by Howard Campbell
[SOUTH FLORIDA] – Dr. Carlton “Pee Wee” Fraser, Bob Marley’s close friend and former physician, died November 21 at the Florida Medical Center in Fort Lauderdale.
He was 74 years-old. No cause of death was given but Fraser had been ill for some time and was admitted to hospital recently.
Alan “Skill” Cole, the Jamaican soccer legend who was also a key member of Marley’s inner circle, knew Fraser for nearly 60 years. He was distraught after hearing of his death.
“Yuh can’t find a nicer person. Pee Wee was a man that gave everything to people,” said Cole. “A really, really great youth.”
He and Fraser were with Marley in West Germany where the reggae star had gone to seek treatment for cancer after being diagnosed by doctors in New York in September, 1980.
Fraser was in London when he heard that Marley died in Miami in May, 1981 at age 36.
Born in Kingston, Fraser studied medicine at Howard University. He returned to Jamaica in the mid-1970s and met Marley through Cole; they were all members of the Twelve Tribes of Israel.
The unconventional Fraser was at one stage physician for Jamaica’s soccer team. He was sacked by administrators in 2013 for prescribing what they said was a banned substance to a player.
Fraser is the fourth person associated with Marley to die in 2021. The others are singer Bunny Wailer, George “Georgie” Robinson, who inspired the song No Woman No Cry and percussionist Alvin “Seeco” Patterson.
