Wilfrid was born on 2 March 1875, the son of Henry Frederick Fox and Ellen Maria Watson, at Bromborough, Cheshire. His father was a merchant who marketed in South America. His mother was born in Charleston, South Carolina, (a British Subject).
He was educated at Marlborough and Trinity College, Cambridge; B.A. 1896; M.A. 1901; B.C. and M.D. 1905. At St George's Hospital, London. M.R.C.S.; M.R.C.P., 1904, F.R.C.P., 1923.
After holding house posts and proceeding to his M.D. he decided to specialise in dermatology and spent some time at the St. Louis Hospital in Paris. In 1906 he was appointed skin physician at St. George's Hospital and a full member of the staff, which he served for twenty years, a number of them as a most careful treasurer, and as first director of the venereal diseases clinic. He was also for a time assistant physician and lecturer in dermatology at the Seamen's Hospital, Greenwich,

 

and on the staff of St. John's Hospital for Diseases of the Skin. He was an excellent teacher, a generous friend, and a witty and kindly host both at his house in Grosvenor Street, at which he conducted a large practice, and at his country home, Winkworth Farm, near Godalming.
On his compulsory retirement in 1926 he turned to business and although he had no previous training became chairman of Duncan, Fox & Co., an import and export house. He had other interests for which he is specially remembered. At his farm he created a beautiful garden which he presented to the National Trust, and founded the Roads Beautifying Association, which brought him the Victoria medal of the Royal Horticultural Society.
Until he was in his seventies he maintained his love of winter sports, organising and partly financing holidays for young and old friends. In World War I he had fitted out his own car as an ambulance and driven it in France; in World War II he again drove an ambulance, although then sixty-five, and was evacuated from Dunkirk in 1940 just in time to escape capture.