Richard Outfin was born on 4 April 1908, the son of William Henry and Edith Outfin. Following his time at Kelly College, he attended Guy’s Hospital, London as a medical student and obtained the LMSSA qualification in 1935. He then joined the RAF Volunteer Reserve in July 1936 with the commission of Flight Lieutenant and was promoted to Wing Commander in 1943. He was married to Cynthia Outfin and had a home in Paignton, Devon.

The Air Ministry employed him to compile the Medical History of the RAF for the French campaign of 1939-40 when he was with the famous No 73 Squadron; he compiled a similar history for the North African campaign in 1942-1943 where he commanded an RAF mobile field hospital and was Mentioned in Despatches. He was one of the first RAF medical officers to land in Sicily, establishing the first RAF hospital on the island and later landed on the Salerno beaches following which he was appointed to a Coastal Air Force Group in Italy. At the time of his death, he was one of the youngest senior medical officers in the RAF and was engaged in a work on the Medical History of the RAF campaigns in Sicily and Italy.

RIchard lost his life while flying having volunteered to take urgently needed vaccine and code books to a small RAF unit in the Central Mediterranean. The plane was lost off the coast of Italy in April 1944 in a mid-air explosion. The plane had a crew of 5 Italians and two British officers as passengers including Richard Outfin. There were no survivors. As well as being remembered on the Mount Kelly memorial plaque and in the CWGC records, Richard's name is recorded on the Guy’s Hospital memorial. Richard's younger brother and nephew followed in his footstoops to Kelly College but he had no children of his own.