The Herald. He was sent to China in July 1947 to report on the Civil War, then to London for the Herald-owned Adelaide Advertiser and the Brisbane Courier Mail in 1948, from where he reported on French, German and English post-war reconstruction, the lifting of the Berlin blockade, and also cricket, for which Rivett had a life-long love (he and Sir Donald Bradman kept up a regular correspondence from 1953 to 1977). He returned to Australia in 1951 to take up an appointment as editor-in-chief of the Adelaide paper The News, Sir Keith Murdoch's evening tabloid newspaper, and the founding publication of what was to become News Limited. Rivett was a popular commentator on radio, and once had the distinction of having a scheduled broadcast on the Suez Crisiscensored. He was a regular commentator on the ABC's Notes on the News programme. One campaign for which Rivett is particularly remembered was the "Stuart Case". Max Stuart, an Aboriginal Australian, was convicted of the rape and murder of a child at Ceduna, South Australia, and sentenced to death. The News was critical of the handling of the case, arguing that Stuart was not getting a fair trial, and urged the Playford government to set up a Royal Commission. On 3 December 1959, the Commission found the case against Stuart wholly justified and, seven weeks later, The News and Rivett were tried on nine charges, including seditious libel. The jury trial was held over ten days from 7 March 1960, with Dr. John Bray representing the accused, who were found not guilty on all but one charge. At that stage, Playford's Liberal and Country League government dropped the case, perhaps because of the adverse publicity it was generating. Stuart's sentence was commuted to life imprisonment and he was released on parole in 1973. In 1960, Sir Keith Murdoch's son, Rupert, sacked Rivett on generous terms, because he considered the editor to be unreliable and uncontrollable. Rivett soon found employment at the International Press Institute in Zurich but returned to Melbourne in 1963, where he worked as a freelance journalist, featuring in The Canberra Times and Nation Review. In 1973, he was elected president of the Melbourne Press Club, being succeeded by Keith Dunstan in 1976. On 5 October 1977, he died of a heart attack at his Camberwell home, and was cremated. Family On 2 January 1940, he married Gwyneth Maude Terry.