Great Falls tribune. [volume] (Great Falls, Mont.) 1921-current, 1922-10-09
By SPARROW M'GANN
snacisI Correspondent of Great Falls Irlbuns

! SAeriai Correspondent OF uFedt FdHs tiluSh1
Copyright. 1922. by The Greet Falls Tribune
New York, Oct. S.-And now at last
we get the inside story of the Sikh
Carpenter fight, told by an American
expert who sat through the mill and
watched every move of the supposed
panther. Sikh, and the gorgeous
Georges. This man says that Six was
scared black when he entered the ring
and continued frightened all through
the second round. He says that if
Carpenter had had the nerve or good
Judgment to wade into the Senegalese
in either of the two rounds, the pan
Their would have laid down and cried
enough"
But the story is best told in the
EXPERTS own words and this is the
way it reached me today:
THE 'prelins' were as tame as
| those at home and it was only in the
main event that a man was thorough
Iy hors de combat and Carpenter, as
they carried him from the ring, was
! far from a pleasant sight to see, with
his face a compact mass of Iyld
humps, his eyes scarcely visible, his
lips swollen so that he could not close
his mouth.
I'VE had been told for weeks by the
idolatrOus French press that Carpen-
tier VISA making an enormous sacri-
| flee in giving us this farewell nance
of seeing him. He was such a great
figure. so much in demand not only
in the rings of America and England,
where the purses were IN dollars ana
pounds. but before the camera as wei.
lie really could not afford 10 fight
for a misery 100000 francs-all that
! Paris could offer-but he would do 1t
just to give his faithful friends a treat.
Loses Crowds Favor
When he climbed through the ropes
into the ring he waved to various
friends in front row seats and nodded
condescendingly to the crowd, ban
daging his hand meanwhile with eXag-
gerated nonchalence. When he had
made the round of the ring in this at
i titude. he turned to the tImekeeper,
seated near his corner and said Let's
hurry up, it's going to rain. 1t sound
ed irritatingly as if he had SAID, Let s
hurry up. | have an engagement for
tea at the Claridge.'
All this condescensiOn was so dlsa-
preeablv obvious to the crowd that
CARPENTER lost a fair share of his pop
~ularity favor before the fight began.
I set this down in justice to the crowd,
which has been accused of fickleness,
of transferring it's favor too quickly
from the old champion to the new.
THE opening round was simple.
Sikh. against the 1.-THE. blonde, playful
Georges. looked like a frightened go
rilIa He cringed. As Carpenter APP
nroached him he simply bent forward
and covered his face with his gloved
hands The crowd booted. Carpenter
laughed and jabbed little tickling
punches behind the negro's ears. Six
pushed his fists toward the champion,
then covered up again. Carpenter
was having the time of his hte. like a
puppy worrying a mouse.
"Siki. at one of Carpenters ap-
proaches, even dropped on one knee
technically down and thererofe not
hittable) and was roughly odd by NJ
Henry Bernstein. the referee, Get up
and fight. you buffer
sikh Scared TO Death
1T was clear that Ski was sorry
he had come. He wanted to go home
and forget all about this nightmare
that he had unwittingly stumbled into.
| had Il very clear impression tnat nau
CARPENTER sailed into him then with a
few stiff punches, even if there was
no vulnerable point of the black man
exposed, Ski would have rolled over
and taken the count. happy to find so
easy an exit.
"The same was true III the second
round. Sikh was still frightened, still
anxious to avoid the terrible blows OF
the great Georges. The latter contin-
ued his cinema performance, but once
or twice, seeing an opening. the negro
came out of his turtle-like attitude to
). look out and Georges managed to land
what should have been a singing
punch on Skis chin. 1t was then tina
Sikh began to unfold. Carpenter had
hit him. but he was still alive. Could
it be possible? Alive and hardly
Jared.
There is just one point where J
disagree with the French experts II
their accounts of the battle. They
think that Carpenter had a chance tf
win in the third round. They chron.
icle that from the fact that he knocked
Sikh down three times. But Sikh was
never really down. Technically yes
because having n knee. or a glove oil
anything but ones feet on the floor is
down The battler was, in my view
simply resting. If Carpenter seemed