SOLDIER BOXERS AT THE FRONT.

Pukekohe & Waiuku Times, Volume 6, Issue 288, 29 June 1917, Page 1 (Supplement)

SOLDIER BOXERS AT THE FRONT.

BY AN OFFICER. " I cannot imagine how you can attend such degrading spectacles.'' How oiten have I had that said to mo during my twenty odd years of experience in boxing before tho war, and when [ muttered something about "manly sport'' or "I am a bit oidfashioned," I little thought that I should live to judge a g!ovo fight in Flanders with an aeroplane hovering a. Itiut tho ring, the hump! hump! of lug guns sounding on the horizon, and tho audience* composed of English, French, and Belgian soldiers. 1 hive judged boxing at the front under various conditions and in curious places—in a grass field with tiny French children playing round my legs, in a famous tcAvn hall, in an improvised kinema theatre, and in tiie market-place. I have judged at a distance of twenty miles from the enemy and within five miles of him, and I have chatted to the famous John Hopley and to Lieutenant Ahbat, tho champion amateur heavyweight of France, at tho ring-side as if wo were all at tho National Sporting Club, and I have yet to disc-over a finer sport for producing men who will "go over" the parapet well and rush a Hun trench.

The open ah is tho place for a glove fight. Come into the market-place with me and take a look at one, but as you push through the outskirts of the crowd mind that muTe does not kick you, and do not got run over by that motor-lorry orHroddon upon by tho brigadier's horse for although if you meet with some mishap that padre in khaki will give you something to pull you round, you may just as well l>o careful. The ciowe! is about 1.500 strong and nearly every one of them has been in danger of losing his life within the last twenty-four hours, and will bo at it again before tomorrow night. Tliey are front-line men and, as the phrase runs, 'all tlia nobility and gentry of the neighbourhood are present." Those pre French soldiers over there sitting in a motor-car and smoking caporal, and that young officer in a staff cap used to write magnificent Latin prose. I myself used to address juries in the law courts rnd I came out with my company from the fire trench last night. Come on, or we shall never see anything.

SPLENDID OPPONENTS. Above the heads of the crowd, even of those who are seated upon horses, rocks the wooden statins upon which the men are sparring—two magnificent spumous. Thud! thud! sound the blows, and the unflinching manner in which t.he.ir bodVs receive them is a test of fitness. Nasty opponents these in a 'bayonet charge, but excellent company in billets, as their steady, smiling faces proclaim. It is Ireland versus Scotland, with Franco and Belgium cheering both, and although the Irishman wins in tho 1 i-'-t round, tli-3 Scotchman has fought -o we'l that he is certain of un extra awarded by the kindness of tho Irishman's commanding officer. No, it will not rain; those little clouds of white wool far awav in the sky arc only anti aircraft shells bursting round a Boche aeroplane; ho will not do much "spot tinn'' to-day whilo the. range and the anglfl is as good as that. And hi it go.\s on. and after the prize, "iving the victors will share the'r windings with tho vanquished and swear that "Your awful uppercut in Uie second round nearly steilenboshed me, old man.'' You priceless people, you privat-. soldiers, how my heart goes to you! The shades of the old-time fighting men aro watching you. I have trained boxers in a hut near Poperinghe whom [ have been shelled with in the Ypr.\s sa'ient. I have been "over the top" with boxers whom I have judged in England. T have borrowed tnc basins and towels from the kindly R.A.M.C. it nd tried to buy sho-s huge enough .or i4-."tone nun in a French village without result, and take it from mo that tho I est l>oxer in the battalion is one of the least likelv men to give trouble: he is alwavs brave , ho is never a -bruiser, and 'ho accepts tho discipline of the referee or his company commander without a murmur. _.„,„.. ENSIu-N.