Don Cockell - plagued by glandular disorders, he still took on the great Rocky Marciano...

Don Cockell: The Battersea Blacksmith

By Derek O'Dell

A letter marked "Please Forward" and addressed to Don Cockell had been kicking around in Jack Solomons' gymnasium for weeks. Don owned a hairdressing business near my home so I volunteered to deliver it. He and I bumped into each other in the shop doorway and I mean "bumped" – he was going out as I was going in.

This was in 1951 when Don was on a run of impressive wins over men like Freddie Beshore, Nick Barone, Lloyd Marshall and Albert Finch. The contest with Finch replaced a world-title challenge against Joey Maxim. Jack Solomons had Joey signed to a firm contract but the Board of Control stepped in and ordered Don to defend his national crown against the Croydon man.

A few weeks earlier I'd watched Cockell box an exhibition with Jack Gardner. His superb physique had brought murmurs from an admiring crowd. He was a splendid figure oozing fitness and ambition and gliding around the ring with sparkling footwork. The contrast with the man now standing in front of me in the shop doorway was stark. Now he was sallow-skinned, fat, and had a nasty boil on his neck. This was the man tipped to beat Maxim yet he looked less imposing than the dossers lolling around the park along the road. I was so shaken at his appearance that I nearly forgot the reason for my mission.

A few weeks later, Jimmy Slade, an unrated American, wiped the floor with him. Worse followed when Randolph Turpin, still a middleweight, stopped Don in eleven rounds.

I thought about that boil and the fat rolls bulging from Cockell's waist and assumed that Don was one of those fighters who didn't train when a fight wasn't in the offing. He'd taken the Slade fight at short notice. If only I'd known then what agonies he'd undergone and how weakened he'd become in his efforts to keep his weight below the light-heavyweight limit! It did register that Don had agreed to meet Slade at the 13 stone limit but his weight problems were a well kept-secret.

Glandular disorders wreaked havoc with Cockell's physique. Hard as he tried, he could not control the fat that piled on to his frame and he was forced to compete at heavyweight level in 1952. Don had come back from a bout of rheumatic fever earlier in his career. It was an illness of such severity that he was not expected to box again. Cockell had two attributes going for him: he was resilient and he had guts – the latter in bucketloads. That he managed to make a considerable mark as a heavyweight is a tribute to his courage and burning determination.

Continue reading:

http://blog.boxinghistory.org.uk/2011/11/don-cockell-battersea-blacksmith.html

Thanks for this stuff and previous posts - always makes for a brilliant read.

Heard that this guy was a top class light-heavy but for the real money like a lot of guys at that time went up....

Certainly didn't look much against Rocky but I've only ever seen him in one fight....

So I'll give him the benefit of the doubt..

As people do speak highly of him..

took a helluva slapping..

Wow, it is hard to even begin to describe the sheer guts this would take, incredibly interesting story.

Excellent article again.

More kudos to Cockell. For me, it is one of the fights that really doesn't bode well for Rocky. Don was a LHW and Marciano really struggled with him. Not only that but Rocky drew on every dirty trick in the book. For me, this was defining for Rocky like Patterson was for Ali. Shameful wins. They won but you never felt good for them. They just bullied smaller men. Cockle was a world class LHW... but barely a domestic heavy. Marciano struggled and bullied him