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The first masked wrestler in British wrestling history? (1876)

Was doing some new research and came across this:

In 1876 a troupe of French wrestlers wrestled in London. One of them was L'Homme Masque (The Masked Man). I haven't seen any earlier mentions of masked wrestlers, so this may be the very first masked wrestler in British wrestling history. And of course this L'Homme Masque was surely inspired by the original L'Homme Masque, who caused a great sensation in Paris in 1867.

11 comments

11 Comments

Hack

Nov 14, 2022

The Masked Marvel made his debut on the 18th December in Manchester and beat Angus McCheyne of Aberdeen. It was said that he had been educated at Eton, believe that if you will. He came with a promise to unmask if defeated. A few days later he defeated Norman The Butcher in 11 minutes.

Hack

Aug 07, 2022

I'm still confused about a Dark Owl in 1931. I can't find any suggestion of a Dark Owl as early as that.

Unknown member

Jul 31, 2022

> And of course this L'Homme Masque was surely inspired by the original L'Homme Masque, who caused a great sensation in Paris in 1867 More than likely it was actually the real him. Thiebaud Bauer, the Masked Wrestler Of Paris, reputedly the first masked wrestler ever in history. Three years later, he went to the States and beat William Muldoon for the American Greco Roman.Heavyweight title but lost it back to Muldoon a year later in 1880.

Phil Lions

Jul 31, 2022

Replying to

Definitely not Bauer. He was in North America in 1876. Also, there were three masked wrestlers in Paris in 1867 (the original L'Homme Masque, another L'Homme Masque at a rival arena, and a red mask). In terms of being the original L'Homme Masque Bauer was just one of several suspects and the only reason why he's in the conversion is because Bauer himself claimed to have been the masked wrestler. However, given how much of a carny Bauer was I don't know if I would believe anything he ever said. A while back I wrote an article about 19th century French pro wrestling. Here's what I had to say about the original L'Homme Masque there: "So, who were all these masked wrestlers in Paris in 1867-68? Which wrestlers were under the hoods? Unfortunately, there's no way to know for certain. There have been a number of names suggested over the years, but we'll never know for sure who it really was. Marseille Jr., Falcet, Folliet, Alfred Perrier, Professor Deligne, Andre Christol and Theobaud Bauer are some of the suspected names, but the main suspect seems to be a guy by the name of Charavay. Even contemporary 1867 French newspapers from several days after the first appearance of L'Homme Masque mention him as potentially being the person behind the mask and say that he was a photographer by trade who was friends with the directors of the arena. According to Professor Edmond Desbonnet, however, the matches at the Athletic Arena were actually under the direction of Charavay (i.e. Charavay was doing the matchmaking). Desbonnet then says that the masked wrestler was a masseur named Charvet, but I think this was likely a mistake. Sometimes Charavay's name would be mistakenly spelled as Charavet (even as early as September 1867) and I'm guessing Desbonnet made a similar mistake. But setting the contemporary 1867 press and Desbonnet's claims aside, another source also identified Charavay as the original masked man of Paris. In an April 1877 story on the famous wrestler Faouet in "Le Petit Journal" newspaper it's stated that L'Homme Masque was sometimes the photographer Charavay, and sometimes Marseille Jr. Reportedly, the source of this information was Faouet himself, who wrestled the original L'Homme Masque back in 1867. We'll never know for sure who the original masked wrestler in 1867 was, nor the other two masked men after him, but Charavay is the best suspect." Sidenote: There's also this myth going around that L'Homme Masque in 1867 was the first masked wrestler in pro wrestling history. Not true. I've seen mentions of masked wrestlers in France as early as 1848. The original L'Homme Masque was just the most famous one.