William Hartnell - Early Life

Early Life

Hartnell was born in St Pancras, London, England, the only child of Lucy Hartnell, an unmarried mother. He was brought up partly by a foster mother, though he did spend many happy holidays in Devon with his mother's family of farmers, where he learned to ride.

Hartnell never discovered the identity of his father (whose particulars were left blank on the birth certificate) despite efforts to trace him. Often known as Billy, he left school without prospects and dabbled in petty crime. Through a boys' boxing club, Hartnell met the art collector Hugh Blaker, who would become his unofficial guardian and arrange for him initially to train as a jockey (horses were his first love) and helped him enter the Italia Conti Academy. Theatre being a passion of Hugh Blaker, he paid for Hartnell to receive some 'polish' at the Imperial Service College, though Hartnell found the strictures too much and ran away.

Hartnell entered the theatre in 1925 working under Frank Benson as a general stagehand. In 1928 he appeared in the play Miss Elizabeth's Prisoner, by R.N. Stephens and E. Lyall Swete, along with the actress Heather McIntyre. The following year they married. His first of more than sixty film appearances was Say It With Music in 1932. He was cast as 'Albert Fosdike' in Noël Coward's 1942 film In Which We Serve but turned up late for his first day of shooting. Coward berated Hartnell in front of cast and crew for his unprofessionalism, made him personally apologise to everyone and then sacked him. Michael Anderson, who was the First Assistant Director, took over the part and was credited as "Mickey Anderson".

At the outbreak of the Second World War, Hartnell served in the Tank Corps, but was invalided out after eighteen months as the result of suffering a nervous breakdown, and he returned to acting. Hartnell usually played comic characters, until 1944 when he was cast in the robust role of Sergeant Ned Fletcher in The Way Ahead. From then on his career was defined by playing mainly policemen, soldiers, and thugs. This typecasting roles bothered him, for even when cast in comedies he found he was invariably playing the 'heavy'. In 1958 he played the sergeant in the first Carry On film comedy, Carry On Sergeant, and in 1963 he appeared as a town councillor in the Boulting brothers' film Heavens Above! with Peter Sellers. He also appeared as Will Buckley in the film The Mouse That Roared in 1959 (again with Sellers).

His first regular role on television was as Sergeant Major Percy Bullimore in The Army Game from 1957–1961. Again, although it was a comedy series he found himself cast in a "tough-guy" role. In 1963 he appeared in a supporting role in the film version of This Sporting Life, giving a sensitive performance as an aging rugby league talent scout known as 'Dad'.

After living at 51 Church Street, Isleworth, next door to Hugh Blaker, the Hartnells lived on the Island, Thames Ditton. Then in the 1960s they moved to a cottage in Mayfield, Sussex. He lived in later life at Sheephurst Lane in Marden, Kent.