When people disappear

[JoonT]

Have you ever known someone who just disappeared? I was talking to someone today whose father recently died. He has been trying to contact his dad's brother, who vanished about 30 years ago, leaving no trace. They've put appeals out on social media, but no luck. The journalist AA Gill's brother also disappeared like this and was never seen again.

It made me think of a neighbor I had years ago. When I first moved in with my ex, I got to know a woman who lived opposite. Her husband was ten years older than her and a bit of a bully/control freak. We saw each other almost every day for years and became quite close, then she vanished. She'd told me that she was saving money and planned to leave him one day, but it still came as a shock. I never saw or heard of her again.

I am adopted. Back in the 60s my bio mother found out she was pregnant and was moving to London at the time so did not tell her family. She went on to have me secretly and give me up.

When my bio father found out she was pregnant he disappeared from home. Ran away in the middle of the night and moved to London to be near her. Got a job and worked there for 4 years never contacting his family who had no idea where he was. They thought he was dead.

I was adopted and their lives went on and they stayed together.

They eventually emigrated to Canada. He contacted his peanuts once after a few years out of the blue to tell them he was alive and getting married and they refused to see him. He never saw his parents again and they are long dead now.

They are still in Canada but I don’t have contact or a relationship with them.

Peanuts 🤭

There has been a young woman (aged 22) missing since August near where I grew up. She disappeared on the beach, her phone has been found, but there is a lot of discrepancies around the people who last saw her alive (my cousin lives near where she disappeared and there are a lot of rumours floating around - she apparently was seen running on the beach). Its so sad. Someone knows something - I wish they would just come forward and tell the truth.

No, we’re in Lancashire.

I had a friend go missing many years ago.
It was in the 70's, a new girl started at my school, we were about 12/13. I am terrible at remembering names, but I will never forget hers, it was Caroline Finch.
We became friends and she lived not far from me, and she lived with her dad, I don't recall if I asked or new anything about her mum. We would hang around and do stuff together quite a lot. One day during the holidays I went to her place as we agreed. There was no answer, I went home and then went back again that afternoon. They never had a phone so I couldn't ring. I tried over the next couple of days, still no answer so I thought maybe they'd gone on a surprise holiday or something. None of our other friends new or heard anything at all either.
Never saw her again! They'd just vanished. When I went back to school I asked in the office if they new anything but they had no idea, and that was that.
I will never forget her and always wonder what happened to her.

I'll be vague so as not to be identifying.

A non blood relative vanished in the late 90s. He was early 50s.

He was declared dead 7 years later.

We don't actually know very much as our only source of what happened would be the number one suspect if he had been murdered.

He had his own business so could have been squirrelling away money to leave.

And obviously this was way before social media/ cctv everywhere.

He was married and had adult DCs/DGCs but the marriage wasn't happy. It seems like neither were willing to divorce as that would have meant splitting of the assets and loss of the nice big house in the nice area, sharing of pensions etc. so they lived partially separate lives eg holidaying separately, socialising separately.

I suppose these things would have made a conscious disappearance easier. Eg unknown friends covering tracks.

I hope he did just go off to have a new life somewhere. He was a nice guy.

If he did die he may have had an accident camping in the wilderness as this was a hobby of his.

But if he was unlawfully killed I don't understand why the police/his blood family didn't do more to investigate. There was no public appeal. Since the advent of social media there's been no campaign to find him or anything.

Sometimes I'm tempted to hire a PI to look into it.

I have all these childhood pictures of Christmas with him and it makes me sad thinking no one ever seemed to search for justice/answers.

Also my friend from school's dad went missing in 2005. He had demetia, and went for a walk in the hills (Lots of hills around there and forest - easy to get lost if you're disoriented). Despite an extensive search, has never been seen or heard from again. So horrible for her family.

@Beezknees @alloalloallo
Damien Nettles - local to me, too. He vanished in 1996 and there are still appeals to find out what happened to him.

My uncle. Though he's more unfindable as PP put it. My whole childhood, he'd pop up from time to time and then disappear for months and years at a time. This latest run is coming up about 20 years now. His father died a couple of years ago, but I don't know if he knows.

When I was 11, a new girl joined my class. We became friends and one day she invited me to her house after school. She was living in a women's refuge only a few streets from my house. I had no idea it was there. She was living there with her mum and two brothers. One day, she just didn't come back to school, and I never heard from her again. Of course, in this instance, it's fairly obvious why. I think about her from time to time. I hope the family found peace. They were from Belgium originally, so I wonder if they made it back there.

Sometimes I'm tempted to hire a PI to look into it.

I have a very good friend who is a private investigator, ex Met Police detective, and she told me that it's actually quite difficult to disappear completely in this country. To do so effectively you need to start planning it well in advance, years ahead maybe. You have clear all your debts, cancel all your financials, move out of the area, change your appearance, and adopt a completely new identity. This will also mean cutting all ties and contact with everybody you have known, including close family.

It's much easier in other countries to disappear, like the USA which has three time zones. And the only ppl she failed to trace had clearly left the country apart from one middle-aged guy. He went to work one Monday morning and has never been seen since. She called it her Reggie Perrin case. He was a forensic accountant and kept meticulous notes so she was convinced he had planned his "escape". He was finally declared dead after 7 years.

Everybody else she traced, which was the majority, had MH problems.

Does anyone remember, in the not too distant past , someone saw an image on Google maps (USA Ithink) and saw something in a lake that looked like a submerged car.
It was reported and on investigation it turned out to be a young person who had been missing for many decades and was never found . A fascinating but very sad story but at least the family could find some peace , I hope x

Not sure if it's the same one ,but I watch a lot of true crime I was watching one about people who disappear ,two young girls were heading somewhere (maybe a party ) in a a car and vanished nobody knew what had happened ,decades later a car was found submerged ,in some kind of creek covered by bushes ect and the remains of the two girls were found they found I ID,with them ,they think the girls must have lost control of the car and they drowned ,very sad but at least the girls families finally had closure .

Yes a friend from school.

I went to a school that had quite a few international pupils. One of my friends from school who I was close to from 13-16 ish, she went off the rails 16-18 and I grew apart from her really.

Anyway after A levels she returned to her home country. Several years later she had a daughter and was well and happy. One day she left her toddler daughter with her parents and left for a work trip as far as I remember. She never returned. This is pre internet and social media and we found out here as her parents contacted the school to ask around if anyone had heard from her. Her daughter would be an adult now and last I'd heard she was still missing. Very sad.

Can’t believe how many stories of this there is.

Does anyone know what the difference would be between someone being declared dead and not?

Did they ever find out what became of Richey Edwards of the manic street preachers ?
That was a mystery and his family couldn't do anything about his affairs for many years

No I don't think they did?
Must be awful for the families not knowing .

Amazing.
best wishes to you all

Me too x
I have regrets as we were very close at one time and about 2 months before she disappeared I was so preoccupied that I didn’t see her. She called and I was busy and that haunts me a bit. I would love to know she is ok

There are rumours he ended up in an ashram in India.

There was a similar thread about a year ago OP which you might find interesting. A poster called "meidid" posted about how and why she "disappeared".
www.mumsnet.com/talk/_chat/4509773-do-you-know-anyone-who-went-missing

That was William Moldt in Florida.

I was just reading this, it dosnt sound good.

We’ve had a few around here in the last few years, usually with sad endings.

There was a guy working in our local pub 20 years ago from America, he was a nice friendly guy, worked there all summer and then all of a sudden he vanished, not unusual as its a tourist town and we often get people coming for work for the season. A few weeks later his parents show up, he'd been missing for 5 years and they had tracked him to our town. They spent weeks here hoping he would come back, put up postered with his pictures but he never resurfaced. No idea how they tracked him down but I always reckoned that he got wind that they were coming and he ran.

A local woman's husband vanished in the middle of the night leaving her alone with 2 small children. She woke up in the morning and he'd gone so she presumed he'd gone to work. He never turned up to work and was never seen or heard from again and that must be over a decade ago.
My mother's friend vanished when they were children back in the 60s. He was about 7/8 and his mother sent him down to the shops 2 streets away and he never returned. They searched the harbour and the woodlands and nothing. My mam reckons he was taken by someone. His poor poor mother was never right again she used to go down to the area where he was last seen and she'd cry his name and beg him to come home to her.

It was also 10 days until she was reported missing, which would have hindered the search massively.

@Standbyguest Any idea why it took so long to be reported?

Me too. It’s awful for his family and friends. How can someone just disappear.