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About Herbert Michael Gilles
- Herbert Michael Gilles (10 September 1921 – 20 October 2015) was a Maltese-British physician and professor of tropical medicine, recognized as a leading expert in his field.Gilles was born to Maltese parents (the family name was originally Galea) living in Port Said, Egypt, and went to a French school there until the age of 11.
- He then became a boarding school student for his secondary education at St.
- Edward's College, Malta.
- After completing his secondary education, he studied at the Royal University of Malta, where he received his BSc in 1943.
- In 1943 he was awarded a Rhodes Scholarship to the University of Oxford but WW II prevented him from utilizing the Rhodes Scholarship.
- During WW II, Gilles served from 1940 to 1944 as an officer/cadet in the Royal Malta Artillery; during the Siege of Malta, he manned one of the anti-aircraft batteries.
- He qualified at the Royal University of Malta as MD in 1946.
- In 1948 he moved to England, where he, by means of his Rhodes Scholarship, received further education at the University of Oxford, qualifying MSc in 1951.
- He practised as a house physician at the Liverpool Royal Infirmary while he studied for a Diploma in Tropical Medicine at the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine.
- From 1954 to 1958 he was in The Gambia working at a poorly equipped laboratory belonging to the UK Medical Research Council.
- Despite the rudimentary laboratory, Gilles and his supervisor Ian McGregor were able to do important research on antibodies to malaria. In 1958, he was appointed lecturer-at-large in tropical diseases by the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine on secondment to the University of Ibadan, Nigeria.
- From 1963 to 1965 he progressed to professor of preventative and social medicine at the University of Ibadan.
- For three years from 1963 to 1965 he held a position as visiting professor of tropical medicine at the University of Lagos College of Medicine, Nigeria, which meant that he spent three months a year in that country. At the University of Ibadan he met Adetokunbo Lucas, who worked with Gilles to create suitable teaching materials in tropical medicine.
- In 1965 Gilles returned to Liverpool as a senior lecturer at the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine and was appointed there in 1970 a professor of tropical medicine, retiring as professor emeritus in 1986.
- In addition to his professorship, he was also dean to the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine from 1978 to 1983.
- He was for a number of years a visiting professor at the University of Malta, travelling to Malta three times a year.Gilles was the author or coauthor of several books and over 150 papers in scientific journals.He married Wilhelmina (Mina) Caruana on February 2, 1955; they had three sons and a daughter before her death in 1972 in a car accident.
- He subsequently married Dr Mejra Kocic Dimitri, who died in 2009.
- He died in Totnes in 2015 and was survived by his four children and six grandchildren.
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