Formerly Consultant Psychiatrist, Hellesdon Hospital, Norwich

Dr Bill Abel will be remembered with gratitude by many Norfolk families for his skilled and compassionate help with their mental health problems during his long service as consultant psychiatrist at Hellesdon Hospital, Norwich.

Bill Abel was born on 9 July 1915 at Nottingham, where his father was an electrical engineer and where he was an accomplished oarsman during his school days. Always a committed Christian, he decided to enter medicine and trained at Edinburgh Medical School, where he met his future wife, Margaret, also a medical student; he retained a strong loyalty to Scotland throughout his life.

World War II broke out shortly after he qualified in 1939 and he immediately joined the Royal Army Medical Corps, spending a considerable period serving in the North African and Italian campaigns, which gave him lasting memories of Assisi and its churches. After the war he spent some time in general practice and then returned to Edinburgh to train in psychiatry. In 1957, he was appointed Consultant Psychiatrist at Hellesdon Hospital, where he remained until his retirement, and which included clinics at King's Lynn and prison work.

Despite his nostalgia for Edinburgh and the Scottish mountains, Bill and Margaret soon became at home in Norfolk, enjoying the north Norfolk coast and countryside, as well as Norwich as a city, where they made many friends. A keen naturalist and bird watcher, Bill was also an authority on Norfolk and Suffolk churches, as well as a talented musician.

Following his retirement in 1979, he continued to work for Priscilla Bacon Lodge for some years, but after the death of Margaret in 2003 he moved to South Wales to be closer to his family, dying peacefully at Willowbrook Nursing Home, Cardiff, on 3 April 2010. Bill and Margaret had five children - one (Lesley) deceased - and 12 grandchildren.