His father, Morris Shernovitch, emigrated from Bessarabia in the 1900s, and in the 1920s changed his name to Maurice Sherwin. Jeffrey qualified in 1961 and joined his father's practice. In 1968 he married Ruth Israel, a talented pianist and herself, the daughter of a doctor in Middlesbrough. She studied at the Royal Academy of Music and, after some years as a music teacher, came to Leeds to study piano with Fanny Waterman. The pair met at a graduates' evening in Leeds. Dr Sherwin began his political career as a Liberal, contesting the Wortley ward unsuccessfully in 1963, but switched to the Conservatives, winning the Talbot ward at his first attempt in 1971. He held the seat until the ward boundaries were all changed in 1980. He then contested Barwick and Kippax, losing to Labour. He was later made an Honorary Alderman. He was also noted as a knowledgeableart collector, possessing works by Jacob Kramer, John Bratby, Henry Moore and his particular obses- sion, the English Surrealists, who featured in his 2014 book British Surrealism Opened Up. The book discusses the friendship between Moore and that other Leeds-educa- ted artist, Damien Hirst. Sherwin countered arguments that Hirst was not a Surrealistby asking what else a cow pickled in formaldehyde could possibly be! Sherwin's collection of 220 paintings was the subject of a 2009 exhibition, British Surrealism in Context: ACollector's Eye, at Leeds Art Gallery.