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A look back at the life and career of Bartley Madden, a New York-based Irish heavyweight who headlined a boxing event at Croke Park in 1926, nearly a century before Katie Taylor.
This weekend it is Katie Taylor’s turn but 100 years ago a New York-based Irish heavyweight was the big draw at GAA headquartersTom Heaney and Bartley Madden at Croke Park in August 1926.
Madden was the last Irish fighter before Katie Taylor to headline a boxing event at Croke Park, DC on March 5th, 1930. He had plummeted 23 feet down stone steps yet somehow remained conscious enough to intermittently talk to those who treated him. In an accent still reeking of his west ofAt the Dispensary and Emergency Hospital, doctors discovered broken ribs and a shattered hip, but it was internal injuries that ultimately killed the 39-year-old.
The New York Times reported the death of a “Trial Horse Boxer”, an accurate description of a redoubtable journeyman who had served as a useful way station for more talented contenders on the road toward shots at the heavyweight title. Nearly a century later, his footnote in history is that he was the last Irish pugilist before Katie Taylor to headline a boxing event at Croke Park.
Twelve thousand braved the rain down Jones Road of an August evening in 1926 to see him square off against Tom Heeney, the New Zealand-born son of a Corkman. Sold as a clash between “the two gamest heavyweights in the world”, Belfast promoter Jim Rice guaranteed each boxer £100, with the winner taking home £750. The undercard started at 6pm and included Battling Brannigan, billed on posters around town as “Dublin’s most promising boy.
” Madden was a grizzled veteran combatant climbing through the ropes that summer evening, his second fight at GAA headquarters. Born in Caltra, Galway, his family migrated to Ballymurry, Roscommon where he played centrefield for the county. Having honed his fistic skills in the British navy, one of his scars was supposedly the legacy of being run through with a bayonet on the high seas.
A myth easily believed by American fight fans who watched him shrug off all manner of gruesome injury in battle. Gianni Infantino jets off in search kindlier footballing friends “Tis the blood of Bartley Madden which smears the page, red blood that flew from his wounds as the giant black from New Orleans, Harry Wills, battered at his face and body with a pair of soggy gloves,” wrote Damon Runyon of their showdown at Queensboro Stadium.
“There’s a dull, rust-coloured spot here that stands for the 12th round when Wills first clawed an old scab from a wound of other fields from Madden’s eyebrow, and when Madden, a red smear from head to foot, staggered weakly, 16,000 people groaned in anticipation of the finish of a brave lad. ” Outlandish versions of Madden’s resume credit him with 200 wins from 300 outings. More credible accounts claim 52 wins, 14 losses, four draws, and 24 no decisions.
All cite memorable brawls with evocatively named characters like Battling Levinsky, Sailor Carroll, Guardsman Penwill, Porky Flynn, Chief Metoquah, Soldier Delaney, and Kid Elle. He fought Leo Gates before 80,000 the day Jack Dempsey defeated Luis Firpo at the New York Polo Grounds in 1923, and, two years later, future title holder Gene Tunney became the first and only man to knock the one-time Irish champion out.
The sight of Madden going down from a right cross to the jaw in the third was so shocking it spawned conspiracy theories he had been kidnapped and his legs tampered with before the contest.
“He had the greatest fighting heart of any fighting man,” said Tunney. “I do not believe the ring ever had a truer sportsman or a more competitive fighter. ” For Heeney, he trained at the Depot in Phoenix Park where pro sparring partners were supplemented by plucky gardaí getting in the ring to try their luck.
For all the work, he struggled against the more chiselled Antipodean, 11 years his junior, with previous occupations that included lumberjack and serious rugby player, unconfirmed press reports even reckoning he had once been an All-Black. Their contest lasted 20 rounds, some reckoned 18 of which went to the visitor.
“It was Madden who urged me to go to America,” said Heeney. “During the fight – bitter scrap that it was, he spoke his mind. ‘You are wasting your time over here, Heeney,’ he said. ‘Go to the States and you will do well.
”His extraordinary ability to stay the course against the finest heavyweights of the time earned Madden $200,000 in purses. Inevitably, he fought too much too often, was ripped off by managers and died, like so many boxers then, now and forever, penniless. Fundraisers were held to assist his infant son and namesake. In his pomp, American crowds marvelled at a gamer remaining upright even as his blood pollocked the canvas.
Being blessed with what one reporter called “an iron jaw and an Indian rubber torso” was both gift and curse.
“They paid to watch this pulpy fleshed hulk with a bulldog heart take a beating,” reported the New York Daily News of another grisly defeat. “Between rounds, handlers of Madden poured iodine into his open wounds. They tried to clear his poor dazed brain with ammonia.
Then, after a few moments rest, Madden would stagger out, flapping his stubby arms like a penguin’s wings to take another trashing. ” Between rounds, near the end of his epic beat-down by Wills, referee Eddie Purdy visited the Irishman’s corner to survey his crime scene of a face and perhaps call a merciful halt to his suffering.
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