Ottumwa tri-weekly courier. [volume] (Ottumwa, Iowa) 1903-1916, 1909-05-11
ONE OF THE CHAMPS
OF THE EARLY DAYS

stake. The date is to be December
lS, 1910, and the place Copthall Com
mon in Sussex, thirty miles from I,on.
don.
The night of December II rain falls
! In torrents. There is little letup the
Following morning, but this does not
discourage the thousands intent on
| witnessing the first international
championship fight between an Eng
llshman and an American and the first
championship bout between a white
man and black man. Setting out
| from London in the early morning.
these thousands move toward Copthail
Common like well-drilled army.
They are drenched to the skin. The
road is of clay, and for one stretch of,
| five miles they wade knee deep
through the clay mud. Do they grunl-
Bile and kick up fuss Hardly!
Rather do they congratulate them
selves on having such an unusual adj
venture, these sturdy fans of 1910.
| At noon an outer circle of wagons
| is made to shield the rivals as much
as possible from The rain and cold
wind. Within this circle a twenty
| four foot ring is formed. The spec
IS
best they can on the slope of an al.
jacent Hill.
Molineaux lands the first blow.
Later, in the second round, he draws
first blood. He is fighting in strange
fashion, nesting his chin on his
chest and striking hand over hand. In
the third round he runs into one Of
Cribs left swings and measures his
full length on the wet earth. The
crowd, in an uproar, shouts its will
lingness to wager. to 1 that Crib
wins. Molineaux leaps to his fest,
PUSHES into a desperate rally, and
finally is again knocked down.
Molineaux now inaugurates a gal
liant uphill battle. In the eighth SEES
sion he is forging ahead He has
Crib on the retreat, sore pressed. In
the ninth he pounds the champion
from corner to corner and at length
levels him. Round follows round now,
and the hopes of the white man fade
fast. The betting has shifted to four
to one that the negro wins.
Poor Crib seems done for. The
twenty-eighth round is brutal. The
negro is beating the champion into a
pulp. He pelts him with fury. A
terrific right slashes Cribb's chin, fall
| ing him heavily. Prolonged groans
come from the muddy hillside with
| its thousands Of drenched English
men.
| Cribs seconds work over him fran
| tically. When time is called the cham
pion is still too weak to respond, and
under the rules Molineaux is victor
Just how the Briton is saved from
defeat and the American robbed of
the title is told in the following ex
tract from a contemporaneous news
paper report
Crib was so much exhausted that
he could not rise from his seconds
knee at the call of Time which was
uttered loudly by Sir Thomas Apreecc
one of the umpires. Joe Ward, his
cupied the attention of the blacks
seconds. and SO managed to prolong
the period sufficiently to enable the
champion to recover little, and thus
assist him to pull through"
| Now again reveals itself the luck
that has followed Crib from the first
day of his career. 1t is the thirty
first round, and Molineaux is still pep
pering the white man. They go into
clinch, and Molineaux throws Crib,
then stumbles over the PROSTATE
body and pitches onto his head. This
stumble costs him the championship.
! The fall takes more from his strength
than all of Cribs blows. He stalls
through the thirty-second round. In
the thirty-third it is merely matter
Of keeping his feet, since Crib is in
no condition to harm as much as q
house fly. But keep his feet he can
not His legs cave under him. He
falls, muttering: I'm done. | can
fight no more" The fight has been
waged for fifty-ive minutes. Rain is
still falling. The spectators must in
deed be all but frozen, but at reali-
zation that their countryman has won,
that the foreign invader has been
vanished, they break into such cheers
as the good Copthall Common has
never echoed before and may never
again. Men catch one another in
their arms and dance there in the
mud on the hillside. Crib, the
champion who came out of retirement
to rescue his race from the black
peril" is hero indeed.
| Molineaux is not satisfied. Three
days later he addresses a letters to
Crib in which he says: My friends
think that had the weather on last
Tuesday not been SO unfavorable,
should have won the battle. | there,
fore challenge you to a second meet
ing at any time within two months
for such sum as those gentlemen who
place confidence in me may he
pleased to arrange He adds that
he Cannot omit the opportunity OF
expressing a confident hope that tbs
circumstances of my being of diff
ferent color to that of people among
whom have sought protection. will
not in. any way operate to my preju
dice
Crib makes no immediate reply
On January 80, 1911, he is given g
, benefit, and among the boxers who
| exhibit is young man named Rim
mer. He Is SO pleased with Rimmel
that he readily consents to find hin
/. backing for bout with Molineaux
Five hundred dollars being posted By
each side, Cribs latest protege ant
his latest victim meet May 81, 1911
;r Mott IN,