by It was a heartwarming story about a young Brit who disappeared for many years in France before being found after the death of his grandmother.
A French media campaign, together with a Facebook page called “Looking for Dominic”, was launched in 2011 to find Dominic Dickson as his family wanted to give him the inheritance left by his grandmother.
The story of his ordeal and a reunited family seemed to have a happy ending as Mr Dickson used the money to set up a home for homeless young people.
But the Telegraph can now reveal that the feel-good story that was widely covered by the British press at the time had a darker underpinning.
It’s about violence and abuse against foster children in a small French village – and a campaign to silence the brutality among adults that prompted Mr Dickson, now 48, to flee his family home there.
‘I just needed to escape’
“No one cared enough to protect the children. At the time, I just needed to escape a society where people openly abuse children, and adults don’t care enough to intervene,” he said.
The true story behind his disappearance has come to light thanks to a new novel written by his younger sister Hannah, aged 44, partly inspired by the horrific events.
The story of Dominic Dickson first came to light in 2011. His parents John and Madeleine – both lawyers – had left “the stress of English life” in Winchester to settle in the village of Bussière-Galant south of Limoges in the Périgord, south-west of France, in the 1990s, when he was 15.
Mr. Dickson’s grandmother Lieselotte lived in Epsom, Surrey.
Mr Dickson left home as a teenager and, after spells of homelessness in Montpellier and Perpignan, ended up running a soup kitchen in Rochefort on the west coast for people without food or shelter.
Thanks to the support of a charity, he got a job in 2008 as a rat catcher and then a gardener in Surgères, east of La Rochelle.
But his parents didn’t know what he was doing, and lost all contact with him for eight years at that time. “We didn’t fall out, but our son was always a free spirit, a little different, and not really tied to family bonds,” insisted the Dicksons.
Parents launched a Facebook page
All that would change with the death of Lieselotte, to whom Dominic was the closest of his four brothers. She left him an inheritance of around £10,000 and his parents decided to find him.
After his parents launched a Facebook campaign and contacted the local press, which published an article with a photo of their son, the family soon received numerous messages when they saw the stray Brit and his black dog and white, Pitchoune.
After all the years of silence, he contacted his mother who “rang a bit on the phone”.
“I regret anything I did, not even the street. It helped to forge my character. But it’s time for me to find my family again,” Mr Dickson said at the time, adding that he would use the money to set up an association for homeless young people.
His mother left a message on the Facebook site saying “a big thank you to everyone for your help and support”. But little has been said about Mr Dickson’s decision to leave town and cut all ties.
The novel contains themes of abuse
The real reasons have now emerged in a novel entitled The Story of Emiliah Bent written by his sister, a legal professional who lives in Grenoble.
Although the book is largely fictional, depicting a young woman who develops a broken relationship with a powerful and domineering chief executive, it is partly inspired by the chilling events witnessed by the siblings in Bussière-Galant in the 1990s.
“I was 11 when we moved there,” Miss Dickson said. “I had seen child abuse before, but nothing to the extent of what happened in Bussière-Galant.
“When I started at the local primary school, it was very clear, from the beginning, that the principal, Monsieur (Jean) Semendjan, who was also the mayor of the village, mentioned beating foster children, and that he took great pleasure off. for the violence he committed.”
On the one hand, he was “teacher, principal and mayor of the village, shaking hands, tasting cheese, laughing with the townspeople”, on the other hand he created a “field of terror” in his primary school, recalls the book in one passage.
One foster child in the village at the time, whose older brother was the named target in Miss Dickson’s class, confirmed the alleged abuse to The Telegraph.
“When we washed our hands before lunch, Monsieur Semendjan would randomly hit my brother or me hard, just because it was us,” said Charlotte [not her real name].
“Of course, our foster family didn’t care. They would beat us again if they found out, so we kept it to ourselves.”
The victim never recovered from the trauma
The book recounts the relentless punishments suffered by Charlotte’s brother. “We all watched in silence as Maître put all his strength into the slaps that hit Ludovic’s team. [not his real name] cheeks… the 10-year-old boy burst into tears, still standing, still rooted in obedience,” reads one passage.
Charlotte’s brother, who died of cancer, never experienced the trauma she went through, she said.
She said: There were four such families in the village and they took us in for financial reasons but treated us badly. I don’t have one good memory.”
She added that Monsieur Semendjan, who died in 2021, targeted other foster children. One scene in the novel is an accurate description of what Miss Dickson saw in the 1990s, of a young foster child, a girl of five or six, being dragged. across the playground by the hair.
Charlotte said she also knew one former foster child who had suffered abuse and had since committed suicide.
Explaining his decision to leave the town, Mr Dickson said: “I befriended some of Bussière-Galant’s foster children, and it was clear they were treated as second-class citizens.
“I heard from many people that certain foster families in the village were abusive. And everyone knew about the principal.
“I left the village because I felt so strongly the harm he was doing to these children and I couldn’t take it anymore. I moved from town to town to avoid being too easy.”
His parents, brother and two sisters remained in the village.
The Dicksons said they hope the book, and his speech, will raise awareness of the plight of vulnerable children.
“The village knew about this. It was an open secret but nobody did anything,” said Mr Dickson.
“I have always wanted to help people in desperate situations and perhaps my grandmother’s legacy is a sign of using this story for the good of the community.”
