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THAT MASPETH FIGHTA SANGUINARY AFFAIR.*Fifteen Round Battle Between Joe Walcott and Kid Lavigne--Other Hard Eastern Fights Which Attracted Attention.round, Walcott was after him. hammer and tong. With the storm of right-hand swings he cut the ear open again and closed up the other eye. Still Lavigne, with his bulldog pluck, never faltered, even though the punishment grew more frightful every moment.When the twelfth round ended it did not seem possible for Lavigne to stay the limit.'‘Throw up the sponge. Sam!” cried manj7 of Lavigne’s admirers to Fitzpatrick, but the latter only smiled and shook his head. It was 111 the thirteenth round, when Walcott was try-New York, Feb. 14.—At a Broadway sporting rendezvous where followers ofin P'!t °u the finishing touches, that cussion arose the other ni-,ht as o. lightweight Cham o ion crimson what was the best glove contest ever }*f *-lf^or i b isseen in the east. Various opinions hom heatl to 1001 m his °n bl0Dd’ware set forth qntil one man spoke up to the effect that by far the most interesting and at the same time the bloodiest fight he ever had seen was the 15-round battle between Joe Walcott and George Lavigne at Maspeth, L. I. on Bee. 2, 1895. Immediately there was an approving chorus from the crowd, for the fight and its exciting incidents were readily recalled.Lavigne was then the undisputed lightweight champion and a wonderful two-handed fighter. He had beaten his way to the front, meeting victimshowed what a wonderfully game man he was.Gete Good Opening.Standing resolutely up to the shower of blows which Walcott rained on his head and neck, Lavigne finally saw what he had been looking for ever since the mill began. It was an opening for the point of the jaw and the Saginaw pugilist let go his right with the force of a pile driver. His aim was not so accurate as it mgh have been, for he only go the blow' to the upper part of the jaw, but there was forcebroke numerous clinches by main force and Lavigne tried for a knockout with a fearful right for the jaw. The blow was high, but it jarred Walcott from head to heel. Wobbling across the ring to a corner, Walcott was on the verge of receiving his quietus when the gong came to his assistance.His Yellow Streak.No sooner had ho taken his corner) than Walcott wanted to climb out of the ring. O’Rourke was furious. He first expostulated with the “Giant Killer.” then entreated him, with the result that Walcott began the fifteenth and last round with apparent, reluctance. Lavigne. battered up so that his nearest relatives could not have recognized him. came out of his corner with a gallant rush. Walcott, had rallied under fire from O’Rourke and was again slugging away with both hands.Lavigne, however, soon forced Walcott to take the defensive, so that when the fight ended Joe was wandering aimlessly up and down Queer street. Before the decision could be announced the crowd, leaping to its feet, cheered Lavigne to the echo, and when it was officially made known that the lightweight champion had really won there was a scene that never has been repeated at a ringside.Lavigne had both eyes closed, his ear was hanging by a thread and his mouth was so badly swollen that he could not eat for a week: yet he was the happiest pugilist in the world that night, for his praises were sung from the Atlantic to the Pacific.Such a terrific strain did these men undergo, however, that it was a year or more before either got back to his old form. If the fight had gone to a finish. Lavigne would have won to a certainty. The excuse made for Walcott was that he had been weakened in getting to weight and for that reason was not equal to the test.Other Good Battles.There have been other exciting fights hereabouts, notably the McCoy-Choyn-ski affair at the Broadway A. C-. in which McCoy was practically knocked and counted out in the first round, when the timekeeper rang the gong by mistake, which enabled the Kid to go to his corner for a rest a couple of minutes before the tangle w'as straightened out Then when the fight w'as resumed McCoy landed a knockout blow' a second or two after the bell had ended the next round. The Fitzsim-mons-Ruhlin go in the Garden, and the fight in which Terry McGovern defeated George Dixon for the featherweight championship were also exciting affairs, but the Lavigne-Walcott affair is entitled to the palm.Jafter victim, until he was ready to go j enough n the punch to send Walcott to out of his class to get on a mill. Wal- knees.cott, who W'as under Tom O'Rourke’s management, was about the best welterweight in the country, but because of his height and general build the matchmakers -were soon endeavoring to bring about a go with Lavigne.After much dickering the men agreed to fight under extraordinary conditions. They w'ere to weigh 133 pounds at 6 o’clock in the evening, three hours before getting into the ring, and the fight was to be limited to fifteen roundsThe colored fighter was only down for a moment or two, but he looked so .sheepish that the crowd broke into deafening cheers. As he got up, Walcott wrore a sickly grin on his ebony features, but this soon changed to a look of ferocity, as he rushed again with all his might. Lavigne met him with powerful body blows and smashes, so that when the round ended the crowd was well-nigh insane.Walcott went to his corner crest-Ias Joe came to the scratch Lavigne was like a fire-brand. He rushed headlong into a clinch and, breaking out of it, he landed a half hook on Walcott’s jaw. The negro heeled and clutched convulsively at the ropes. Lavigne •was after him red hot then, and Walcott began to hug the lightweight champion to save himself. The refereewith the understanding that Walcott! fallen. O’Rourke gave him encourase-had to knock Lavigne out inside of | merit and told him that he would sure-that limit in order to win. Walcott i -v 'vin in the fourteenth, but as soonhad to do a lot of hard road work to get down to this weight, and when the men jumped on the scales at the appointed time they both tipped the beamat 131 Vo-The Fight Begins.Three hours later they got into the ring of the Empire A. C.. which was packed to the doors. The betting favored Walcott, who soon as the first gong rang forced the fight He began with fierce rushes and heavy slugging, which the sports believed would soon put an end to the Saginaw lau. But in the first seven rounds Lavigne, though he was on the defensive, held his own so well that the big crowd cheered him again and again. Walcott never allowed the white man to rest a minute, however, and in the eighth round he landed a terrific smash on Lavigne’s left eye, which quickly closed, while another hot punch drew the blood from the Kid’s mouth.Surely, the sports said, the fight was nearing an end, for as Lavigne came up for the ninth round and rallied he did not show his usual speed and strength. Walcott, who had been grinning all along, as if he had a cinch, rushed again with merciless punishment, and swinging his right, he landed such a terrific blow on the Kid’s left ear that it swelled to the size of a baseball before the round ended.As he went to his corner. Lavigne begged bis seconds to lance his ear. as the pain was awful, but they did not have time. Before the tenth round was on Lavigne’s ear was swollen so much that it was larger than both of bis fists put together. Walcott made a mark of it at once, and proceeded to rain a shower of cruel blows upon it.All of a sudden a tremendous smash broke the ear open and a torrent of gore was spattered over both fighters and those of the spectators who were Bitting in a fringe around the ring.Another smash seemed to cut the whole ear off, so that it dangled on Lavigne’s neck, held by a few bloody tendons.His Wonderful Nerve.It was such a grewsome spectacle that even such old-timers as Jere Bunn, A1 Smith and Jimmy Wakely turned their heads away.But Lavigne, going to his chair, was relieved of the pain and turning to his manager, Sam Fitzpatrick, he said:“Patch the ear up any old way, Sam, so that I can keep the blood out of my eyes, for I’m going to beat that coon before the go ends!”So Fitzpatrick put some healing preparation on the ear, which turned It jet black and stopped the flow of blood for tne time being. But soon as the lightweight champion got to the emtor of the ring for the eleventh
Newspaper Details
Davenport Daily Republican
Davenport, Iowa, US
Sun, Feb 15, 1903
Page 2
Full Page
Clipped by
John H.
IL, USA 16 Apr 2018
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