Oswald Rae: Magician leads E.N.S.A. company through a firefight with Japanese troops!
Englishman Oswald Rae (1892-1967) made his first professional appearance as a magician in 1912. Three years later, during World War One, he joined the Royal Engineers. While on active service, Rae gave over 500 magic performances in France, boosting morale for thousands of worn-down troops. He was personally thanked and complimented by General Lord Plumer, commander of Britain’s Second Army on the Western Front. After the war, Rae served in Germany with the Army of Occupation until he was demobilised.
On his return from Germany, Rae joined a concert party at Exmouth, England, and stayed with them until 1921 when he became manager of DeMond’s Concert Party Enterprises, Skegness. He continued with them in 1922, before going into variety theatre the next year. Often billed as ‘The Bewildering Humorist’ his credits included performances before British and foreign royalty.
‘Ossie’ was interviewed by the BBC for a broadcast about IBM’s British Ring on 30 June 1934.
When World War Two came around, Rae signed up with the Entertainments National Service Association (ENSA) and – given his prior military experience – was tasked with managing a small company called Coming Your Way. It was six-hand act, with Rae doing magic, a pianist, a husband and wife who presented whip tricks and rope spinning in cowboy outfits, and two dancers.
Rae was a kind man, with a dry wit and humour, but his kindness was often abused and he struggled to keep the company in order. The pianist was a drunk and the husband and wife had frequent domestic disputes. Coming Your Way was (apparently) the first and last ENSA company to work in the forward areas of India’s Eastern Command. The unit commanders there, complained that the poor discipline of the company resulted in too many adventures which put them at risk.
In one incident, the ENSA company narrowly escaped with their lives when their two jeeps drove through the middle of a firefight between British and Japanese patrols, with the entertainers obliviously singing at the top of their voices. The surprise of this sight caused both sides to cease fire, until the jeeps disappeared round a bend in the track, at which point the fighting restarted - a narrow escape.
Prior to India and Burma, Rae’s travels with ENSA entertaining British and Allied troops took him to Egypt, Palestine and Syria.
Post-war, ‘Ossie’ carried on working as a magician. His peers described him as an excellent performer with a good line of patter, Oswald Rae served as the IBM Ring 25 president for 19 years, from its founding through to 1947. And he was editor for the society’s official periodical, The Budget. He was also an honorary member of the Society of Indian Magicians (having met many of their members while deployed with the military overseas) and of L’Association Francaise des Artistes Prestidigitateurs.
On 20 June 1947, he was one of the first magicians to appear on post-war television after the BBC resumed broadcasting. Other TV appearances followed.
A post-war image of Oswald Rae performing for a BBC television show (late 1940s)
After the demise of variety theatre in the 1950s, Oswald Rae primarily worked private parties. He died, aged 74, in October 1967.
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