Champion with wits as fast as his fists
TERRY Downes, the “Crashing, Bashing, Dashing, Paddington Express” became middleweight world champion in 1961 and was well known for his sharp humour.
He provided one of the bestknown quotes in boxing after being defeated by the Nigerian Dick Tiger. Asked who he would like to fight next, Downes pointed at the boxing promoter Mickey Duff who had set up the fight and said, “That ****** .”
He was also once asked by a female journalist whether he looked at his opponents’ eyes or gloves. “I always look at their gloves, darlin’. I ain’t been hit by an eye yet.”
Downes was born in Paddington, to Richard, a mechanic, and Hilda, who worked at Barker’s department store and claimed to have seen his first boxing bouts outside pubs on London’s Edgware Road: “The geezers got stinking drunk and knocked the hell out of each other – and all for free.”
His father taught him to spar and the family then moved to the United States when he was a child. He boxed at the YMCA in Baltimore, before joining the Marines, where he became a boxing champion and tried out for the US Olympic team. That fell through when someone realised he was a “limey” so he returned to the UK.
His professional debut came in 1957 when he knocked out Peter Longo in 90 seconds. Huge success followed, as did romance – he met 17-year-old typist Barbara Clarke and they married in 1958.
She would accompany him to matches but couldn’t watch her husband in the ring. “Waste of a bloody good ringside seat,” said Downes. The couple went on to have four children; Terry also had a daughter from another relationship.
He won the world middleweight title in July 1961 when he defeated Paul Pender and the following year he also beat Sugar Ray Robinson.
But Robinson was 41 by then, which Downes acknowledged. “I didn’t beat Sugar Ray, I beat his ghost,” he said.
After retiring from boxing in 1964 he occasionally acted in films, usually as a villain, appearing in The Fearless Vampire Killers, A Study In Terror and The Golden Lady.
At the time of his death he was Britain’s oldest surviving former world champion. He leaves his wife, children and eight grandchildren.