There are a lot of people who are aware of the fact that Eric Clapton, who is 79 years old, endured a terrible loss when his little son passed away in a fatal freak accident.
Few people, however, may be aware of the fact that the artist made a heartbreaking final vow to his son, who was only four years old.
“He would still be alive if I hadn’t checked the fax,” the speaker said.
A terrible accident that occurred on March 20, 1991, resulted in the death of Eric Clapton’s son, Conor, who was only four years old. This tragic event altered Eric Clapton’s life in an irrevocable manner.
During the time that Conor was in New York with his mother, the Italian actress Lory Del Santo, he fell from the apartment window of a 53rd-floor residential building in Manhattan. Conor had just completed cleaning the house when he raced past an open window that had been left unlatched. In a moment that was both devastating and tragic, he fell to his death.
A window had been left open for some time. “Lory informed me that Eric was on his way to pick up Conor,” she stated.
Before going to check on Conor, I paid attention to the fax machine after hearing it and checking it out. It was only a fraction of a minute ago that I arrived at the location. The man had left. I would have been able to save his life if I hadn’t checked the fax.
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Just a few weeks before Conor would have turned five years old, his life was cut short in one of the most tragic and terrible ways that could possibly be imagined. Soon after hearing the news, Clapton, who was in another part of New York at the time, made his way to the location where the incident occurred.
After I informed Eric of what had occurred, he became completely iced over. Almost as if he had suddenly lost his ability to function. But he did not make any comments. It all seemed so implausible. The relationship that Eric and I had with each other ended after Conor passed away,” Lory explained.
Tickets to the circus were spent.
There was no romantic relationship between Eric Clapton and Lory Del Santo at the time of the horrific event. Lory was granted complete custody of their son, and she and Conor made the trip to New York to celebrate Easter with Clapton by travelling there.
Clapton accompanied Conor to the circus on Long Island on March 19, the day before the tragedy occurred. This was the first time that the two of them had spent an entire day together without any other company.
Clapton had eagerly purchased tickets to the circus, anticipating the opportunity to create one-of-a-kind memories with his kid. However, he was unaware that this would be the final day that they would spend together.
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The author of Slowhand: The Life and Music of Eric Clapton, Philip Norman, is a biographer who said that “that sawdust-scented afternoon showed him what he’d been missing.”
When they got back to the flat, Conor was talking excitedly about the elephants and clowns, and Eric told Lory that from this point forward, he was going to make it his goal to be a good father.
At the same time, Clapton had the desire to bring both Conor and Del Santo to London so that they could live with him. With an eagerness to spend more time with his son, the rock star was looking forward to the future. On the following day, he had assured him that he would go to the Bronx Zoo, and then he would have lunch at an Italian restaurant that was located close. In the morning, when Lory was getting ready for the day and Conor was playing around the flat with the pure delight of a child, a terrible event occurred.
However, a terrible event transpired.
Away from the scrutiny of the general population
Clapton withdrew from the public eye as a result of the devastating effects of his sadness. Over the course of the agonising days that followed Conor’s passing, Eric Clapton took his son’s body back from New York to his hometown, escorted by Conor’s maternal relatives from Italy, in order to make preparations for the funeral.
Ripley, a small village in Surrey, England, was chosen as the location for the interment of Conor, who was Clapton’s hometown. Ripley, which is situated approximately 25 miles southwest of London, is the site where Clapton spent his childhood and has continued to be a very special spot for him.
Following the funeral service, Clapton, overcome with grief, fled to Antigua, where he rented a little cottage and remained there for over a year, secluded from the rest of the world. He mentioned how he rarely communicated with other people and instead lost himself in music as a means of coping with his situation.
When they left, I was in possession of a small Spanish string guitar, and I developed a romantic attachment to it. “I went to Antigua and rented a small cottage there in a community. I just swatted mosquitoes all day and played this guitar. I stayed there for almost an entire year, without much contact with the outside world, and I tried to heal myself,” he recounted. “All I did was try to get better.”
During that moment, music turned into a safe haven for him. Over and over again, he played and reworked songs in an effort to find some type of emotional release. “All I could do was play and write these songs and I re-wrote and re-performed them again and again and again and again until I felt like I had made some sort of move towards the surface of my being and then I was able to come out,” Clapton recalled.
a letter written by Conor
Will Jennings and he collaborated on the composition of Tears in Heaven, which turned out to be a musical expression of his anguish. As a means of working through his grief and ensuring that Conor’s legacy is not forgotten, the song, which was initially composed for the soundtrack of a movie, evolved into one of his most heartfelt and intimate pieces.
In the midst of this heartbreaking loss, Clapton was also given something that destroyed him all over again: a letter from Conor. With the assistance of his mother, Lory Del Santo, the young kid had written his very first letter to his father just a few days prior to the disaster. In a tragic turn of events, the note that had been despatched to Clapton’s London residence did not arrive until after Conor had passed away.
“The baby had learnt to write a few words, and he said to me, ‘Oh mummy, I want to write a letter to daddy, what shall I write?'” Lory vividly recalled that terrible moment. “What shall I write?” “Well, write, I love you,” I told him. “I love you.” He penned that, and we sent it out in the mail just like any other letter.
Following Conor’s passing, Eric and I travelled to London in order to attend his burial. When Eric opened his mail shortly after the burial, he discovered that it contained a letter from Conor. I was present when he opened it at that moment. That is a part of time that I will never forget.