Jan. 4, 1940: Armstrong vs Ghnouly

As Marvin Gaye sang back in the day, “Ain’t nothin’ like the real thing, baby,” and these days how boxing fans yearn for “the real thing,” for meaningful competition and genuine greatness. You’ll recall a few years back how Floyd Mayweather Jr Unblocked Games Minecraft. took to calling himself “The Best Ever,” ‘TBE’ for short, and while most took the self-accolade with a massive grain of salt, the fact others did not tells all you need to know about the lack of perspective some fight fans have in regards to the history of pugilism. The truth is the Golden Age of boxing is a long way gone now, decades ago, and the true greats accomplished feats today’s fighters can only dream about.

Take, for example, the man they called “Homicide Hank,” the one and only Henry Armstrong, without question one of the greatest pressure fighters in the sport’s history, a dynamo of non-stop aggression who attacked and cut down his opponents like a buzz saw on wheels. In 1937 alone he fought 27 times, capping one of the greatest single years in any boxer’s career by battering Petey Sarron to capture his first world championship. Think about it: 27 fights in one year. All wins, all but one by KO. That’s greatness.

The legendary Henry Armstrong. Ink drawing by Damien Burton.

So is the fact that in May of the following year he jumped all the way up from featherweight to welterweight to challenge fellow all-time great Barney Ross. After dominating Ross over 15 rounds, he dropped down in weight and challenged another Hall of Famer, Lou Ambers, thus winning the lightweight championship of the world. Armstrong would vacate the featherweight title, but for a brief time he held three of the eight traditional world titles in boxing at the same time, a feat never to be duplicated. And we won’t even get into how in March of 1940 he challenged for the middleweight title but had to settle for a draw, though most present thought he deserved the decision.

In the meantime Armstrong maintained his hectic schedule, notching win after win against truly formidable competition. This was an era very different from ours, when the ranks were crowded with excellent fighting men, not diluted by superfluous weight classes and meaningless titles, and when fans expected top pugilists to test themselves against dangerous rivals.

Armstrong defeats Barney Ross for the welterweight title.

And the simple truth is one would be hard-pressed to find a better stretch of wins in all of boxiana than the ones Armstrong piled up in his prime. The list of battlers he bested during that time includes such names as Baby Arizmendi, Benny Bass, Juan Zurita, Frankie Klick, Lew Feldman, Chalky Wright, Ceferino Garcia and Lew Jenkins, a line-up of champions and title challengers that, collectively, eclipses Floyd’s entire record in terms of quality opposition. And that’s just a sample of the many fighters battered by Armstrong’s churning fists.

To be more concrete, in February of 1936, Henry lost by decision to Richie Fontaine. One month later he avenged the defeat and then began a truly incredible run, winning all but three of 65 bouts in fewer than five years. The three matches he didn’t win included the aforementioned draw, a disqualification, and a highly controversial loss to Ambers in their rematch when referee Arthur Donovan deducted five points from Henry for fouls, causing Ambers’ decision win to be widely regarded as an injustice; Armstrong had in fact, for the second time, gotten the better of “The Herkimer Hurricane.” Think about it: 65 tilts in 55 months against some of the best fighters in boxing history, and not one truly legit defeat. Talk about “the real thing.”

Henry floors Ambers en route to winning his third world title.

Following the controversial loss to Ambers, which in fact only added to Armstrong’s image as perhaps the greatest boxer alive after Joe Louis, Henry focused his energies on defending his 147 lb. title. In fact, he was a bit small for a welterweight, but that didn’t stop “Hammerin’ Henry” from racking up the most title defenses in the division’s history, 19 in total, before the one-and-only Fritzie Zivic toppled him in a huge upset. He defeated Zivic in the rematch, but before he ever crossed paths with “The Croat Comet,” Armstrong notched title defense number 14 in his hometown of St. Louis, Missouri when he took on one Joe Ghnouly, aka “The St. Louis Bearcat.”

The challenger was no slouch himself with 59 wins on his record, but he was not on the same level as his crosstown rival. In other words, Ghnouly was a talented boxer, a legit contender who had gone the distance with Ross and Kid Chocolate and had beaten Eddie Cool, but Henry Armstrong was something more, a true all-time great; indeed, without a trace of hyperbole, we can say Hank was one of The Best Ever. He floored Ghnouly three times in round one, which prompted the challenger to get on his bike and keep his distance as best he could over the next few rounds, before three Armstrong left hooks ended the match in the fifth.

And just 20 days later, there was “Homicide Hank” in Madison Square Garden, stopping in nine rounds challenger number 15, Pedro Montanez, and inspiring The New York Times to rave about Henry’s fistic “savagery” and comment that “no man near Armstrong’s inches or poundage could have survived [his] blistering firepower.”

Photos of Armstrong battering Pedro Montanez.

Two knockouts in two world title defenses in just shy of three weeks. That’s how they used to roll, folks. A different time and a different kind of fight game, when boxing fans could watch true legends do battle. And knew “the real thing” when they saw it.

George Armstrong Custer

George Armstrong Custer has been better known for his exploits after the Civil War than those during.  However, his career in the Union army was a success due in large part to his dual characteristics of bravery and audacity.  Described as aggressive, gallant, reckless, and foolhardy, Custer has become one of the most celebrated and controversial figures of the Civil War.

Born in Harrison County, Ohio on December 5, 1839, son of Emanuel and Marie, Custer was nicknamed “Autie” because of his mispronunciation of his middle name as a small child. George had four younger siblings, Thomas, Margaret, Nevin, and Boston, as well as several older half-siblings from his mother’s first marriage to Israel Kirkpatrick, who died in 1835.

During much of his boyhood George lived with his half-sister and brother-in-law in Monroe, Michigan, where he attended McNeely Norman School, carrying coal with a classmate in order to pay for room and board. Upon graduation, he taught school for two years before being admitted to the U.S. Military Academy, where he graduated in 1861, ranked last in his class of 34 cadets.  Ever a trickster, multiple demerits for pulling practical jokes on his classmates brought him close to expulsion several times.

Graduating in 1861, his low rank was less significant than it might have been during peace time because of demand for officers and he was mustered into the Union army as a second lieutenant in the 2nd U.S. Cavalry.

Custer was able to distinguish himself as a risk-taker early in the war. During the Peninsula Campaign when General John G. Barnard stopped at the Chickahominy River, debating where to cross based on the depth of the water, Custer took action and promptly rode his horse out to the middle of the river so as to determine if it was passable. The act gained him notoriety among important high-ranking officers.  During the Battle of Bull Run, Custer served as a courier between Winfield Scott and Irvin McDowell, subsequently serving as a staff officer for Generals George B. McClellan and Alfred Pleasanton with the temporary rank of captain.

On June 29, 1863 Custer was commissioned to brigadier general of volunteers and assigned to command a brigade in Kilpatrick’s division. While in this position he led his men in the Battle of Gettysburg where he assisted in preventing J.E.B. Stuart from attacking the Union rear.

Throughout the war Custer continued to distinguishing himself as fearless, aggressive, and ostentatious.  His personalized uniform style, complete with a red neckerchief could be somewhat alienating, but he was successful in gaining the respect of his men with his willingness to lead attacks from the front rather than the back.

During the Richmond campaign in 1864, Custer participated in the battle at Yellow Tavern, where J.E.B. Stuart was mortally wounded.  Following which he and his men were transferred to the Shenandoah Valley.  Here he played a major role in the defeat of Jubal Early’s army at Third Winchester and Cedar Creek. As Custer's final major act in the war he led the division responsible for cutting off Lee’s last avenue of escape at Appomattox; a week later he received the appointment, major general of volunteers.

In 1866, Custer was commissioned lieutenant colonel of the newly formed 7th Cavalry and assigned to command the cavalry in the west.  While in this position he took part in Winfield Hancock’s expedition against the Sioux and Cheyenne in 1867.  After a court-martial and suspension from duty for an unauthorized visit to his wife, Elizabeth Clift Bacon, Custer was restored to duty by Philip Sheridan.

Custer went on to take part in the Yellowstone expedition into the Black Hills, which precipitated the Sioux uprising of 1876, culminating in the Battle of Little Big Horn on June 25, 1876.  Under the over-all command of General Alfred H. Terry, Custer was to be part of a two column attack. 
However, upon discovering a large native settlement, Custer proceeded to divide his own forces into three battalions. Without waiting for support, Custer led an attack which resulted in the annihilation of his immediate command and a total loss of 266 officers and men, including his brothers Tom and Boston.  The soldiers' remains were given a hasty burial on the battlefield, but within the next year Custer’s body was reinterred at West Point with a full military funeral.

George Armstrong Custer was a prolific writer who recorded many of his escapades, and it was through these writings, as well as his wife’s determination to clear his name that he became one of the most celebrated and controversial figures of the Civil War.

George Armstrong Custer

George Armstrong Custer was born in New Rumley, Ohio December 5, 1839. He was appointed to West Point in 1857 and graduated last in his class in 1861. During the Civil War his bravery and flamboyant style attracted the attention of his superiors and earned him rapid promotions. By war’s end he was a brevet major general. “Brevet” was a temporary, wartime promotion. Once the war ended, all those who earned a brevet rank reverted to their actual rank. In Custer’s case, he reverted to captain.

When the Seventh Cavalry was formed at Fort Riley in 1866, Custer was appointed the lieutenant colonel of the regiment.  He did not have to wait long to get experience with the Plains Indians. His regiment accompanied General Winfield Scott Hancock’s “peace commission” to southern Kansas in the spring of 1867.  Rather than creating peace with the Indians, however, Hancock’s mishandling of the talks resulted in “Hancock’s War.” The Seventh Cavalry spent the next three years at Forts Hays, Dodge, Larned, and others in pursuit of Indians throughout Kansas, Nebraska, and Oklahoma.  Custer was court-martialed in the summer of 1867 for force-marching his troops from Fort Wallace to Hays without orders. This and other charges led to his being relieved from duty for one year.  But before his year was up, he was called back by General Philip Sheridan to lead his regiment in a winter campaign against the Cheyennes. This would become his first major engagement against the Indians when he attacked Black Kettle’s village along the Washita River in what is now Oklahoma.  While it was a victory for Custer and his Seventh Cavalry, some considered it a massacre and many of his officers grew to distrust his judgment.

Custer was a brilliant strategist and had experience leading large groups of men into battle but did not know how to deal with the individual soldier and see to his daily needs.  As a result, his treatment of the enlisted men under his command was often unnecessarily harsh.  This resulted in many of his men deserting.   

In 1870 the Seventh Cavalry was transferred to Kentucky where they performed reconstruction duty, primarily suppressing Ku Klux Klan activities. In 1873 they were again transferred, this time to Dakota Territory.  Here he led an expedition to the Black Hills where gold was discovered. This unleashed a barrage of miners swarming over country that had been set aside for the exclusive use of the Sioux Nation.  This led to all-out war between the Indians and whites.  In 1876, the Seventh Cavalry was part of a campaign sent to “round up” the Indians and confine them to reservations.  The Seventh Cavalry met a vastly superior force of Indians along the Little Bighorn River in Montana on June 25, 1876.  Of the nearly 600 Seventh Cavalry soldiers involved in the battle, 268, including Custer, were killed.

George Custer has had more written about him than any other soldier of the Indian Wars and he is often epitomized as all that was wrong with the clash of cultures that was the Indian Wars.  It may be more accurate to say that Custer and most other officers of the period sympathized with the Indians' plight and felt Indian agents, who were a generally corrupt lot who robbed and cheated the Indians, were to blame for many of the problems. He said, “If I were an Indian I often think that I would greatly prefer to cast my lot among those of my people who adhered to the free open plains, rather than submit to the confined limits of a reservation.”  But he also saw them as “savage in every sense of the word.”  He did not advocate extermination, as some have said, but felt Indians would eventually have to give way to the advancing white civilization.  Overall, George Custer was a complex man who was given a difficult job to do in an equally complex and difficult period of American history. 

FIGHT OF HIS LIFE : A Boxing Immortal, Henry Armstrong, at 75, Is Enduring Tough Times Again

Arcel, who trained Ross in 1938, was in his corner for the bout and saw, close up, the beating Ross received. Armstrong's victory convinced Arcel of the fighter's greatness, which he is still sure of more than 50 years later.

"He could be classified with the greatest fighters of all time," Arcel said. "The fighters today, most of them he would chase right out of the ring."

Armstrong took 20% of the gate for the Ross fight, which was $32,200. Ambers and his lightweight crown were next. Tickets went on sale for $16.50 tops, $2.50 reserved and $1 general admission. Armstrong went into the fight as the odds-on choice, but the champion wound up inflicting more damage than the challenger, who won on a split decision.

Ambers' face was almost unmarked, but Armstrong needed 10 stitches to close a cut in his mouth, which he suffered in the second round, and his left eye was almost closed.

The New York crowd was so loud that when the bell sounded at the end of the 15th round, neither the fighters nor the referee heard it. Armstrong needed to be steered to his own corner by Ambers' handlers.

When the decision was announced, there was a new champion. Armstrong had won because of his two knockdowns of Ambers, one in the closing seconds of the fifth round and the other in the middle of the sixth.

Armstrong, who had weighed in at 134 pounds, finished the fight at 129. But he was the new champion. Not only was he the world featherweight champion and the world welterweight champion, but the lightweight king as well.

In September, however, Armstrong gave up the featherweight title, and the two others were gone in two years. Ambers won his lightweight championship back when by scored a 15-round decision over Armstrong in 1939, and in 1940, an unheralded Fritzie Zivic beat Armstrong in another 15-round decision for the welterweight crown.

Armstrong retired twice and made two comebacks, losing to 21-year-old Cpl. Ray Robinson in 1943 at Madison Square Garden, before giving it up for good in 1945. Armstrong was 31.

The civilian Henry Armstrong got involved in politics and drinking, then religion and the fight against drinking. He endorsed Los Angeles Supervisor Leonard Roach and the Presidential ticket of Dwight Eisenhower and Richard Nixon. Before then, though, he offered a lot of toasts.

In October 1954, Armstrong spoke to the Temple Baptist Church about his drinking. Four years earlier, he had been ordained by his father-in-law, W. L. Strauther, at the Morning Star Baptist Church.

"I'd get drunk and drive my big car, roaring up and down the streets, and didn't care about anything," he said. "(Once) I blacked out. When I came to, I was in the car heading north out of Malibu at 75 m.p.h. I didn't realize I was driving. There seemed to be a presence beside me. I lost my taste for whiskey right then--and it's never come back to me."

In 1959, after 25 years of marriage, Armstrong was divorced by Willa Mae Armstrong, who said she no longer felt loved.

"He left me at home and went out alone," she said. "He never showed me any affection."

The couple had one daughter, Lanetta, who is 53 and living in Los Angeles. She is reluctant to talk about her father.

Lanetta said she felt estranged from her father. "He wasn't too close to me," she said. "He was always on the go. I mostly didn't see him too much."

Even so, it was she who sent the flowers to Armstrong's hospital room.

Whether it was bad investments, the divorce, the drinking or whatever, Armstrong had run out of money by the mid-1960s.

He left Los Angeles in 1967 and took a job as assistant director of the Herbert Hoover Boys Club in St. Louis. He also became a minister at the Mt. Olive Baptist Church. He married again and had two more children, Henrietta and Edna, with his second wife, Velma. Friends of Armstrong thought he was doing well until Velma Armstrong died. Henrietta and Edna are grown now and living in St. Louis.

The former Gussie Henry, who said she married Armstrong 10 years ago, took him out of St. Louis and brought him back to Los Angeles. But Armstrong's friends said he would have been much better off if he had stayed in St. Louis.

"We tried not to let him leave here," said James Reddick, who has known Armstrong for close to 50 years. "I know he was getting up in age, getting senile and forgetful, but he should have stayed. He had the kind of job where he basically didn't do anything and got paid for it. People were impressed just because of who he was. That was the way it was, but it was kind of sad.

"When you're on top, people cater to you, but once you start slipping, you find out who your friends are. He didn't have any money when he got here. It was gone. He didn't have nothing. But who can you blame for that? Nobody but him. I hate it for him."

Armstrong's financial plight is widely known in boxing circles. Arcel said such problems are not limited to Armstrong.

George Armstrong Custer and the Battle of the Little Bighorn

As a soldier, General Ulysses S. Grant had depended upon the able assistance of Ely S. Parker, a Seneca Indian. As president, Grant tried with little success to ensure peaceful relations with Native Americans. Many Americans saw Indians as little more than animals that stood in the way of progress, and favored their extermination. But not Grant. At his inauguration, Grant said that he would "favor any course toward them which tends to their civilization and ultimate citizenship."
After taking office, Grant named Parker head of the Bureau of Indian Affairs. He received a delegation of Native Americans at the White House, including the Oglala Sioux chief Red Cloud. He advanced a policy of peace. Grant also abided by the provisions of the second Fort Laramie Treaty, which gave the Lakota Sioux possession of much of Montana, Wyoming, and what is now South Dakota. But when gold was discovered in those hills, whites rushed to the territory, and clashes between Native Americans and whites began. The man who started it all was a career soldier named George Armstrong Custer.

Custer had already gained a reputation for getting into trouble. He graduated from West Point last in his class. Just after his graduation, he was court-martialed for failing to stop a fight between two cadets. But by then the Civil War had broken out, and the Army needed all the officers it could get. Custer went unpunished.

Custer distinguished himself in several Civil War battles. After the war, he went West, where he led the Seventh Cavalry in a successful campaign against the Southern Cheyenne Indians. In 1867, Custer was court-martialed again, this time for leaving his post without permission. The Army suspended him for a year without pay. But as trouble with the Indians grew, he was returned to duty.
In 1874 Custer led an expedition in Lakota Sioux territory, in the Black Hills of Dakota. There, he confirmed the presence of gold -- and started a gold rush, which would soon cause trouble between Native Americans and white miners. Grant tried to honor the Treaty of Fort Laramie, but miners pressured him to let them search for gold in the sacred hunting grounds of the Sioux and Cheyenne.
Grant gave in to the pressure. The federal government issued an order requiring all Indians to move onto reservations by January 31, 1876, or be considered hostile. But many Indians did not hear the order or simply ignored it. Grant decided to send troops under generals John Gibbon, George Crook, and Alfred Terry to Dakota to fight the Sioux. At first, Custer was not included as part of the force.
Grant's reason for avoiding Custer was political. Custer had testified about corruption in Grant's Indian affairs offices, so Grant removed him from command. But Grant's wartime friend Phillip Sheridan persuaded him to send Custer West. For Custer, the move would prove fatal.

In June 1876, as sightseeing crowds flocked to the Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia, U.S. troops in Montana and Dakota began a multi-pronged attack on the Indians who had not gone to reservations. Custer arrived in Indian Territory first. Instead of waiting for forces under Generals Crook and Terry, Custer led little more than 200 men in an attack on the Sioux Chief Sitting Bull's camp on Montana's Little Bighorn River.

In the fight that followed, a force of thousands of Sioux killed Custer and all of his men. Shock and outrage over what was called "Custer's Last Stand" hastened the government's campaign against the Indians. By the following year, the Sioux had been forced to retreat into Canada. In death, Custer became a hero, the subject of songs, books, and poems. Ironically, the man who had led an attack on a peaceful Sioux village was remembered as the victim of a massacre.

Consideration of Native Americans's rights would not reawaken until the 1880s, when leaders like Mary Bonney took up the cause.

George Armstrong Custer

George Armstrong Custer, a U.S. cavalry officer who served with distinction in the American Civil War, is better known for leading more than 200 of his men to their deaths in the notorious Battle of the Little Bighorn in June 1876. The battle, also known as “Custer’s Last Stand,” was part of the Black Hills War against a confederation of Plains Indians, including the Cheyenne and Dakota Sioux. It remains one of the most controversial battles in U.S. history.

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(1839-1876), Civil War cavalry commander and Indian fighter. Born in New Rumley, Ohio, Custer entered West Point in 1857. Upon graduation in 1861 he was assigned immediately to duty as an aide to Gen. George McClellan. Next he drew a cavalry assignment, and his boldness in battle brought rapid promotions. At twenty-three he was the youngest brevet brigadier general in the Union army. While on furlough he met and soon married Elizabeth Bacon, who was to play a significant role in shaping his career and perpetuating his memory.

Did You Know?

George Armstrong Custer graduated last in his 1861 West Point class. Today, that position is known as the "Goat."

When the war ended, Custer was returned to the permanent rank of captain. After serving several months in Texas, he was commissioned a lieutenant colonel and assigned to the Seventh Cavalry Regiment based at Fort Riley, Kansas. Accompanied by Elizabeth, he reported for duty early in 1867. Under Gen. Winfield Hancock’s command, Custer led the Seventh Cavalry in several skirmishes against Indians in Kansas and Nebraska. Soon after the campaign closed, his uxoriousness came near to ending his career. Instead of remaining with his troops at Fort Wallace as ordered, he made a hasty journey to Fort Riley to see Elizabeth. As a result he was suspended for one year.

In 1868 Gen. Philip Sheridan replaced Hancock and soon arranged for Custer’s reinstatement. That November, after raiding Black Kettle’s Cheyenne village, he was in trouble again for leaving the field without searching for a missing reconnaissance unit that had been ambushed and slain. Among other activities during the next six years, Custer wrote My Life on the Plains in which he attempted to justify his actions, and in 1874 he violated the treaty of 1868 by taking an expedition into the Indians’ sacred Black Hills where gold was discovered. The gold rush that followed created intense Indian hostility and precipitated the government’s decision to confine all northern Plains tribes to reservations.

In 1876, under command of Gen. Alfred Terry, Custer led the Seventh Cavalry as one force in a three-pronged campaign against Sitting Bull’s alliance of Sioux and Cheyenne camps in Montana. During the morning of June 25, Custer’s scouts reported spotting smoke from cooking fires and other signs of Indians in the valley of the Little Bighorn. Disregarding Terry’s orders, Custer decided to attack before infantry and other support arrived. Although scouts warned that he was facing superior numbers (perhaps 2,500 warriors), Custer divided his regiment of 647 men, ordering Capt. Frederick Benteen’s battalion to scout along a ridge to the left and sending Maj. Marcus Reno’s battalion up the valley of the Little Bighorn to attack the Indian encampment. With the remainder of the regiment, Custer continued along high ground on the right side of the valley. In the resulting battle, he and about 250 of his men, outnumbered by the warriors of Crazy Horse and Gall, were surrounded and annihilated. Reno and Benteen suffered heavy casualties but managed to escape to a defensive position. Since that day, ‘Custer’s Last Stand’ has become an American legend. The battle site attracts thousands of visitors yearly.

Throughout his career, Custer exhibited a reckless temperament that kept him in almost constant trouble with superior officers. Yet his courage has rarely been questioned. In life he was a flamboyant man who attracted ardent admirers and severe critics. In death it has been the same. His wife, Elizabeth, through her publications and lectures during the half century she survived him, did much to create the image of a beau sabreur that still persists. Probably more words, pro and con, have been written about George Armstrong Custer than any of his military contemporaries of comparable rank.
The Reader’s Companion to American History. Eric Foner and John A. Garraty, Editors. Copyright © 1991 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

Henry Edward Armstrong British chemist

Henry Edward Armstrong, (born May 6, 1848, Lewisham, Kent [now a part of London], Eng.—died July 13, 1937, Lewisham) English organic chemist whose research in substitution reactions of naphthalene was a major service to the synthetic-dye industry.

Armstrong studied at the Royal College of Chemistry, where he developed a method of determining organic impurities (sewage) in drinking water, which was used in the sanitary surveys of water supplies and helped to control typhoid fever. In 1867, he went to study under Hermann Kolbe at the University of Leipzig in Germany and secured his Ph.D. there in 1870. In 187l he became professor of chemistry at the London institution Finsbury Circus (later Finsbury Technical College) and in 1879 was appointed to help organize the teaching of chemistry and physics at the City and Guilds of London institute. From 1884 he taught at the Central Technical College, retiring in 1911. He had been elected a fellow of the Royal Society in 1876.

Armstrong’s classic researches in chemistry dealt in part with subsitution in the hydrocarbon naphthalene, a problem on which he published some 60 treatises, which, with the work of his collaborators, securely established the chemistry of a substance and its derivatives that were of the greatest technical importance in the dyestuffs industry. He also pioneered in organic crystallography, contributed much to the understanding of the chemical composition of camphor and related terpene compounds, and devised a centric formula for benzene.