"Dear Tommy. Could you make the loser's end of the purse a little larger?"

There's some evidence either way from the news reports. Whatever happened I doubt the version in much later papers is entirely accurate. It'll probably take more than some old newspapers to answer this one. Hopefully the biography on him will do it.

Syracuse Standard - March 4, 1896 (page 3)
Ryan said after the fight: "I have no excuse to make for my defeat, I simply went outside my class and got whipped. A strained tendon in my right leg caused me lots of trouble after the third round. It prevented me from being as quick on my feet as I otherwise would have been."