On the 1st of February 1996, talented lyricist and songwriter, Richey Edwards vanished. Since then sightings of him have been reported around the world but what likely happened to the missing Manic Street Preacher?
Where you can find us?
For more information on the podcast and the hosts, make sure you check out this link.
Follow us on Instagram - @welshmysteries, as well as via our individual profiles (@kaycpage and @mags.cross).
Work with us?
If you have a particular case that you would like us to cover, please feel free to contact us via the email below.
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On the 1st of February 1996, talented lyricist and songwriter, Richey Edwards vanished. Since then sightings of him have been reported around the world but what likely happened to the missing Manic Street Preacher?
Where you can find us?
For more information on the podcast and the hosts, make sure you check out this link.
Follow us on Instagram - @welshmysteries, as well as via our individual profiles (@kaycpage and @mags.cross).
Work with us?
If you have a particular case that you would like us to cover, please feel free to contact us via the email below.
We are also open to discussing business and sponsorship opportunities via this email.
Both hosts have access wmm@kay-page.com.
Sources used
The Welsh, as a people, are famed for several aspects of our culture and way of life. There’s
our accents, our language, sheep, rugby, Gavin and Stacy, and more recently, football, but chief among them is the legend of Welsh musicality. The idea that Welsh people are not born with a silver spoon in their mouths but instead a song in their hearts. Privileged in a cultural sense.
After all, we’re the country that gifted the world Tom Jones and Shirley Bassey, but in recent decades, the South of the country has become famed for its indie band scene.
Think the Stereophonics, Feeder, Super Furry Animals, and Catfish and the Bottle Men. But then of course there’s the Manic Street Preachers – probably one of Wales’s most famed and recognised musical exports.
It’s this band on which today’s episode is centred, as today we’re going to discuss the Manic Street Preachers bandmate who vanished, without a trace.
On the 22nd of December 1967, Richard James Edwards was born in Blackwood in the valleys of South Wales. He was one of two children, and it’s said that he and his sister, Rachel, had a natural and easy bond.
As a teenager, Richey attended Oakdale Comprehensive School and it was while enrolled at that school that his musical future was sealed. While in school, Richey met Nicky Wire, Sean More and James Dean Bradfield – those we now know as the Manic Street Preachers.
The decline of the coal mining industry had financially decimated the South Wales valleys and there was little for young people to do. It’s often been cited as one of the key reasons why so many successful bands were born in the area in that period. Because in looking for an outlet, young people found a new one – music.
The mines in the valleys were already dying or dead by this point and the landscape of the employment market was changing. Many people found jobs at Blackwood’s pot noodle factory, but other than employment opportunities were few and far between. The area was struggling, and with little else to do, many young people spent more time indoors than previous generations.
The young men who were to eventually be the founding members of the Manics were no different, they too found themselves spending more time indoors. It’s been reported that Wire and Edwards spent copious amounts of time in each other’s bedrooms, listening to records and reading books. They kept up with the news and were interested in politics. Passions and interests that would eventually combine and helped the band to find their distinctive style.
They were precocious and intelligent young men, and it was of little surprise to his family that Richey Edwards had achieved 3 A’s at a-level, affording him a spot at university.
Between 1986 and 1989, Richey attended the University of South Wales in Swansea, graduating with a 2.1 in political history. It’s a degree that most of us wouldn’t associate with a successful songwriter but hold on to that for now.
Edwards focussed his studies on the inter-war relations between Germany and Russia, with professors said to have been deeply impressed by their student. His tutor, Eleanor Browning commented that: "He was thoroughly capable intellectually. A serious young man - he never let his interest in pop music interfere with the work."
Following his graduation, Edwards returned to his hometown and signed on as unemployed for a short period of time, unsure where his future would take him.
It was during this time that his interest in politics intensified. The Thatcher years had been politically defining for many young people, particularly in those that had been somewhat affected by the various controversies that punctuated her premiership, and the coal mining strikes were still within the review mirror.
It’s since been reported that during this period of his life, Richey wrote numerous songs about the miners’ strike. A moment in history that many in South Wales and other mining communities would still uphold as defining. Still to this today, it’s a talked about topic and for many, it has continued to be a decider in who they vote for.
For a while, Edwards watched from outside of the band, assisting the Manic Street Preachers as a driver and a roadie. But in 1989, Richey Edwards was officially invited to join the band and became the fourth member of the Manic Street Preachers.
At the end of 1989, Edwards, Wire and two friends recorded a single called ‘Suicide Alley’. And as easy as that – the Manic Street Preachers, as the four piece they were known in the 90s, were born.
When it came to musicality, Richey was never the strongest and it’s been reported that he mimed playing the guitar during some early performances. However, along with the band’s bassist Nicky Wire, it was at writing songs that Edwards excelled. The band also cite him as being a key figurehead in deciding the distinctive sound of the band.
It’s estimated that Edwards wrote 80% of the lyrics on the bands third album alone - The Holy Bible. Released in 1994, it climbed the chat quickly, reaching number 6 and remaining there for 11 weeks. With the benefit hindsight, the lyrics of the album have been poured over by fans of the band. It’s now believed that many of the songs contain references to issues that might offer some insight into the state of mind that Richey Edwards at the time.
A recent article written for the Radical Art Review laments on some of those lyrics, pondering how some of the lyrics are as relevant now as they have ever been.
“Richey Edwards eloquently crafted narratives that characterised the personal impact of working-class alienation and mental illness under capitalism, intertwining the struggles of marginalised people with his own experiences.”
His politics appears to have been progressive, with topics such as poverty, class and sexuality often included within his lyrics.
The band was later to be praised for many of the lyrics that Edwards had written, the songs tending to be polished and intellectual but laced with political meanings. And so, maybe his degree came in handy after all.
British lyricists of his time, regarding him as a poet as much as he was a writer. His lyrics held meaning, they were powerful and honest.
The band never tried to force rhymes or rhythms into their music, it was often the lyrics themselves that did the talking, the meaning being held in the power of each word.
It didn’t take long for the talented singer to become something of an icon within the music industry. And since his disappearance, he’s been hailed as an essential and important figurehead of the Cool Cymru movement. For those unfamiliar with the Welsh language, the word Cymru is the Welsh word for Wales, and it’s probably one that you’re going to hear a lot more of. At the time of writing this podcast episode, there’s a growing sense of Welsh identity and there are now calls for Cymru to be the country’s recognised name at international sporting competitions.
The Cool Cymru movement was a cultural movement in Wales that sought to raise the profile of the nation via the medium of music and independent movies. The Manic Street Preachers were seen as being essential to this, alongside other Welsh bands such as the Stereophonics, Catatonia, and the Super Furry Animals.
The movement emerged in the late 1990s, when the Cool Britannia movement was being pushed across the border in England. The success of the arts in Wales was often viewed in comparison with this and from that, the term Cool Cymru was born.
In the years that followed this revolution, experts would attest to the Cool Cymru movement has having played an important role in the forging of a new sense of Welsh identity. Something that is perhaps comparable to the recent change in Welsh identity that we’ve seen in the wake of the pandemic and the football team having finally made it to the world cup.
Social historians have since claimed that the image of Wales as being ‘underachievers’ was a driving force behind this shift. And that in a want to challenge that perception, artists rebelled against the status quo. Into this void came the likes of Cerys Matthews and Richey Edwards, unconventional and rebellious lyricists who helped promote Welshness via their music.
Experts believe that Richey was central to this and that after he went missing, the bands narrative shifted and mellowed slightly.
As many of you will know, the Manic Street Preachers were a success and are still popular to this day. In fact, just prior to the release of this podcast, the Preachers announced that next year they will be performing at the castle.
Yet behind the scenes, Richey Edwards was said to have struggled with his mental health.
While promoting the band throughout the early 90s, he was open about his severe bouts of depression. He was known to self-harm, something he had discussed about in various interviews.
Since his disappearance Richey’s openness regarding his mental health has been widely praised and many regard it as being well before it’s time.
Author Caitlin Moran, a self-confessed admire of Edwards, commented that: "a cause celebre among depressives, alcoholics, anorexics, and self-mutilators, because he was the first person in the public eye to talk openly about these subjects, not with swaggering bravado and a subtext of 'look how tortured and cool I am', but with humility, sense and, often, bleak humour".
In one particularly renowned incident, Richey self-harmed following comments from NME journalist Steve Lamacq.
It was the 15th of May 1991, and following a gig at Norwich Arts Centre, Lamacq questioned how seriously Edwards took his art. Richey responded by carving the words 4 Real into his forearm with a razor blade. An image of which is widely available online.
According to legend, it was an injury which saw him in A and E but was one for which he refused treatment until all other injured parties had been treated. In the end, he received 17 stitches.
There was something incredibly powerful about the emotional nature of Richey’s dedication to his craft and journalists across the country took interest.
Alongside depression, Richey was also said to suffer from insomnia, using alcohol to help him sleep.
It’s been widely publicised that Richey struggled with his self-esteem and during the height of the Manics success – those for which he was present – he’d become disillusioned with the chase for recording sales.
It was something that James Dean Bradfield himself confirmed about Richey during an interview which is recounted in the book Withdrawn Traces: Searching for the Truth About Richey. A book that was written with the support of Richey’s sister.
“One thing I know is that towards the end, Richey became very obsessed with some kind of victory over himself. He really didn’t want to be a loser. But, because he was haven’t got a clue what the fuck happened to him, people can’t take that as a testament in blood, that he failed or he succeeded. All I know is that, as I say, towards the end, he was totally obsessed with the idea of victory.”
Sometimes a heavy burden comes with being an artist, one that’s repeated throughout history. By their very nature, artists are sensitive souls, they feel things deeply, emotions weighing heavier than they might for most. Richey was an artist – one of the best songwriters that Wales will ever have known – but feeling things overpoweringly extends beyond the boundaries of art. It tends to affect how strongly you feel emotions in everyday life too. I can relate, I am a highly emotional person and sometimes things can feel overpowering.
In an article for the Independent in 2020, to mark the 25th anniversary of his disappearance, Ed Powers lamented that Edwards was the ‘heart and bruised soul of the group’.
In that same article, Hawys Roberts the co-author of the book Withdrawn Traces: Searching for the Truth About Richey Manic, described the impact that Richey seemed to have.
“He was so enigmatic on the inside and outside and played the part of the rock star so well that he drew people in with his outlook and aesthetic. He reached an audience by articulating the tragic sublime and resonated with people who felt voiceless or unable to express the way they felt.”
Speaking about his bandmate and friend, Wire commended that: "Richey had become internally politicised, wrapped up in his own lack of peace."
During the 18 months before he vanished, these issues were said to have become even more pronounced for Richey and it’s been reported that he was really struggling with his mental health.
In 1994, just before the Holy Bible album was released, Richey sought treatment on two occasions. It’s been reported that he was seeking help for his eating disorder, alcohol misuse and depression.
The first bout of treatment took place at Whitchurch hospital in Cardiff, and it was the direct result of a suicide attempt, something that was revealed in the book Withdrawn Traces: Searching for the Truth About Richey Manic. The only book that has been written with the support of the family, via Richey’s sister Rachel, it outlined what had happened.
On the 18th of July 1994, Richey called his mother. In the call, he told her that he’d done something that he might now regret. His parents didn’t hesitate, they jumped in their car and made their way from Blackwood to his home in Cardiff Bay.
“They discovered his apartment in total disarray. Empty drink bottles, rubbish strewn across the floor and graffiti daubed all over the plain white walls, most pretraining to the recently deceased Kurt Cobain. Richey was lying in a bath filled with cold water, coloured by the blood seeping out of his forearms. On the edge of the bath rested a block of cannabis and an empty vodka bottle.”
The day after this incident, Richey was voluntarily hospitalised for severe depression at Whitchurch hospital. In relation to this incident, the authors of Withdrawn Traces were handed a paperback book by Richey’s sister, Rachel. Inside was a brief and matter of fact farewell note, in the format of funeral instructions.
It read: “No music to be played. Only immediate family to come (includes band & Jo & Dan). Maybe a poem – Tulips by Sylvia Plath. I LOVE YOU. I’M SORRY. I JUST NEEDED TO FEEL SOMETHING MORE.’
Rachel has since publicly that ‘Tulips summed up everything he thought at the time. Why do I know this? Because he told me, he kept a copy of it, and asked for it to be read at his funeral.’
The poem is generally regarded as depicting the tension between Plath’s want for the simplicity of death and the tulips encouragement of life.
Some have since philosophised that Richey’s prolific song writing was having a disastrous effect on his mental health, as it was forcing him to dredge up dark and deep feelings.
But he was also self-harming again.
In the April of 1994, the band had been performing in Thailand when Richey discovered two gifts in his dressing room that had been left by his fans. The first was a big, fluffy Snoopy (perhaps because of Richey’s own, late, dog) but the second was a set of carving knives. In his book, Everything, Simon Price recounts the note that came with them, stating that it read “Look at me while you do it”.
Returning to the stage following a costume change, Price recounts that:
“Nicky walked back out in a floral dress which was rapidly torn off my the front row, leaving him standing in nothing but his jockey shorts. Richey also reappeared with a different look: his chest was cross-hatched with fresh, running knife wounds. According to Wire, Edwards was actually annoyed by the fans gruesome request, and he speculates that Richey actually did it for the benefit of the photographers. Shortly after Thailand, a Select photo shoot, Richey had to be restrained from cutting himself for the camera.”
Further to this incident, Price suggests that Richey had started to experience and witness the negative side of the industry – and fame – mode widely. A new kind of ‘obsessive’ fanbase had started to emerge, with Edwards often finding himself at the centre of their obsession. These fans would ‘break into his hotel room, dressing up in his clothes, drinking for his stale coffee cups, stealing his used bars of soap – even rolling around in the bed he slept in.”
We now know that 1994 was to be a particularly difficult year for Richey with his mental health said to have entered a downward spiral from which he arguably never recovered. It’s since been suggested that the death of several celebrities, as well as a few close friends, severely affected Richey’s mental health.
It’s famously reported that Richey claimed he drunk for two reasons. One to make the day shorter and two because of insomnia, which he had been battling for years. As referenced earlier, it’s suggested that alcohol helped him sleep.
It was at this point in time, that Richey entered treatment for a second time.
Following his release from treatment, Richey was to re-join the band for their European tour alongside Suede and Therapy. This was to be the last tour that Richey Edwards took part in.
In the October of 1994, the Manics launched their national tour, beginning in Glasgow.
On the 21st of December 1994, the band performed at the London Astoria – it was to be Richey Edwards very last public performance. In an act of destruction, he chose to smash guitar on stage and the rest of the band joined in, destroying the lighting system as well as other equipment.
From what we can tell, the Christmas of 1994 was a normal one – enjoyable even, with the band having returned to Wales to spend time with their families. They also made time to see each other, said to have gifted presents to each other, while reminiscing on their childhood.
Yet, while things seemed great from the outside, there are some suggestions that Richey’s mental health was still in decline. For one thing, it was over the holiday period that Richey provided what would become his last confirmed song lyrics. They were handed to the band’s musical wing, via Sean Moore and for reasons he outlined to Simon Price, none of them have ever been used.
“They were pretty heavy going. There wasn’t a lot to pick out to be honest. Most of it was very fragmented and rambling.”
While Nicky Wire described much of it as being ‘ranting’.
Perhaps the nature of these lyrics provides some insight into the mindset of Richey Edwards in the weeks before he vanished, but so too does the diary that he was gifted that Christmas.
It’s worth noting that Richey was experiencing a period of change in certain areas of his life.
However, some of those close to Richey had come to understand that he tended to do this when he was having a hard time.
Interestingly, there is on resource which Rachel provided to the authors of Withdrawn Traces which affords an unprecedented amount of insight into Richey’s mindset at the time he went missing. And that is his diary.
Having been bought for him a gift that Christmas, it began the week before Christmas and covers an interesting period in his life.
The following entries cover the first week of the diary and there are few interesting comments.
In what would turn out to be a foreshadowing of sorts, Richey seemingly vanished in early January 1995. With Nicky returning from holiday to be told, by James, that Richey had gone missing.
According to Price; “His mother had assumed he was in London with the band, while the band had assumed he was in Blackwood with his mother, but he wasn’t with either. This time the disappearance proved to be a false alarm: Richey turned up a day later.”
On the 14th of January, Richey received the worst news he could have imagined. A vet had decided it was time for his childhood dog to be put to sleep, having been affected by painful arthritis for a number of years. Once described as his most prized position, Snoopy meant the world to him and he was devastated by his death.
His siter Rachel recounted that she visited the family home to find Richey curled around Snoopy’s body – he was sobbing.
Then, Richey experienced a break-up. In the book, Withdrawn Traces, it’s suggested that Richey had proposed to his partner, Jo. However, she declined his proposal, choosing to end their on-again-off-again relationship.
Rachel revealed that: “Everything was collapsing around him. He was shutting down because it was all coming at once – with Snoopy, the band and Jo. He would come home to Blackwood and sit around the house crying. Mam would take time off work to look after him and feel terrible when she had to leave him alone. She kept telling him that he was still young, and there were plenty of other girls out there, but he was adamant that Jo was the only one for him.”
Looking back at this moment, Rachel would realise that there had been some dramatic changes to her brother.
It was shortly after these events that those close to him noticed one of his physical ‘tells’ that suggested he was having a hard time, because Richey had shaved his head into a caw cut. According to loved ones, it was something that Richey tended to do when he was experiencing a hard time.
And there was more, particularly around the time that a commerative tree was planted in the family’s garden for snoopy.
‘That day Richard had a little camera, and he took pictures of Mam and Dad, which was odd because he had never done anything like that before. As I went to leave Mam and Dad’s house that day, Richard did a very strange thing. He looked at me up and down. I said, “What’s the matter? Is something wrong with my belt?” He just said nothing, but now I realise he knew it would be the last time he ever saw me, which makes me think he had everything planned out.”
On the 23rd of January 1995, Richey took part in an interview with Japanese music magazine, Music Life. This was his last interview.
On the 1st of February 1995, Edwards and fellow band made Bradfield were due to fly to the United States. It was supposed to be the beginning of the American promotional tour for the Holy Bible album, but Edwards failed to meet the band. It was at this point that his disappearance was noticed.
In the book Withdrawn Traces: Searching for the truth about Richey, Rachel recalls that Richey was dreading the United States trip. The night before the band were due to leave, Richey had called his mum leave and told her that he didn’t want to go to America. Yet while he was obviously reluctant, his mother didn’t notice anything overly concerning in the conversation.
Earlier that afternoon, the 31st of January 1995, Richey had told his bandmates that he would meet them to explore the local area, with plans to visit some of the local cafes, pubs, and food places. It’s now suggested that these plans were made while Bradfield and Edwards were listening to music in one of the cars in the underground car park.
However, when Bradfield knocked for Richey later that evening, he admitted that he’d changed his mind and decided to stay in his room for the evening.
At the time of his disappearance, this was all that was made public, and many believed that Bradfield had been the last to see him. However, in Withdrawn Traces its confirmed that this wasn’t necessarily true. In fact, it’s now claimed that Richey had welcomed a guest to his room that evening.
The information, which the band passed over to the family, was that a woman named Vivian had visited Richey’s hotel room that evening.
In the years since he vanished, Rachel told the authors that she’s done her best to ascertain exactly who this mystery woman was but that to date, she’s not found any substantial information on who this person was or what the nature of their relationship to Richey.
From what she has gathered, the suggestion is that Vivian was potentially a fan turned friend. There was very little information on this person in the police files and, in fact, Rachel alleges that the events of that evening – the 31st of January – remains as murky new as they were at the time.
‘We still don’t know exactly what happened that night. I’ve spoken to other people with family members who have gone missing, and normally they have received a much fuller picture of the last known 24 hours of their loved ones. For us, though, even after all these years, there’s new information being revealed about the night Richard vanished. It was only after reading a magazine interview with James that we discovered the two of them spent time listening to new songs in the Embassy basement.’
As to why Vivian was at the hotel, when she left or if Richard left with her, there remain no answers.
The following day, the 1st of February, Bradfield became concerned when Edwards failed to meet him in the hotel lobby. Aware that they were due to fly to the United States, Bradfield attempted to rouse Edwards by knocking on the hotel door, but no response was received. A result – and now worried – Bradfield asked the hotel to unlock the room with a master key.
What they found was unsettling.
The bathtub was filled with water and a gift box – addressed to Richey’s former girlfriend – sat on a cupboard. The box, which was wrapped like a present, contained a brief note that said, ‘I love you’. It also contained books, videos and several cryptic pictures including some which showed mansions and cartoon characters. The package was covered in literary quotes and the ex-girlfriends address was already written on it.
I want to point out something that I noticed immediately upon hearing about Richey’s 1994 suicide attempt as there’s an obvious comparison with the scene within his hotel room on the 1st of February. And that is the water that was found in the bathtub. There’s also the graffiti that was found on the walls of his apartment, writing, like that which was found on the unsent parcel to his ex-partner Jo.
As well as the box, a receipt was found which suggested that Edwards had spent £9.60 at a printing company the day before, leading some to speculate that it was where he’d obtained the images.
Almost twenty-four hours after he disappeared, the band’s manager filed a missing person’s report at Harrow police station and police were given access to Richey’s address book. The band began their own search, starting with a ring around to see if anyone had seen Richey. None of those contacted had seen him. One band member, Bradfield, travelled to the states alone, while Nicky Wire phoned various other hotels in London to see if Edwards could be located. Meanwhile the family were also trying to contact Richey, placing an advert in the Daily Mail, pleading him to let them know that he was safe.
It’s now believed that Richey left his hotel with very few possessions, carrying only his car keys, his wallet, passport, and a small amount of his Prozac tablets. However, he left behind his toiletries, packed suitcase, and the rest of his medication. He then drove to his flat in Cardiff.
It’s unclear where the ‘7am’ timestamp came from, but we now know that this couldn’t have been correct.
As was referenced in the statement, it’s known that either Richey visited his flat in Ascot Court, Cardiff, as almost all the possessions that he’d taken from the hotel were located there. However, there was also another clue, as the receipt for his payment on the Severn bridge, dated the 1st of February was located. It was timestamped as having been issued at 2.55.
Originally, it had been assumed that the 2.55 related to 2.55pm, with police having worked on the theory that Edwards ventured over the bridge in the afternoon. However, in 2018 the original software engineer of the bridge confirmed that the clock worked on a 24-hour schedule, meaning that 1pm became 1300 and so on.
Recounted in Withdrawn Traces, Ian McCray - the owner of the ticket system that was used on the bridge – confirmed the error in this assumption.
“The tickets the old bridge produced were definitely telling the time in a 24-hour format. There had to be a way to distinguish a.m. from p.m. for all kinds of reasons. Some people would need the receipts for expenses and VAT purposes. They could be used in crime investigations. I even installed these systems for South Wales Police so they could clock in and out with a specific time when they brought people into their stations for questioning. I worked for 37 years with those clocks, and a receipt stating 2.55 means the early morning.”
Based on this, it’s now accepted that Richey Edwards travelled across the bridge during the early hours, meaning that he would have had to leave London at some point between 12 and 1am.
He also highlighted the fact that a receipt wasn’t given as a default and that for Richey to have one, it likely meant that he’d asked for it.
Before this discovery, it had long been reported that Richey had left his hotel in London at around 7am, but the new revelations make that impossible. And throw the entire timeline in to question.
It wasn’t until the 15th of February that the police finally issued an appeal for Richey, asking for him or anyone with information to come forward.
“Police are anxious to trace Richard James Edwards, a member of the pop group ‘Manic Street Preachers’ who has been missing from the London area since Wednesday 1st February 1995 when he was seen leaving the London embassy hotel at 7.00am.
It is known that on the same day he visited his home in the Cardiff area and is still believed to be in the possession of his silver Vauxhall Cavalier motorcar.
Richard’s family, band mates and friends are concerned for his safety and welfare, and stress that no pressure will be put in him to return if he does not wish to do. They stress that his privacy will be respected at all times.
Police are asking anyone who has seen Richard, knows of his whereabouts, or have seen his car, to contact them at Cardiff Central Police Station.
Should Richard himself hear or see this appeal, his family and friends are anxious for him to contact one of them or the Police to let them know he is safe and well. They again wish to stress that Richard will not be urged to return or reveal his whereabouts if he does not wish to do so.”
A few days later, on the 17th of February, Richey’s car was officially found, having been located at the Aust services on the English side of the Severn crossing. It’s the village into which the old Severn bridge lands. The ticket attendant who’d both ticketed and reported the vehicle, told police that it had first been noticed on the 14th of February.
It’s worth noting here that the Severn Bridge is a known suicide location and for that reason, many people immediately drew meaning from where his car had been located. In fact, suicide remains one of the two prominent theories in Richey’s disappearance.
Returning to the car - the vehicle itself appeared to have been lived in, and evidence suggested that Richey had been staying in the car for at least a few days. How long the car had been there was never definitively identified, but based on the ticketing officer, we know it was there for at least three days. However, nobody had ever come forward to say that they’d seen Richey inside the vehicle.
The car was found to have a dead battery. A number of family photographs, which had been taken on and around the Christmas of 1994 were also inside the vehicle. The cassette-deck was found to still have a Sex Pistols record within it and an empty wine bottle was also located.
The family felt that the police were lax in how they approached the car, never once giving it a full investigation.
Rachel told Withdrawn Trace that: “The police didn’t know anything about the car. They never investigated the car; never looked into why it may have a flat battery, or the circumstances around that. I don’t believe they took anything out of there to look at. Wat my dad brought back in the car was a hold-all bag, an empty bottle of wine, the photographs, Richard’s medication and a cassette tape.’
However, the discovery of the car meant that a third police force had now become involved in the investigation with both London and Wales already investigating. The ca’s discovery – essentially near Bristol - invited the Avon and Somerset force to join the search.
The family were able to check Richey’s bank statements and uncovered an interesting pattern from the weeks before his car had been located.
Some sources have reported that Richey had withdrawn £2000.00 in the two weeks between when he was reported missing and when his car was located – however, this has known been disproven. As most of these withdrawals had happened in late January – prior to his last known sighting.
On the 20th, 21st, 23rd and 25th of January, Richey withdrew £200.00 from various cashpoints around Cardiff city centre. However, some of this spending is said to have been itemised as receipts from the period showed him purchasing breakfasts in Marks and Spencer, comics and books from Forbidden Planet, and films from Virgin Megastore.
He withdrew another £200.00 on an unspecified date and there was also a transaction dated the 31st of January when he once again withdrew £200.00 from a cash point in Surrey. According to records, Richey used some of this money - £44.40 – to purchase new pyjamas for his bandmates as a present and he also, spent the £9.60 at the printing store.
And while missing from the outlined accounting in Withdrawn Traces, there’s also the fee that Richey paid for the Severn bridge, and presumably the petrol that he’d have needed to get him in to Wales.
It’s also possible that Richey had been withdrawing the money in preparation for his trip to America, while others theorise that he had a few home-based projects that he was working on.
And so, despite what doe-eyed fans who want nothing more than to believe that Richey is somewhere sunny might believe, there is little evidence to suggest that Richey Edwards had anywhere near £2000.00 on his persons when he vanished. The maths suggest that he potentially had less than £400. A large sum of money for the period, but not the same as the £2400.00 that is often claimed.
On the 25th of February, the Edwards family received a concerning and disturbing visit from South Wales police who claimed they were acting on behalf of the met. They’d be instructed to search the entire property – and did so, thoroughly searching the entire house and garden.
The announcement by police in the 14th of February had triggered a wave of sightings, many of which Rachel read when she visited the police files in London. She photographed two of the sightings, both of which placed her brother in Newport (just the other side of the Severn bridge) within two days of each other.
The first was dated the 21st of February and was a witness statement from a 19-year-old student called David Cross. He told police that:
“A friend of mine named Lori Fidler, an American girl is friendly with Richie James Edwards who is a member of the band called Manic Street Preachers. Lori has been a friend of mine for three years. In that time she has visited Britain on four occasions from New York in America where she lives. The Manic Street Preachers were or are Lori’s favourite band. When she has visited Britain particularly on the last occasion she followed their tour. Lori has often shown to me photos of the band as well as photos of Richie James Edwards taken with her. Although I do not follow the band I know what Richie James Edwards looks like.”
He then continues by outlining his sighting of Richey. He claims that on the 5th of February, he caught a bus from the campus to the gym, arriving at Newport bus station at around 10am. He then headed to the Newsagents where he encountered Richey.
“As I approached the newsagent’s shop I saw stood outside this newsagents Richie James Edwards. He did not appear to have come out from the shop. He was stood alone near to a silver grey coloured car, the make of which I did not know. It looked similar to a Vauxhall Cavalier. Although I did not know him, I said to him, ‘Hello Richie, I’m a friend of Lori’s’. He said to me, ‘How is she? How is she doing?’ he looked at me and said, ‘I’ll see you later’,’ I was about the enter the newsagents when I saw him get into the driver’s seat of the car and drive away in the general direction of the bus station. There were no other persons in the vehicle. I am positive it was Richie James Edwards from the photographs I have seen. The only difference was that his hair was shaved very short. I recall he was wearing a dark blue coloured jacket which had a white pattern on it. When I spoke to him, although briefly I noticed he looked withdrawn and pale.’
Interestingly, the authors of the Withdrawn Traces book note that there is a picture of Richey and Lori widely available on the internet. Perhaps even more interestingly, it’s suggested that Richey had a copy of this image in his personal possessions but that he’d torn Lori from the picture.
There are number of details in this statement that convince many that it was Richey, as he seemed to know Lori and the car was also a match.
The second statement was dated the 23rd of February and was taken from taxi driver Anthony Edward Hatherall. His account is probably the most famous, in this case.
In his statement, he outlines the events that took place on the 7th of February, with him having collected Richey Edwards from the King’s Hotel on Newport High Street. He notes that the fair came via a phone call at around 7am.
“I parked outside and went into the reception area and asked the desk for the person who had requested a taxi. The female receptionist stated that she would inform him and I returned to my taxi. A male person came out and sat in the rear near side of the car. I would describe this person as being male, white, approx. 5’10/6 tall, slim build, dark brown collar-length hair which was all one length, clean shaven, gaunt face, wearing a black polo neck top and blue jeans. He had a Walkman attached to his jeans and he had headphones on. On getting into the taxi he said, ‘Can you take me to the Uplands in Rogerstone?’ I agreed and drove on. I noticed that he spoke with a cockney accent, but it sounded very much put on. He asked me if he could lie down in the back seat and I stated I had no objections. This person did not appear to be drunk or under the influence of drugs. There was no conversation between us until we got to Uplands when I asked him where he wanted to go exactly. He produced some paper with directions on it which he said he had got from the hotel. He read it stating he wanted the A4591 to Risca, Crosskeys and Cwmcarn. I stated that I could not go on a longer run until I had some money up front. He then handed me £40 in two £20 notes. I asked him for his exact destination but he stated that he did not know at the moment. He said he was looking for his boss who had driven a lorry to South Wales from London and had broken down somewhere in Gwent. I thought it was extremely strange and if he had not paid he would not have gone any further.”
At this point, Richey asked the driver for a map of South Wales and requested information on the various train stations. The driver told him that the nearest one was Blackwood bus station and they drove there.
“For the rest of the journey he say quietly in the back until we got to Blackwood Bus Station. It would have been around 7.50pm at this time. As we entered the bus station he said, ‘No this is not the place’. He asked again where the nearest Railway station was and I explained there was one in Newport and one in Pontypool. He then requested I take him to Pontypool Railway Station. At Pontypool station he got out of the car and asked me to wait for him. A short while later he returned and stated he had phoned the London office and been told to go to Aust Services which is on the English side of the Severn bridge. He requested to go via the ‘scenic route’, not driving along the motorway because he stated he is always driving along the motorway. There was very little conversation until we got to the Severn Bridge. At first he stared he wanted to be dropped in the motel at the Severn Bridge services but then changed his mind. I eventually dropped him off at the café area of the services. He paid me another £20 and then I drove away. Before I left he asked me for a receipt for the fare. The actual dare was £68.00 but he asked me for a discount which I gave him. I made the receipt out for £70 to Buster Haulage.’
The taxi driver later spotted a newspaper article about Richey and believed that his passenger had been the man in the photographs. He also commented that his suspicions ‘were heightened by the peculiar events of that night and the strangeness of the person’.
I’ve never seen any record of Richey having stayed at this hotel at any point in relation to his disappearance but everything about this account suggests that he did. It would be really interesting to know if the police followed this lead and if so, if the hotel were ever able to advise them how long Richey had stayed there.
Since I’ve known about Richey’s disappearance, I’ve believed that the taxi sighting of Richey was pretty much cut and dry. That it was him, that it was one of the strongest leads in the case. But the more and more I read that statement, the less convinced I become.
The story he tells is strange and unnerving, and aside from not wanting to be recognised, what other reasons did he have for hiding his identity? I’d always believed that the taxi journey represented a farewell tour but there’s very little in the statement to suggest that is what it was?
And then there’s the physical discrepancies which the authors of the Withdrawn Traces highlight:
“How likely is it that somebody five foot seven could pass for somebody six foot tall? Then there is the hair. Richey recently game himself a closely cropped crew-cut; was his ‘collar-length hair which was all one length’ a wig?
The only aspects of this story that make interesting are the locations, some of which hold a loose connection to Richey or the case. But even those are questionable. After all, we know that Richey’s car was found at Aust services and so, this leads to questions over where his car was at the time of this journey.
It is still possible that the taxi passenger was Richey, perhaps the driver mis-remembering certain details. But there’s also the possibility that it wasn’t.
Famously, there is said to have been a sighting of Richey outside of the passport office in Newport, however, this isn’t something that Rachel discusses in Withdrawn Traces.
And so, this statement leaves a plethora of questions in it’s wakes. I’m therefore inclined to think that it’s not given too much credit. Unless it relates to one of the above statements.
Then there were the international sightings, with various people claiming to have seen Richey in far flung areas of the globe. From New York to Fuerteventura and Lanzarote. And even, as this witness from Swansea claims, India.
It’s worth noting that this witness, Vyvian Morris was a musician himself when he believes that she saw Richey in 1996.
“We were on a visit that day to the hippie market in Anjuna. It was early in the afternoon, and we had just got there when we saw this group of hippies coming out of a café and getting on a bus. I immediately thought, that’s Richey Edwards. He looked a bit the worse for wear. He was very sun burned and had matted long hair, like it hadn’t been cared for.’
The witness managed to get the attention of another of the hippies and asked him who the ‘Richey’ like figure was.
“He told me: ‘That’s Rick’. I asked him how long he had been with them and he said: ’18 months’.
He believed this matched with-it being Richey Edwards and was convinced that it was him. However, he concludes his statement by saying that ‘without speaking to the man, I could never be 100% sure it was Richey.’
And here lies one of the biggest issues in the reliability of any witness testimony – everything is subjective. I’ve lost count of the number of times that I’ve caught a glimpse of someone I thought I knew or someone I thought I recognised from TV. How many times have those sightings been right? Fewer than I care to admit. Our memories are subjective, each one filtered through a million distortions and for most of us, the memories are far from picture perfect.
Unfortunately, this statement was given to the media and a short while after, and as a result, tabloid journalists descended on Goa. They were hell-bent on finding Richey, forcing Morris to second guess his decision to go to the press.
He later admitted that he regretted it, releasing that it risked destroying the anonymity that Richey – if it was him – had worked so hard to create.
Then there was the Fuerteventura sighting. Reported as having happened in the November of 1998, British-born Tracy Jones was working in a bar when the incident happened. She told the Island Sun that she overheard one customer shouting at another. According to her memories, the phrase yelled was: “You’re Richey from the Manic Street Preachers”. The man being shouted at bolted. However, it was later speculated that this incident was actually a hoax.
Then came Lanzarote, an incident which was recounted to the Edwards family via a letter.
“On Boxing Night we were returning to our apartment when we spotted a young man playing a guitar vert quietly and singing to himself. It was a very quiet spot and we stopped to look, because we thought it odd that he should be sat on the floor and playing and singing in that manner. He did have another man with him: he was doing nothing bug hanging around. This was down by the Old Port, opposite the Victoria Inn, in Calle. Above some council buildings there is a paved area, and he was in there playing.”
There was a second sighting in Lanzarote in the October of 2004, when holiday-maker Lee Wilde claims that he saw Richey on the beach.
“I know people will find this difficult to believe and they’ll think I’m some sort of crackpot, but I am convinced that this is who I saw…He didn’t do anything very much, he smiled and we chatted briefly – you know, just hello and some small talk. He was looking out across the water with half closed eyes because of the sun, but he still watched me approach. Before I could say hello back, he just said something like ‘It’s beautiful isn’t it?’ all while staring ahead. He was talking about the view obviously but I was more intrigued by his appearance. There was something quite different about him. He was incredibly thin, skinny would be a good description, a drawn complexion and greying hair. Then there were his arms. They were wrapped in leather bracelets and fabric that looked like rags – but in a fashionably untidy way, I don’t think they were bandages. But on the areas of his arms that weren’t covered you could make out scars which looked worse than they really were because of his tanned skin.”
There remains only two viable theories in discourse around what could have happened to Richey Edwards. The first of which being the most widely accepted and that is that Richey Edwards chose to end his own life.
As we’ve discussed, it seems apparent that in the months before he vanished, Richey’s mental health struggles had continued. Perhaps even worsening in the weeks before he was last seen due to circumstances in his personal life.
But we also know that there are certain behaviours which might now be considered as indicators of suicidal ideation. There were the changes in his appearance, the giving away of certain possessions and the concerning behaviour he exhibited.
We know, for example, that Richey had appeared gaunt to those who’d seen him, and it appeared that he was losing weight. There’s also the fact that he had dramatically changed his appearance in the weeks before he vanished, choosing to crop his hair short in buzz-cut.
And there was more. Again, we turn to Withdrawn Traces: “In the weeks before disappearing, he was smashing his head against walls, lacerating his torso, and walking around London in slippers and pyjamas – very visibly unwell.”
And then there’s the actual evidence which seems to further the idea that he was going struggling with his internal conflicts.
There’s the fact that he was living in his vehicle for at least a few days prior to his disappearance when he had a perfectly decent flat in Cardiff Bay.
It’s worth pointing out that the Severn crossing is a difficult and treacherous area of water and there is a possibility that no body would ever be recovered.
The second theory is that Richey wilfully disappeared and that perhaps disillusioned with fame and the music business, he simply decided to start over.
For years this theory has seemingly been supported by the repeated money withdrawals and a sighting which is suggested to place him outside of the passport office in Newport. And then you have all the sightings.
In the book Withdrawn Traces, the researchers reveal that Richey was obsessed with artists who’d managed to start over, or those who’d written about that subject.
Take the Catcher in the Rye author J.D Salinger, who famously disappeared on following the publication of their last fiction book in 1965. Rumours circulated that Salinger had chosen to live in some kind of self-imposed exile and it was a topic that the Manic Street Preachers had openly discussed.
In an interview with EP magazine in 1991, Richey commented that:
‘One of the best things I’ve ever read is J.D. Salinger. After his big success, The Catcher in the Rye, he locked himself away in a basement for twenty years. But he was still writing. He’s got manuscripts on his shelves, but no one’s ever seen them.’
The interviewer than asked if Richey could imagine himself doing that and he replied, ‘I’d like to think so.’
The idea of disappearing was also a theme in the works of another of Richey’s favourite authors, William S Burroughs. For a considerable period the author had disappeared and spending a number of years living in exile in various countries.
But there was also a third figure who was said to have been influential to Richey. That of French poet Arthur Rimbuad.
He wrote the bulk of his work as a young adult, said to have completed his works between the ages of 16 and 19. He then vanished from public view, before settling in Abyssinia (now Ethiopia) where he obtained a job working for an export business.
In the book, Withdrawn Traces, the authors highlight several ‘measures’ which it suggests were a deliberate attempt by Richey to link himself to the poet.
“On tour in France in November. 1994 he was interviewed for Melody Maker wearing a white boiler suit covered in lines of Rimbaud verse. As he peered into a tomb in Motparnasse Cemetery in Paris, the letters scrawled across his back read: ‘Once, I remember well, my life was a feast where all hearts opened and all wines flowed. Alas, the gospel has gone by. Suppose damnation were eternal! Then a man who would mutilate himself is well damned, isn’t he?’”
The authors then turn their attention towards the box that Richey had left for his ex-girlfriend, with it now being revealed that many of those contents were linked to the theme of disappearance.
“If we make the assumption that the texts left in the Embassy gift box serve as a black box recording salvaged from the closing seconds of Richey’s journey as a Manic Street Preacher, then their contents provide details of his mind’s parting flight path.”
In a letter to Rachel, Jo listed the contents of the box from memory.
Read into that what you will but it’s worth purchasing a copy of Withdrawn Traces for a detailed discussion.
The writers of the book conclude that the police’s search wasn’t detailed enough and that as a result, a staged disappearance couldn’t be ruled out.
“Our intuition regarding the truth about Richey draw us to these kind of answers. Very little has been done in terms of a proper official full-scale search for Richey and thus no progress made in learning the empirical facts of the case. What we are left with is this, the narrative verdict – the narrative that emanates from Richey’s words and actions and seems to imply a planned disappearance and exile.”
At this point, I want to touch briefly on the numerous criticisms directed towards the police forces involved because the more I researched, the more I found.
At first, the family believed that the police were doing a thorough investigation, but this perception was to quickly shift and, in the end, they were left questioning if even the basics had been undertaken.
Former Detective Superintendent Stephen Fulcher – famed for the Christopher Halliwell confession – has considered the case and has specifically raised a number of concerns.
He told the authors of Withdrawn Traces that:
“That 24 to 48-hour period from when you hear about the disappearance is the time you act. That’s when you can gather the most important information before a large part of it is lost.”
As far as Rachel is concerned, important statements were not taken from the three people who allegedly saw Richey last – James of the band, the mysterious Vivian and the person who checked him out of the hotel room. Again, in the book, this event is said to have happened at 7am but based on the receipt from the toll booth, we now know that this time frame is impossible.
What – if anything – happened or was said between Vivian and Richey on the evening before he vanished could now be lost for good. But there is some suggestion that he tried to give her his passport.
Additionally, Rachel is under the impression that certain other aspects of the hotel were also overlooked with her questioning of the phone calls from the room were even checked.
As I mentioned earlier in the episode, three police forces ended up becoming involved in the investigation and this might cloud the entire process. Instead of being a cohesive and organised investigation, it became chaotic, with each force failing to understand the other.
“There seemed to be no accountability, no one would take responsibility, and we were always being passed from pillar to post. It certainly wasn’t advantageous to have more forces involved – it was quite the opposite. When the car was found, the police took photos of it but two years later destroyed them. That was evidence the destroyed.”
The area surrounding the Severn Bridge and the location where Richey’s car was found was a known suicide spot. It was an area that had witnessed two similar incidents in the months before he vanished, and both occasions the Severn Area Rescue Association was launched. However, when this action wasn’t authorised when Richey went missing.
The Severn Estuary is widely regarded as being one of the most dangerous stretches of water in the United Kingdom, due to the speed of the water and other contributing factors. It’s tidal range generally sits at 50 feet, making it one of the largest in the world. Added to that is the fact that high winds tend to blow in the opposite direction to the flow, creating a dangerous combination. The tides there can be lethal and it’s traditionally proven to be a problematic place to end up.
The tidal pattern also creates a great amount of movement in the silty bottom of the estuary, meaning that sediment could conceivably cover a body, and, as a result, in some instances a body might never be found.
More recently the Severn estuary has tended to give up her secrets and these days bodies are recovered more often than they are not. However, in these instances, that’s because the correct authorities are looking for them and because a search has been launched pretty quickly.
It’s important to note than in Richey’s case, his car had likely been in that car park for up to three days. Making it possible that Richey had gone into the water three days before the area became of interest – and even then, no search was undertaken.
Rachel told Withdrawn Traces that it was a subject about which she had sought expert opinion.
“I spoke to the National Rivers Authority, the Maritime and Coastguard Agencies and the Hydrographic Office, and we discussed the details of the tides on the date Richard disappeared. They all gave conflicting answers about the arrival of the spring tide, and the strength of the current that February. There wasn’t anything conclusive I could really take from them.”
It's fair to say that Rachel tried to chase down all leads and while these days she is the primary driving force in keeping Richey’s story alive, she’s also taken an active role in the investigation.
This included writing letters to coroners within the area of the Severn asking for information on any bodies that might have been recovered. But also, she’s contacted mortuaries in the local area and asked if they had any information about anyone who had potentially that might have matched her brother’s description.
At times, she felt utterly desperate, visiting the location of his suspected suicide, and starting at the water, wondering if he was somewhere beneath the surface.
A short while after he was reported missing, the officer in charge broke the hearts of the Edwards family, when he declared that:
“At every street corner there is potentially a Mics fan who would recognise Richey. He has so many out there. It is not as though he was just an ordinary unknown who has disappeared. Every fan is unwittingly looking for him. He has drawn no money since he left the hotel six months ago, nor asked his parents for any. In these circumstances, I have to move towards the theory that Richey is no longer with us.’
In the years that followed the police would continue to come under criticism, with a particular focus of these concerns often being that of Avon and Somerset.
It took 14 months for the information about Richey’s disappearance to be circulated but there were also other examples of failings, by the police, in other cases.
One such example was that of Christopher Goodall, who vanished in the October 1997. A Manic Street Preachers fan, it would later come to light that he’d driven to Wales to end his life. His mother recalled the stories about Richey and contacted the police within the area of the Severn bridge.
It would later come to light that his body had been found in the November of 1997, but for various reasons he wasn’t identified until March of that year.
The connection was only made when the police in Gloucestershire appealed – via the Police Gazette – for information on a teenage body within their mortuary. It seems little effort had been made to identify the teenager who’d been found in the Severn River. And there were other incidences of bodies not having been identified for years.
In one such example, the body of Anthony Calveley was cremated in London before he was formerly identified. Despite having been found within his birth certificate on him, no effort was made to locate his family and instead, he was buried in an unmarked grave. It’s reported that Anthony was sleeping rough at the time and that he was battling addiction issues – meaning the police likely showed prejudice in the mishandling of this case.
It’s for this reason that Rachel had written to coroners about her brother.
“I get distraught thinking that Richard might have been one of the nameless bodies that wasn’t identified, who ended up in an anonymous grace somewhere. Or, worse, that his body was cremated, which would further limit the chances of ever finding out the truth of what happened to him.”
In 2005, Rachel supplied her brother’s DNA to the police, having found it surprising that it hadn’t already been asked for. In the end, inspired by a TV show that she’d watched, she took the initiative and gave them a sample.
It was only in researching this episode that I began to realise just how bad the investigation into Richey’s disappearance really was. But in truth, it’s been present from the beginning.
In fact, it’s visible as early as 1999, when a book was published entitled Everything (A Book About the Manic Street Preachers). In this book author Simon Price – who was a music journalist – outlined several concerns he found with the investigation.
According to him, aspects of the investigation where ‘far from satisfactory’ and he asserted that police had failed to consider Richey’s mental health as a crucial factor. He also reported that Rachel – Richey’s sister – had also hit out at the police for failing to investigate related CCTV in a timely fashion. In fact, it’s alleged that police didn’t analyse the CCTV until two years after Richey had vanished.
At the time of Richey’s disappearance there was a fair amount of CCTV on the Severn Bridge, potentially offering vital evidence about Richey’s timeline.
In 1997, Tim Rogers produced a radio programme called Eye on Wales in which he discussed Richey’s disappearance. In this episode, he spoke to the police about the issue of CCTV.
Rachel explained in Withdrawn Traces:
“Tim Rogers spoke to a member of the Metropolitan force involved in Richard’s case during the programme. Detective Inspector David Snelling informed him that there was no footage from the bridge and if it did exist, it would have been destroyed by 1997. Yet Tim Rogers easily obtained the recordings from the operators of the bridge. It appears to be something else the police overlooked.”
Years later, Rachel and her parents were able to view this footage, but it was grainy, and the weather conditions had only worsened the visibility.
From what they could see, there was a figure on the footpath during the daylight hours of the 1st of February, but it wasn’t clear enough to determine if it was Richey.
This, however, also feels out of alignment with what was now known about the timeline.
For one thing, if this is Richey, it also means that the witness statements are all inaccurate. It forces us to question how – if he was on the footpath of the bridge on the same day he left London – his personal possessions came to be in his flat. And, how his car was then not spotted for over two weeks.
The police believed that the car had been lived in for at least a few days and, again, that’s at odds with him having taken his life on the 1st.
I say this as someone outside of the investigation, but everything suggests that if he did end his life, it was likely closer to the timeframe when his car was located.
Perhaps more importantly, there would also have been CCTV footage in and around the Aust services where Richey’s car was located and allegedly, there was a business park near to the river footpath in that vicinity. These could have been valuable sources of information, but as far as we know, they were never checked.
And finally, the book Withdrawn Traces summarised some of the concerns.
“Over the course of more than two years, we saw endless delays from the police. The Richey file went missing then suddenly reappeared. One minute Rachel had the right to access information from her brother’s file; the next, the police claimed she did not. Phone calls were not returned. New officers were continually put in charge of the case.”
The police’s failure to adequately investigate leads a plethora of questions in its wake and it makes it borderline impossible for any theory to be ruled out. And while there are, of course, two dominate theories that seem the most likely, there has been the occasional pondering over the prospect of foul play.
In fact, Nicky Wire himself has once raised this question and while there is no evidence of that Richey lost his life at the hands of the third party, it can’t be entirely ruled out either.
There is a concern that the police were too quick to assume that the case was a suicide once they had began investigating , with Rachel herself stating that the car appeared to be staged.
“People have commented in the past how staged the discovery of Richard’s abandoned car appeared. He hadn’t had a drink since he left the Priory the previous year and yet there was an empty bottle in the car – no receipt for it although there was lots of other rubbish. The steering lock was left on the vehicle, but if someone is in a chaotic state of mind and intending to kill themselves, it seems unlikely they would care to do such a thing. Maybe he or perhaps someone else put the lock in to ensure the vehicle was discovered. In hindsight, the steering lock should have been fingerprinted to eliminate this possibility.”
There are of course two ways of looking at this suggestion. The first is that someone else staged the car in a bid to distract from the fact that it was a homicide. Or that perhaps Richey staged the scene himself. Could that be the reason why his belongings were in his apartment? Why the books he left were themed around a disappearance? And why he requested a receipt on the Severn Bridge. Was he attempting to create a narrative? Is this further proof that he managed to start over?
These days, Rachel Edwards has tasked herself with keeping Richey’s face in the national media and to date, she’s played an important role in telling his story.
In 2017, Rachel performed on Britain’s Got Talent as a member of the Missing People Choir. During the song, a picture of Richey Edwards appeared on the screen behind them. It remains one of the most poignant and powerful acts that I’ve ever seen.
According to Rachel, the charity was a lifeline for her and her family following Richey’s disappearance and she’s said that they’d have been lost without it.
In 2018, Rachel was also involved in the writing of the book Withdrawn Traces the very first to have the family’s involvement.
In 2020, she recounted some thoughts on her brother in GQ Magazine:
"It sounds like a cliché but it was a very happy family, a very happy upbringing. I know Richard is on record as having said the same thing. He was two years older than me and my overwhelming memory of our childhood is that he was very supportive of me. When I was at school I used to have a lot of anxiety, particularly around schoolwork. When I went on to comprehensive school, he'd already been there for a couple of years. At the end of each day we'd walk our dog Snoopy, I'd talk to him about my homework and he'd help me. He'd allay my fears, which, I suppose in retrospect, is ironic given the anxiety that he suffered years later."
In 2002, Richey’s family were granted permission to have Richey declared legally dead, but they chose not to, wanting to wait a little bit longer.
However, on the 23rd of November 2008, Richey Edwards was officially ‘presumed dead’ on the request of his parents. It was reported that this was requested because Richey’s affairs needed to be sorted. However, their lawyer made it clear that it was not an ‘acceptance of death’.Following this, the band refused to comment but made numerous gestures in tribute of their fourth member.
At the Reading festival of 2008, they dedicated their entire set to Richey. In the spring of 2009, the band released a new album with each song being compromised of lyrics that had been written by Richey before his disappearance. At the time, Paul Rees the then Editor-In-Chief of Q magazine commented that: ”I think it's very, very interesting that the band have left it until now to use Richey's lyrics again. It remains to be seen whether they will make the album Richey said he wanted to make just before his death, which he described as 'Pantera meets Nine Inch Nails'. But I think it shows some sort of acceptance that he has gone, even if it is at the back of everybody's mind that he might just walk through the door.
A few days after the presumption was granted, the Guardian published its obituary to the 27-year-old rockstar.
The Manic Street Preachers returned to rehearsing three months after Richey vanished, telling the media that it had helped them to move forward with their lives. But they were never going to be the same. The music that Wires writes is now less political and more uplifting and the ‘Welshness’ that was front and centre has somewhat faded to the background
But Richey is far from forgotten.
To this day, an extra, unused microphone is included in the staging for a Manic Street Preachers concert. A tribute to the bandmate who remains lost.
But a symbolic gesture isn’t the only thing that the band have done to show their support for Richey and as late as 2005, they were still paying a 25% share of their royalties into a bank account in his name.
If anyone has any information on the disappearance of Richey Edwards, they can contact South Wales police or the Missing Person charity.