1961-02-02 — Page 9

K.O. PUNCH!

PART FIVE?

THE CHINA MAIL, THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 2, 1961.

The classic master... the last Corinthian. That was Jim Driscoll, who, in an epic fight with Charles Ledoux, showed incredible skill and courage before the end came in the 16th round.

The blow that smashed

bare- headed. Traffic jammed and crawled to a stop. Along the packed pavements, 100,000 people stood in the cold as the funeral procession-more than a mile long-wound its way to the cemetery.

Wonten wept. Men stood

Cardiff had never seen a death march like it. All work stopped as everyone, young and old,

the spell of Peerless Jim

flockert into the glorious biti in boxing history, classic master, the last Corin-

streets to watch the

cortege pass.

For the mothers End rene from every

Wales part Then were children femia the Incal orphininge, eseb einsping a wreath.

There were fraugh looking men with bent

and battered cars many umble to hold back tear as they marched strielly past the seat thousands,

ACCOLADE

For this was ALI ancestor Wales narri Welshmen will never forget--February 3, 1925, whom the greatest boxer of his the-- and probably of all time--went on his Inst journey

Jim Deixeull was the name, The Celtie irgend his conteni» porarles christened "Peerless Jim... The term "pert- less" has survived down the years, pure and untarnished, an accolade Kiven to no one eine in the tabled hals of sport.

"No hay que no" there is but onet say the Spaniards whenever they talk ad their incomparable matadi. Munalele he -the maestra who, when worked the bull with the rape, bound his enraptured audience to him by the poetry, the ri and the sheer hypnotic grace of kla passes.

In boxing. Driscoll, the Welsh- man with Irish blond surging in hia velns, shed the same raysie He hnd the same - definable quality we Jools term genius,

nurn.

LEFT JAB

He first exhibited his faultless Art in that rumbustions, guslit ern before the 1914-18 war, when whisky was 3s. Vd. a bottle and the horse buses elopped through Plecadilly.

In those raucous, rip-roating days J Drizcull stood up in the ring as handsome as Apollo. With his block. curly hair, chiselled nose and dark, wide-set eyes, he boxed and beat the finest feather-weights on both sides of the Atlantic, wiekding a left job as straight and flashing as a burnished sword.

Indeed, once the bell had gone, Peerless Jim paruded an array of talents s incachy they seemed to place him on a lonely pedestal.

What other man, when an up- ponent came straming In. could send him the wrong why, or through the ropes, by the merest inclination of the head

Whirl other man, when the pace grew hot and fast, could slip the forcest punches by matchless footwork and the most natural of body swerves?

And whet a killing right evoca the Welshmuan packed!

It

*

ARTISTIC

Peerless Jin: although sleet-white

abled the Welshman to win outright the first Lonsdale beli Jor feather-weights.

1

And it was the name royal right

which once laid out efly Spiniflelds market porter who hat pleked a quarrel with Drizell as he was crossing the streel.

Driscoll, who was wearing tali bat and frock coat in the fashion of the day, walled for the

porter to come to and

A

then handed hum

gold sovereign. with the admoni- Lion "to be more careful how

Deople

Le talked future...."

in

Yet, for all their quixotle ru- mancé and colour, It is for one of these explolls that Jim Driscoll. of Cardiff, with Lux remembered.

Pervercly--and because it is British trait-be will always be cherished for his last light Charles Ledoux, of against France: and the noble and unforgettable manner in which he lost 11.

AGEING

thinn....

"We of the club," declared Bettinson before the fight, "bave decided that the future genera- tion shall see him (Driscoll), his ways, his perfect style, and the correct ideas, as he surely typi- fles

"And so, contrary to custoni, we shall employ the makers of motion pletures. It may be the tust time we shall see him the ring, and We con hardly

hope to see his like again."

17:

flow clairvoyant was the sage master of the N.S.C.

As those successful men Ananelers, noblemen, the last of the fancy watched the miracle, emotion welted up.

MAGIC

was as

It

V the Driscoll magic, the riscull cachant- met, had reached like a blade deep inte their touched a chord,

certs and

If he led, he was thrown off balance by his apponent's spilt second counters.

Gloves,

gloves kloves. ....the ring rained leather ....hooks, uppercuts, crosses, jabs that stabbed and stunk

and all stung by a man who, by

every canon of common sense. should have been In bed: Indeed, should never have accepted the match.

SHORT ODDS

As for Lednux himself, he was dumbfatindled,

fool.

By ALAN HOBY

Out they came for the 15th and Peerless Jim seemed as good as evor. Or was he?

For Ledoux, to his surprise and to the consternation of the club members, was GETTING THROUGH!.

Unknown to everyone, ut known even to Ledoux. Driscoll's injured thumb had gone in the 19th round. Every time he con-

nected, excruciating pain shot up

his arm.

The agony was back, too. in his stomach. Nausea was rising to clog his breathing. His legs Telt ng heavy as marble col- umns. Disense, age, tine and 11s tyranny had trapped him.

He fled a powing, pathetic left as Ledoux, still credulous at this colossal slice of luck. cnine roaring in.

over his bowed head and forced sips through his parched lips.

As the bell tolled the 10th round, Driscoll dragged howelf wearily to his feel.

The Rugby star fell from a helicopter...

By JOHN REED

The giant young intelligence officer swung out from the helicopter that hovered in the Cyprus mountains. As he descended the rope it gave a bit ("like an idiot, I did not realise there was so much slack") and he began to slip.

The friction burned his hands into two jumps of ngony. Then he hi the first knol in the rope and let go...

boxed for the regiment I was; 10st. 242b.

Army job

Campbell-Lamerton is one of Britain's young old Korean He was only 18 when he went to the Far East as u National Service second lieu-

Ledux vaine stalking forward, } gloves raised-und then paused. That was in 1957. And as he Bimultaneously, as the gallout | lay in hospital with broken Frenchman stood there unable right leg and ankle, Michael veterans. to hit the ruin reeling in front Campbell-Linerton, of fik of him, two towels floated into Duke of Wellington's Regiment, the ring. They were followed sadly, painfully reflected th Tenunt. rapidly by the weeping seconds Army and Rugby,,vareer was

Flown back to England, he spent six months in hospital and rehabilitation. Progress was slow. He thought he would have to find a civilian job.

who find thrown them.

Gently, the picked up Dris- call whe had collapsed, and

411 almost unbearable att silence, carried him away.

TRIBUTE

Later, peers of the realm. bushess men, racehorse owners, and celebrities from stage and

over.

Mike, who also served in Kenya, is now adjutant of the T. Ä. Balto, of the 5/7th Doke of Wellington's Regiment at Huddersfield and living in mar- ried quarters with his wife and two young children.

Will he stay in the Army? "Certainly. I love the life. It is my vocation as long as they And he hopes to go to Staff College.

Hie

want me."

Scottish qualifications:

First nearing left found sport started a national testi- wasted leg muscles. "1 found I i «aty grondfather was a Sent.

Driscoll's Jaw. Then, arcing through the air, came a swing dush on Dris- which landed coll's stomach.

That blow, the virtum K.O., the finishing punch in every- thing but the technical applica- tion of the count, struck chill in- to the blood of every elab min- her

For

TOWELS IN

But he rejoined his ballation in 1968 and started shot-puiting that winter to strengthen his

rack

TH l started playing Rugby Lgain in the reserve team and

weight walying and et cuit Training helped to build my strength and KA muscles," Mke told me at his Huddersfield headquarters.

monial find for Peerless Jim.

One mognate gave £600 and the Avers and golden sovereigns poured in. Soon the samt safeguard Driscoll's old age reached £2,000 and later £5,000, And the following morning de most moving tribute of all ur- rived. A five pound note from "to your mar- Charles Ledoux

who was my vellous Driscoll

Campbell-Lamerion was nasier at boxing."

himself Ledoux

eventually his way back... to a promising became a larnier, disUnguished, Army career and International citizen, and mayor of Pouglies- | Rugby heneurs. thats-Eaux.

For Mike, capped by Scotland against France in Paris ro

the it was

blow it was era,

the

Reduced! to the status advice, beaten to the punch, polat. losing practically every the Frenchman si had the

chivalry, at the end of innate each round, to point with won- der at the grey-faced veteran ended an who was making him look a triumph of the new Angelcan heresy of the mauling, hook- uí ing. etose-in Yankee school

the end, for dighting and ever, of the straight left as the supreme weapon of the ring..

Driken, as the punch landed, went white as bleach, His hag- gord face fell in. His teas bent 10 Smash odds of 13-1 on Driscoll were and bowed like rubber hose. He did not go down, but that was because he was Jim Driscoll,

Fur the first the the club's rule of strict silence was broken by the cheers, rolling out like n drum enll, as Driscoll deployed the whole range of his consum- mate art.

withering,

on h

Indeed,

If Ledoux strived did Driscoll's never

with more bril- to the body, that Realus gleam Hance than on the night of devilish efl played October 20, 1919, when he met puffed face with the speed and the Frenchman at the old Na cuiting force of a rapler. tional Sporting Club, Covent Garden.

If he hurled a falling Burry

Aud so the one-sided contest went on until, suddents, it was the 15th round.

Around the ringside the mem- The Ught burs were jubilant.

while seemed as good as over

being offered.

There were no falters.

But Ledoux, despite selentille caning he had taken,

the

of blows at Driscoll's head, he was by no means finished. He hli nothing but the ale, or nes was stil strong, still hoping. Broad-shouldered, bullet-head-casionally the Welshman's gloves still rushing in swinging punches ed. Ledoux was the best ban or arms.

at those pinched, bird-brittle tam-weight

If he stayed back.

nt Driscufi ribs, that white. In Europe A

stomach. raked him with his fire. merciless, two-Dated shigger who claimed the world tulle.

Morever. "The Apache" or "The Little Assessin," as he was known to his countrymen, was at the flood tide of his powers.

Not su his ageing opponent. Driscoll, on the verge of 38, was. a physical wreck.

Gone was the silken-muscled splendour, the sheen of fitness of the vanished years.

trouble and the insidious ap- Gone gnawed away by gastric

proach the flaring good looks.

of tuberculosis — were

In their place stood a tab, toothless wrinkled, his once glossy black hair isced with grey, his face sunken and pre- maturely old.

He looked and was-in a bad way as he climbed through the | repes in front of that exclusive and wealthy club ellentele in their belled shirts and black ties.

LEGENDARY

Few among those N.S.C. mem- hers knew that the Wetahuman had lajured his left thumb when he broke training two

weeks before to spar with a novice in o charity show. Even fewer knew that, with only four days to go, agonising internal poins tad forced him to bed, where be slayed unt the morning of the Dght.

Even then, however, the who. Welshman could have won and sick despite its burning, ulcerated with fever he was always sunnch, his sore thumb, coughing, always fenil knocked his dry, racking cough.

the cocksure stuffing out of

terrible Abe Attell, fenther-

Four D. Jones THE STRIPED BY MADDOCKS

SERVANT CALLS JONES FOR A WORD IN HIS EAR...

IF WO DON'T GET RAIN SOON ME GROUND- NUTS WILL ROT

FERDINAND

and

NANCY

Had he insisted on 15 rounda

weight champion of the world, instead of 20, as the late "Peggy

In New York: a light which was Hiven a "no decision" label bul which every expert present agreed Driscoll won with artistic

RAH.

It tens the Driscoll right which, together with the must

CHESS

By LEONARD BARDEN

Here is a problem by O, Nagy (Morning Post, 1937). White to play and mate in two MOVES.

Solation No. 5972: 1 R-3 cht: 2 RXR12 RXR. Q-03 ch úth a quick male), Qxli 3 R-92. Q-38 ch; à

07 and tofna.

London Regrate Servios,

Bettinson, the N.SC. matchmak- suggested there would have bren only one result.

But when Francois Descamps, Ledoux's manager, stuck volubly to his demands, Driscoll, always careless where his own interesis were concerned, replied pirtly: "What's the odds? Make i 20."

And so, before an expectant, unashamedly iero-worshipping | Audience, Peerless Jim, the ""Hv“ ing legend." went out on that

October night *1

yours ago to light Charles Ledoux, iño human cyclone from the Con- tinent.

For one breath-taking. hour against a thumping, crowding, wildcat opponent more than o decade lila junior, the old wizard of Wales held the handpicked Rathering in the palm of his flawless left hand.

For one hour and 15 rounds --- the full championship courne today Jim Driscoll's indomit able spirit soared above the pala that clawed at hlu stomach, the | soreness thui tore at his chest. Instead, he was a goð, hla left hand shooting our LIKO A white ramrod. the blenched. driving glove jorking back Ledoux's anturnin's head an tí De whe

that marionette; inexorable fist hampering like ‚n machine gun at the French-

maki's Alpa, nose and atas.

It was witchcraft the "quine

i tassoned of boxing skill by the

HI, TOM--- WHAT DO YOU KNOW?

I WANT

A WORD WITH

YOU...

NUTHIN'

weakly

KIND SIR, WOULD YOU CARE TO HAVE A WORD WITH US STRIPED PEOPLE}

IN PRIVATE

SURE, I'L SLIP AWAY WHEN I CAN

Ledoux threw everything but old the ring at the tottering

man in front of him.

Somehow Driscoll, alck to The point of total collapse. managed to survive until the end of the round. Back in hiz

they a bottle poured

MAJOR BLUDNOK IS

corner,

of champagne

Capped

oh

Scottish for-

of the season.

But today it is not- the French-i man that we remember.

It is James Driscoll the finest cently, is the boxer Britain

ever produced. Ward discovery Peerless then, peerless now, and Denis Lalanne, leading French peerless for as long as men pull Rugby critic, described him as on gloves in the prize ring. an enormous revelation....the

best player of the match.”

(All rights reserved)

NEXT WEEK:

The

This exelling 6ft 41⁄2in. Regu- lax Army officer hny another distinction too. At 173. 21b. he is currently the heaviest inter- national forward 10 - Britalu (Springbok heavy-weight "Mo!" Myburgh 1s 17st.).

revenge parachutist and when I was

of Sugar Ray

-London Express Service,)

FIZZ AS JONES TIP-TOES QUEA THAT STRIPED CHAPASKED ME TO MEGT HIM IN THE

STABLES

By Mik

HI, EGBERT~-~

WHAT DO

YOU KNOW?

By Erale Bushmiller

BALBOA DISCOVERED. THE PACIFIC OCEAN---THE OPOSSUM IS A MARSUPIAL---TORRICELLI INVENTED THE BAROMETER ---

BRICK BRADFORD

OKAY, SHADY,1 APOLOSITE! I GUESS THIS PLACE VS.

SETTING ON MY HERYES]

IT'S OKAY, JOB!.. I WONDER WHAT PIO MAKE OUR

·RATIONS, FLY

AWAY!

STRNAD

THAT'S THE THING THAT BOTHERS ME MOŠKE THAJA, THER DINOSAURS) WID MAY BE UP AGAINST A

FOSECI WA CANNOT

LISTONI WHAT WAS

THAT

IT MUST HAVE BEEN A GIONAL. FROM BRICK}· I'LL ANSWER

was too heavy to be a

serving in Korea my weight shot up to 1961-too much choco- Jate!" Mike chuckled: "My flähting weight? „Probably about 10st, 10, although when I

SWIS

Sheaffer's

BUT I

ALWAYS

TRAVEL

SWISSAR

The Altine of

Switzerland

PEM

Pen For You

THE DOLD NEW

PEN DESIGNED EXCLUSIVELY FOR MEK

ME AND MY

You'll Like

BIG MOUTH

By Paul Norris

HE'S ALIVE! HI GOT DOWN SAPELY, TOO! MAYED H STILL HAS HIMS

RATIONS!

AERO

You can be SURE

if its..

FORD

The Lamerton is Cornish. My father was a Navy man and I was born in Malta."

Scoth selectors, looking for bly forwards who might equal 11:0 massive South Africans, liked the 27-year-old Army and Blackheath sccom-row forward when he played for the Com- binet Services against a Scot- fish XV.

The final Scottish Trial and straight into the Scotland. team Jor Paris... that was the repid rise of Caplain Campbell- Lamerton. His Influence in the

zum and in the line-outs helped to transform the pack.

The "Dukes" and Scotland ens be proud of him.-London Express Service.

English footballers

can forget that £100

Says STANLEY MATTHEWS

If any of England's star

professionals

are now

having glorious dreams of £100 a week under

the. new. lid-off

wage

structure, they will soon be disillusioned.

last

Since the fortnight of strike fall

ended in agreement Wednesday, I have heard of fabulous figures ikely to paid to the tup men in the game.

Forget all about it. I can see no British player ever getting the big money of John Charles and Alfredu 31 Stefano, anlese, of course. they take the one-way trip to Europe. Although the maximum wage has gone, I belleve that all our clubs will fix an unofficial criling ...and it won't go an higher than about £40

a week. And few players are likely to get anything like that amount

of although most the lop team players are cecinit 1 get a sizeable lift in shetr Soccer earnings.

I would think that slara ke Bobby Charlton, Jimny Greaves, Denis Law, Jimmy Mellroy, Dave Mackay, and Cut Jones, George Easthra, Alex Han Springelt, and Parker are among the men to hit the top most likely

bracket.

CX-

A WARNING But here is a warning. I

peel the club to impose A sliding scale to case this new burden.

Players may get the big money when they play in the first Icam-but the cash may drop

If they lose their places. This situation already exists in many clubs, and may have to be accepted generally. This is certain to create keener etmpetition for places in League club sides, sng it will be challenge to all players. Bo football should be better and the standard of play lin- provid

And there is no fear that dit-

ferent pay rates will ruin feui work.They have been doing it in Scotland for years and I have yet to notice any signs of je:lousy or lack of team spirit.

Way back in the early 1020'

Glasgow Rangers aigned that Alan Morion ace of wingers from achaleur Queen's Park. He was paid the then fr bulduk plary of £25 a Wiết Alber- elde him on the wing Wha Tommy

Cales-01 Le a

week.

But was there my sign of

frouble? Not at all

they

become one of the greater lott

of hil wltigs -time. It will be the asth, this

side of the border.

--(kenden Exgiem Barvica),