'Oh, oh!' I said to myself, 'this fellow is tough.' I decided then to box him. For four rounds I hit him so often about the head that my wrist began to get sore and I shifted to his body. Then in the eighth round I hit him again with another solid right, just above the eye. I saw Heeney back away, trying to pry open his eye with his glove, even though the eye hadn't been closed.
I knew what had happened. I had had two personal friends lose the sight of an eye after being hit in that spot. It damages the blood vessel, you know. Heeney had been temporarily blinded. I stepped back and did not hit him again for the rest of the round.
Between rounds it was my habit to observe my opponent's corner. I saw Jimmy Dawson, a boxing writer, rush over to ask Charley Harvey, who managed Heeney, what had happened. Then I saw Harvey make a jabbing motion with his thumb, implying that I had stuck my thumb in Heeney's eye.
I was furious....for the next two rounds I gave Heeney a terrible beating—the worst beating of his life, and all because of his manager. But in the 11th round he was still rushing me. 'There's heart!' I said to myself. I evaded him, and he almost fell. Then I turned to the referee and said: " 'If you want me to go on hitting this man, I won't be responsible for the consequences.' And he stopped the fight.
During the last war I made a trip to the Solomon Islands. I found that Heeney was also there—he had become an American citizen and a first-class seaman in the Seabees. I had him transferred, which was a very difficult thing to do, and made a chief athletic specialist, tripling his pay.
Now sometime after the war I ran into Ernest Hemingway, and he said, 'Tom Heeney tells me you were a dirty fighter.'
'Tom Heeney said that? Do you mind if I ask him about it?'
Hemingway said he had no objections. So the next time I was in Miami I took a cab over to Heeney's bar on the Beach. I walked in and had a Martini, but there was no sign of Tom. Then a woman came over and said she was Mrs. Heeney. She said that some men at the bar had told her I was Gene Tunney.
She called Tom, who was at his apartment, and when he arrived I repeated what Hemingway had told me.
'Yes, Gene,' Heeney said. 'You were a dirty fighter.'
'Tom, I don't understand you,' I said. 'Would it be reasonable for me to try to maim you, and then immediately step back and allow you to recover?'
Heeney had to admit that it wouldn't be at all reasonable. Well, we parted friends, but I don't know even today if that man believed in his heart that I was telling the truth."
(Gene Tunney)
