“How Sir Hiram Maxim Met the Hooligan” (St James’s Gazette, 24 June 1902)

  • Originally published on the Bartitsu.org site on Friday, 8th September 2017

In which the estimable inventor Hiram Maxim, best-remembered today for devising the world’s first portable machine gun, tells of how he fended off a London hooligan with his fists and trusty umbrella.

Sir Hiram S. Maxim, who says he has had three encounters with hooligans, writes to say that when walking from Southfields Station to attend a garden party at Wimbledon on Saturday afternoon last, he was struck several times with a ball flung by boys. Lady Maxim took the ball, and Sir Hiram later returned it to the boys.

“I thought no more of the matter” (says Sir Hiram) “until I saw a large and powerful man come running after us. He approached me, exclaiming something about “boys and cad,” which I didn’t exactly understand, and at once made a rush at me, aiming a very heavy blow at my face.

Fortunately I had, in my younger days, been a good boxer, and I warded off his blow, at the same time giving him a sharp blow across the face with a strong and closely-folded umbrella that I happened to have in my right hand.

He made several more rushes, each time only to receive a stinging blow in the face. Although I had successfully warded off all his mad rushes, and he had not succeeded in touching me, still I was soon very short of breath, and thought of what the doctor had said.

At this time he was standing some 12 feet away, and then gathering himself together, he made one more desperate lunge. This time I brought my umbrella to the charge as soldier does his gun, and summoning all my remaining strength I gave him a powerful thrust in the pit of his stomach. The umbrella, which had stood the racket up to this point, collapsed, the staff being broken in three pieces and the frame smashed, but it knocked the wind out of the ruffian, and I left him doubled and trying to get his breath.

In looking over the wreck of the umbrella I find that the tip of it is gone, and Lady Maxim suggests that the man may have carried it off, and that there is still a possibility of my being arrested for manslaughter!”

Sir Hiram says he has been told that, as a good citizen, he ought to report to the police, but Lady Maxim says the man has received quite punishment enough.

“What ought I to do?”

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