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A new masked tag team emerged in 1968, initially working for Joint Promotions associate Jack Atherton, but soon more widespread for Wryton Promotions. The French masked men were the creation of Wigan’s Jack Atherton, who had a love of all things Continental as far as wrestling was concerned, and had been a good friend of Charlie Glover, the original Red Devil.
The masked men emerged into the public spotlight with one strict instruction from Jack, “Keep your mouths shut!” That was because the rule-bending French pair were Mancunian Eddie Rose and Salfordian Pete Lindberg. Their colourful costumes were provides by Tyrers of St Helens.
Increased bookings working for Wryton Promotions placed greater demands on Eddie and Pete as they were required to work in the midlands and northern England. With full time jobs and a limited driving time of three hours from Manchester it took only about a year before they decided to recruit a third member. We guess the short list was limited and their friend Ian Wilson seemed a likely choice, with a permutation of two out of three forming Les Diables Rouges. This was quite easy as members of the team were never given individual names.
Les Diables Rouges wrestled most of the big names in tag, including the Royal brothers, Hells Angels, Borg Twins, The Barons and the Cadmans.“The Royals were an exceptional team in the ring. We actually felt bad about being disqualified against them four times. The Hells Angels were the funniest opponents because of the verbals from Ada; it was a good job we could hide our laughter behind the masks.“
Despite success around the halls the team were deprived television work due to ITV’s reluctance to show masked wrestlers at that time. The first masked man on tv is believed to have been The Black Mask in 1960, we were allowed the Outlaw a few years later, but hooded terrors remained a scarcity. So what chance a masked tag team on tv? In the 1960s and early 1970s there was no chance.
Les Diables Rouges were never unmasked. They were often victorious but many matches ended in their disqualification with a refusal to unmask causing even more anger amongst the fans. In the early 1970s Les Diables Rouges moved across to the independent promotions. No longer following Jack Atherton’s instructions they dropped the Continental name and became the Red Devils. Two reasons were given by Eddie Rose; one that they were fed up of being French, and the second a futile attempt to hold on to Joint Promotion bookings with their original name.
A lifelong Manchester City fan Eddie very strongly explained to us that their name had nothing at all to do with another Manchester football team, “The Red Devils had nothing to do with any football team in the Manchester area!! NOTHING. It was later hi-jacked by the PR people at Old Trafford. The original sporting Red Devils were the Salford Rugby League team of the 1930s who were invincible for a time. Our Red Devils were also a rival to the local team of Paul Mitchell & Johnny South who were the Broughton Rangers – an old Salford team that eventually moved to Belle Vue.“
Working for the independents brought new opponents; most notable named by Eddie as Dale Storm and Bruce Welch, The Fabulous Harlequins, Johnny Saint and Joe Critchley, Rex Strong and The Zulu, Gorilla Reg Ray and Stoker Brooks, “Our most unusual bout was against Reg and Stoker because they were established villains who on that night out-villained us.”
When Pete Lindberg retired Ian and Eddie continued working as The Red Devils until Eddie retired in 1984. At all times during the masked men’s career each of them continued to pursue their singles careers under their own name. Eddie told us of the time he turned up at a hall to find The Red Devil wrestling Eddie Rose. The Red Devil worked that night while Eddie Rose failed to appear due to a car break down.
“I’ve still got my gear,” Red Devil Eddie told us, “but I can only get into the mask.”
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