“The best copper Beverley ever had”. “A proper bobby, that people listened to”. “You didn’t mess about when Bill was around”. “A true gentleman”. “A great man, always kind, and a gentle giant”. These are some of the many tributes that have been paid to Bill Rice whose sad death was announced this week.
Bill was a well-loved figure in and around Beverley for over 50 years as a police constable and charity worker. Although famously, Bill didn’t regard himself as a ‘Beverlonian’, he was born in Ferriby, many saw him as the quintessential Beverley character known by sight to generations over his long life.
However, Bill Rice was very well-known in his adopted home town where he resided with his wife and family for over 50 years. Both revered for his imposing height as a long-serving police officer and loved by his community for his many roles in the town’s civic life. Bill and his penny farthing, which he rode every year at the Lions Carnival, his 25 or more years as town crier, and his long and dedicated charitable efforts with Beverley Lions all mark Bill Rice out as an extraordinary individual and a fond example to so many.
William Albert Rice was born in 1931. The son of a postman, he left school at 14 to become a butcher. However, in 1951 after 2 years of national service, he joined the police. Initially based in Hessle and then Beeford he arrived in Beverley in 1962 with wife Joy and children Gillian and Nigel.
In 2010, at the age of 79, and still sporting his famous moustache and sideburns, Bill told HU17 magazine that in the sixties he was “often stationed at Saturday Market at closing time.” He described how ”life was very different back then”, saying “we had a few rum lads, but no stabbings or kickings or anything like that”.
In 1977 Bill retired and began working on the family business with his son and set about a raft of charity work spanning over 40 years. He helped many vulnerable people in the area throughout his life and in 1998 Bill Rice was given East Riding Council’s Chairman’s Award for services to the community.
In 2013 Bill was awarded the honorary freedom of Beverley. Former Beverley Mayor Cllr David Elvidge said that “he was a giant of a man in many ways. I was proud to have known him and it was a pleasure to have seen him awarded the freedom of the town.
“Bill stood out for so many reasons but always had time to talk and will be missed by a number of generations of Beverlyonians whose lives he helped for the better”
Despite the odd frailty of later life, Bill kept going with his work for the community and remained a familiar figure to the next generation of Beverley residents out and about the town into his 80s.
Most people who knew him would wholeheartedly agree that Bill Rice was a one-off. He embodied the best of us all in this town. He gave it everything, lived a wonderful life himself and touched the lives of so many others and he remains in our hearts. All of the town’s thoughts and prayers go to Bill’s family at this time and we hope in some small way it offers comfort to know that he was so loved and respected in his home town.
Further reading: Bill’s 2010 interview with HU17 Magazine
an absolutely amazing man who will be missed by lots of people – my thoughts are with his family x