Davey Boy Smith Jr is the son of the legendary Davey Boy Smith, who enjoyed a successful career in both solo and tag team WWE (The British Bulldogs with Dynamite Kid) was part of the McMahon Empire from 2006 to 2011. He subsequently wrestled between others for New Japan Pro Wrestling and Major League Wrestling. Smith Jr. inducted his father at the Hall of Fame ceremony for the 2020 honorees because he comes from a wrestling family! Want more facts? Just keep reading!
Davey Boy Smith Jr: 11 Fun-Facts and Videos About His Career!
1. Davey Boy Smith Jr comes from a mixed descent:
Harry Francis Smith is of predominantly British descent through her father Davey Boy Smith who was from Lancashire, England and the wrestler’s mother Diana Hart is from a large family of Scottish and Ulster Irish heritage. Through a maternal great-grandmother, Smith also has Greek ancestry and Italian through his father.
2. A family business:
Harry Francis Smith’s dad is the late yet famous wrestler “The British Bulldog” Davey Boy Smith. Smith’s mother Diana Hart is the youngest daughter of promoters Stu and Helen Hart, making Davey Boy Smith Jr the nephew of his eleven siblings, all of whom have been involved in one way or another in the field of wrestling.
Harry Francis Smith’s maternal cousins Natalya Neidhart, Matthew, Teddy, Matt, Bruce Jr., and Torrin Hart, as well as his cousin Mike, also wrestle or used to wrestle, while his cousin Lindsay is an on-air personality. Smith is close to Natalya as the two lived together as children while the parents were tag team fighting. Smith is also very good friends with his cousin’s husband TJ Wilson, with whom he shared an apartment at one point.
Harry Francis Smith’s father’s family also has a history in wrestling where his father and cousin Thomas “The Dynamite Kid” Billington wrestled as a tag team for many years and Billington’s daughter Bronwyne is a wrestling valet. Davey is also a second cousin of Dynamite’s two nephews, Thomas Billington II and Mark Billington II, who are also wrestlers.
While Harry Francis Smith is famous for wrestling in the WWE INITIALLY under the ring name David Hart Smith, he has also previously wrestled under the ring name DH Smith (“D” for his father Davey Boy Smith and “H” for the Hart family) for WWE and its developmental territory, Florida Championship Wrestling.
Davey has a sister named Georgia who is a wrestling personality and an announcer.
3. Davey Boy Smith Jr’s professional wrestling career began in 1994:
Harry Francis Smith began wrestling at the age of eight, trained by his father Davey Boy Smith and his uncle Bruce Hart. He made an early appearance for the then World Wrestling Federation (now WWE) on October 5, 1996 at the age of 11 when he teamed with his cousin Ted Annis against TJ Wilson and Andrew Picarnia at a WWE show. WWF in Calgary.
Harry Francis Smith also appeared at the end of In Your House 16: Canadian Stampede with the rest of the Hart family. Davey then made his professional debut at the age of fifteen at the Rockyford Rodeo and became a mainstay for the Calgary-based Stampede Wrestling promotion. In May 2002, Smith associated with his dad on two occasions, shortly before his untimely death. Harry Francis Smith was offered a contract with World Wrestling Entertainment in the summer of 2004, but chose to attend college and wrestle in Japan before signing.
In 2004, Harry Francis Smith made a fighting group with TJ Wilson as “The Stampede Bulldogs”, a reference to “The British Bulldogs”, the team made up of his dad and his dad’s first cousin, the Dynamite Kid. In the same year, Harry Francis Smith formed a stable known as The Hart Foundation Version 2.0 with Wilson, Jack Evans, and Teddy Hart. Initially, the Hart Foundation Version 2.0 performed in Stampede Wrestling prior to expanding to America, where they competed in Major League Wrestling.
Harry Francis Smith traveled to England in January 2006, appearing with One Pro Wrestling at No Turning Back on January 6, 2006 and he was billed as the mystery opponent of NWA World Heavyweight Champion Jeff Jarrett, apparently chosen by his uncle, Brett. Hart.
4. New Japan Pro-Wrestling came calling after 2004:
Instead of going to the WWE, Harry Francis Smith aka Davey went on a five-week tour of Japan, wrestling with New Japan Pro-Wrestling as “Black Assassin” and suffered a broken hand in the process. One year after January 2005, Smith left Stampede Wrestling and wrestled several dark matches for World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE), before embarking on a second tour of Japan.
Harry Francis Smith then returned to Stampede Wrestling in October 2005, and on November 25, 2005, Davey was defeated by TJ Wilson in the finals of a tournament for the vacant North American Heavyweight Championship.
5. Davey Boy Smith Jr finally said yes to WWE with Development Territories in 2006:
When Harry Francis Smith signed with WWE, he trained at Florida Championship Wrestling, where he won the FCW Southern Heavyweight Championship.
On April 1, 2006, Harry Francis Smith aka Davey and several of his family members attended Bret Hart’s induction into the WWE Hall of Fame where he met with WWE executives John Laurinaitis and Carl De Marco, and signed a developmental contract with him on April 4, 2006.
Harry Francis Smith wrestled dark matches for the company before its debut, winning against wrestlers like Rob Conway and Mike Knox, and losing to Randy Orton.
Harry Francis Smith debuted for Ohio Valley Wrestling (OVW), at the February 14, 2007 television tapings, in a tag team match with Kofi Nahaje Kingston, in which they won against The Belgium Brawler and Nicholas Sinn. On the following recording, the Kofi and Harry duo became collectively known as the Commonwealth Connection team and faced La Résistance in a losing effort. Harry Francis Smith was then sent to Deep South Wrestling (DSW), where he reformed the “Stampede Bulldogs” with TJ Wilson.
After WWE ended their relationship with DSW, Harry Francis Smith moved to Florida Championship Wrestling (FCW). On June 26, Davey Jr. faced a 21-man battle royal to become the first FCW Southern Heavyweight Champion in a winning effort.
Harry Francis Smith later joined with his wrestling cousins Teddy Hart and Nattie Neidhart to form the Next Generation Hart Foundation. The cousins debuted in a six-person mixed tag team match, in a losing effort to Mike Kruel, Vladimir Kozlov and Milena Roucka.
They were later victorious against the OVW Southern Tag Team Champions also known as the James Boys in a non-title match. Harry Francis Smith later returned to FCW to form another version of the New Hart Foundation, along with Hart, Wilson, and Ted DiBiase, Jr.
Davey Jr. then appeared in a winning effort against Carlito in a dark match during a Raw taping at the United Kingdom where his family is from.
On October 16, the British-Canadian professional lost the FCW Southern Heavyweight Championship to Afa Jr. and was unable to make the referee’s ten count and was ruled out, due to being in the UK with WWE.
6. Davey Boy Smith Jr made Raw appearances in 2006:
Between 2006 and 2008, Davey Boy Smith Jr appeared on Raw, despite not being part of the main roster, in a segment where he and others in the locker room chased off invaders from ECW, in addition to making his television debut as “DH Smith” on the October 22, 2007 episode of Raw, defeating Carlito using his father’s trademark power slam. On October 29, in a winning effort, Smith and Jeff Hardy defeated Carlito and Mr. Kennedy. He dedicated the match to his father.
In between, Davey Boy Smith Jr wasn’t seen on the main roster for over a year for example it was reported that Smith had been suspended for 30 days due to violations of “WWE’s Substance Abuse and Drug Testing Policy” on November 2, 2007. By the next month, Smith returned to the active roster by defeating Charlie Haas at Heat.
7. Davey Boy Smith Jr then returned to Florida Championship Wrestling (FCW):
Smith was drafted to the SmackDown brand As part of the WWE Supplemental Draft on June 25, 2008, however, the British wrestler returned to Florida Championship Wrestling (FCW) on August 26, without making his SmackDown debut.
Davey Boy Smith Jr made the decision to return to FCW full-time in order to mature and put more effort into developing his in-ring work and personality because he needs to create the Davey Boy Smith Jr persona.
On October 30, Smith won the FCW Florida Tag Team Championship with TJ Wilson, defeating Joe Hennig and Sebastian Slater, but in a losing effort, he later lost it to Tyler Reks and Johnny Curtis on the December 11, 2008 taping of FCW television.
8. Davey Boy Smith Jr is part of the Hart dynasty since 2009:
Without making any appearances on SmackDown!, Davey Boy Smith Jr was drafted to the ECW brand as part of the 2009 Supplemental Draft, on April 15, 2009.
As a villain, Davey Boy Smith Jr made his ECW debut on May 12, attacking Finlay during Finlay’s match with Tyson Kidd (TJ Wilson), using the ring name David Hart Smith.
David Hart Smith, Kidd and Natalya formed a new version of The Hart Foundation, called The Hart Trilogy at first, although on the May 27 episode of ECW, the name was changed to The Hart Dynasty.
In a winning effort, Davey Boy Smith Jr emerged victorious in his first match with ECW, defeating Finlay on the May 19 episode, with the help of Kidd and Natalya.
The Hart Dynasty switched to the SmackDown brand and entered a feud with Cryme Tyme. At the WWE Bragging Rights pay-per-view in October, Smith, and Kidd competed in a seven-on-seven match with Finlay, Chris Jericho, Kane, Matt Hardy, and R-Truth as Team SmackDown in a winning effort to defeat Team Raw. In December 2009, they challenged D-Generation X for the WWE Unified Tag Team Championship but were unsuccessful.
They became Unified WWE Tag Team Champions by defeating The Big Show and The Miz on Monday Night RAW on April 26, 2010. With this victory, the team was drafted to RAW. But after their loss of title, they fall into oblivion, in particular David who only very rarely appears in Superstars with a cowboy character.
Finally, he left WWE in 2011 and traveled the American independent circuit and recently joined Ring Ka King where he changed his name to Bulldog Hart and where he won the tag team title. Then he became RPW heavyweight champion but after months of inactivity, Smith was released from his WWE contract on August 5, 2011.
In the summer of 2012, Smith arrived in Japan where he fought for NJPW by joining the Suzuki-Gun group. Partnered with Lance Archer, he won the Tag Team Titles on October 6, 2012 at King of Pro Wrestling.
9. Since 2020, Davey Boy Smith Jr has made Sporadic appearances:
“When I was in WWE I lost the passion and when I left WWE, I thought my career was over.
—Harry Smith in 2013”
Luckily, the British-Canadian wrestler found work throughout his career in a sporadic manner like when he was on an episode of WWE’s online talk show The Bump where Davey Boy Smith Jr appeared live via webcam, appearing alongside his former Hart Dynasty partner Tyson Kidd aka Ty Kidd.
Next, during the “After the Bell” podcast hosted by Corey Graves, it was announced that Smith’s father, the British Bulldog, would be inducted into the Hall of Fame class of 2020, with Smith announced as the inducer of his dad two years ago on March 12, 2020.
10. Return to NJPW and the birth of KES:
After his stint with the independent circuit starting with 2011, Smith and Lance Archer, formed the Killer Elite Squad, as the NWA World Tag Team Champions in June 2013
On August 13, 2012, New Japan Pro Wrestling-Smith announced that Harry Francis Smith would return to the promotion the following month as a member of Minoru Suzuki’s Suzuki-gun stable, forming a regular tag team with Lance Archer’s stable because New Japan wanted a huge monster as Archer’s partner.
Also, Harry Francis Smith received a good offer from All Japan Pro Wrestling, but chose NJPW due to the previous relationship.
The birth of KES can be traced to September 9, when Smith submitted IWGP Tag Team Champion Hiroyoshi Tenzan in an eight-man tag team match, after which he and Archer called themselves KES (Killer Elite Squad) in an effort to challenge Satoshi’s title.
On September 24, New Japan renamed Harry Francis Smith back to “Davey Boy Smith Jr.”
On January 10, 2015, KES, along with the rest of Suzuki-gun, participated in a major storyline, where the stable invaded a Pro Wrestling Noah show. By December, it was announced that Suzuki-gun had disappeared from Noah, concluding the invasion storyline. Noah’s return to NJPW on January 5, 2017, saw an attack towards the Chaos stable with KES targeting IWGP Tag Team Champions Tomohiro Ishii and Toru Yano.
Smith (who loves Japanese dishes like sushi and chankonabe) would work in NJPW for the next year, usually in multi-man matches but on June 15, 2019, it was reported that Smith would no longer be wrestling for NJPW.
11. Major League Wrestling (2018-2020)
After Davey worked at New Japan Pro-Wrestling as well as Pro-Wrestling NOAH where he formed Killer Elite Squad with Lance Archer between 2012 and 2019 within Suzuki -gun, he debuted in Major League Wrestling (MLW) in 2018 where he formed a new version of the Hart Foundation with his cousin Teddy Hart as well as Brian Pillman Jr. whose father was a very close Canadian family member thanks to his training as a wrestler in the Hart Dungeon.
On the December 2, 2020 episode of Fusion, Smith lost to Low Ki in the first round of the Opera Cup. Following his loss, MLW announced that the Canadian wrestler has left the MLW promotion.
In conclusion, Smith was able to achieve a lot in his life thanks to his dedication and passion for his family business, and even after his father died, Smith announced that he acquired the trademark under the nickname “British Bulldog”, which was made famous by his father. Thanks to his biggest influence, who also happens to be his dad, the wrestler subsequently began wrestling as “British Bulldog” Davey Boy Smith Jr. in 2015.
