Showbiz wonder who delighted audiences at Colston Hall during two-week stint
Two exhibitions starting in Bristol next week explore the life of a remarkable African-American circus performer through both biographical information and artistic interpretation. Eugene Byrne looks at the career of Carlos Trower, a man who was forgotten not long after his death, but who is now being re-discovered.
THE “African Blondin” will appear to-night and during the week at the Colston Hall, in connection with Poole’s Jubilee Myriorama. This wonderful artiste is announced to wheel a barrow, cook a beef steak, walk in a sack, &c. on a tight-rope, stretching from one end of the building to another at an altitude of nearly 50 feet. There will be no extra charge for admission, but the doors will be open early to prevent a crush.
So said the Western Daily on Monday, January 16, 1888, and the “African Blondin” did not disappoint. The local press gave him rave reviews, The Bristol Magpie, the local weekly magazine specialising in sport and entertainment for the city’s growing population of young and affluent middle-class readers, said that he was the star of the show and that “We would advise all our readers who have not seen this marvellous entertainment to go at once, and those who have should go again.”
French acrobat Charles Blondin became a household name after walking across the Niagara Falls on a tightrope. The African-American Carlos Trower, whose skill on the high-wire seems to have been no less remarkable, understandably became known as the African Blondin.
Carlos Trower is one of those remarkable individuals whose story, long forgotten, has been rediscovered in recent years and tends to enthuse everyone who encounters it.
An African-American who escaped slavery who managed to escape and build a new life in Britain where he became a successful performer and something of a celebrity … What’s not to love?
The tale impressed our Victorian ancestors, and now it’s impressing people again, not just in Bristol where he performed a few times, and where he lived for a while, but in other parts of the country where he put on some spectacular shows as well.
As with so many figures from showbiz, it’s hard to pin down some of the facts of his early life. He was born in America sometime between about 1845 and about 1850. In some versions he came from New York state, though it’s equally likely that he was from one of the southern states, where slavery was still in force, and that he escaped as a child via the “Underground Railroad”, the getaway network operated by American antislavery activists and was then helped to leave the country by northern sympathisers who paid his passage by ship to Scotland.
Carlos Trower may not have been his original name.
He’s thought to have arrived in the UK at the age of around 11 and met some African or African-American circus acrobats in Glasgow, and followed them into becoming a came a circus performer, famous for his increasingly daring and remarkable trapeze and tightrope acts.
Despite a terrible fall early on his career when the rope broke, he recovered to develop an act which put him on the bill at theatres and music halls across the country.
He could walk a tightrope carrying another person, or would take a small stove to the middle of the rope and cook steaks or pancakes, throwing bits of food down to the audience to eat. He was also the star attraction of a number of spectacular outdoor performances, such as one at Rudyard Lake in Staffordshire, or one in Tiverton where he walked the rope wearing a suit of armour at dusk with a firework display going on in the background.
To our knowledge, Trower performed at least two Bristol venues, once at the now-forgotten Zoological gardens at Avonmouth in 1871, and then at the Colston Hall in 1888. In the latter case, he was on the bill for a fortnight and a 120ft length of rope was hung 50ft above the audience on which he “walked forwards and backwards, blindfolded and in shackles” to the delight of audiences and newspaper correspondents.
Circus performer, historian and author Dr Paul Green has been researching Trower’s story and has uncovered details of Trower’s residence in Bristol with his wife Annie.
The couple were married at Barnstaple (not long after Trower’s triumphant performance at Tiverton) and moved to Bristol where their daughter Celia was born at 7 Christmas Steps in March 1876.
How long the Trowers stayed here is unclear, though we know they were living in London by 1883.
“Carlos trained his eldest daughter in the circus arts,” says Dr Green, “and they sometimes performed flying trapeze routines together. Celia was known as ‘Little Wonder’ and the ‘Black Star.’”
Alas, Trower’s triumphant stint at the Colston Hall was to be among the last of his performances. Early the following year, Annie was writing to theatrical trade paper The Era seeking financial assistance:
My husband, Carlos Trower, the African Blondin, has been very ill some time, and three weeks ago went quite out of his mind. There are no hopes of his recovery, and he has been moved to Grove Hall Asylum, Bow. I am left with three children unprovided for. If you will kindly mention this … I am sure there will be a few friends that will help me.
Dr Green has found that Trower was committed with a diagnosis of ‘General Paralysis of the Insane,’ which, he says, “was often untreated syphilis, but also a Victorian catch-all diagnosis for degenerative neurological disorders.”
The same paper recorded Trower’s death at the age of 40 not long afterwards, in April of 1889. Dr Green found that Celia ceased performing not long after her father’s death.
Next week two exhibitions inspired by Carlos Trower’s life and work under the blanket title ‘A Fine Balance’ start on Wednesday May
26. The Finis Gallery on Christmas Steps, situated opposite the house in which the Trower family once lived, will feature a small display as well as short films.
There will also be an exhibition in the foyer of the Bristol Beacon (formerly the Colston Hall) which will explore themes of circus and performance. Admission is free, but because of Covid safety tickets need to be booked in advance. See https://tinyurl.com/ysfppxd9 (Please note that the related performance is already sold out due to limitations on numbers.)
Both events are co-ordinated by Local Learning. For more information on the project, see also www. locallearning.org. uk/a-fine-balance/
» On the off-chance that any readers might have any memorabilia or pictures relating to Trower and his family – we don’t have any photos of Celia the “Black Star”, for example – please get in touch via Bristol.times@bnm.co.uk