Frederick Grace (29 February 1884 – 23 July 1964) was a
lightweight
Lightweight is a weight class in combat sports and rowing.
Boxing
Professional boxing
The lightweight division is over 130 pounds (59 kilograms) and up to 135 pounds (61.2 kilograms) weight class in the sport of boxing.
Notable lightweight ...
boxer. He fought as Fred Grace and at the
1908 Olympic Games he became Olympic champion, defeating
Matt Wells along the way. He also became the British and European amateur champion.
Biography
Born in
Edmonton
Edmonton ( ) is the capital city of the Canadian province of Alberta. Edmonton is situated on the North Saskatchewan River and is the centre of the Edmonton Metropolitan Region, which is surrounded by Alberta's central region. The city ancho ...
,
Middlesex
Middlesex (; abbreviation: Middx) is a historic county in southeast England. Its area is almost entirely within the wider urbanised area of London and mostly within the ceremonial county of Greater London, with small sections in neighbour ...
, he first became a boxer at
Eton Mission Boxing Club. Making use of the facilities provided by Eton Mission, he also became proficient on the parallel bars.
In his early 20s, Fred incurred serious damage to his knee after an incident on his motorcycle. Fred declined the surgeon's advice to amputate and determined to regain his fitness. Subsequently, from that time to the Olympics in 1908 he never figured in any title challenges.
After the Games, Grace went on to win four
Amateur Boxing Association British
lightweight titles between 1909 and 1920, when boxing out of the Eton Mission ABC and Eton Boys BC respectively.
However, whilst in his prime, boxing was banned from the 1912 Olympics in
Stockholm and WW1 canceled out the Olympics of 1916, therefore Grace was unable to defend his title. By 1920 he was 36 years old and at the Olympics in
Antwerp he won just one bout in the
lightweight class before being eliminated by the eventual winner of the title,
Samuel Mosberg
Samuel A. Mossberg or Mosberg (June 14, 1896 – August 30, 1967) was an American lightweight professional boxing, boxer who competed in the early 1920s. He was managed by Billy Gibson and Jack Bulger for most of his professional career.
Amateu ...
, of the
US.
Grace worked as a heating engineer for most of his life and retired in 1949. He died on 23 July 1964 at
Ilford,
Essex
Essex () is a county in the East of England. One of the home counties, it borders Suffolk and Cambridgeshire to the north, the North Sea to the east, Hertfordshire to the west, Kent across the estuary of the River Thames to the south, and Grea ...
, aged 80, after being struck by a car while out walking.
References
External links
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Grace, Frederick
1884 births
1964 deaths
English male boxers
Lightweight boxers
English Olympic medallists
Olympic boxers for Great Britain
Boxers at the 1908 Summer Olympics
Boxers at the 1920 Summer Olympics
Olympic gold medallists for Great Britain
Sportspeople from Edmonton, London
Olympic medalists in boxing
Road incident deaths in London
Medalists at the 1908 Summer Olympics
Boxers from Greater London
England Boxing champions