This true tale is mainly about Barnsley’s Kevin Fisher and his links to one of the greatest British boxers in history – Randolph Turpin. But to start with, I’ll explain how I first heard of Turpin.
My father hero-worshipped this black British boxer from Warwick. One evening, in the 1960s, while he drew on a Park Drive cigarette, he told me: “When Turpin fought the world champion, Sugar Ray Robinson, no one gave him an earthly, but I felt sure that evening in 1951, that Turpin would upset the apple-cart. So, like all boxing fans, I listened to the radio commentary for all 15 rounds, until the ref finally raised Turpin’s arm in triumph. He’d become the new World Middleweight Champion and there was pandemonium at Earls Court.”
My dad went on to explain that Turpin was only beaten in his prime when he was very troubled, or in later life when he was made ‘punch drunk’ through a thousand heavy blows to the head. Eventually, in 1961, the British Boxing Board of Control recognised Turpin’s vulnerability and withdrew his licence to fight.
“Sadly, the poor fella never really stood a chance,” said my dad, shaking his head. “There was no one to look after him at any point of his career. Instead, the exploiters chewed him up and spat him out. Randolph must have been aware of this because he tried to take personal responsibility for his affairs, but made a complete hash of it. He was hopeless at keeping written records and allowed the parasites to leech off him, or trick him into bad investments and loans. And when he was skint, all the lousy bloodsuckers disappeared back into the woodwork.”
By the early 1960s, Randolph Turpin was all washed up and penniless but he hit on a novel idea for making a modest income. The Boxing Authorities might have withdrawn his licence but no one could stop him from boxing against professional wrestlers for a generous purse. However, when the novelty wore off, he was reduced to fighting purely as a wrestler for a much smaller fee.
Sometime in the early 1960s, Turpin (accompanied by his sister Joan, for moral support) came to Barnsley to wrestle, but there was going to be no exploitation here – Sam Betts would see to that. It’s well documented that at this time, Betts, the famous Barnsley wrestler, was up to his eyes trying to create a union of wrestlers to prevent them from being swindled (Google: Ingleburgh – wrestlingfurnace.site). For Turpin’s protection, Betts appointed his trusted corner-man, John Denton Fisher, to look after him and his sister whilst they lodged in Barnsley.
“Come here Kev and let me introduce you to the greatest British boxer that’s ever lived,” he told his seven-year-old son, at their council home on Swaithedale, Worsbrough. “This is Randolph Turpin and his sister Joan, and they’ll be sleeping at ours tonight.”
Kev recalls that Randolph and his sister were the very first black people he’d ever seen in his life. He’d seen black people on TV but never face-to-face. To the young Kevin Fisher, meeting Randolph Turpin was the thrill of a lifetime.
A few years later, Randolph was still being let down by his debtors and hounded by his creditors – especially the Income Tax Office, who refused to believe he had not received a penny for his second world title fight.
Then one day tragedy struck: Randolph was thought to have shot his own daughter twice and then took his own life. At the post mortem a bullet was found lodged against his skull but a second fatal shot pierced his heart. At the inquest, the coroner recorded a verdict of suicide. His daughter miraculously survived.
However, Randolph’s brothers and sisters fought the coroner’s decision tooth and nail because of a significant typed letter he’d written a short while before his apparent suicide. In it, Randolph claimed that several attempts had already been made on his life, to stop him speaking out against all those in the world of boxing who were guilty of corrupt business deals.
In 2001 Randolph Turpin was inducted into the International Hall of Fame in New York, and in the same year a wonderful bronze statue of him was unveiled in Warwick.
Randolph sometimes expressed his frustrations in poetry. He once wrote: “So we leave this game which was hard and cruel/And down at the show on a ringside stool/We’ll watch the next man, just one more fool”.