With 1548 runs at 57.33, Bartlett finished fifth in the averages (behind Wally Hammond, Joe Hardstaff, Jr., Len Hutton and Eddie Paynter). "Wisden" elected him as a Cricketer of the Year in the 1939 edition. He hit 40 sixes in 1938, second only to Arthur Wellard. Immediately after his innings against Australia, when Arthur Fagg dropped out, Bartlett was added to the English team to tour South Africa that winter. He toured and scored 358 runs at an average of 51.14 in the first-class matches but did not play in any of the Tests. A year later, he was selected for the planned Indian tour under the captaincy of Jack Holmes, but the Second World War led to its cancellation.