Doctor Colin Scott Dafoe (21 November 1909 – 29 July 1969) was a

Canadian Canadians () are people identified with the country of Canada. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Canadians, many (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of their being ''C ...

surgeon In medicine, a surgeon is a medical doctor who performs surgery. Even though there are different traditions in different times and places, a modern surgeon is a licensed physician and received the same medical training as physicians before spec ...

, best known for his work with Marshal Josip Broz Tito's Partisans in

Yugoslavia , common_name = Yugoslavia , life_span = 1918–19921941–1945: World War II in Yugoslavia#Axis invasion and dismemberment of Yugoslavia, Axis occupation , p1 = Kingdom of SerbiaSerbia , flag_p ...

during the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

. His three-men medical team was parachuted to Eastern Bosnia on 12 May 1944, and he remained in the country for the following six months. Mission Dafoe was a World War II

Special Operations Executive Special Operations Executive (SOE) was a British organisation formed in 1940 to conduct espionage, sabotage and reconnaissance in German-occupied Europe and to aid local Resistance during World War II, resistance movements during World War II. ...

(SOE) medical and military expedition to assist Yugoslav Partisans in Eastern Bosnia. Dafoe was born in Madoc, Ontario, the son of a prosperous hardware merchant. The Dafoe family was well established in the area and had already produced one visibly successful son in John Wesley Dafoe, editor-in-chief of the Manitoba (later Winnipeg) Free Press from 1901 until his death in 1944. There were also at least two notable physicians in the family: an uncle, Dr William Allan Dafoe, who was to influence Colin Dafoe's decision to pursue a medical career, and Dr W.A Dafoe’s son Dr Allan Roy Dafoe, who later moved to the northern town of

Callander, Ontario The Municipality of Callander (formerly the Township of North Himsworth) is a township in central Ontario, Canada, located at the southeast end of Lake Nipissing in the Almaguin Highlands region of the District of Parry Sound. The municipalit ...

, where he would rise to international celebrity as the country doctor who delivered the

Dionne Quintuplets The Dionne quintuplets (; born May 28, 1934) are the first quintuplets known to have survived their infancy. The identical girls were born just outside Callander, Ontario, near the village of Corbeil. All five survived to adulthood. The Dion ...

on May 28, 1934.

References

* 1909 births 1969 deaths People from Hastings County 20th-century Canadian surgeons {{Canada-med-bio-stub