Claye was born in Brigg, Lincolnshire, on 18 July 1896, the son of a clergyman; his mother was the sister of the first Lord Moynihan. He was educated at Lancing College and Leeds University. His studies were interrupted by the first world war, during which he served in the 4th Dorset Regiment in India and Mesopotamia. After demobilization he resumed his studies, qualifying with the Conjoint Diploma in 1924 and graduating MB ChB with first-class honours and gold medal the same year. After resident appointments at Leeds General Infirmary and Leeds Maternity Hospital and experience at the London and St Bartholemew's Hospitals, he proceeded MD in 1926 and took the FRCS two years later. He joined the staff of Leeds University on appointment to the resident post of tutor in obstetrics, and in 1929 became honorary obstetric surgeon, a post he held until his retirement in 1961, when the title Emeritus Professor was conferred on him. He was elected FRCOG in 1934 and knighted in 1960. He was the doyen of British obstetrics and in certain respects, such as that of anaesthesia in childbirth, he was a recognized expert. He was above all a practitioner of the art of looking after the pregnant mother. To him she was always a woman, not merely a case, and by his practice and his teaching in this respect he played a leading part in maintaining the standards of British obstetrics and in enhancing the reputation in this respect of his own medical school at Leeds. It was typical of him that he voluntarily accepted a whole-time chair after having been part-time professor with a private practice. In this respect he had the advantage over those who are elected straight into a whole-time chair and at a relatively early age, not having had experience in private practice; an experience which tends to inculcate a greater understanding of human nature. In addition to his work at the University Claye served in many other ways. He was President of the 13th British Congress of Obstetrics and Gynaecology in 1952 and a member of Council of the Royal College of Surgeons of England from 1950 to 1955. He was Sims-Black Travelling Professor in Australia and New Zealand in 1956, and in the same year was appointed honorary consultant surgeon at the Royal Women's Hospital, Melbourne, where the honorary MD was conferred on him. He was an examiner for the universities of Oxford, Cambridge, Aberdeen, Belfast, and Manchester, and for the Conjoint Board in England. He was also an examiner for the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists and its President from 1957 to 1960. He served on many committees of the British Medical Association and was President of the Section of Obstetrics and Gynaecology at the Annual Meeting in 1949. His publications included *The evolution of obstetric analgesia* (1939) and *Management in obstetrics*, which reached a second edition in 1956. Claye was a man of culture as well as a man of medicine. Not the least interesting of his publications was the delightful anthology, English well used which he published jointly in his retirement with Canon Adam Fox, who had been an assistant master at Lancing when Claye was there as a schoolboy. Scrubbing up was always accompanied by reading two pages of Palgrave's *Golden Treasury* and Claye sang as a bass for many years with the Leeds Choral Society. In 1928 he married Marjorie Elaine Knowles, the daughter of a doctor. They had each graduated with first-class honours at Leeds in 1924. They had two daughters. After retirement he and his wife were both successful in obtaining the BA in English at London University. Claye died on 25 February 1977.