Shelly Hayles
Dr Cathy Bobrow
Dr Rachel Mulcahay
Dr Margaret Reeves
Dr Chris MacGregor
Dr Hammad Tirmizi
Dr Jane Charles-Nash
Dr Efran Javahiri
Dr Nicky Elliott
Dr Rajesh Gupta
Dr Julia Bartley
Dr David Carter
Dr James Connor
Dr Ingrid Ferguson
Dr Carolyn Barcoe
1999
2000
2000
2003
2004
2005
2005
2006
2007
2008
2010
2010
2011
2011
2012
2013
2013
2014
Practice Managers:
PM Kathleen Robinson
PM Jane Hastings
PM Loraine Pengilley
PM David Twist
PM Paul Butterworth
DPM Jean Taylor
1980 - 1995
1995 - 1997
1997 - 2009
2009 - 2012
2012
2014