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Taylor AW, Whiston B, Cooper MJ. Leslie Wallace Lauste MBE (1908-2001): Brighton surgeon and prisoner of war in occupied Europe. J Med Biogr. 2020;30(1):38-45doi: 10.1177/0967772020939374.
Taylor, A. W., Whiston, B., & Cooper, M. J. (2022). Leslie Wallace Lauste MBE (1908-2001): Brighton surgeon and prisoner of war in occupied Europe. Journal of medical biography, 30(1), 38-45. https://doi.org/10.1177/0967772020939374
Taylor, Alexander William, et al. "Leslie Wallace Lauste MBE (1908-2001): Brighton surgeon and prisoner of war in occupied Europe." Journal of medical biography vol. 30,1 (2022): 38-45. doi: https://doi.org/10.1177/0967772020939374
Taylor AW, Whiston B, Cooper MJ. Leslie Wallace Lauste MBE (1908-2001): Brighton surgeon and prisoner of war in occupied Europe. J Med Biogr. 2022 Feb;30(1):38-45. doi: 10.1177/0967772020939374. Epub 2020 Oct 04. PMID: 33016176.
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J Med Biogr. 2022 Feb;30(1):38-45. doi: 10.1177/0967772020939374. Epub 2020 Oct 04.

Leslie Wallace Lauste MBE (1908-2001): Brighton surgeon and prisoner of war in occupied Europe.

Journal of medical biography

Alexander William Taylor, Benjamin Whiston, Maxwell John Cooper

Affiliations

  1. The Department of Primary Care and Public Health, Brighton and Sussex Medical School, Brighton, East Sussex, UK.
  2. Breast Surgery, The Mermaid Centre, Royal Cornwall Hospital, Treliske, Truro, UK.

PMID: 33016176 DOI: 10.1177/0967772020939374

Abstract

Leslie Wallace Lauste (1908-2001) was an English surgeon of French ancestry who practised in Brighton. This article used his memoirs and interviews to describe his life during the Second World War. In 1940, after declining evacuation by the Royal Navy, he was captured at Boulogne- Sur-Mer. Lauste went on to work in the following hospitals, of which most were attached to prisoner of war (POW) camps: Dannes-Camiers (France), Lille (France), Enghien (Belgium), Malines (Belgium), Dieberg (Germany), Klein-Zimmern (Germany), Stadtroda (Germany), Treysa (Germany), Kloster Haina (Germany), Lamsdorf (Poland), and Moosburg (Germany). Lauste's memoirs indicate that most surgical work was routine rather than trauma-related. He gained considerable freedoms in camp and attended external hospitals to give a surgical opinion. Lauste witnessed the consequences of allied bombing raids on German cities and considered these a "genocide." Lauste's life offers insight into the Nazi mistreatment of Russian prisoners, management of a typhus outbreak, camp liberation, and extraordinary journeys within occupied Europe. His memoirs provide new insight into the life of a British POW surgeon and reveals personal courage, kindness to others, and passion for medicine. Lauste never married. He died in Brighton in 2001.

Keywords: History of medicine; Lamsdorf; Leslie Lauste; Moosburg; Stadtroda; World War Two; prisoner of war; surgery; war doctor; war surgery

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