The Birmingham age-herald., 1909-04-11
MANY FIGHTERS
 AFRAID OF GUNS Don't Like Sports Handy With
 Shooting Irons SOME CASES IN POINT Fake Rough Houses" Are Started for the Benefit of English Can didates for. Fame and United
 States Money.
SOME CASES IN POINT
From the Washington Post.

fun with some English fighters who came to America to win fame and fortune in the ring" said an old New York sport ing man the other evening
 Tt seemed to me that nearly every pu- gilist Is afraid of gun, and especially the Johnny Bull fighters, who have an idea that every American is a Wild West desperado and will shoot at the drop of the hat. We had all the British scrap pers buffaloed on the shooting end of the game in the old days.
 Even Jem Mace, Tom Allen, Joe Goss, and other great English pugs were leary of the Yankee shooters when they first came over here. But after getting next to the right people they, in turn, used to scare other English fighters who ar rived here by relating alleged hair breadth escapes from rain of bullets at the ringside.
 There was a game little English chap who called himself Cock Robin, and he was dead crazy to have go with any 19O-pounder So we matched him with Soap McAlpine, who must have out weighed him by at least 20 pounds, but Cock Robin said he'd fight even if Soap weighed a ton. It was a cold night in midwinter, showing hard, when we got
 
 from Ridgewood, L. I.
 "The fun did not begin until long after midnight, in such cold back room that everybody was soon lit up with the in fernal booze which the bloated innkeeper was only too glad to sell. It was ban ner night for him, and he told us to go as far as we liked. as he had everything fixed so that there was no chance of be- ing pinched.
 Started Fake "Rough House."
 We Jet the game Robin punch old Soap for half dozen rounds, when we started a fake rough house across the ring. First 1t was a war of hard words and then we began pulling our guns, shooting at the ceiling. Poor Cock Robin was the worst frightened man ever saw.
 'He was paralyzed for couple of min- utes, and finally dashing out of the ring he bolted out of a back window, carry ing sash and all with him. All hands cried to him to come back and he would not be harmed. while some of the boys started after him across the fields in the deep snow. But Cock Robin could run, and did run faster than any Marathon star I ever saw.
 With only a pair of tights and shoes to handicap him, he sped along like a deer In the chilly wind. We felt sorry for the Robin, for 1t was only joke, and we wanted to hand him a purse for his gamenes in the ring. But he was never seen in America again. How he ever got to town that night, half naked, nobody ever knew.
 q heard years after that he went back to his old calling, that of training dogs at Birmingham, telling his countrymen what terrible gun fighters there were in this country and how he ran 50 miles with a hail of bullets falling all around him
 "In 1887 Charley Johnston, Jimmy Wake1y, Phil Lynch and BL4y Porter, the bank burglar, crossed the Atlantic for the purpose of seeing Jake Kilrain meet Jem Smith in France for the cham pionship of England. These four Ameri- cans had the reputation of being handy with the gun. Charley Mitchell, who was Kilrain's chief second, and who didn't fancy the presence of these gentlemen at the ringside, quietly put up a job to shut them out
 Johnston Was kiIraln's Umpire.
 Johnston had been appointed Kilrains umpire, and had declared in Lonodn that his man would get fair play or there'd be serious trouble. He was so loud in his threats that Georgs Atkinson soon declared that he would refuse to referee the mill if Johnston and his party were allowed to be present. Mitchell was evil dently playing the double-cross game by pretending to be Kilrain's friend and at the Same time betting his coin on Smith. as 1t was afterward learned.
 "On the train to Dover Mitchell crossed over to where's Johnston was sitting and began in rather playful manner to fan the American for his gun. When he found that Johnston was well heeled. Mitchell said: q see you've got your re- volver with youl Do you expect troubler
 Mot at alli replied Johnston. I've always got it with me-
 'This was enough for Mitchell. who kyrl.- with whom he held a whispered conver. sation. When the party arrived at Rouen. France. they put up at different hotels, Johnston and his three friends asked Mitchell if they'd have time to get shaved and wash up a bit Mitchell as- sured them that there was no hurry and that they would not have to leave for the battle ground until 9 o'clock the next morning.
 But when Johnston and his friends called at Mitchelrs hotel, at T o'clock in the morning they found that the fly Eng lishman and his cronies had skipped out about ten minutes before, leaving no word as to their destination Johnston wired all over the country, and finally discovered where Mitchell and his gang had left the train. When Johnston, Wakely, Lynch and Porter reached tho station they were informed that Mitchell and company had taken a boat up the river.
 Gunners Left In Lurch.
 '~There was no boat in which to follow them, so the four gunners were left high and dry without chance to witness the battle they had travelled 5000 miles to see. It was clever trick the part of Mitchell and he got away with 1t, al- though Johnston came near blowing his head off in Paris the day after the mill. It was only the interference by some gendarmes that prevented gun play.
 ''Kilrain and Sntth fought 10s rounds to a draw Referee Atkinson said he stopped the fight on account of dark ness, but mosts of the fair play Britons at the ringside said the battle was stopped merely to save Smith, who was backed by tough mob. It was the old Jack Baldock gang, whose motto was: Win, tie or wrangle. With Johnston and his fellow gunners at the ringside, the result might have been different or there would have been some trouble. Mitchell knew this, and that's the reason he gave the four Americans the slip. The English rowdies, as tough as they were, didn't want any blooming Ameri- can shooters for theirs.
 terward the backer and manager of John L. Sullivan, and about the only man that ever could handle the big fellow. It was simply because Johnston would not stand for any funny business and was ready to hold up the biggest fighter ever born with his shooting iron. Sullivan knew this and always respected Johnston. heard the latter on several occasions