Bowie met Hermione Farthingale – the “girl with the mousy hair” from the song – in January 1968 and became “soul mates”. But after a year she left him to work in the film Song Of Norway. Bowie’s response was to write the song Letter To Hermione.
Speaking at a preview screening of the forthcoming BBC Two documentary David Bowie: Finding Fame, the former ballet dancer, now in her 60s, revealed she first heard the song a year after its release.
Three weeks after the record came out in 1969 Bowie married Angie Barnett.
Farthingale said: “He married Angie three weeks later so I think you can see, it wasn’t a letter that actually had a stamp on it, and wasn’t demanding an answer.”
Farthingale is also credited with inspiring Bowie to write several other songs, including An Occasional Dream.
She denied their relationship had been one-sided, saying: “We missed each other as soul mates, as family, whatever it is that makes people incredibly close.”