SENSATIONAL KNOCKOUTS.

Digger (Invercargill RSA), Issue 9, 14 May 1920, Page 4

SENSATIONAL KNOCKOUTS.

BY "COUNT."' Carpentier and Billy Wells. Wells and Moran. Knocked out without receiving u biow. Wells' better form against Beckett. Wells and Sunshine. Goddard's amaziing remark. Carpentier and Dick Smith. Johnson and Jefferies. Since J. L. Sullivan first- discovered the effects of a blow upon the chin, boxers have concentrated upon that blow, and are doing so now, in spite of all sorts of grotesque attempts to show that new punches are being found out by physical scientists and specialists upon nerves. The other day I read something about Dempsey having been taught a new blow by some medical man, and the doctor or the writer, or both, wanted to make the public believe that it was a result of that discovery ^ when Willard was rendered helpless. Willard was not unconscious whatever may be said by the referee ; he was rendered helpless. If we are to get anything new in the way of a knock-out blow, the nation most likely to introduce it is the Japanese, who, ' in t-heir sports, have learned more about nerves and physical equilibrium than any other dwellers upon the universe. One great ha-ndicap to the infiiction of the many hurtful presses and knocks vbich are the speciality of the Japanese, however, lies in the pr.esence of boxing glcves upon the hands. The Japs do their work in this direction by incisive pressure irorn thumb or fingers upon particular nerves, the paralysing of which means the coliapse of the body and mind. It is possible that, so long as our boxing referees fail to bar the rabbit punch, a time will come when some foxy little fellow from the East will teach some boxer how to apply the heel of his hand to the brain nerve at the back of the neck, which the Japanese wrestler presses upon by the aid of the vest which is used in the sport, NOTHNG NEW. In the way of a direct punch, there is nothing new just now in the way of knock-out blows. They land on the chin, which causes pressure of the brain by that sir.all, paper-like bone near the temple ; or the mark which expels the breath from the body and makes it impossible for a few seconds for a man to get his lungs in working order again, and underneath the heart. In the last-named case, an upward blow with the right to the body is the kind of punch which brings about the downfall of the opponent. All those parts of the human body are so vulnerable, so susceptible to hurt, that they sufiice to render incapable almost any boxer who is hit there by any one who has punching power commensurate with his weight. Take for insiance Bombaxdier Wells when he collapsed after less than eighty seconds of boxing against Carpentier at the Naticnal Sporting Club. After that contest, Carpentier iliustrated to me how he accoraplished the knock-out. Ia his

description of the blows he was quite right. (Excusc this seeming condescension on my part in stating that Carpentier was coirect ;. but it is a fact that boxers do not always know how they have knocked thei*' maii out.) THE REASON WHY. Remarkable as was this sudden downfall of Britain's heavy- weight hope against the then briliiant French boy, I do not be- • Heve that it wa3 brought about entirely by force of blow or blows. It was coliaj.se of nerve force— the wreckihg of the moral fibre of a man who went into the* ring convinced that he would be hurt. Wells guarded his body with both arms as soon as the bell was wrung, and he had never even got his arms and fists into attacking pose before Carpentier, changing the direction of his punch, sent his fist to Ihe chin, and Wells sat upon the floor of the ring, incapable or rising. Now, Wells is of that sensitive — refined, you like — disposition which gives to a blow every credit for being hurtful. He has none, or very little, of that quality which causes a man, though hurt, to say to himself : "I'm not going to let that trouble me rather does he s&em to think that he has been hurt more than may be the case. I am confident that he was not hurt so much as he thought he was when Carpentier knocked him out, and yet I am prepared to swear that Wells himself thought that he had been hit just about as hard as anvone could be. It will be long before I forget the deathly siience that went round the National Sporting Club as soon as people realised what a forlorn show had been made by the British champion against the bast in France. Men who have followed boxing for tens of yeaj?s sat still in wonderment, trying to convince themselves that it was all a dream, and that Wells would get up and continue the contest. A, few seconds served to convince them of the bepelessness of that wish ; and men, h arden ed to boxing and the sight of men being knocked out, sat there and sighed, as you who were in England must have sighed when you heard of the British troops being driven back by the Germans in March of 1918. We had a glorious July 17th to follow, however ; but it was not so with Wells, and it seemed as if that knock-out blow had not merely finished off a British champion, but had Knocked the bottom out of British boxing for ever. SEMI-CONSCIOUS. In a manner of writing, I have seen this boxing curiosity, Wells, knocked out without receiving a blow. It was in his contest with Frank Moran at the London Opera House. In a minute from the start of that affair Wells walked from the middle of the ring to his corner, as if under the impression that the round had finished. As they were three-minuto rounds, it seems almost reasonable to say that Wells even by then was reduced to a state of mind that meant semi-consciousness. Wells was much better, however, in his bout with Beckett; I mean, much 'better from the point of view of keeping possession of his senses after he had been hit. He was hurt badly, but he took his time well and properly on the floor, and rose with determination on his face, as if he meant to go on and win. IJnfortunately for Wells, however, he could not keep cool enough to remember all that he had been taught in the gymnasium by Jim Driscoll and others, with the result that, in one of the clinches, he left his chin sticking out from Beckett's shoulder, and in perfect position for one of the present ehampion's best blows with the left. That blow went along, and the businss was all over. To show you what a quaint, psychological thing boxing is I will recall the contest between Wells and old Sergeant Sunshine at the King's Hall, Blackfriars, just after Wells returned from India. The older soldier knocked the boy down three times, and on each occasion Wells was unconscious, just so long that he had to be cailed to his senses by his seconds who shouted to him to get up. Three times Wells got up, and eventually knocked out Sunshine. A SURPRISE FOR MOIR. Wells is a fruitful snbject when knockouts are being dealt with, but his experieuce at Olympia when he lost to Gunner Moir is so fresh in your minds that I will oniy recall to you the fact that a lot of people left the building quite early in the contest, expressiag disgust at the fact that a fellow like Moir should liave been matched with Wells. "It was a shame to put the poor old fellow up against a man with whom he had no possible chance }" You will all remember how, before those people could get out of the 'building, Wells lay on the floor, stretched out by means of a body punch, the delivery of whieh seemed impossible to Moir, so much had the latter been punched about to different parts of the ring. Goddard was knocked out because of his (Continued on page 6.)

SENSATIQKAL KNOCKOUTS.

( Continued from page 4. ) own conceit. When he was in training he openly expressed the opmion that there was not a man on earth who could hurt i him with a punch. Poor young fellow ! I write "poor" because even the hiding he got did not seern to teach him anvthing in the way of a lesson. AN AMAZING COMMENT. He was shown a snapshot of hirnself lying on his hack, at full stretch on the fioor of the ring, and his only comment was ; "That me?" What ean be dorie with a fellow of that eort ? How Beckett hrought about that knockout is well worth the telling. He had heard of Goddard's expression of contempt for anything in the wayf of a punch that Beckett might possess, but he had not dreamt that the big chap would leave hirnself open to that left hook so soon as he did. Anyhow in the first round, Gcddard proved the courage of his -convictions by ieaving hirnself elear to he hit, and he was hit so hard that the pride of the Queen's Bays shivered from head to foot, and must have wondered if half Olympia had fallen in on him. The recovery he made during the first interval between rounds was wonderful — so good in fact, that the confidence he ever possessed returned to him, and he again failed to guard against that left hook. On this occasion Goddard had to go to the fioor to rest, and when he looked appealingly round to his seconds to know what to do, he was told to remain on the fioor for another second or two. Goddard was cool enough to do that: but when he got up he was all out to dedefend hirnself, and of that he had about the most crude idea of any heavyweight in Great Britain, and that is saying a great deal. Those punches were the preliminary to the final hit, for when Goddard, shakihg and wondering, concentrated as much as his scattered wits would let him upon guarding against that left hand, Beckett sent along one of the quickest and straightest right-hand hits I have ever seen from a heavy-weight, and Goddard had been taught that it was i'oolish ->o have talked of people not being- able to \urt him. REALLY OUT. That punch by Beckett went straight xnd truly to the chin,.and the reason that Goddard would not helieve the picture where he was shown lying on his hack lies in the fact that he was so utterly senseless as a result of the blow that he could not remember anything b.efore he began to sit up and take notice. That was a sensational knock-out to all who had taken Goddard at his word — a thing that it is very unsafe to do with a boxer who talks ahout the impossibility of a man of thirteen stones and more being able to hurt him. Goddard was hurt go badly that he scarcely knew he was hurt. The punch had produced insensibility as

quickly and eompletcly as if the boxer had been put into dreamland by the application of chloroform — possibly more quickly. Goddard's case was one of absurd disregard to defence, born of a stupid notiea | that he could not be knoeked out, CARPENTIER v. SMITH. Quite different from all the preceding knock-outs was that administered by Carpentier to Smith recently. It was no particular cleverness 011 the part of the ^ Frenchman which enabled him to finish off an opponent who had given him no end of trouble. Just as important. as ihe blow which is the last are those which lead up to them. 1 Nothing contributed to the downfall of Smith on this occasion more than a couple of low blows, which were most painful to the Englishman. In writing this, I have not only the word of Smith, but I happen to know that each of those low and very hurtful blows were reeorded on the sheet of one of the judges. That sort of thing is always unpleasant to record but, in justice to Smith, such an occurrence must be pointed out. There was more than those hits which h'elped the Frenchman to his sudden victory, and that was the conduct of the ring-master, who mauled Smith about in the most unfair manner. It was after one of these maulings that Smith was sent down, for Carpentier, giving his opponent no time in which to recover, sprang forward and landed two uppercuts to the chin in such rapid succession that the effect of them, coming upon the effect of the blows 1 have mentioned, were too much for the ser-geant-major. Smith's was far indeed from being a dishonourable vielding either in the matter of skill or pluek. JEFFRIES v. JOHNSON. As I haye said, that which leaus up to a knock-out blow is just as important as the last punch itself. It may surprise you that Jeffries went through the preliminary part of his knock-out from Jack Johnson twelve months before the two met. Jeffries had put on such an alarming amount of fiesh that, when tlre matcli was made, he stipulated for twelve months in which to train, and started his preparation at Carlsbad. You know what that means — purging and scouring the inner coats of the intestines until fatty deposit-s are simply torn away, and all the power of resistance or recovery of the st-omach niuscles is dissipatcd. No wonder you see the big nigger laughing while he is doing just what he liked with the b;g frame of the man who thought that the salts of Carlsbad could put him back to the physical condition that was his before countless eocktails had had their sway. KNOCKED OUT BY KINDNESS. Jeffries was knoeked out by kindness • by the forbearanee of an opponent who, with smiling face and merry quip to 011lookers, illustrated how easy it would be in any particular round to put a finish to the half-resuscitated Jeffries. The later did not lose sigbt of this, and the indignity he suffered while watching the frequency with which Johnson let him off, gcorched its way into what vanity of mind Jeffries had left, and he was knocked-out by a broken heart as much as by the severity of the nigger's punching.