George LaBlanche, The Marine, Died in Lawrence

George LaBlanche, The Marine

Born George Blais in Point Levi, Quebec on December 19, 1856, George LaBlanche, as he became known, would go on to boxing infamy with a famous illegal maneuver named the “Pivot Punch.” Although slight in size, 5ft 6 inches tall and weighing between 140 to 160 pounds, LaBlanche was powerfully built, good with both hands and began his career fighting men in the heavyweight class. He was scrappy and he was fearless having learned much of his trade in rough lumber camps and later the Canadian military. In 1883 he joined the US Marines at Charlestown, MA and thereafter he was known in the ring as “The Marine.”

On June 11, 1884, LaBlanche was discharged from the USMC and began travelling to rings around the country in earnest. His record doesn't elaborate on why the Marines found him unfit for service.

The Marine's Discharge Papers

His boxing career lasted about 15 years and was sporadically interrupted by time spent in jail for a variety of petty offenses. LaBlanche’s career coincided with the sport’s move away from bare knuckle fighting to fighting with gloves under the Queensbury rules. In August of 1889, George LaBlanche met up with the six year Middleweight title-holder, Jack “The Nonpareil” Dempsey in San Francisco. This was to be a Championship of the World title fight but LaBlanche weighed one pound over the limit so it was declared a non-title bout. Dempsey had the lead for much of the fight, and it was somewhere in the 26^th round (yes, you read that correctly…fights would drag on till one person couldn’t get up) that LaBlanche first used his Pivot Punch on Dempsey, this time hitting him in the neck to no avail. The Pivot Punch, as it has been described, is a punch delivered by spinning like a top…the puncher would miss with a left, spin on around and smack the punchee with a fierce right, using the power of momentum. A  punch like this would be similar to hitting someone with a sledgehammer or baseball bat. In the 32^nd round, LaBlanche delivered his second Pivot Punch and Dempsey went down for a long, long time. It has been said that Lablanche learned the punch, which had never been ruled illegal before this fight, from a British pugilist named Jimmy Carroll.

The Pivot Punch, or the Lablanche Swing was quickly ruled illegal, and although there was no way, on so many levels, that LaBlanche could be ruled a champion, he managed to claim the title whenever possible. The boxing world would remain stunned by this fight for many years to come.

Rules were a bit more fluid then, and he rode high for a while on the fame, but it would appear either that sudden fame got to be too much, or that he was unofficially sanctioned by the professional boxing community. George’s career began a downward trajectory. It was reported that he kicked an opponent during one fight and his life out of the ring got even more chaotic.

A year prior to his match up with Dempsey, LaBlanche had done some jail time (3 months) for promoting a brutal prizefight between two women in Buffalo. The seven round fight lasted an hour and a half and it was said that “both women were severely punished.”

LaBlanche limped along, fighting here and there until 1900 when his professional career officially ended. He would be arrested on a regular basis and given that his name was well known, his indiscretions would make the national papers. Robbing fellow drunks was the most common offence committed by LaBlanche. In 1908 a reporter from the Fitchburg Sentinel was called to the police station in that city, a beat cop had arrested a rather odorous individual with no means of support who had arrived by train in Fitchburg. LaBlanche regaled his growing audience with tales of his days in the big rings and “sprang from his bench and illustrated the celebrated so-called pivot punch.” He also told his audience that he had been roaming the country since his 1889 fight with Dempsey, and couldn’t remember how or when he arrived in Fitchburg. The reporter showed some heart when he said:  “His (LaBlanche) plight is another instance of the changes the beset a man throughout his life, for in the  George LaBlanche who sits in the cell at the central station, few would recognize “The Marine” who once pushed his way towards the middleweight championship and was winning money by the handful.” (Fitchburg Sentinel, 12/19/1908)

Reports would surface periodically about LaBlanche spending time drying out in Tewkesbury but on May 3, 1918, at age 62 George LaBlanche passed away in the Municipal Hospital in Lawrence. George’s visits to Lawrence happened because his sister, Adeline Gagnon, lived in Lawrence with her husband, Esdras. The Evening Tribune reported: “LaBlanche had been a frequent visitor to Lawrence. Several times he has been reported dead but he appeared shortly after to prove he was still very much alive.” His sister Adeline was a well-respected church lady at St. Anne's.

What happened afterwards speaks well of the character of Lawrencians and the deep affection they have always displayed for their athletes, (and LaBlanche had become one of their own by this time): the ex Mayor William White made a “stirring appeal” at a Boston fight for funds to help bury the indigent Marine. $177 was raised and applied toward burying LaBlanche here in the Sacred Heart Cemetery. A mass was held at St. Anne’s and officiated by Father Henri Girard. White served as a pallbearer along with fight promoters Billy Bell, James Crilley, Alderman Maloney, Eugene McCarthy and B.J. Keaveny.

(I went looking for the grave at the Sacred Heart Cemetery in Andover and ended up contacting the Boston Archdiocese who keeps records for this cemetery. LaBlanche is listed as being buried in the family plot which is marked with a simple flat stone inscribed Gagnon, his married sister's last name.)

George LaBlanche never fought professionally in Lawrence but would often pass through they city during his later years. He was a scrappy fighter, an underdog and a bit of an eccentric – qualities that Lawrencians found endearing. Although he wasn’t a homegrown hero, he brought the best of Lawrence boxing together in 1918 to honor him and celebrate his life.

If you'd like a more in depth profile of George LaBlanche click here for an excellent one by Lou Eisen.

Special thanks to BoxingTreasures.com and Dan Cuoco of IBRO for making their LaBlanche photos available.

Note: Pivot Blow First Freak Punch Barred – “During the unlamented bare knuckle days, true

boxing skills were limited. It was punch and pull, tug and wrestle, a round finished when one

of the fighters hit the turf, the pace inevitably slow, the number of rounds and elapsed time

often incredible. Then came gloves, with John L. Sullivan ousted by the clever Jim Corbett,

with Bob Fitzsimmons in the offing and Jim Jeffries in the wings. The armory of the

professional fighter began to grow in the 1880s, when George LaBlanche, the Marine,

introduced the pivot blow. …. It was so difficult to acquire that the fistic poobahs decided to

make it illegal. On August 27, 1889, LaBlanche knocked out the great Jack Dempsey, The

Nonpareil, in the 32nd round for the middleweight championship. However, leading fight

writers of the time refused to recognize LaBlanche as the new titleholder. They decided that

he had used the pivot blow, for some time barred,and they also held that the Marine had

been overweight. Dempsey, they insisted, had not lost his championship. However, the fight

did accomplish the demise of the pivot blow as a professional weapon. Since LaBlanche’s time

nobody has tried to beat the law by reviving it. Nobody would know how. LaBlanche

accomplished the pivot blow by using the heel as a pivot, holding out the arm and swinging

around at full force. The impact was terrific. The Marine said that he hit upon the pivot while

fooling around in training. Many a ring stratagem has been mastered in that manner. The

pivot blow is listed as the freak of freak punches in the professional category. Most of these

freaks are barred by the rules.”

Source: Dan Daniel, The Ring, December 1973, page 32