In early 1916, a frenzied group of fight promoters gathered in Barcelona to organize what promised to be a 'sensational encounter' between former world heavyweight champion Jack Johnson (the famous black fighter who was living in Europe, a fugitive from his native land because of charges of having violated the Mann Act) and Arthur Cravan, an outspoken, notoriously eccentric Englishman, who claimed not only to be a professional fighter, but also the nephew of Oscar Wilde. Posters were hung throughout the city to publicize the event. In the controversial match, which took place at the Plaza de Toros Monumental on Sunday afternoon, April 23, we can safely surmise that Cravan fought true to form, that is, leading more with his mouth than with his fists. After six rounds of what must have amounted to little more than a skillful demonstration of shadow boxing - staged more for the benefit of a rolling camera than the disappointed audience - Johnson finally dropped Cravan with an upper-right/left-cross combination. Knockout or not, the audience smelled farce, and because of the guaranteed fifty-thousand-peseta purse, the next day the daily press proclaimed the fight 'The Great Swindle.'
For Johnson, it was just one more relatively uneventful 'ring contest,' as he called it, arranged for the benefit of his pocketbook. For Cravan, it was the main event in his tragically short life; two and one-half years later, at the age of thirty-one, he would disappear off the coast of Mexico, leaving behind only scant traces of a fascinating and adventurous life, one that stretched from the outback of Australia to the inner circle of vanguard artists and poets on both sides of the Atlantic.
Though he claimed to be a light-heavyweight champion (of something, somewhere) Cravan, according to Boxrec, had absolutely no competitive experience prior to the fight. Indeed, his official record notes that he fought only three bouts: With Johnson (knocked out); against Frank Hoche (a draw, June 26, 1916); and against Jim Smith ("The Black Diamond" with only this fight to his credit) in Mexico City, September 15, 1918 (knocked out). With a record of no wins, two losses via knock-out, and a draw his only threat as a boxer was to his own safety.
(By Stephen J. Gertz)
