The lost boy behind BGT’s most moving song ever...
As Missing People Choir le aves TV’s Ant in tears, devast ated father tells of teenager whose disappearance was inspiration
TO MANY, it was the poignant highlight of the evening, persuading even presenter Ant McPartlin to shed a tear.
But for Peter Boxell, appearing on last night’s Britain’s Got Talent had a truly personal resonance.
For when the 70-year-old grandfather sang I Miss You with the mesmerising Missing People Choir, it was to perform a song he wrote himself in memory of a child who has been gone for nearly 30 years.
Lee Boxell, his only son, disappeared on September 29, 1988, after telling his father he was going to watch Crystal Palace play just a few miles from their home in Cheam, Surrey.
Lee, 15, never made it to the match. Nor did he ever return home. There is no explanation, his body has never been recovered and there have been no sightings. It has cast a long shadow over the lives of Peter, his wife Christine and their daughter Lindsay. The words of Peter’s song – ‘In my dreams, I see your face, walk with you, hold you safe’ – are addressed directly to their vanished son.
‘When I sing, it’s a message going out to Lee,’ Peter told The Mail on Sunday. ‘It’s me saying “Where are you? I hope you are safe and well.” ’
The song was performed by Peter and his fellow members of The Missing People Choir.
‘It was such a proud moment to be able to perform on BGT. I dreamt my son could hear me singing on the show. Singing has helped me so much to not bottle everything up.’
As the weeks and months went by, Peter and Christine left no stone unturned in the search for their son. Peter said: ‘We looked everywhere, as did the police. We always thought someone in our community must have known something.’
Today, his bedroom remains exactly as it was the day he went missing. They had no news at all for a quarter of a century, then, five years ago, they thought there was a breakthrough.
The police told the family that they believed Lee’s remains were in a local graveyard near an informal youth club known to be targeted by paedophiles. Officers excavated the site but found nothing.
‘That was a very difficult phase,’ Peter continued. ‘The police had come up with a theory that Lee had been murdered and they dug up every inch of a graveyard looking for Lee’s remains.’
It was at this time that Peter discovered a new and unexpected interest in music – both singing and writing. It was an important distraction and during that time, Peter wrote his first song, Where Is Lee?
It was, he says, ‘nothing elaborate and very simple’ but it told of the disappearance. He performed it to 800 people at St Martin-in-the-Fields in Central London and soon moved on to writing a new song – the one that so impressed Simon Cowell, Amanda Holden, David Walliams and Alesha Dixon last night.
Peter admitted he ‘nearly filled up with tears’ during the performance. Christine, 75, and Lindsay, 39, were in the audience, weeping. The judges gave the choir a standing ovation and put them through to the next round. Cowell said: ‘I have to pay you absolute respect for what you’ve just done. It was incredible.’ Peter joined the Missing People Choir in 2015, becoming friends with other members including Peter Lawrence, the father of missing chef Claudia Lawrence, and
‘My song is a message, going out to Lee’ ‘He used to sit on my lap and I’d read him a story’
Rachel Edwards, whose brother Richey Edwards from rock band Manic Street Preachers went missing in 1995.
‘I am 70 now and the memory of those first few months does fade and the pain does somewhat ease,’ explained Peter.
‘I want to know Lee is still alive, I want to know if he is still OK, how he is. Unfortunately I have to accept the reality is that he probably was murdered, but I don’t know.’
He fears he may die without ever knowing what happened. He said: ‘I am getting old now and I don’t have many years left to find out. But I guess when I die, I will meet my
son and be able to tell him what has been happening all of these years.’
For now though, Peter is left with 15 years of ‘magical’ memories.
‘The best times I ever had with my son were when he was little, about five or six,’ said Peter. ‘He used to sit on my lap or next to me on the sofa and we would have a cuddle and I would read him a story like Noddy. It’s those little quiet moments – private moments – of Lee listening to my storytelling. Those are my favourite memories.’
To donate £5 to the Missing People charity text FIND to 70660. www.missingpeople.org.uk/terms