Meet Eric Clapton’s 5 children, including late son that inspired his biggest hit

Ruth Kelly Clapton was born in January 1985 to Eric and Yvonne Kelly, the manager of AIR Studios Montserrat who he began an affair with while still married to his first wife, Pattie Boyd.

Yvonne was also married at the time, and Ruth was kept a secret from the public until 1991, when the media discovered following the loss of his son that he had welcomed a daughter through an affair.

Ruth and Eric were close through her childhood, but were estranged for a number of years in between. However, as she grew older, they reconnected and are now very close. Ruth works in the lifestyle space, an expert in styling and fashion.

Ruth is a mother herself, welcoming sons Isaac and Theodore with ex-husband Dean Bartlett. She is based in London with her sons and her current partner Peter.

Eric welcomed his first daughter with his wife Melia, Julie, in June 2001. Julie is a creative just like her father, having studied Fine Arts at the Rhode Island School of Design.

She specializes in, according to her social media, “weaving, knitting, papermaking, performance, and painting” and mostly works out of Brooklyn, having displayed her work at several exhibitions. 

While she is less public-facing than her older sister, her social media indicates she is currently in a relationship with a woman named Kam.

Eric and Melia’s second daughter Ella was born in January 2003. She has a public social media profile like her sisters, and is currently, per her LinkedIn, a student at the University of Newcastle, England studying sociology.

Ella is very close with her sisters, joining them as they flew to London to celebrate their dad’s 80th. She also runs a substack page under the pen name “Maeflo” where she shares musings on life and young adulthood.

Sophie, Eric and Melia’s youngest daughter, arrived in February 2005. Little is known about Sophie compared to her older siblings, as she is the only one without a public social media presence.

However, she is close with her family and her dad, with her most recently being captured during a family vacation to Tokyo in 2023.

Through an affair with Italian model Lory Del Santo, Eric welcomed a son named Conor in August 1986. Lory’s pregnancy caused Eric and Pattie’s divorce as the couple had been attempting to have kids of their own.

However, in 1991, four-year-old Conor tragically lost his life after he fell out of an open bedroom window from the 53rd floor of a Manhattan apartment building.

The loss devastated Eric, and inspired him to write the 1992 ballad “Tears in Heaven,” which appeared on the soundtrack for Rush. The heartbreaking soft rock song became his biggest solo hit, and remains his best selling effort in the United States.

“Tears in Heaven” was included in the singer’s iconic Unplugged record and won him three Grammys. Conor’s death inspired Eric to front several campaigns supporting childproofing homes.