Shadow Boxing.

But unfortunately, the shadow struckback!

Jem Driscoll

by

Harry Shaffer

that was how Gilbert Odd described Matty Baldwin's encounter with Jem Driscoll. Considered by many the finest ring tactican ever, Jem Driscoll hardly looked the part ; two cauliflowered ears, and barely that many teeth, the guant figure of Driscoll was anything but imposing. Ah, but once in motion he was as if transformed into a true thing of beauty.Driscoll's professional career spanned 18 years and sixty-nine fights, he lost only three times. The first a decision to Harry Mansfield in 1904, which he avenged the next year with a knockout victory.Driscoll by the end of the year 1908 had really no worlds left to conqueror in Britian ,having won the BritishFeatherweight Title from Joe Bowker, although some said he had a bit of un-finished business with Owen Moran and Freddie Welsh, having fought both in exhibition bouts only.

But the call of bigger purses and the world title beckoned and Peerless Jem went to America. From November of 1908, beginning with the previously mentioned boxing lesson for Matty Baldwin, until February of 1909, Driscoll fought nine times in slightly over ninety days, winning all nine. His last fight prior to the bout with Abe Attell, one for which he had crossed theAtlantic, was against Leach Cross.

"...If Battling Nelson had been in Leach Cross's bootslast night he would have been just as much a fool. There is simply no use trying to hit this curly headedWelshman...He can make anybody miss, and the beautyof hiswork is that he can make a man come plunging in even though his efforts are bound to end up in a tangle of ropes and empty air. And, as a Popular shot, well, Jem doesn't know what it is to miss....the whole town is fired up over the "Welsh Wizard".-Hype Igoe. Milwaukee Free Press. February 12,1909.

"It was the most embarrassing thing that ever happened to me," ruefully grinned Leach in later days. "I couldn't touch that shifty Welshman once in ten rounds. What did he do to me? Well, at the end of the fight, my brother - and manager-Sam looked at me in the corner and said"What're you doing in this corner- you're not Leach Cross! You don't even look like Leach Cross!" And it was true-that little Britisher had knocked my face lop-sided!" "A few days later Jem was taking a nap in the gym when Cross strolled in. One of the hangers-on whisperedloudly, " Look out, Leach!-don't wake Driscoll up.""Leach stole quietly over to the slumbering fighter andsmote him playfully but resoundingly on the chest."There!" he cried in triumph-"don't anybody ever say I never hit Jem Driscoll!"(1)

On the night of February 19th just ninety-eight days after his first fight in America, the Welsh Wizard stepped intothe ring against the reigning featherweight champion of the world, Abe Attell. Attell, known for his rough tactics, rushed Driscoll swung, missed, crashed into the ropes and went sprawling on his knees, and thus it went for ten rounds. Driscoll all the while picking away a Attell's face with sometimes triple jabs. When the fight ended Driscoll had not a mark, while the Champion's one eye swollen shut and his nose badley swollen. The New York State law did not permit fights to a decision, but the papers of the day were not in doubt as to the winner.

" Jem Driscoll gave Abe Attell an artistic trouncing,luckily the law forbade the rendering of decisions, otherwise Driscoll would have taken the featherweight title away with him."-Police Gazette

"Abe Attell found his reign as premier featherweight boxer in the world had come to an end. ...At the National Athletic Club on East 24th Street the little Briton opened the eyes of the crowd and closed one of Abe's. ..there was no question as to which was the better man." -Tad Dorgan

Driscoll was to claim later that Attell had agreed to bebound by the newspapers decision, an agreement Attell did not recall.

At this point in his American "tour" Driscoll was as great a draw as any fighter, most entertainers, and far greaterthan the heavyweight champion of the world, JackJohnson.When Jimmy Johnston and Charlie Harvey, who were handling Driscoll's affairs in America, went to see him at his hotel they had great plans. But they found Driscoll all packed, ticket in hand and ready to sail for home.Driscoll had promised to appear at the annual Nazareth House Charity Tournament, Nazareth House being aWelsh oprhange. Driscoll kept his promise appearing, asalways, for free.

Driscoll was to return to America only once, in the Spring of the following year, on the promise of a championship fight, but that was not to be, Attell proving as elusive outside the ring as Driscoll was inside. Driscoll fought one rather listless bout against Pal Moore and returned home. At this point, Driscoll was already suffering fromthe early stages of the lung disease that would ultimatelyt ake his lfie.

Four days before Christmas of 1910, Driscoll set about clearing up part of that unfinished business, mentioned earlier, and fought Freddie Welsh. Whether it was the frustration of the abortive Attell affair or extreme roughhouse tactics of Welsh, the fight ended in a most uncharacteristic manner for Jem Driscoll. He lost! "Throughout the battle both boxers resorted to questionable tactics and in the sixth and seventh roundsWelch(sic) was loudly hooted for using the kidney punch so often. Driscoll was cautioned for butting in the seventh, and in a heated clash during the tenth Jem, getting his head under his opponent's chin, butted Welch (sic) badly, pushing him all around the ring. The referee then parted them and handed the verdict to Welch(sic)." "...seconds in Driscoll's corner leaped into the ring and promptly mixed words with Welch's (sic) handlers. Some blows were struck and it was with difficulty the police dragged the warring partisans apart....Driscoll, badly cut, stood tears streaming down his face. Jem was the popular favorite, and the spectators expressed loud and long disapproval of the verdict to Welch(sic)"

-Milwaukee Evening Wisconsin. December 21, 1910

Jem Driscoll fought once in each of the suceeding years, knocking out Spike Robson to retain the BritishFeatherweight Title, and winning the Londsdale belt an unprecedented three times, became the first ever permanent owner of the belt. In 1911 he knocked out Jean Posey, forthe vacant European Featherweight Title and the vacant British World Featherweight Title and then in the last of the un-finished business he fought a twenty round draw against, the man many thought was the only British fighter ever in Driscoll's class, the Fearless Owen Moran. In the July following the Moran fight, Driscoll retired from the ring. He spent the next four years in the service teaching boxing and giving exhibitions. At War's end Driscoll, his health failing, found himself nearly broke.He returned to the ring in 1919, literally and figurtively a shadow of his former self. At forty years of age, and suffering from the ravages of advancing tuberculosis, Driscoll still managed to defeat and equally aged Peddlar Palmer and hung on courageously for a twenty round draw with Francis Rossi.

The swan song of Jem Driscoll occurred at the National Sporting Club in London on October 20, 1919,...with Charles Ledoux. He was a wrinkled, sallow and seamed old man with a collapsed chest and tired eyes. Those who had not seen him since his glory days were shocked. Yet, when the gong sounded...the mantle of fatgue was left in Jem's corner: the tired eyes became again the mocking eyes of the mongoose; and for a while he was once more the gaunt ghost, supreme, untouchable. For fifteen rounds he made Ledoux look like a novice... He could go no further than the sixteenth. As it started, Jem, almost unmarked , looked down at his shriveled legs in disgust...his seconds, literally raised their man tohis feet. The fighters closed and Ledoux hit him over the heart, Jem staggered to the ropes. He was helpless. Surprized at the sight, young Ledoux could only stand and stare...Before he could move in for the kill, a towel came floating out from Jem's corner. On that foggy October night in 1919, Jem Driscoll the boxer died and was buried amid the cheers and tumult of the crowd. And on that night the gaunt ghost of Jem Driscoll vanished. In its place arose a flesh and blood man who lived on in pain for five more years. The pain ended on January 30, 1925...(1)

Driscoll's funeral in Cardiff was one of the largest in the nation's history.

But the story does not end there,for over thirty-five years after his death, each Sunday, someone put fresh flowers on Driscoll's grave. The Ghost of the Ring lived on memory.

(1) Boxing Illustrated. October, 1961. The Peerless Welshman by Gilbert Odd

Photograph of Driscoll's Grave site Courtesy of Tony Gee.