One of the most popular child actors in film history, Freddie Bartholomew was born Frederick Llwellyn in Dublin, Ireland, in 1924. He was raised in England by an aunt, Millicent Barthomolew, from whom he took his surname. Freddie had appeared on the London stage and in 2 minor British films when on a visit to the U.S. with his aunt in 1934, he was offered the title role in David Copperfield by MGM. This film made him an overnight star and he went on to appear in such classics as Anna Karenina (1935); Little Lord Fauntleroy (1936); and Captains Courageous (1937). His salary soared to $2, 500 a week making him filmdom's highest paid child star after Shirley Temple. But with the advent of young manhood, his dimpled, angelic good looks began to fade. After a stint in the Air Force in World War II, his film career was all but finished. In 1954, he went to work for an advertising agency and remarked at the time that the millions he had earned as a child had been spent mostly on lawsuits, one of which involved a headline court battle in 1937 between his parents and his aunt for custody of young Freddie. "I was drained dry, " he said. Freddie Bartholomew died in Florida in 1992 at the age of 67. He leaves a legacy of some of the greatest adventure films of the 1930s.


British child actor of the 1930s. The American child actor David Holt had originally been cast as the title character in The Personal History, Adventures, Experience, & Observation of David Copperfield the Younger (1935). But the film's producer, David O. Selznick, developed misgivings about having an American boy portray a quintessentially British boy. He replaced Holt with Bartholomew. He was taught to lose his Irish accent and speak perfect English by the teachers at the Italia Conti school in London. Retired from television work in 1991 due to the onset of emphysema. He was considered for the dual roles of Prince Edward and Tom Canty in The Prince and the Pauper (1937).