William Mervyn Barrett (known as Merve) was born in Melbourne – the youngest of the three children of John Joseph Barrett, three times Mayor of Fitzroy, and Margaret Winifred (nee Sheahan). In 1943 he married Beryl Jean Ferguson and they had four children: John Ferguson, Sara Elizabeth, Michael Mervyn and Peter Glenn.
Merve attended Xavier College, Kew, and then the University of Melbourne, graduating in medicine in 1941. His undergraduate teaching hospital was St Vincent’s Melbourne where he was JRMO in 1941, and 1942. He was at Royal Children's Hospital, Melbourne in 1942 and 1943, then joined the Royal Australian Air Force and was Medical Officer to the Transport Wing from 1943 to 1946, where he achieved the rank of Flight Lieutenant; one of his duties was caring for Pacific theatre prisoners of war.
During 1946 and 1947, Merve was a registrar at Royal Women's Hospital and Royal Children's Hospital, Melbourne. In 1947, he went into general practice in East Malvern. From 1953 to 1955, he was registrar to the Psychiatric Unit of the Repatriation General Hospital. Between 1955 and 1978, he was in solo general practice in Reservoir and continued to work in the Repatriation General Hospital Psychiatric Unit. In addition, he was assistant to the Physician Outpatients Clinic at Prince Henry's Hospital for 4 years from 1955. In 1963, Merve worked in London for 3 months in general medicine and dermatology.
Merve was elected FRACP in 1975, and in 1977 became a Fellow of the Australian College of Medical Administrators. During 1978, he attended Mount Royal Geriatric Hospital Melbourne as Consultant Physician and obtained his Diploma in Geriatric Medicine that year. Merve became a Fellow of the Australian College of Rehabilitation Medicine in 1982, and then worked at the Henry Pride Centre Kew for 18 months.
In 1983, Merve was appointed geriatrician to Mildura Base Hospital. He returned to general practice in November 1988, in a solo practice in Warracknabeal where he worked in co-operation with two other solo general practitioners. He retired from medical practice in 1997, and stated on leaving Warracknabeal that he was going to roam in his car with his dog for some time before deciding where to settle down. He settled at Hopper's Crossing, maintaining his connection with Rotary and the RSL at Werribee. Dementia increasingly restricted his activities and his capacity to act independently. He died in 2001.
Merve Barrett was, from the point of view of his colleagues, intensely private. He was forthright, but kind and caring. His medical career was unusually broad in its scope and he accepted the challenge of obtaining the qualifications of each area of medicine as his interest in it arose. His family knew him as a kind and patient person who was also proud and deliberate with a sense of fair play.
His interests outside medicine were, from early in his life, golf and horseracing. He had a long connection with Huntingdale Golf Club. He owned land at Kilmore where he spent many hours watching nature. He believed in God'All these beautiful things that nature provides could not have just happened.'