‘I still can’t forgive them’: family’s anger at Exeter University after son’s suicide

The family cat, Berlioz, still seems to be waiting for Harry Armstrong Evans to appear and often sleeps on his bed, surrounded by an untidy collection of computers and electronic games.

When Harry’s parents, Alice and Rupert, trip over something at their Cornish watermill home, they think at first their son has left his large shoes lying around, before they remember he is gone.

“We miss Harry every second of every day,” said Alice, 63, a marine consultant. “We wondered whether we should move away from here but we really would lose the feel of Harry, especially in his room still full of computer paraphernalia.”

Rupert, 72, an inventor and pioneer in renewable energy, said: “He was a bright, cheerful young man who had an inquisitive mind and not a hateful bone in his body. He is sadly missed by us all.”

Harry Armstrong Evans. Photograph: Courtesy of the family

In June last year, at the age of 21, Harry, a student in physics and astrophysics at the University of Exeter, killed himself six months after a disastrous set of exams. In the weeks leading up to his death, his family saw his mental health decline and sought help from the university. Harry himself told academic and welfare staff that he had done so badly after being left feeling horribly isolated in his student flat during Covid lockdown, and asked for help.

But the family feel the Russell Group university let Harry down. “I still can’t forgive them,” said Alice. “I can’t forgive them for not seeing that Harry’s marks had plunged that much and he needed help. He probably felt it was the end of the world.”

Describing his son as a “geek in the nicest possible way”, Rupert said: “He was conscientious and didn’t like to fail, so his results were devastating.”

Harry’s sister Freddy, 27, who works for an energy surveying company, said: “They didn’t take what Harry was going through seriously. They brushed Mum off and they couldn’t be arsed to contact Harry properly. They didn’t escalate it. They didn’t seem to feel responsible.”

After attending primary school in the Cornish town of Launceston, Harry won a scholarship to attend Winchester College in Hampshire, where he boarded between the ages of 13 and 18. He was a rower and chess player and very bright. After school he was offered places at Bristol, Bath and Exeter universities.

“Exeter was nice and close,” said Rupert. “He was doing well his exams, heading for a 2:1 or better. Then the lockdowns came – total disaster.”

“I have nightmares over how long he was alone for,” said Alice.

In January 2021, Harry’s results fell off a cliff, with marks as low as 21%. The university accepts his decline was “unusual”. Harry believed they had wrecked his chances of going on to postgraduate studies and he stopped communicating with his family.

They were so worried that in February his older brother Archie rang his student accommodation and got a janitor to knock on his door to check he was still alive. Harry opened the door.

“Eventually we went to see Harry and brought him home,” said Alice. “I was worried. He was thin. I thought I’d better get in touch with the welfare people.”

On 7 May 2021 – seven weeks before he died – Alice called the university’s wellbeing team and left a message saying her son was “not in a good place mentally”. The inquest into Harry’s death heard that a welfare consultant pressed the wrong button on the computer system and accidentally closed the case. “It never crossed my mind someone would lose the information,” said Alice.

She rang back a fortnight later but still no red flags were raised. “I think they thought ‘stupid mother’ and took very little notice.”

On 28 May, Harry sent an email to his academic and pastoral tutor and the welfare team explaining that isolation during the pandemic, along with family difficulties, had affected his mental health. The tutor emailed Harry and offered to meet, but his family believe that by the time Harry was found dead on 24 June in an outhouse at home, nobody from the university had spoken to him directly.

Alice said: “Exeter rang up and gave condolences over the phone. I asked have they lost any other students. They just didn’t answer the question. I realised it is so difficult to get truth from any university about suicides. It feels sometimes like we’re living in Russia.”

They discovered that 11 students at the university were believed to have killed themselves in the last six years, including another young man in the physics and astronomy department – though the university says not all of the 11 deaths have been confirmed as suicide by a coroner.

Alice said: “Had I known a young man had killed himself on Harry’s course, I possibly would have decided Exeter and that course might not have been right.”

‘He was conscientious and didn’t like to fail, so his results were devastating.’ Photograph: Courtesy of the family

During the inquest, Exeter staff said they did not think the family’s concerns or Harry’s email merited red flags. Welfare emailed him but thought it might have been “intrusive” if they tried to speak to him directly.

“We don’t think anyone saw him,” said Alice. “They assumed that because he was quiet he wouldn’t have wanted to be contacted. Someone should have checked how he was.”

Rupert said: “They set the bar so high, someone has to be lying on the floor having done something to themselves before they say: ‘Oh, there’s a problem.’”

The family appeared in person at the two-day inquest in Truro; the Exeter staff gave evidence via video link. “I found that very disrespectful,” said Alice. “It feels like they are trying to play the whole thing down, sweep it under the carpet. I wanted to take my shoe off a number of times and throw it at the screens.”

The family are calling for new legislation to require universities to publish the number of students who have killed themselves at their institutions and which faculty those students were studying in.

Rupert said: “If records are kept, there would be a race to the top. If you can show you’re a happy university and your wellbeing policies work, you’ll tell everybody.”

They also say the Department for Education should be given powers to investigate and place universities in special measures where a suicide rate exceeds the national average. They say it should be mandatory for pastoral and academic tutors to undergo and record their attendance at mental health awareness training.

The university claims that student health and wellbeing is always its top priority, but during the inquest staff members acknowledged there was thinking to be done about how it stayed in touch with students – and parents or guardians.

Alice said: “We do blame ourselves. Every day I go through Harry’s life and say, if we hadn’t done this or that, chosen a different course, a different university. I think I’ll think that for ever.”