H. Paulsen Forster

(b. Middlesbrough, Yorkshire, **/**/1880 – d. South Africa, **/**/1943). Actor. Harold Paulsen Forster appears in the English Census of 1881 and 1891, but by 1901 he is no longer there, possibly because by that time he was already in South Africa. In fact, in the South African Archives there is a record of conduct and service of a (Harves) Paulsen Forster in the South African constabulary dated 1901 and a trooper named as H.P. Forster was recruited and served in the Natal Mounted Rifles in 1902. In 1922, H. Paulsen Forster had a small part in the film The Vulture’s Prey, based on the novel by H. De Vere Stacpoole and directed by Dick Cruikshanks and William Bowden. It looks as though that may have been the sum total of his acting career. He also appears on the voters’ list for Johannesburg North for 1927, 1929 and 1931 and someone by that named died in 1943, leaving his widow Ethel Beatrice Forster (née Terry), whom he had married in 1914. They had a daughter in 1919 and at that time his profession was given as clerk. (There is a certain amount of speculation involved here, but the known facts fit.) (FO)

Sources

S.A. Pictorial, 29 April 1922

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