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After leaving the Army he started work at Bury Abbatoirs as an office clerk and remained with them until its demolition in 1970 to make way for the Bury Interchange Bus and Railway Terminus. He then worked at John Greenwood & Son at Garden City Abbatoir in Holcombe Brook.
When John Greenwood took early retirement and closed the business, he went off to work in Rawtenstall for Edmond Ashworth’s another Abbatoir and, when they ceased trading, he took up his last job at Tovah Meat Products, a Jewish meat processing company in Cheetham Hill Manchester. He remained there until 2008 when, at the age of 82, he decided that the change from manual book keeping into computerisation was not for him, and he took a rather belated retirement.
Bill met May, in 1951 and they were married a year later on August 23rd 1952 at Bank Street Unitarian Church. At the time he was a member of Dorothy Birch’s Concert Party and. along with May, they would entertain the paying public at Bury Hippodrome and various church halls in the area. He had a good bari- tone voice and would entertain with the songs of the day, followed by a joke or two.
Bill was a keen fan of Bury Football Club and of Oldham Rugby League Football Club. He was a keen Crown Green Bowler, and he played for Bibby & Baron the Paper Manufacturers in the Bury & District Workshops League.
Bill was a member of Bury Parish Church. He was the secretary of the Scouts Parents Committee and the Chairman of the Men’s Society. As well as being one of the church wardens, he and a friend became the first ever Rectors of Bury’s Warden, a position created for the two longest serving Church Wardens, by the then Rector of Bury, Cannon John Reginald Smith.
In the 1980’s Bill joined the Radcliffe Male Voice Choir. In the 1990’s along with the choir he
Performed for the public at the Manchester Gmex Exhibition Hall, where he was one of a thousand male voices from around the region and further afield. It was only the onset of dementia which prevented him from carrying on with the singing that he so much enjoyed.
It was while watching a recoding of the D-Day land- ings in 2017 that Bill started opening up about his war- time activities, his experiences of going through the liberated French villages and towns, and his football- ing experiences within the Regiment. His interest rekindled, he visited Home Headquarters and went to
Bovington in 2018 and again in 2019 to mark the 100th anniversary of the formation of the Royal Armoured Corps where he met Dame Kelly Holmes and Kate Adie. He was due to visit Bovington again in 2020 to mark the 75th anniversary of the end of World War 2 but this was delayed because of COVID. In January 2021 he was invited to attend the delayed 75th anniver- sary events but sadly died on 20 February 2021, some three months before the events were due to take place.
William Frew Howie
by Amanda Howie (daughter)
William ‘Bill’ Frew Howie was born in a small cottage on a farm just outside Dunning, Perthshire in 1940. His father was a tractor man and his mother a house- keeper. He had 3 sisters and a brother. Bill and his siblings, espe- cially his partner in crime, his older brother Jim had a wonder- ful, carefree childhood playing in
the surrounding countryside and on their beloved Craigrossie hill. They were often caught playing pranks and getting into mischief in the local area; something that followed Bill into his army career. Bill enlisted in 1959, serving 19 memorable years, first in The Royal Scots Grey and then, on amalgamation, the Royal Scots Dragoon Guards reaching the rank of Staff Sergeant. He returned to Dunning on leaving the army with an ‘Exemplary’ military conduct sheet, with his young family and lived there until he sadly died in May 2020 aged 80.
Bill and Zenka met in November 1961 in Catterick. Zenka was serving as a nurse in the QARANC. They were engaged two weeks later and married on Bill’s 22nd birthday on 24 March 1962. Two things Bill always told people about the wedding; it was a cold winter and it was the only birthday present he couldn’t get rid of! They had a happy marriage, bad times as well as good, separation which is part of army life but maintained a strong sense of humour and love. Bill was very proud of his army days and, although they had a difficult time having a family, they were lucky in the end to have two daughters. Wendy was born at Simpson Hospital, Edinburgh in 1970 and Amanda was born at Portway Hospital, Weymouth in 1972.
During their retirement Bill and Zenka made sev- eral trips to Canada and America, usually involving a Steam train trip or two, a great love of Bill’s life having first being employed at Perth Railway Station before joining the army aged 19yrs old. Both were involved
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