Thomas Gummer (1894–1982) was a British

middleweight Middleweight is a weight class in combat sports. Boxing Professional In professional boxing, the middleweight division is contested above and up to . Early boxing history is less than exact, but the middleweight designation seems to have beg ...

and

heavyweight Heavyweight is a weight class in combat sports and professional wrestling. Boxing Professional Male boxers who weigh over are considered heavyweights by 2 of the 4 major professional boxing organizations: the International Boxing Federation an ...

boxer who won the British middleweight title in 1920 and went on to fight for the European title.

Career

Born in

Rotherham Rotherham ( ) is a market town in South Yorkshire, England. It lies at the confluence of the River Rother, South Yorkshire, River Rother, from which the town gets its name, and the River Don, Yorkshire, River Don. It is the largest settlement ...

in 1894,Thomas Gummer (1894 - 1982)
, ancestry.com. Retrieved 29 November 2014 Tom Gummer served as a Private (and later Corporal and Sergeant) in the

York and Lancaster Regiment The York and Lancaster Regiment was a line infantry regiment of the British Army that existed from 1881 until 1968. The regiment was created in the Childers Reforms of 1881 by the amalgamation of the 65th (2nd Yorkshire, North Riding) Regiment of ...

of the

British Army The British Army is the principal Army, land warfare force of the United Kingdom. the British Army comprises 73,847 regular full-time personnel, 4,127 Brigade of Gurkhas, Gurkhas, 25,742 Army Reserve (United Kingdom), volunteer reserve perso ...

, and had his first professional fight in 1914. He won all of his fights (at least eleven) that year, and his first two of 1915, including a victory over former British

champion "Iron" Hague by knockout with three seconds of the final round remaining. A planned fight in July 1914 against David Cohen (aka Dick Simmonds) resulted in a court case after Cohen took payment for the fight but then disappeared after seeing Gummer and becoming "nervous and frightened". Gummer suffered his first defeat to

Gus Platts Augustus T. Platts (24 October 1891 – 4 December 1942) was a British boxer who was British and European middleweight champion. Career Platts' first known fight was in 1910. His first defeat came in December that year to Kid Vinton. After buil ...

in August 1915, at which time Gummer was a heavyweight and Platts a

welterweight Welterweight is a weight class in combat sports. Originally the term ''welterweight'' was used only in boxing, but other combat sports like muay Thai, taekwondo, and mixed martial arts also use it for their own weight division system to classify th ...

and over 2 stones lighter, and his second to Harry Curzon in November. In 1919 he faced both Platts and Curzon again, and won both fights. He got his first British title shot in March 1920 against Jim Sullivan after reigning champion Pat O'Keeffe retired from boxing; Gummer won after Sullivan retired in the 14th round. He followed this with a win over Bandsman Jack Blake and a draw with Herbert Crossley before fighting Ercole Balzac for the European middleweight title in Paris in December 1920; Gummer was knocked out in the ninth round. He had a second shot at the European title in March 1921 against

, a fight in which Gummer was also defending his British title; Gummer retired in the sixth round, losing his title. Gummer's final fight was against

Ted Kid Lewis Ted may refer to: Names A shortened form of the following: * Edmund * Edward * Thaddeus * Theodore (given name) Art, entertainment, and media Fictional characters * Ted, a character in the post-apocalyptic short story ''I Have No Mouth, a ...

in February 1922 at The Dome in

Brighton Brighton ( ) is a seaside resort in the city status in the United Kingdom, city of Brighton and Hove, East Sussex, England, south of London. Archaeological evidence of settlement in the area dates back to the Bronze Age Britain, Bronze Age, R ...

; Intended as a fight for Lewis's British middleweight title, it was fought as a non-title catchweight bout after Gummer failed to make the weight; Lewis knocked Gummer out in the first round. After retiring from boxing, Gummer played

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kick (football), kicking a football (ball), ball to score a goal (sports), goal. Unqualified, football (word), the word ''football'' generally means the form of football t ...

for Rotherham Eastwood in the 1920s and worked as a boxing referee between the late 1920s and the 1940s. Tom Gummer married Myra McMahon and they had four children together. He died in Rotherham in 1982.

References

External links

Tom Gummer's boxing record
boxinghistory.org * {{DEFAULTSORT:Gummer, Tom 1894 births 1982 deaths Military personnel from South Yorkshire British Army personnel of World War I York and Lancaster Regiment soldiers Heavyweight boxers Middleweight boxers Sportspeople from Rotherham English male boxers 20th-century English sportsmen