In the 1860s a major crackdown on prize fighting took place in an increasingly puritanical Britain forcing most of the top British fighters to emigrate to America. There followed a 20 year period in which the American title was held by British born fighters who had emigrated to America. In total eight English and Irish born fighters held the title untill John L Sullivan brought an end to this period by defeating Paddy Ryan. Following the retirement of John C Heenan the American title was held by the following British born fighters: Joe Coburn Jimmy Elliot Mike McCool Tom Allen Jem Mace Tom Allen Joe Goss Paddy Ryan Jem Mace became the first recognised world champion when he unified the British and American titles by coming to America and adding the American title to the British title which he already held. The irony is that Mace as British champion fought another British born fighter (Tom Allen) for the American title. A previous atempt by mace to unify by taking the American title off Coburn fell through when they failed to agree terms. The fact that Joh L Sullivan ended two decades of British rule probably contributed to his status as Americas first sporting megastar. Since then British heavyweight champions have been few and far between with the result that this ocupation has been largley forgotten. With British ring magazine champions in four weight classes at present we might just have seen another mini invasion.
Excuse me this is the British forum. Please change the title to "Enzo Mac destroys all Heavyweight champs 1865-1882". Very interesting post janitor. I read George McDonald Fraser's "Black Ajax", the fictionalised account of Tom Molyneaux in Britain while back and really enjoyed it. Any recommendations for a good book about the millers of this era?
The book "Master of the ring" about the career of Jem Mace provides a good overview of the period albeit from the perspective of Mace's career.
The fascinating thing about this period is that it did not result in an American reaction to find an American hope to get the title back. The battle lines were drawn between the Irish born boxers suported by Irish Americans and the English born boxers who the non Irish American republic suported to keep the title out of Irish hands.
