Edward was educated at St Thomas's Hospital, qualifying M.R.C.S., L.R.C.P. in 1903 and D.P.H. in 1907. He was formally the Resident Medical Officer at Croydon Borough Hospital, serving as house-physician to the Evelina Hospital for Children, as clinical assistant to the Royal Waterloo Hospital for Women and Children, and as assistant medical officer of health and bacteriologist to the Borough of Croydon. However, he was living, and was in practice, at Wimbledon when war broke out. Edward took up a temporary commission at the rank of lieutenant in the R.A.M.C. on 2nd November 1914. He entered the war in Egypt on 25th May 1915 and was sent to Alexandria in the June, but was invalided home from there. He died of typhoid at the 3rd London General Hospital, Wandsworth. He was the eldest son of Thomas Edward and Emmeline Parsons of 47 Cottenham Park Road, Wimbledon.