in his talent contest days.
A dapper, dashing young Eric poses for his public alongside a female admirer (his Auntie Alice).
Master Eric Bartholomew, Vocal Comedy & Dancing Act.
Eric’s mum and dad, George and Sadie.
George and Sadie celebrate their golden wedding anniversary with their only son.
Eric: Do you remember our first meeting?
Ernie: Yes, I do remember. We decided to team up and have a go at comedy.
Eric: We should have tried that.
FOR A LAD of thirteen, Eric Bartholomew had already come a long way – but compared to Ernie Wise, he was still an untried amateur. Eric, at that time, was just another wannabe. Ernie, on the other hand, was already a bona fide star. He’d been on the BBC, appeared in a West End show and received rave reviews in the national newspapers. He was six months older than Eric. It might as well have been six years.
Ernest Wiseman was born in Leeds on 27 November 1925. His father, Harry, had been decorated for bravery during the First World War, but like a lot of war heroes, he didn’t take too well to peacetime. He worked on the railways in a variety of fairly menial occupations, but his meagre wages did nothing to quell his extravagant nature. He met Ernie’s mother, Connie, on a local tram. It was love at first sight. Connie’s father thought Harry was far too common for his daughter, and threatened to cut her off without a penny if she married him. He was a man of his word. When Connie and Harry got married and moved into a rented room together, the only thing she was allowed to take with her was the piano she’d saved up to buy.
Ernie was the first of five children, and Connie had to be incredibly careful and resourceful to feed a family of seven on just a couple of pounds a week. From his mum, Ernie learnt that your bank book is your best friend, a motto which stood him in good stead as the business brains behind Britain’s most successful comic duo. In the years to come, Eric would make countless quips about Ernie’s cautious attitude to money. Like all the best jokes, this running gag was based on painful experience. Long after he became a wealthy man, with more cash than he could ever hope to spend, Ernie would still maintain that the main thing in life is being able to pay your bills.
Thankfully for everyone concerned (except, perhaps, Connie’s father) Harry’s paltry salary was supplemented – and then rapidly superseded – when Ernie joined his dad onstage. Harry was already a part time performer on the local working men’s club circuit, but his act really took off when he teamed up with Ernie, who’d shown similar showbiz flair as Eric from a similarly early age. ‘I’d come on and do a clog dance and members of the audience used to throw pennies,’ he recalled.1 Still only seven years old, he found it hard to stay awake at school, but performing trumped anything the classroom had to offer. Soon Carson & Kid, as they called themselves, were earning several pounds every weekend – more than Harry earned in a whole week on the railway. By the time Ernie played the Bradford Alhambra, aged eleven, in the Nignog Revue (political correctness had yet to be invented) he was already a veteran. Now called Bert Carson & His Little Wonder, Harry and Ernie were fast becoming the toast of the Yorkshire halls.
I’m not all there . . . Eric’s first professional act, showing off the results of all those song and dance lessons that his mother made him undergo in Morecambe.
It’s tantalising to wonder whether Harry and Ernie could have gone on to even greater things, but their partnership ended in 1938 when a man called Bryan Michie came to town. Michie was scouring the country for fresh talent for Jack Hylton’s latest juvenile revue, and when he saw Ernie do a turn at the Leeds Empire, he sent him straight down to London so Hylton could see this Little Wonder for himself. Hylton was so impressed, he put Ernie in a West End show that very evening. The show was Band Waggon, starring Arthur Askey, but it was Ernie who was singled out for special praise in the overnight reviews. ‘His timing and confidence are remarkable,’ raved the Daily Express. ‘At thirteen he is an old time performer.’2 His surname shortened to Wise, at Hylton’s instigation, when Eric first set eyes on him, in Manchester in 1939, he’d already matured into a seasoned pro.
Eric was still raw compared to Ernie, but there was no mistaking his talent. ‘Go out there and give them all you’ve got,’ Sadie told him, as they waited in the wings. ‘If you pull it off I’ll buy you an airgun.’3 Eric gave it both barrels. Ernie spotted Eric’s star potential straight away, and so did the boys in the band. ‘Bye, then, Ernie,’ they teased him. ‘Things won’t be the same with this new lad around, but I dare say we’ll soon get used to him. What are you going to do now?’4 Hylton was complimentary but non-committal. ‘Your boy has talent,’ he told Sadie. ‘Maybe we can use him.’5 Eric returned home to Morecambe without exchanging a word with Ernie, but it wouldn’t be long before their paths crossed again.
I’m not all there . . . Eric’s first professional act, showing off the results of all those song and dance lessons that his mother made him undergo in Morecambe.
After several agonising months, Eric finally received the call that he (or rather Sadie) had been waiting for. Hylton wanted him to join the cast of Michie’s new touring show, Youth Takes A Bow. Sadie had always been determined that her only son wouldn’t end up ‘tied to a whistle’ like his father. This was only the beginning, but in a way, it was the biggest break he ever got. Eric made his professional debut at the Nottingham Empire, on a salary of £5 a week, plus expenses. Sadie went with him, as his chaperone.
Eric was lucky to have such supportive parents – a mother sufficiently committed and resourceful to accompany him on this Light Ent trek around the country, and a father sufficiently easy going to let her go. Such an arrangement would have been impossible if they’d had any other children. It was only because Eric was an only child that Sadie was able to spend so long away from home. When Ernie joined the cast in Swansea, he travelled there alone, as he had done ever since his first trip to London. His dad had long since returned to Leeds, to help Connie raise their other children. Harry Wiseman never found another partner to replace his son, but Ernie was more fortunate. Finally, at the Swansea Empire, the two halves of Britain’s greatest double act were introduced to
