My own brother destroyed Amy: He watched his big brother Blake pull Amy Winehouse into the squalid depths of heroin addiction. Now Harry Civil lifts the lid on the toxic marriage that ripped his family apart
- Blake Fielder Civil and Amy married on impulse in May 2007, in Miami
- But the marriage brought out the worst in the drug-addicted couple
- Harry's whole family was demonised in their quiet Lincolnshire village
- Off-the-rails Blake even offered his 14-year-old brother hard drugs
It often seems there’s no escaping the Amy Winehouse story – the stellar career, the addictions, the lonely death surrounded by vodka bottles in an unkempt London flat. It is now four years since she died at the age of 27, yet the legend, and the record sales, keep growing, helped by an army of Amy fans of course. And in her father Mitch, she has a tireless publicist.
In a few weeks, a controversial new biopic, Amy, will open, charting her life from fresh-faced, gravelly voiced young singer to tragic lover of tattooed drug addict Blake Fielder Civil. Once again, Mitch, a former taxi driver, has taken the opportunity to step forward to air his views.
Yet this is not the only version of the truth about Amy’s life, and she is not the only victim, as Harry Civil knows only too well.
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Doomed by drugs: Singer Amy Winehouse and her husband Blake Fielder Civil in December 2007. Blake and Amy met in 2004, but Blake's brother reveals the truth about the ill-fated marriage
Tragic death: Amy Winehouse arriving at the BRIT Awards 2007 at Earls Court in London. Amy died aged 27 in July 2011 at her London flat. The singer spiralled out of control, encouraged by her ex-husband Blake Fielder Civil
Leading a quiet life in rural Lincolnshire, the 22-year-old might seem to be a world away from the London maelstrom that ultimately claimed the singer’s life, and the sequence of events that also put his older brother Blake in jail.
He knows only too well the devastating consequences for the ordinary – and entirely blameless – individuals caught in their wake, including his own family, which was eventually destroyed.
Naturally reticent, this is the first time Harry has spoken about the terrible years leading up to Amy’s death; how he watched as Blake and Amy tempted his 14-year-old brother Freddy with cocaine; and how his ill-fated marriage to Amy saw the Civil family ostracised and hounded from their home village.
He said: ‘They seemed hell-bent on destroying each other and didn’t care about dragging others down with them. It was like watching two speeding trains hurtle towards each other before a violent crash.’
Ill-fated: Amy Winehouse and husband Blake Fielder Civil arrive at the 2007 MTV Movie Awards at the Gibson Amphitheatre in California. Blake's brother Harry watched as the couple gradually destroyed each other with their joint drug addiction, trapping each other in their destructive lifestyle
Happy on the surface: Amy and Blake, pictured at the MTV Awards in December 2007. Despite his crippling heroin addiction, charismatic Blake was still able to charm
Heavy-set and blond, Harry – an engineer – is in some ways the opposite of his charismatic big brother. In a taut, hesitant interview, he admits to struggling with feelings of shame that Blake turned out to have feet of clay.
He said: ‘I felt guilty because everyone knows it was Blake who introduced Amy to hard drugs. I didn’t speak to him for about two years because I blamed him for so many things. I didn’t hate him. I just wanted Amy to be still alive. We got back in touch only a couple of weeks ago.
‘It destroyed our family,’ he continues, sadly.
‘People spat at us and called us junkies. Blake was demonised and local people behaved as if we had a contagious disease they didn’t want to catch. Mum and Dad split up under the strain. We had always been very close, but now we rarely see our dad.
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‘Mum was determined to save Blake, but lost her hairdressing business because of the time and money she spent on rehabilitation care for him. I think it hit us all very hard. I was going through GCSE exams when the drama was at its height.
‘I did OK, but sometimes I do wonder if my results might have been better without all the fuss.’
No one would have much noticed the Civils outside the village of Claypole in Lincolnshire, if it hadn’t been for their ambitious eldest son. No doubt they had their problems, like any other family, but father Giles, a head teacher, had a respectable position in society. Life was unremarkable.
Harry had always idolised his big brother.
‘I remember that he used to play with me and Freddy despite the nine-year age difference,’ he says.
‘He taught us to ride our bicycles, took us the park and kicked footballs with us in the garden. He was never mean to us. We adored him. We were just an ordinary family who did things together.
People spat at us and called us junkies
Harry Civil, brother of Amy's ex-husband Blake Fielder Civil
‘Blake was at a grammar school and was quite academic, but he found village life dull. I think he was drawn to the excitement of London. A friend helped him get a job as a runner for a record production company. Although he kept in touch with Mum and Dad, Freddy and I didn’t see him for a few years.
‘After he left we became a tight group of four. We always had dinner together around the dining table when we talked about our day. Dad and I would go to watch our football team's home games at weekends. Freddy, who resembles Blake, was closer to Mum.’
Blake, now 31, left for London when he was 16, hoping to make his way in the music industry. For a while he seemed entirely taken up by metropolitan life, and almost disappeared. Then, like the prodigal son, Blake suddenly started to make visits home .
Caught in the maelstrom: Harry Civil, the younger brother of heroin addict Blake Fielder Civil, who is blamed for introducing Amy to hard drugs after they met in 2004. Harry recalls how the ill-fated relationship between Amy and Blake destroyed his family and led to them being ostracised in the small Lincolnshire village of Claypole
‘That’s when my parents first became suspicious,’ Harry continued. ‘He had lost loads of weight and was so pale that he looked quite ill. We all realised his attitude had changed.’
Blake and Amy, who met in 2005, had been together for about a year before he told his family. Harry recalled: ‘Mum and Dad noticed that he had become arrogant and bolshie. He definitely had an edge to him.
‘He had changed and I realised that he was doing drugs, though not that he was an addict. It was only after I saw him with Amy that I realised how bad things were.’
The full truth emerged when Harry was 15 and was invited by Blake and Amy to visit them in London along with his younger brother Freddy, who was 14.
‘Blake rang to ask if we wanted to visit for the weekend,’ Harry said. ‘He picked us up at King’s Cross and we went to their flat in Camden. Amy came to the door and we were embraced with hugs and kisses.
Beauty: Amy arrives at Westminster Magistrates Court in London in 2009, as the couple were granted a divorce by a London judge, after Amy was seen cavorting in St Lucia with another man
‘She didn’t have a beehive. She looked normal in skinny jeans and a vest top. She was a bit pale, but I didn’t think much about it at the time. They had promised to take us out for dinner and the next day we would see Camden market.’
The two-bedroom flat was ‘messy’ – the spare room crammed with clothes and shoes. It also smelled ‘funny’, Harry said.
Amy and Blake disappeared into their bedroom, leaving the boys to watch television.
When a hungry Harry went looking for them over an hour later, he heard someone retching and smelled the pungent smell of drugs being smoked from a pipe.
‘I knew about Blake doing drugs, so I assumed that’s what it was. I just turned around.
‘They finally emerged looking sweaty and agitated. Blake claimed he had a tummy bug and had been sick in the bathroom, but I knew they had been doing drugs.
‘There were needles and strips of tin foil, which I knew were used to take heroin or crack cocaine.
‘It was obvious that they were habitual users. There were always people coming and going when we saw them, some of whom, I later realised, were drug dealers.’
However, Amy doted on the teenagers. Their presence seemed to lend a sense of family to her life and she enjoyed having them around. She was especially fond of Freddy who, Harry says, was more like Blake. ‘We’d go shopping, to the cinema and to dinner. We had fun. They told us funny stories and were always in very high spirits. Sometimes Mum would join us and on a few occasions Dad came along.’
Rock and roll: Amy and Blake watch the show at the MTV Europe Music Awards in November 2007, in Munich, Germany. The couple met in 2004 and got married on an impulse in May 2007
Star: Amy performing in June 2007, just a month after getting married to Blake in Miami. Blake's brother Harry recalls going on tour with the singer to Scotland in 2006, and seeing his brother and Amy lighting up a tin foil in the tour bus
The brothers also travelled with the singer. Harry recalls being on Amy’s tour bus heading for Scotland in 2006. ‘It was like a huge luxury caravan. Freddy and I were sitting in the middle section watching DVDs. We were so excited.
‘I went to the back bedroom to find Blake and saw them lighting up a tin foil. They looked spaced out, staring at each other with wide eyes. They didn’t see me, so I just closed the door and backed away. About 30 minutes later they came out and Blake asked Freddy if he wanted to try some. I think they thought he would be more susceptible.
‘But Freddy was stunned and immediately said no.
She'd wear the same clothes for several days in a row and her face would be caked in stale make-up.
Harry Civil
‘I couldn’t believe Blake could be that irresponsible. He was grinning like some goofy kid as if he was offering his brother candy. We knew he started doing drugs from his teens, but this was a new low.’
Blake and Amy married on impulse in Miami, in May 2007. But marriage seemed to bring out the worst in them. And the money they now had at their disposal, thanks to the success of Amy’s second album Back To Black, meant easy access to any kind of illicit substances.
As the weeks and months went by, Blake and Amy’s relationship became seemingly more volatile and destructive. Amy’s arms bore the marks of self-inflicted cuts. ‘When we first met Amy she was looking after herself, but within a year she went downhill,’ Harry said.
‘She’d wear the same clothes for several days in a row and her face would be caked in stale make-up. She lost a lot of weight, often didn’t bother to comb her hair and always had a cigarette on the go.’
By the time Harry and Freddy went with them to Munich for the MTV Awards in September 2007, the couple were doing drugs openly. Munich was the last happy family gathering. Blake was arrested that November and pleaded guilty to attacking a pub landlord and attempting to pervert the course of justice by offering him £200,000 to keep quiet about it. He was sentenced to 21 months in jail. (Four years later he was also given 29 months for burglary and possession of an imitation firearm.)
Tragic loss: Amy posing for a photograph in February 2007 after being interviewed by the Associated Press at a studio in north London. Amy died alone in July 2011 at her flat aged just 27, from alcohol poisoning
Harry says this was when his parent’s marriage really started to go sour. ‘Mum was determined to support Blake. Like any mother she put her children first. People in the village acted as if we were gangland criminals. They called Blake a junkie and said we were the same. Freddy and I were always in arguments and fights at school.’
News reports about Amy and Blake led to the demonising of the entire family. A pet chicken was found strangled. Giles’s school received anonymous malicious letters claiming that he was not fit to teach children.
‘When the locals heard that Blake would come and stay with us after his release, a group of sanctimonious locals got together with the council and police to stop it,’ says Harry. ‘They argued that if Blake came to the village then Amy would follow and drug dealers would start hanging around. It was ludicrous. They acted like frightened yokels from the Middle Ages.
‘Dad eventually got tired of the hassle. I think he was worried about the impact it would have on his professional reputation.’
After 26 years of marriage, Giles left the family home in February 2009 – five days before Blake’s release. And the drama continued. Soon after Blake was freed from prison he fell into a coma after a drug overdose. He spent time in intensive care and was discharged a month later.
Harry said: ‘I don’t see either of my brothers now and a lot of things have happened that can’t be reported for legal reasons. But suffice to say that much of the bad stuff was directly linked to the break-up of our family.
‘I think Blake regrets the pain he’s caused. He used to say he couldn’t help being an addict and begged us not to hate him. Until two weeks ago we had not spoken for a couple of years. He called me out of the blue and wanted to know how everyone was. I got the impression that he’s trying to rebuild his life.
‘I haven’t spoken to Freddy for a while either and I even lost touch with Dad, though I see him now and then. He never remarried and still works as a head teacher.
‘We are rebuilding bridges, but it’s a slow process. I hope Blake can conquer his demons.
‘There is no turning the clock back, but I would like us all to be together again at Christmas one year, or get together around a dining table. It would help with healing.’
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