Rutherford Alcock obtained the MRCS diploma in 1831. During the following year he volunteered for service as a medical officer in the British Marine Brigade, which fought during the Miguelite War in Portugal from 1832 to 1834. After that campaign, he transferred to the British Auxiliary Legion of Spain in May 1835 for service in what later was called the First Carlist War (1835-37). After serving for one year as a surgeon he was promoted to the rank of Deputy Inspector General of Hospitals. He had hoped to return to King's College Hospital, London, to the Chair of Military Surgery, with an associated assistant surgeonship at the Westminster Hospital but, because of a severe bout of what is now believed to have been rheumatic fever, he lost the use of his thumbs and decided he could not continue as a surgeon. Accordingly, he decided not to take up the Chair of Military Surgery at King's on his return to Britain. In 1839 he was appointed to a lectureship in surgery at Sydenham College and, for a brief period in 1842, he was the Home Office Inspector of Anatomy. He then decided to explore other career opportunities and initially was British consul to China, at Fuchow in 1844, at Shanghai in 1846 and at Canton in 1854. In 1858 he transferred to the Diplomatic Service. He retired in 1871 after a successful and distinguished career.