Boxing: Encyclopedia II - Boxing - British boxing legends

Great Britain, the birth place of modern boxing, has produced numerous boxing legends. Among British amateur boxers, only those who won Olympic gold medals tended to achieve recognition beyond the limits of boxing enthusiasts. They included Harry Mallin (Middleweight), 1920 and 1924), Terry Spinks (Flyweight, 1956), Dick McTaggart (Lightweight, 1956) and Chris Finnegan (Middleweight, 1968). In 1908, at the Olympic Games in London, five weight divisions were contested, Bantamweight, Featherweight, Lightweight, Middleweight and Heavyweight. British boxers won them all, and four of the finals were all-British!

It is the professional side of boxing, however, that has produced the celebrities whose activities the public have generally followed. In the period between bare-knuckle pugilism and post-Queensberry boxing, Jem Mace was important. He carried many of the traditions of the old London Prize-Ring, but promoted the use of gloves and helped to popularize the sport in the United States and Australia. In the post-Queensberry era, the first British fighter to achieve superstar status was Bob Fitzsimmons. He weighed less than 12 stone but won world titles at Middleweight (1892), Light Heavyweight (1903), and Heavyweight (1897). He fought his last bout at the age of fifty-two.

Successful fighters have provoked fierce local pride. The best example was Jimmy Wilde, a Welsh flyweight who won the world Flyweight Championship in 1916 and held it until 1923. He once had a sequence of eighty-eight fights without defeat. Between 1911 and 1923, he won seventy-five of his fights by a knockout. He was idolized in Wales, where they commonly believed him to be the best boxer, pound-for-pound, that ever lived. He was described as the "Mighty Atom" and "the ghost with a hammer in his hand".

The Scots had a similar pride in Benny Lynch, a flyweight from Glasgow, who held the world flyweight title in 1935 and again in 1937. Over the years, Scots have had great success at this weight; Jackie Paterson won the title in 1943 and Walter McGowan in 1966. Scots have also had success in the lightweight division. Ken Buchanan won the title in 1971 and Jim Watt in 1980.

In Northern Ireland, Rinty Monahan held the flyweight title from 1947 to 1950, and Barry McGuigan won the W.B.A. featherweight title in 1985.

England, too, had its successes at the lighter weights. Among the flyweights, Jackie Brown won the title in 1932, Peter Kane in 1938 and Terry Allen.

The Welsh had their own featherweight legend Jim Driscoll. His nickname was "Peerless Jim". He was born in the one time Irish "slum" of Newtown. Jim was the first outright winner of the Lord Lonsdale Belt. Jim had prolific wins of the British, Empire and European titles. Jim is considered by many to be the best pound for pound fighter of all time.

Britain has had other popular world champions. In the 1930s, Jackie Berg won the light welterweight title. In the 1940s, Freddie Mills won the light heavyweight title. In the 1950s and 1960s, Randy Turpin and Terry Downes won middleweight titles. and in the 1970s, John Conteh and John Stracey won the light heavyweight and welterweight titles respectively. With so many title-awarding bodies in the 1980s and 1990s, the public became unsure about who actually was the champion. Nevertheless, the successes of Nigel Benn, Naseem Hamed, Chris Eubank, and Joe Calzaghe continued to bring extensive media coverage to boxing and sustained a considerable public following.

The most popular boxers, however, have not always been the world title-holders. Just fighting for the world title in the heavyweight division can bestow celebrity status, as was shown by Henry Cooper, who twice unsuccessfully fought Muhammad Ali in the 1960s.

Britain had to wait 100 years to have its first heavyweight champion since Bob Fitzsimmons lost his title in 1899. Lennox Lewis became undisputed champion in 1999, having first gained the W.B.C. title in 1993. Frank Bruno held the W.B.C. world heavyweight title from 1995 and 1996, after beating the man who beat Lewis, Oliver McCall. He lost it to Mike Tyson in a rematch of their 1989 title bout.

Sue Atkins (alias Sue Catkins) helped to pioneer women's boxing in Britain in the 1980s, but without any official recognition. The first British woman to be issued with a license was Jane Couch from Fleetwood, who won the Women's International Boxing Federation (W.I.B.F.) welterweight title in 1996.