A FATHER and son who lost contact almost 50 years ago, have lived in Bolton just five minutes apart from one another for 10 years without either ever knowing.

Now, thanks to an appeal for help to the Evening News, they have been reunited.

Mr Frank Howarth, 82, of Farnworth, made an appeal to find his two children in the BEN last week.

An old soldier, he lost touch with them both in the late 1940s, after returning home from fighting abroad in Second World War, to discover his marriage had deteriorated in his absence.

He was away for more than four years, fighting with the Durham Light Infantry from 1943 to 1947.

He divorced and remarried, but taking his second wife's strong feelings into consideration, he did not keep in touch with his children.

Now, almost 50 years later, in response to a BEN article, Mr Howarth has been contacted by his son, Duncan, and by a grandchild he has never met.

Mr Howarth said: "My son is also going to contact my daughter, who he says lives in Horwich, and we will arrange to meet.

"I am delighted and rather excited about hearing from them.

"It is incredible to think we have lived so close to one another without ever realising."

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