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Picture courtesy of Sunday Herald | |
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Kane had narrowly lost to Benny Lynch in a world title fight in Glasgow on 3 October 1937 and had drawn with Lynch over 15 rounds 5 months later in Liverpool. When Lynch was stripped of his title for being well over the weight limit for his title fight with Jackie Jurich, the Californian had become the champion. Kane then defeated Jurich in Liverpool in September 1938, giving him such a thumping that he had to have his little finger amputated on his right hand. So there can be no doubting the menace posed, and experience possessed, by the man from Golborne.
Like Paterson, Kane was in the RAF, but had been boxing regularly throughout the war years.
The two met on 19 June 1943 when the Englishman put his title on the line at Hampden Park in Glasgow. The contest had fight fans in a state of excitement: after all, here was Paterson, the Lonsdale Belt holder, the British champion, taking on the world number one.
Kane and Paterson went toe to toe from the second the bell sounded for round one, slugging it out in the middle of the ring. Paterson was the better puncher and caught Kane with the right, dropping him to the canvas. Kane got up on the count of four but Paterson connected with two more punches. The champion was in trouble and at fractionally over a minute into the fight, he was counted out.
In Jackie Paterson, Scotland had a new flyweight champion of the world. Paterson also won the Lonsdale Belt outright in the 61-second contest and became the first southpaw to win the flyweight crown.
The latter years of the war saw Paterson continue with his impressive form, going unbeaten until August 1945 when he lost to Gus Foran in a non-title fight.
Paterson added another title in his next fight on 12 September 1945, moving up six pounds to bantamweight. At the bout in Glasgow, Paterson won the Commonwealth Bantamweight title on points against Jim Brady. The good times continued when Paterson won the European Bantamweight tile on 19 March 1946 from Theo Medina in London.
At this point in his career, Jackie Paterson was World, Commonwealth and British champion at flyweight, and Commonwealth and European champion at bantamweight, an extraordinary achievement.
