Giveen's suicide

Sir,

Further to WB’s piece Clearing Giveen in September’s issue, the ERA Club published an extract from a proposed follow-up to Split Seconds, in which Raymond Mays refers again to Giveen.

Mays received a letter from Giveen in the spring of 1930, in which he said he was facing problems and wanted to see Mays to discuss them.

They met and dined in London’s Grosvenor Hotel, and Mays was alarmed at Giveen’s state of agitation.

The following morning, on leaving his room, Mays met one of the porters:

“Have you seen your friend, Mr Giveen, sir? He was walking up and down the corridor outside your room last night, flourishing a revolver.

Two days later, Giveen’s body was found on the towpath of the river at Medley Weir, just above Oxford.

He had shot himself.

Martyn H Flower,
Yarm,
Cleveland.