Born 21 May 1888 the fourth son of Louis Rivett, cotton-spinner, of Stockport, High Sheriff of Caernarvonshire, and his wife, née Smith. He was educated privately and at Trinity College, Cambridge, where he took second-class honours in the Natural Sciences Tripos, part 1, in 1909. He received his clinical training at the Middlesex Hospital, where he was Freeman scholar, qualifying in 1912, and served there as house surgeon, casualty surgical officer, and obstetric house surgeon. He took the Fellowship in 1915, and the Cambridge Mastership of Surgery, then the most coveted surgical diploma, in 1916. He had determined to specialize as a gynaecological surgeon and was appointed obstetric and gynaecological registrar at the Middlesex Hospital, but soon gave up the post to serve with the RAMC in France. He was posted to the 102nd Field Ambulance of the 17th Corps in the first Battle of Arras, April 1917. Later he joined the Royal Air Force Medical Service, and was put in charge of the surgical side of the Anglo-French Hospital at Le Tréport. On his return to London he was appointed to the honorary staff of Queen Charlotte's Hospital and of the Chelsea Hospital for Women, and became operative assistant to Victor Bonney. He was gynaecological surgeon to Queen Mary's Hospital for the East End 1919-31, and also served King George's Hospital, Ilford, the Hounslow Hospital, and the Welwyn Cottage Hospital. On the retirement of Sir Comyns Berkeley in 1930 he was elected to the honorary staff of the Middlesex Hospital. Rivett had great natural dexterity and manipulative and mechanical facility, which put him early in the front rank as an operator. He amused himself as a skilful clockmaker and locksmith. In addition to a very busy professional life, Rivett devoted much thought, energy and time to the promotion of his specialty. He examined for the Conjoint Board and for Cambridge and Bristol Universities. He served on the committee of management of Queen Charlotte's Hospital, and was the leading spirit in the National Birthday Trust Fund for the Extension of Maternity Services from its foundation in 1928. He was secretary of the section of obstetrics and gynaecology at the British Medical Association's annual meeting in 1926. He was a member of the Chelsea Clinical Society and the Hunterian Society, and not long before his death was elected in July 1947 an honorary Fellow of the American Gynaecological Society; he visited America in 1939 and 1946. At Queen Mary's Hospital he was instrumental in securing the opening in 1923 of the Margaret Lyle Maternity Wing, one of the largest in London. At Queen Charlotte's and the Chelsea Hospital during 1945-47 he organized, the combined post-graduate teaching school in obstetrics and gynaecology. He was a foundation Member of the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, and served as a representative Member on the Council for seven years, only accepting election to the Fellowship in 1936. Rivett contributed to the Queen Charlotte's Textbook of Obstetrics in the first (1927) and subsequent editions, up to the sixth edition, 1943.