THE COVENANTER
weights but we made a team of six and four the end although of course he was declared
of us..Sgt Alan Nelson, Sgt Davie McMillan, the winner. I was at least given a very fine
Rfn Murdoch and myself all won our trophy to keep but sadly I couldn’t afford to
weight, the others were runners up. We had have it engraved at the time.
the most number of winners so the Depot
became Scottish Command Champions. The winter of ‘59 was really severe; very cold
A while after that I received a letter from and with heavy snowfalls so of course the
Scottish Command inviting (?) me to join coalminers took the opportunity to go on
a team from theArmy which would take strike. By this time I was married and my
on a team formed by the Scottish Amateur son Terry was a couple of months old so
Boxing Assosciation in aid of a huge Charity heating in our quarter at No 14 was pretty
fundraising event which had been going much essential, unfortunately though the
on all year. I joined the Army team at heating system in the quarters consisted
Edinburgh and was quite surprised to see that of an open fire in the sitting room and a
we had quite a talented team (Lots of good coal fired range sort of thing in the kitchen
amateur sportsmen doing National Service which had a central fire grate with a small
in those Days) and we were bussed over to oven on one side and a larger one on the
Dunfermline where the show was to take other. Pots or kettles could be heated on top
place. All my previous boxing experience of the oven part for cooking and although
had been in Army gyms or in inter club we did have a single electric ring on which
and schoolboy championships in Glasgow you could boil a kettle, coal was essential for
which usually were held in town halls or cooking and heating. Very soon it became
rather poor boxing clubs but this was the impossible to obtain and we tried burning
full black tie affair with the ring surrounded anything available, any scrap timber to be
by dinner tables at which much drink was found, old shoes, cardboard boxes screwed
flowing. Apparently a large sum of money up newspapers and so on. My wife Rose
had been raised from those attending. went home to Glasgow one weekend to visit
her mother and a neighbour offered her half
At the weigh in it soon became obvious a bag of coal....she brought it back to Lanark
that we were facing not an S.A.B.A team on the bus in an old suitcase.
but in fact the full Scottish National Team
including ABA champions. There was a large pile of coal over at the
They did not have an opponent for me as boiler house which provided the heating
their bantamweight had suffered an injury and hot water system for the main barrack
of some kind, but so as not to disappoint blocks, It was crushed coal intended for high
me (?) they suggested that I could do an temperature boilers; every piece of it about
exhibition bout with a spare lightweight the size of a grape and it fell down through
they had on hand. two large open hoppers into the space in
The result would not count in the nights front of the furnaces where the boilermen
scoring as it was against the rules to worked.
match opponentswith such a weight I reckoned they wouldn’t miss a few buckets
difference although regarded as OK if it so I went over late one night armed with two
was an exhibition bout. I said ok because large metal buckets and a shovel. Through
I thought it would just be an excuse for my the open hoppers I could see the boilermen
opponent to ponce about and show off a bit and I couldn’t just shovel the stuff up into
(at my expense of course) since he was the my bucket as they would hear me so I had
well known”Spangles Hunter” with many to stand there in the freezing dark until one
international appearances for the Scottish of them started to feed the boiler and then
team behind him. time my shovelling with his so the noise
at my end was covered by the noise at his,
I was sadly mistaken however because from then it was off with the goodies, but I had
the first bell it was obvious that the only to pass the Sgts Mess on the way back and
exhibition he was interested in was one just as I was near it, the door opens and out
where I would be disposed off in the first comes the RSM and one of the Sgts. It was
minute of the first round. It took a lot of a dark night and they were under the light
fancy footwork to keep out of his way at above the mess door. I stood stock still and
first but I lasted throughout the bout and pretended to be part of the landscape. The
even managed to land enough punches of RSM had the quarter next to mine so I had
my own to feel honours were fairly even at to stand there with a heavy bucket hanging
34
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