PART 2 - Paul Cupitt Interview: Author of Jack Carroll: And the Rise of Australian Boxing

Following on from yesterday's PART 1 of this exclusive interview with Paul Cupitt - author of 'Jack Carroll: And the Rise of Australian Boxing' - we delve further into Jack Carroll's career and hear about his bouts late in his career, and why a lucrative bout against the formidable American welterweight champion, Barney Ross, never occurred. 

No Holds Barred: Carroll was ranked in the top three welterweights in the world by Ring magazine between 1935 and 1937; taking top spot in 1936. Was he ever close to being granted a world title shot?

Paul Cupitt: Yeah, Carroll was the number one contender behind [Barney] Ross. The Ross-Carroll fight was actually scheduled for December 1936. Ross agreed to come to Australia, but he wanted his purse deposited in a bank by October or he wouldn’t come to Australia. I think the purse agreed on worked out to be about ten- or twelve-years wages back then; a crazy amount of money! It ended up being a catch-22 that robbed Carroll of his title shot. The promoter was Charles Lucas; he needed to pre-sell tickets to raise the money to get Ross to Australia, but it was still the middle of the Depression, people didn’t have the money to spend on tickets for a fight that was months away and where one of the guys wasn’t even in Australia. Had Ross come, they were expecting over sixty thousand people to attend the fight, but he wouldn’t leave until those people had paid their money. So, there was no chance of ever getting Ross to Australia with his demands - which were fair demands at the time considering he was making good money in America fighting guys like Jimmy McLarnin, Izzy Jannazzo, and Ceferino Garcia. So, there was no need for him to come to Australia, but it was the same for Carroll; there was no need for him to go to America because he was making a year’s wages every time he lined up one of the major stadiums.

No Holds Barred: But, presumably it would have made sense for Carroll to travel to the USA if a world title shot was guaranteed?

Barney Ross
Owner: Cyberzone

Paul Cupitt: Well, there were talks of him going to America at certain times. But, Carroll basically said that if Ross was going to make the demand of money to be paid upfront, then he would do the same with American promoters who wanted to take him over there. Carroll was very loyal to his promoters, and his whole thing was to make money for his family. He was already making that much money fighting in Australia. The other thing is that there were all these horror stories about Australian boxers fighting in America at the time. I mean the story about Les Darcy is pretty well-known - about him dying in America - and then there was Billy Grime who was a world-rated boxer in the 1920s; he went to America and there were all these rumours - I don’t really know how true they are - about him being drugged before his fights and having his money stolen and stuff. There was a lot of xenophobia towards Australians going to America at the time.

No Holds Barred: Other Australians fought in the USA, and other Americans fought in Australia, so were those money demands common for other big names at the time too?

Paul Cupitt: The really big-name fighters could demand their travel expenses to come to Australia, then they’d be like any other fighter: 25% of the gate was the purse for a main-event fighter at the time. Ross was a reigning world champion, and I think the only other reigning world champion who fought in Australia at that time was Tommy Burns, and he made similar demands to fight Jack Johnson. So, it was outlandish for a big-name fighter to make those demands, but not so much for a world champion.

No Holds Barred: In his last five fights, he beat talented Americans Jimmy Leto three times and Izzy Jannazzo. The latter had lost a decision to world welterweight champion Barney Ross a year earlier. News of these victories must have made its way back to the USA. Were there further calls for Carroll to be issued a world title shot late in his career?

Paul Cupitt: Yeah, there were. When he beat Jannazzo and Leto in his last few fights, Ceferino Garcia was on his way out to Australia, and he was going to fight him too. But, Carroll’s doctor told him to retire because he couldn’t make weight for his last two fights with Leto; his doctor basically told him that if he didn’t retire he was going to have a nervous breakdown. The plan was to fight Garcia and to use that to try again to lure Ross to Australia and hopefully get a better deal. So, yeah there were definitely renewed calls to get Carroll a title shot. There’s another story which is quite well-known with boxing fans in Australia, but I couldn’t verify it, so I left it out of the book: Maxie Rosenbloom was fighting in Australia, in 1936 I think, and he supposedly saw Carroll either in the gym or at one of his fights. With Rosenbloom and Ross both being Jewish they knew each other quite well, and apparently he told Ross that if Ross went to Australia he would lose his title, so told him to stay in America. It’s an interesting story but one I couldn’t verify.

No Holds Barred: WOW! So, do you know what other American boxing insiders thought of Carroll at the time?

Paul Cupitt: Well, Nat Fleischer - the founder of Ring Magazine - saw Carroll and was a big fan of his. He actually thought Carroll would beat Ross; I don’t know if he saw him in the ring or if he saw him on tapes - I think it was probably tapes - but, he was under the impression that Carroll would’ve beaten Ross had they fought. A lot of the American trainers who saw Carroll fight were impressed. Guys like Jimmy Leto, Willard Brown and Wesley Ramey all thought very highly of him. Van Klaveren wasn’t a huge fan of his after their first fight; they fought during a rainstorm in an open-air stadium, and he blamed the rain for the loss. But Carroll said something like, “He couldn’t have realised that I was fighting in the same rainstorm as him”. They fought a rematch in the same open-air stadium six weeks later in fine weather, and Carroll beat him even easier; van Klaveren’s opinion of him changed after that. All the Americans who fought him thought he was a fantastic fighter; they just couldn’t believe the pace he could keep up for the distance.

No Holds Barred: You mentioned Rosenbloom and Fleischer’s opinions of Carroll’s in-ring ability. In your opinion, would Carroll have had a good chance of victory over the great American Barney Ross?

Paul Cupitt: Well, I think it would have been a horrible style match-up for Ross. Two of Ross’ main attributes were his conditioning and his jab; Carroll had an equally good jab and was in equally good condition, but he was much larger. Ross came up from lightweight and was probably better in the light-welterweight division. Ross would essentially be fighting a larger - although more unpolished - version of himself. Only the real hardcore historians who aren’t Australian know about him overseas, but those who know about him or have seen him fight rated him very highly. Like I said, Nat Fleischer also wrote that Carroll would have beaten Ross.

No Holds Barred: Who did he consider his toughest opponent?

Carroll-van Klaveren
Owner: Owner: National Library of Australia

Paul Cupitt: I remember reading a newspaper interview with him towards the end of his career, and him rating van Klaveren as his toughest opponent. Leto was also one of his better wins. It shows the calibre of Carroll, because a couple of years after his three losses to Carroll, Leto beat Charley Burley. Van Klaveren is very underrated, and guys like Jack Portney and Willard Brown were both good fighters. Brown fought Bobby Wilson in Australia before Carroll fought both of them; if you read the newspaper reports of the fight, it sounds like there was a crazy beginning to it: Brown just absolutely beat the hell out of Wilson for the first two and a half minutes. Then Wilson - who was a very underrated puncher and somebody not many people have heard of - knocked Brown down with about thirty seconds left of the first round, then knocked him down cold with about five seconds remaining of the round. His corner managed to wake him up in-between rounds and sent him out for the second round. Wilson got another two knockdowns in the second round, then Brown woke up half way through the round and came back into the fight and ended up beating Wilson for the rest of the fifteen rounds to win on points.

No Holds Barred: Which of his wins was he most proud of?

Paul Cupitt: I think the van Klaveren fights were probably the ones he was most proud of. The win over Richards was one of those wins that didn’t mean as much at the time, but when you see what Richards achieved later in his career, it became a bigger win. Richards was ranked in the top three at both middleweight and light-heavyweight by Ring Magazine at one point.

No Holds Barred: Why did he never fight outside of Australia and was he ever given any opportunities to do so?

Paul Cupitt: He did fight briefly in New Zealand early in his career; the voyage actually put him off ever wanting to travel again. He suffered really badly from sea sickness, so he never felt he was at his best outside of Australia. His daughter was telling me stories of how they had a holiday home on the beach in Melbourne after his career ended, and his mates would take him out fishing; he’d always want to go out fishing even though he’d always get sea sickness and end up throwing up over the side of the boat. Then, his mates would all get upset with him because they’d end up having to go back early. So, the sea sickness was the big thing that kept him in Australia. He had offers to go to America but, like I said, there were all those horror stories about how Australian boxers were treated over there; like Les Darcy and Billy Grime. The main thing was he didn’t want to risk his future earning potential for his family when he was making large sums of money fighting in Australia during the depression.

No Holds Barred: I suppose it was also such a long distance.

Paul Cupitt: It was a five-day boat trip to New Zealand, and I think it was about three weeks to America at that time. He reckoned he lost six kilograms from throwing up; apparently, they hit quite bad weather during the trip. He lost his first fight off the boat to a guy called Harry Casey who he then beat twice rather easily; he blamed that loss on the voyage. The first fight was in Wellington in the North Island, and the second fight was in Christchurch in the South Island, so he had another boat trip in-between the fights; he said the only thing that saved him in the second fight is that he managed to fall asleep before the boat departed. 

No Holds Barred: Considering he never contested or captured a world title, despite his high ranking towards the end of his career, do you know if he had any regrets?

Paul Cupitt: From speaking with his daughter and grandchildren, I don’t think he did. Before he retired, he paid cash for a brand-new house, brand-new car, and they had savings in the bank when he retired. This was during the great depression. Boxing set him up for life, so I don’t think he had any regrets about not fighting anyone.

No Holds Barred: Considering the dangers in boxing, such as injuries, bad decisions etc., would you say that ultimately his decision to not fight in America was vindicated by the fact he retired having provided long-term for his family?

Paul Cupitt: Yeah. When they were talking to him about going to America to fight Ross after the fight in Australia fell through, he just said out loud that he didn’t want to risk putting his family’s financial situation in jeopardy. He had bad hand problems and was quite injury-prone throughout his career, so I think there was a good chance of something bad happening if he’d gone to America; like if he’d gone to America for six months and didn’t fight, and the family have no money coming in, then he’s sort of put them in a bad position when he could have just stayed in Australia and earned money. He had a full-time job working in a slaughterhouse too; he actually started working there after his last loss to Henneberry, and he reckoned it helped his hand injuries because he was ripping skin off of carcasses, so he reckoned it strengthened muscles in his hands.

No Holds Barred: Why did he decide to retire when he did? Was it because of the injuries?

Paul Cupitt: Yeah, it was doctor’s orders. He couldn’t make the welterweight limit anymore and his doctor was worried he was going to have a nervous breakdown if he kept at it. So, with the financial position he was in, he just didn’t want to put his health at risk.

No Holds Barred: What did he do after his boxing career ended?

Paul Cupitt: He went back to work in the slaughterhouse, he took over Bill O’Brien’s gym after he died, and he was also a referee; he was the main referee at West Melbourne Stadium. His daughter told me he was an avid gardener; he liked working in the garden and listening to the footy on the radio. He was just a very quiet, humble sort of guy.

No Holds Barred: So, aside from the refereeing he didn’t really keep up his profile in boxing?

Paul Cupitt: Well, he trained guys; I wouldn’t say he wasn’t a good trainer, he just didn’t have any star fighters. If you read through the newspapers in the 1940s/50s there’s a lot more talk a bout Ambrose Palmer’s fighters than Jack Carroll’s fighters. So, he was sort of more famous as a referee. He didn’t like the limelight when he was a headlining fighter himself, so he just sort of kept to himself.

No Holds Barred: He was inducted into the Australian Hall of Fame in 2003. Is he remembered well in Australia today? 

Jack Caroll: and the
rise of Australian Boxing

Paul Cupitt: Well, when Ron Richards died a lot of people from the boxing world attended, but when Carroll died there was very little mention in the newspapers because he’d just sort of disappeared off the radar. So, unfortunately he isn’t as well remembered as he should be, which is one of the reasons I focused the book on him. A lot of the older generation remember him, but Australians have had a number of world champions since: Jimmy Carruthers, Lionel Rose, Johnny Famechon, Kostya Tszyu, and Jeff Fenech, for example; so, we’ve had quite a few guys. Even though being ranked in the top five in the 1930s was harder than winning a world title today, a lot of people just look at him and don’t really rate him because he never won a world title, which I think is more of a misunderstanding of the era than anything else. But, he was consistently our biggest drawcard in Australian boxing history; if you look at the top ten highest attendances, I think he’s in there four or five times. His fight with Jannazzo I think held the record for the largest attendance right up until Fenech versus Azumah Nelson, and that fight was in 1937.

No Holds Barred: Did people attend those fights from all over or were they mostly locals?

Paul Cupitt: It was more of a local thing I think. The stadium was right in the busiest part of Sydney at the time, so people would just get the train out there to watch the fights. It was just something everyone did on a Monday night; a lot of the fights in Australia at the time were on Mondays.

No Holds Barred: Yeah, back in the day lots of venues held boxing shows on pretty much any day of the week, especially in the UK and USA.

Paul Cupitt: In Australia, you’d have shows in Sydney Stadium on Monday night, Wednesday night there’d be shows at Leichhardt and Melbourne, Friday night there was a big show in Brisbane, then there was a bigger show on Saturday night in Melbourne. Then you had all the smaller shows like Newtown, Newcastle, and in smaller suburbs in Victoria like Bendigo. So, there were fights every night of the week in Australia at the time.

No Holds Barred: With the size of Australia and lack of modern transportation, did it not put fans off of going to many events?

Paul Cupitt: With the more run-of-the-mill shows like most of Carroll’s fights before he fought all the world-rated guys, they were attended more by locals. But, with the really big shows - like the third Henneberry-Palmer fight - hotels were booked out weeks in advance before the fight.

No Holds Barred: You mentioned you met his family. What do they think of the book?

Jack Carroll: and the
rise of Australian Boxing

Paul Cupitt: They love it! They think it’s fantastic that somebody has kept his memories alive and hope it will keep him alive for future generations. I didn’t find out that his daughters were still alive until after the book came out. There’s not a lot of people still around from that era, so just the word of Facebook got back to them. Very athletic family, the Hardwick family: Carroll’s great-grandson plays Australian football for one of the Premiership teams, one of his daughters is in the national basketball hall of fame, and his other daughter played softball for Australia.

No Holds Barred: Finally, how can fans buy your book?

Paul Cupitt: Australians can order it from their local bookstore. It’s also available online: you can order it from Amazon, Book Depository, Wordery, and some other online stores.

No Holds Barred: It’s been a pleasure talking to you about a fascinating period in Australian boxing.

PART 1 - Paul Cupitt Interview: Author of Jack Carroll: And the Rise of Australian Boxing

Paul Cupitt is an Australian boxer, trainer, boxing historian, and most recently author of the recently published book: 'Jack Carroll: And the Rise of Australian Boxing'. I interviewed him about his book, and learned a lot about a period of boxing in Australia i knew nothing about. I have received a copy of his book, and my interview with him has certainly made me look forward to reading it. I have decided to publish the interview in two parts. I hope you enjoy the read. 

No Holds Barred: Firstly, can you tell us about yourself?

Paul Cupitt: I’ve lived in Newcastle, New South Wales, Australia, for most of my life. I also spent a bit of time in Sydney. I got interested in boxing when I was younger; about the time of the Holyfield-Tyson fight. It was just a sort of casual interest at that time and grew much larger around the Tyson-Lewis fight and I’ve been a pretty hardcore fan ever since then. I’ve worked in probably every role in boxing apart from promoting since I became involved in the sport. I had an amateur career that lasted about five or six years; I won the Australian amateur boxing league title in 2012, turned pro about eighteen months later, had a couple of pro fights. Haven’t fought for about four years now, but I wouldn’t say I’ve retired just yet. I’m more of a trainer and historian now; I’ve been a member of the International Boxing Research Organization for about three years. I teach kids boxing at the local youth club; training at the grassroots level.

No Holds Barred: You fought as an amateur for five or six years?

Paul Cupitt: Yeah, on and off. I had my first fight in 2006 and my last one in about 2013. There was about three years in there where I didn’t fight.

No Holds Barred: So, you started quite late then?

Paul Cupitt: Yeah, I had my first fight just before my twentieth birthday. My dad took me to the gym to let off a bit of steam when I was a teenager. I sort of went from being a hardcore fan to falling in love with the sport completely.

No Holds Barred: Did you plan to be a professional fighter for longer or did you just want to give it a try?

Paul Cupitt: I had planned to do more; my career got side-tracked before it even started really. It’s very big on selling tickets in Australia; I guess that’s the same everywhere. I had a lot of people backing me when I first turned pro, but a couple of bad promotions where people bought tickets and then the fights fell through, so the people stopped buying tickets. It’s a hard sport when you haven’t got anyone with money behind you. So, it just sort of fizzled out. I’m also quite injury prone.

No Holds Barred: Now you train fighters?

Paul Cupitt: Yeah, I’ve helped out training probably four or five pros. I help out with one guy at the moment, but he lives quite a fair distance away. So, I sort of help corner him. I’m just trying to be involved in the lower levels and groom them from the lower levels up now; I think getting kids involved in boxing at a younger age makes a big difference.

No Holds Barred: So, what made you choose to write a book about Jack Carroll?

Paul Cupitt: Well, I originally started the project as a book on Ron Richards and Fred Henneberry, who were two Australian middleweights that fought each other ten times. I’d just sort of run out of things to read and wanted to read something on Australian boxing, and I knew the story of those two; I knew about Carroll as well. Richards was an Aboriginal boxer from Queensland, and Henneberry was a white, working class guy from New South Wales, so it was like a natural rivalry; especially back in the 1930s. It was quite a heated rivalry: five of their ten fights ended in disqualifications. I wrote about thirty-thousand words on them before I got to Henneberry’s bouts with Carroll; just sort of reading about them - especially the second and third fights where Carroll beat him - and just how much the Australian people loved Carroll, made me switch the focus onto him. The stuff I wrote about Richards and Henneberry stayed in the book because I felt it added to Carroll’s legacy. I think Carroll isn’t just one of the unsung heroes of Australian boxing, but also one of the unsung heroes of Australian sport. The other big athlete at the time when Carroll was fighting was Sir Donald Bradman. I mean, you’d probably know who Bradman was without even being Australian I think, but nobody knows who Carroll is; he doesn’t even have a Wikipedia page, and I think that’s a shame really because he was one of our greatest sportsman of the time.

Jack Carroll Owner: National Library of Australia

No Holds Barred: Why did so many of Richards’ fights with Henneberry end in disqualification?

Paul Cupitt: I think one of the earlier ones was a controversial one where Henneberry hit Richards in the back of the head; he was actually on his way to winning by knockout in that fight. As for the later ones, Henneberry was a businessman; he used to gamble large sums of money on his fights, and back then in Australia if a fight ended in disqualification, all bets were off. So, Henneberry had a habit if a fight wasn’t going his way; he’d start using headbutts and his shoulder in the clinch. He’d bet his whole purse on himself! Henneberry gets labelled as this dirty, racist fighter, but I don’t think he was either. He was very much a businessman; he did what he had to do to make money at a very tough time in the sport.

No Holds Barred: I checked out Richards’ and Henneberry’s records. I saw that Richards beat Gus Lesnevich and some other big names.

Paul Cupitt: Yeah, Richards battered Lesnevich! He dropped him twice from memory, I think. One of his eyes was swollen shut at the end of the fight; he battered him.

No Holds Barred: Had you written any other books before your book on Carroll?

Paul Cupitt: No. When I went looking for something to read on Australian boxing, I found there was nothing really written in detail apart from the obvious ones like Les Darcy and Jeff Fenech, and they were just overall history books on Australian boxing. But, this was really our golden era; Australian boxing was at its peak when these guys were fighting. So, one day I just sort of thought to myself, “how hard would it be to write a book on this?”, and just started researching it. I then started writing on the Richards-Henneberry rivalry. I’d written articles years ago, but they weren’t very good. I’ve always had an interest in writing about boxing, which I think comes from my reading habit. I’ve written a few articles in-between writing my book, which I think helped my skills as a writer. But, this was my first really big foray into writing.

No Holds Barred: How did you compile your research? Did you get any help with research, editing etc.?

Paul Cupitt: Harry Otty gave me some help; I was put in contact with him through being a part of the IBRO. He helped me format the book and get it out there. He basically gave me a crash course in self-publishing. Harry Otty wrote the book on Charley Burley; it’s an excellent book! It was actually the last book I read before I started working on my book, funnily enough. Harry had a quick read through what I’d written and told me to change this and change that. He helped me with things like how I had the dates set out and stuff like that; stuff I hadn’t even thought about. So, he helped me with the formatting of the book, which is a big deal because you get guys who charge as much as $5,000 for that sort of stuff online.

No Holds Barred: How long did it take you to write the book and how did you find the time?

Paul Cupitt: I pretty much had to balance writing with work. It was a four-year project; it was an on and off sort of thing. I started out just doing an hour here and hour there. It was all over the place; like I’d written bits about Henneberry and Richards, and then started writing bits about Ambrose Palmer who was another great Australian fighter at the time - he fought both Henneberry and Richards. He actually bested both of them in their series; he was much larger than them though. His most famous fight was probably against Young Stribling. Then, I started with bits on Carroll and I found there were big holes in the middle of the whole thing. Once I filled the gaps in and the book had its direction, I was working a full-time job towards the end; I was up at 6am, and some days writing all afternoon until midnight. My schedule depended on when my wife was working too so I wasn’t neglecting her too much. 

No Holds Barred: I read he was born Arthur Ernest Hardwick. Where did the name Jack Carroll come from?

Paul Cupitt: It was actually the birth name of one of the biggest stars in Melbourne at the time: Charlie Ring. Hardwick took the name Carroll so his mum wouldn’t find out he was boxing! Ring was actually at the first fight that Hardwick fought as Carroll; Ring looked on the bout sheet and saw his birth name on it and walked up to the person they said was Jack Carroll and said, “if you disgrace my name, I’ll disgrace you!”. So that was Jack Carroll’s first memory of his first fight; having a former Australian champion threaten him if he didn’t do well!

No Holds Barred: So, Charlie Ring was pretty decent too?

Paul Cupitt: Yeah, he was a former Australian middleweight champion; I think he lost the title in 1922. He was one of the biggest stars in Melbourne at the time Hardwick turned pro. He relocated to Britain, but not too sure how he did over there.

No Holds Barred: How famous was Carroll during his prime?

Jack Carroll & Don Bradman Owner: National Library of Australia

Paul Cupitt: Well, the only bigger athlete at the time in Australia was Don Bradman. The thing with Carroll was he hated the limelight, so he didn’t like people fussing over him; which is sort of why he was forgotten after he retired. His fight with Izzy Jannazzo was held in front of more than thirty thousand people. The first fight with Bep van Klaveren would have drawn more if it hadn’t rained; people were pulling things out of bins to shelter themselves because they wanted to stay there and watch him. That’s how much they loved him at that point!

No Holds Barred: Are Australians that averse to rain? In the UK, we’re so used to it, I don’t think anybody would really care if it rained [laughs].

Paul Cupitt: Well, it was in the middle of the summer and we get that real tropical, heavy rain here. This rainstorm apparently just came out of nowhere; it started raining just before eight o’clock and the fight was due to start at about eight thirty, so people were pulling bits out of bins and shielding themselves with things they found under the seats. They were just standing there with these makeshift covers and watching these two fight in a torrential downpour.

No Holds Barred: Was the ring not even covered?

Paul Cupitt: Well, it was on Boxing Day in the middle of the Australian summer, so they weren’t expecting rain. It was the promoter’s first open-air venture, so they were still doing things on the fly. They had a shelter set up in case it rained in the second fight though. 

No Holds Barred: Could you describe Carroll’s fighting style?

Jack Carroll Owner: National Library of Australia

Paul Cupitt: Well, there’s only four minutes of footage of his entire career. There are bits from his third fight with Henneberry, and the rest are from fights later in his career. I took a lot of footage from VCRs, and just sort of put it all together for YouTube. I think he’s often incorrectly labelled as a classy boxer; sort of in the stick and move type style. He was actually more of a wild-man who imposed his will on a lot of his opponents. I think the big thing that’s undeniable about his style was his work-rate and his speed; a lot of guys just couldn’t handle the sheer volume of the leather he threw at them. He was often cruising through fights behind his jab until the other guy nailed him, at which point he just started unloading on them. He was famous for his left hand; you’d rarely read about him using his right hand. He threw every punch with it; he would throw hooks and uppercuts up close; he threw it well to the body. His trainer, Bill O’Brien, helped him develop the great jab which complemented his height; he was just under one hundred and eighty centimetres tall, which is huge for a welterweight. From what I’ve seen of footage, the only modern-day guy he kind of reminds me of is Paul Williams; the way he used his size and style, and bombarding guys both at range and on the inside. 

No Holds Barred: Was Bill O’Brien a renown trainer?

Paul Cupitt: Carroll was his main charge; he didn’t really have anyone else as big as Carroll. He had a couple of other guys like Jack McNamee, who was a good fighter. There were a lot of really good trainers in Australia at the time; Ambrose Palmer became Johnny Famechon’s trainer, and Jack Carroll became a trainer for about ten years after he retired. Palmer and Carroll never fought each other professionally, but they often cornered against each other later in their careers. Palmer’s dad was friends with Peter Jackson, and before Jackson died, they’d been working together on the ultimate method of boxing which they called ‘the Method’. Palmer’s dad taught Ambrose and all of his brothers how to fight using the ‘Method’, which was a very sort of defensive style of boxing focusing on defence and using mainly the left hand, and just waiting for the opening for the right hand. So, there were a lot of good trainers in Australia at the time; Bill O’Brien was one of the more underrated ones. He was also a full-time barber, so he didn’t really have the means to get around with his fighters; so, I think a lot of guys left him. That’s the impression I got from the research, but I couldn’t really find the evidence to be sure.

No Holds Barred: Did Carroll have much of an amateur career?

Paul Cupitt: No. A lot of guys just turned pro early on to make extra money at the time. He used to spar his friends at school and stuff like that, but nothing official.

No Holds Barred: Amateur boxing doesn’t seem as big back then as it is in modern times.

Paul Cupitt: Especially in Australia. We had some good Olympians like Snowy Baker, who I think was one of the few Australians who won an Olympic medal. I don’t think he ever fought professionally though. He played rugby union and swam; he was a multi-sport athlete. He ended up being one of Les Darcy’s promoters; he even promoted on the West Coast of America towards the end of his life. There wasn’t much of an amateur system in Australia at the time; a lot of guys just turned pro young, like Carroll who turned pro at seventeen.

No Holds Barred: He began his pro career at bantamweight, before moving up to lightweight, and then welterweight soon after. What made him transition through weight classes in such a small period of time?  

Paul Cupitt: I think it was just because of the young age he turned pro. It was customary in Australia at the time to have a 2pm weigh-in, so it wasn’t like guys were cutting a lot of weight. Being almost one hundred eighty centimetres tall, it didn’t take long for him to fill out from being a boy to a man. So, I think he just naturally put the weight on. He turned pro at seventeen and I’d say he was a fully formed welterweight by about twenty-one. He won the title when he was twenty-two, I think. I met some of his family a few weeks ago; his grandson showed me a photo they had which I’d never seen before. Most of the photos you see of him are of him in his late twenties/early thirties, but in this one he couldn’t have been twenty years old; full set of blonde hair; a beautiful photo.

No Holds Barred: He won the Australian welterweight title in 1928 against the British-born Al Bourke via seventh round stoppage. How big a deal was his win in Australia at the time?

Paul Cupitt: Being Australian champion in the 1920s/30s was quite a big deal. It’s not like nowadays where Australian guys can bypass national honours and fight for IBF Pan-Pacific and WBA Oceania titles. You had to win the Australian title before being able to fight for the Empire title, which was the next one up. So, you had to prove you were the best in Australia first. With there only being eight weight classes at the time, and with boxing being as popular as it was back then, being one of the eight champions in Australia meant everyone knew who you were.

No Holds Barred: So, being Australian champion back then was a bit like being British or European champion back in the day?

Paul Cupitt: It wasn’t as big as being European champion, but being Australian champion was definitely a big deal. Guys would come from America, Britain, Canada and other countries to fight the Australian champion because they knew they could make a lot of money.

No Holds Barred: How popular was boxing in Australia at the time?

Paul Cupitt: Oh, boxing was huge during that era! It was already huge before Carroll started. It’s surprising to hear now, but when Carroll was at his best boxing was bigger than cricket and rugby league. The only sport that was bigger than boxing at the time was horse racing. With Australia being a Mecca of boxing before the First World War - Bob Fitzsimmons started his pro career here, Jack Johnson, Sam Langford, Sam McVea all toured Australia - and prior to the Walker Law being passed in America, many American fighters came to Australia because we had such a solid system in place; fights were scheduled for 20-rounds, they were scored, large crowds attended, and there were no issues with the police or anything like that. But, after Les Darcy died the popularity dropped off. It came back first with Henneberry and Palmer and then later with Carroll and Richards.

No Holds Barred: Carroll lost the title to Charlie Purdy later in 1928 via disqualification in what appears to have been a non-title fight. Why did the title change hands, and why did Carroll not protest?

Paul Cupitt: Well, it’s an interesting one. Purdy sort of claimed the title, but Carroll was still recognised as the champion by the major stadiums because he hadn’t lost under championship conditions. Because there wasn’t a rematch, both men kept their claim to the title. Then, Purdy lost the title to Wally Hancock who was signed to Leichhardt Stadium - which was the rival to Sydney Stadium - meaning that Carroll couldn’t fight Hancock, so it was pretty much like the politics around today. Carroll eventually beat ‘Bluey’ Jones and that reunified the titles, but he never officially lost it, at least in the eyes of Stadiums Limited who ran boxing in the major stadiums at the time. Purdy was one of his main sparring partners later in his career.

No Holds Barred: So, was it a bit like Carroll was still considered the champion but Purdy held the title?

Paul Cupitt: No, it was sort of the other way around. Carroll still held the title, but a lot of people considered Purdy the champion. There hadn’t actually been an agreement for the title to be on the line, but because they both made the weight, Purdy claimed that he was the new champion. The public didn’t really warm to Carroll until he beat Henneberry in the rematch. So, when Purdy claimed he was the champion, a lot of the crowds just sort of went with it. It was just because Carroll was so dominant. He didn’t really look like a boxer - he was described as having ‘lolly pink skin’, I think the term is; blonde hair, tall and lanky, just not your stereotypical muscle-head boxer. That sort of turned the crowds against him early on, but as he started beating all of these guys, he won the crowds over eventually.

No Holds Barred: He fought a lot of boxers who some readers may not be familiar with. Could you tell us about some of his more famous opponents? What made them stand out from the rest?

Jack Carroll & Tod Morgan

Paul Cupitt: Well, starting with the world ranked guys: his biggest win was probably against Bep van Klaveren; he was the number one welterweight contender when Carroll beat him. He was also an Olympic gold medallist. He’d beaten some good fighters leading up to the fight like Kid Azteca and Ceferino Garcia. He was robbed against Young Corbett, although he was beaten fairly in the rematch. At the time, he was being groomed to fight welterweights Jimmy McLarnin or Barney Ross for the world title. But, he took a huge money offer to fight Carroll, who nobody in America had heard of at the time. Carroll won almost every round in both of their fights; those fights sort of catapulted Carroll to the top of the rankings. Wesley Ramey was another big win; he was the number one contender at lightweight and is often considered one the greatest fighters to never win a world title. He’d beaten Tony Canzoneri not long before he came to Australia. Although Carroll was a lot bigger than Ramey; Carroll was a huge welterweight whereas Ramey was an average-sized lightweight. Richards and Henneberry were both at some point ranked in the top five at middleweight in the world, and Carroll beat them both easily. Tod Morgan was a former super-featherweight world champion; he made around ten defences of that title. He also beat guys like Jack Portney and Willard Brown, who were top five welterweight contenders. I don’t think some people today realise how big a deal that is; at that time, there were four times as many professional boxers and there weren’t all the multiple sanctioning bodies. Nowadays, if you’re a top five contender, you’re really in the top twenty boxers in your division. There were also less weight classes, so being ranked in the top five back then was probably harder than actually winning a world title today.

No Holds Barred: Also, a lot of people today don’t realise that losses were much less damaging to a career than they are today. Also, a lot of fighters back then sparred much less than today, so a lot of fights back then could perhaps be described as competitive sparring sessions.

Paul Cupitt: Yeah, exactly. Also, you had guys fighting back then with broken hands and cuts still healing from a fight two weeks before. As long as they put on a good show, the crowd would keep coming back; a hard-fought loss was sometimes better than a win where you didn’t look too good.

No Holds Barred: Some fights back then were declared ‘No Contests’ if the referee deemed the fighters hadn’t made enough effort.

Paul Cupitt: Carroll had a couple of those; one of the last blemishes on his record was the fight before he fought van Klaveren. He fought a fighter called Paul Schaeffer. The newspapers gave this big promotion on Schaeffer, who was the British or Canadian champion - he was sort of half British, half Canadian - and when they came out, Carroll just murdered him to the point where the referee had had enough, but instead of stopping the fight and declaring Carroll the winner, he called it a No Contest. Carroll got paid but they didn’t pay Schaeffer. That was actually Carroll’s last fight at Sydney Stadium; after that he signed for a new promoter who was previously working at Sydney Stadium but wanted to start an open-air venture, and that sort of led to the van Klaveren fights and Carroll’s legacy as Australia’s greatest drawcard.

No Holds Barred: He also fought many opponents several times, such as Fred Henneberry, Roy Stewart, Jack Smith, Harry Casey, Charlie Purdy, Jimmy Leto, and several others. Are these renown rivalries in Australia in the same way Jack Britton vs Ted ‘Kid’ Lewis or Muhammad Ali vs Joe Frazier are in the UK and USA?

Paul Cupitt: Not so much with all of those names. There was a huge rivalry between Carroll and Henneberry. With those other guys, Australian boxing sort of had some really top guys and some much lower guys, and the guys in the middle sort of had to fight each other quite a few times, and if it was a good fight the promoters were quick to put it on again the following week if both fighters were still good to fight again. Henneberry’s rivalries with Richards and Palmer were by far fiercer rivalries than those with Carroll; I think that’s probably more to do with Carroll being pretty much peerless in Australia at the time. Palmer was the Australian heavyweight and light-heavyweight champion at the time, and he wouldn’t put the titles on the line against Carroll because he knew it was a fight he wasn’t guaranteed to win; Carroll chased the fight with Palmer for a year.

No Holds Barred: He wanted to fight Palmer at light-heavyweight?!

Paul Cupitt: He wanted to fight him for the heavyweight title! He was willing to fight him at any weight. Palmer fought Young Stribling with a fifteen pounds weight disadvantage, yet he wouldn’t fight Carroll with a twenty pounds weight advantage! They sparred a fair bit, so he knew Carroll wouldn’t be an easy fight. Carroll and Palmer were the two best guys in Australia at the time, so even though there was such a size disadvantage for Carroll, he wanted that fight because it was the biggest money fight for him at the time.

No Holds Barred: So, Carroll and Palmer were the two biggest names at that time?

Ambrose Palmer
Owner: Boxrec

Paul Cupitt: Yeah, at that time they were. Henneberry was still working his way up. His stock dropped a bit after Carroll beat him, and Richards’ stock dropped a bit after Henneberry beat him in their third fight. It wasn’t until his [Richards’] bouts with Deacon Leo Kelly, who was a world rated light-heavyweight at the time, that he became a really big star in Australia.

No Holds Barred: Carroll was knocked out by the heavier and future Australian middleweight champion Fred Henneberry in the thirteenth round of their first fight in February 1932. Was he close to victory prior to the knockout?  

Jack Carroll & Fred Henneberry Owner: National Library of Australia

Paul Cupitt: He was winning that fight easily for the first ten rounds. He had a hand injury which had been plaguing him for a bit leading up to that fight, so he was ring rusty. His daughter had just been born too, so his match fitness wasn’t at the level it normally was. But, he was well ahead after ten rounds, then he got tired and Henneberry had just sort of found his groove as a fifteen-round fighter and just took over in the last couple of rounds. Carroll took the ten-count, but the fatigue had set in. Henneberry just sort of battered him to the ground and Carroll was just too tired to get up. All the reports of the fight were talking of Carroll dominating the fight and then becoming exhausted and Henneberry getting stronger and stronger and eventually cornering him, putting him down, and him not being able to get up.

No Holds Barred: He later defeated Henneberry twice on points, again outweighed both times. How significant were those wins?

Paul Cupitt: They were huge. The second fight was one of Carroll’s first fights in a long time in front of his hometown fans. Henneberry refused to put the title on the line because he knew he wasn’t guaranteed to retain it, so he refused to weigh in leading up to the second fight. Carroll then beat him to a pulp; he swelled both of his eyes shut. Outside of his second fight with van Klaveren, it was probably his finest display in the ring. There were constant delays for the third fight; Henneberry had boils on his shoulder, I think, and Carroll came down with the flu, so the date changed a few times. Then, Henneberry pulled the same stunt again and refused to put the title on the line; he weighed in this time, but he wouldn’t put the title on the line. It ended up being the same situation that Carroll had with Purdy but reversed. So, Carroll was claiming the middleweight title but Henneberry was still considered the champion. Then, Hugh McIntosh became involved again in boxing in Australia and basically said, “Henneberry’s the middleweight champion and Carroll’s the welterweight champion” and just sort of left it at that, so Carroll stopped trying for the middleweight title.

Check out PART TWO of this exclusive interview with Paul Cupitt tomorrow.