authority in anyorganized fight be the referee. In a narrow sense, the boxing ref was an extraordinarily powerful figure, particularly because the level of betting on boxing matches was huge, even if punts the size of the one which the Duke of Cumberland had lost a century before were now rare.
By 1868 the West Ham pumping station project is completed and William, Bridget and their growing family are on the move again, still in West Ham, but now to 21 Greengate Street. William continues as a general labourer and fathers twins, Maria and William, who arrive in 1869, to be followed four years later by Emily. The family is now as large, with five children, as it is going to get.
At around the time of Emily’s birth in 1873, it seems that Bridget Cooper dies, quite possibly in childbirth; she would have been 40 at the time. William remarries a local Plaistow girl, Mary, whose maiden name we cannot discover. As significant as his remarriage is the fact that William and his brood decide to relocate completely; they head south of the Thames to 19 Williams Place, near the Elephant & Castle in Newington. By that time, the relentless urbanization and gentrification of the Plaistow district had reduced the differences between the teeming anthill of humanity that characterizes the south bank of the Thames and the urban sprawl which replaces the once rural Essex borders to almost nil. It is quite likely that the Coopers have been priced out of their neighbourhood.
South of the river, it is all rather different. In nearby Bermondsey there are regular riots and marches by disaffected (and hungry) dockers and their families that regularly spill over into Westminster and the City ofLondon. More than once the Army is called out to disperse them. There is disease, too, which rips through the crowded tenements with blinding speed. Cholera is the most common, but despite the heroic efforts of men like Bazalguette, the state of public health is still quite dire and infant mortality is at levels that are found today in the third world. Dysentery is a particular killer.
Interestingly, all three men of working age in the Cooper family are now involved with horses, which suggests, but does not confirm, that William Cooper’s own rural origins possibly had an equestrian flavour to them before he moved to London. William, who is now 49, is by no means too old to wield a pick or shovel, but he has forsaken jobbing labouring and is now described as a ‘Horse Keeper to a bakery’. Eldest son Charles has done even better: he is described as a ‘Riding-Master’, and little George Cooper, by now only 17, is following a similar career, but without notable success yet – he is a ‘Horse Keeper out of employ’.
But George has also discovered boxing, as the echoes of ‘Donnelly and Cooper’ ring down the years. Unfortunately, the forces of law and order have it under the microscope, in a last ditch effort to stamp it out. In 1882, Mr Justice Hawkins in the case of Regina versus Coney (Coney is clearly a prizefighter) handed down a landmark decision:
Every fight in which the object and intent of each of the combatants is to subdue the other by violent blows is a breach of the peace and it matters not, in my opinion, whether such a fight be a hostile fight begun in anger, or a prizefight for money or other advantage. In each case the object is the same and in each case someamount of personal injury to one or both of the combatants is a probable consequence; and although a prizefight may not commence in anger, it is unquestionably calculated to rouse the angry feelings of both before its conclusion. I have no doubt, then, that every such fight is illegal and the parties to it may be prosecuted for assaults upon each other. Many authorities support this view.
Indeed they did. Hawkins’s pronouncement was one of a long line of negative verdicts as to the suitability of boxing as either sport or spectacle; for this reason, some subtle practices
By 1868 the West Ham pumping station project is completed and William, Bridget and their growing family are on the move again, still in West Ham, but now to 21 Greengate Street. William continues as a general labourer and fathers twins, Maria and William, who arrive in 1869, to be followed four years later by Emily. The family is now as large, with five children, as it is going to get.
At around the time of Emily’s birth in 1873, it seems that Bridget Cooper dies, quite possibly in childbirth; she would have been 40 at the time. William remarries a local Plaistow girl, Mary, whose maiden name we cannot discover. As significant as his remarriage is the fact that William and his brood decide to relocate completely; they head south of the Thames to 19 Williams Place, near the Elephant & Castle in Newington. By that time, the relentless urbanization and gentrification of the Plaistow district had reduced the differences between the teeming anthill of humanity that characterizes the south bank of the Thames and the urban sprawl which replaces the once rural Essex borders to almost nil. It is quite likely that the Coopers have been priced out of their neighbourhood.
South of the river, it is all rather different. In nearby Bermondsey there are regular riots and marches by disaffected (and hungry) dockers and their families that regularly spill over into Westminster and the City ofLondon. More than once the Army is called out to disperse them. There is disease, too, which rips through the crowded tenements with blinding speed. Cholera is the most common, but despite the heroic efforts of men like Bazalguette, the state of public health is still quite dire and infant mortality is at levels that are found today in the third world. Dysentery is a particular killer.
Interestingly, all three men of working age in the Cooper family are now involved with horses, which suggests, but does not confirm, that William Cooper’s own rural origins possibly had an equestrian flavour to them before he moved to London. William, who is now 49, is by no means too old to wield a pick or shovel, but he has forsaken jobbing labouring and is now described as a ‘Horse Keeper to a bakery’. Eldest son Charles has done even better: he is described as a ‘Riding-Master’, and little George Cooper, by now only 17, is following a similar career, but without notable success yet – he is a ‘Horse Keeper out of employ’.
But George has also discovered boxing, as the echoes of ‘Donnelly and Cooper’ ring down the years. Unfortunately, the forces of law and order have it under the microscope, in a last ditch effort to stamp it out. In 1882, Mr Justice Hawkins in the case of Regina versus Coney (Coney is clearly a prizefighter) handed down a landmark decision:
Every fight in which the object and intent of each of the combatants is to subdue the other by violent blows is a breach of the peace and it matters not, in my opinion, whether such a fight be a hostile fight begun in anger, or a prizefight for money or other advantage. In each case the object is the same and in each case someamount of personal injury to one or both of the combatants is a probable consequence; and although a prizefight may not commence in anger, it is unquestionably calculated to rouse the angry feelings of both before its conclusion. I have no doubt, then, that every such fight is illegal and the parties to it may be prosecuted for assaults upon each other. Many authorities support this view.
Indeed they did. Hawkins’s pronouncement was one of a long line of negative verdicts as to the suitability of boxing as either sport or spectacle; for this reason, some subtle practices
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