After education at
St Peter's School, York, Medhurst was awarded
Royal Aero Club pilot certificate No. 1437 on 13 July 1913. He was commissioned into The
Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers on 16 June 1915 and in a few months was training to be a pilot with the Royal Flying Corps. He was soon operational on the Western Front flying the
Nieuport Scout with
No. 13 Squadron. In 1917 he became the officer commanding
No. 14 Squadron operating in Palestine. On 1 August 1919 he was awarded a permanent commission as a captain in the Royal Air Force and by 1925 had attended the
RAF Staff College. He became Officer Commanding
No. 4 Squadron in 1930 and he joined the Directing Staff at the RAF Staff College in 1931 before becoming deputy director of Intelligence at the
Air Ministry in 1935. He then went to
Rome as Air
Attaché in 1937. Medhurst held a number of staff appointments during the
Second World War including RAF Secretary of the Supreme War Council from 1940, Director of Allied Air Co-Operation and then Director of Plans all during 1940. He became
Assistant Chief of the Air Staff (Intelligence) in 1941 and after a spell as Temporary
Vice-Chief of the Air Staff later in 1942 he became Assistant Chief of the Air Staff (Policy) in February 1943. In March 1943 he was appointed commandant of the RAF Staff College later moving on in February 1945 to be Air Officer in Command of
RAF Middle East Command. After the war Medhurst was made Air Officer Commanding-in-Chief,
RAF Mediterranean and Middle East Command (which had absorbed his previous command when it was disbanded in August 1945). His last appointment was as Chairman of the
British Joint Services Mission to
Washington, D.C. in the rank of
air chief marshal. Medhurst retired on 19 April 1950 and he died a few years later aged 58 on 18 October 1954. ==Family==