Streetfighters: Real Fighting Men Tell Their Stories

by Davies, Julian

  When I think of it, I’ve been very lucky and only been down for three months when I was young. I’ve done a lot of damage to people in the past. I sometimes put it down to the way I hit. I always aim for a few inches just behind the target so my fist goes through with the punch. One thing that did frighten me was one day a clairvoyant got hold of my hands. “I can see you killing someone with these hands some day, you must pull your punches or someone will die,” he told me. Now at the time I had been very lucky with some fights, people hurting their heads and swallowing tongues and that. I’ve moved away from the trouble and try to enjoy life a bit more these days. I’ve knocked loads out but never caused it, there’s always been a good reason why I’ve done it. I help train the boys at the boxing gym now and I’m happy doing that. It’s a good crack helping the lads.

  MALCOLM PRICE

  Merthyr Tydfil

  Malcolm Price (right) with the author

  A legendary streetfighter from the South Wales mining community, Malcolm built up respect by taking on and beating all comers. His work on the motorways took him the length and breadth of Britain and he stormed through the local hard men in every place he visited. His reputation soon rose from being one of the hardest men in the valleys to one of the hardest in the UK.

  AS A KID, my father made me go to the boxing gym. He was a very strict man, so I had to go. I didn’t want to go at first but he made me go a couple of times a week. After a while I won the Welsh Schoolboy Championship and caught a bit more interest in the sport. I went on to turn pro. I had six fights, winning four and losing two. The losses were to the same guy, “Big” Jim Monaghan. He was a big bugger, about 6ft 4in, and he gave me two really hard fights.

  One day, I asked my father if he would pick up my coat, which I had left in The Swan pub the night before. When he got there, the place was wrecked. He asked for my coat and was informed that I was the one who had caused all the damage from the fight I got into. When he came home he wasn’t happy, so I moved in with my grandmother for a while. Meanwhile I got six months for the offence, losing my boxing licence as well, which was the worst part of it all. I did a lot of bouncing in those days, but I didn’t get into much trouble on the door. It was pretty good on the doors back then.

  I don’t know why I turned into a streetfighter; it just seemed to happen overnight. Looking back over my life, I can’t put a finger on why I was always fighting. As a kid I was more interested in ornithology, which still interests me today. Then I seemed to change overnight, and then it was one non-stop battle. I talked about this with a friend once who told me, “Malcolm, I remember when we all would go to the dance halls together. You would always stand at the back of the hall just watching, wouldn’t say boo to a goose. The old dance hall was full to the brim one night with gangs of teddy boys. I remember a fight breaking out. All the dance floor was full of lads fighting, all the girls screaming their heads off. I look over to you and you put your glass down and then start punching, and every time you punch, someone falls down. You just kept hitting and hitting all the guys fighting. In the end I had to jump on your back to stop you, just in case you really hurt someone. I kept telling you who I was until you calmed down. Everyone backed away from you and we decided to leave. Malcolm, from that day forth you were always fighting. People wanted to know who was the lad who beat those guys up. Everywhere you went, people knew you as a fighter, so it was inevitable that you became what you became.” I don’t know if this was where my life changed but I know that it didn’t help me much.

  A few times in my life I had men come and see how good I could fight, try their luck. I was in The Express pub one day and this big guy from Caerphilly turned up. He had heard about me and came up to fight me, so we went outside to go to the car park. It didn’t get that far because I did him in the alleyway on the way there. I smashed him up and stuck the boots in. He lost all his teeth in the process. I just left him unconscious in the alleyway and went back inside. He came for a fight and that was exactly what I gave him.

  I was always getting asked to sort trouble out for other people. Sometimes I earned a bit of money out of it, sometimes I just helped out. On one occasion I got called to sort out trouble in a club down the valley. Some big karate guy and his mates were playing hell there and they were too rough for the locals to sort out. Message got back to me in Merthyr to come down and sort it out. I walk in and ask the owner, “Which one is the big troublemaker?” The owner points out this big guy sitting down drinking with all his mates. I walk over, pick up this heavy wooden chair on the way and bring it down with all my strength onto the guy’s head, which splits straight open. The guy is flat out on the deck and his mates are too scared to move to help him. After that there was no trouble in the club, job done. I just wanted to be in and out of the place with as little hassle as possible.

  Another time I was in The Western pub and some guy was trying to get off with my mate’s wife, so I told him not to. Well, he was all dressed up and said, “I’m off out to a dance and thought I might make a kill here first.” I replied, “I’ll make a kill now,” and with that I knocked him clean out, right over the table he went. Well, Mr and Mrs Brown, who ran the pub, were very strict, so my good mate Mike Mahoney and me dragged him in front of the bar where Mrs Brown couldn’t see him. Thing was, she was so short she couldn’t look over the bar. As it happens, she knew we were up to something and leaned over to see him sprawled on the floor.

  “What have you done?” she said.

  I answered, “The man’s drunk, he’s fallen over a table.”

  “Well,” she said, “he looked sober enough when he asked me for a pint just now.”

  When he was out we took his dancing shoes off and put them on the fire and Mrs Brown was trying to get them out, but by that time they were ruined.

  One day me and Mike were out drinking in some club out of Merthyr, so I get to the bar with all the glasses in my hands when some big rugby player says to me, “Out of the way Blondie.” So I said, “Look mate, I’m trying to get served by here.” Well, one thing leads to another and we go outside to fight. We were heading for the alleyway behind the houses when I notice a police car watching us, and all the time this guy is ranting and raving. So I pretend to laugh so the police would think we were just messing around. We get to the alley and square up. All of a sudden I hear footsteps behind me and there’s this other big bugger: they’re both hoping to do me. I hear more footsteps and it’s Mike covering my back. Well I deck the one in front of me with a straight right and Mike sorts his out. With that, the whole bloody rugby team come down the alley after us. I turn to Mike and he shouts, “It’s like Custer’s last stand, bugger it, let’s go for gold!” There was four or five on the floor and the buggers were still coming. Anyway, someone calls the police and they were everywhere. The rugby team were fighting with the police, so me and Mike edged past them all into the street. With that, a Merthyr taxi goes past and the driver says, “Hi, Pricey.” So I shout, “Wait, stop!” He stops and takes us back home to Merthyr. Now that was a close one.

  I was working up in England once when the site foreman, a little Irish guy, comes up to me and says, “Jesus, a big man like yourself should be in the boxing booth earning yourself some money.” So off we go to the booth to try to earn some cash. Well, I’m in this ring fighting some big guy who spends his day in these booths fighting the biggest from each town, so he was no mug. I think this guy’s name was Kincaid. They give me an old pair of shorts, which left me with everything hanging out, and an old pair of daps [training shoes – JD]. I asked my cornermen from Merthyr for a drop of water to wash out my mouth. So I look for a bucket to spit in and there’s none there. I indicate to them and they say, “We haven’t got one.” I look around me, and there’s so many people there that I can’t spit it into the tent, so onto the floor it goes.

  Well, it goes to round two and I catch this bugger with a straight right and down he goes, flat out cold. So the little guy in charge pushes me against the r
opes, saying, “Step back, step back.” He keeps pushing and pushing. So I tell him, “Any further back mate and I’ll be out of the ring.” All the time he was giving the fighter some time to recover. Well you could have counted to 100. He wasn’t getting up. I had a couple of bob for that one and off we go straight into the pub. They asked me to stay on with them and fight for them but I enjoyed my work on the motorways too much to leave it.

  When I worked on the motorways, I never looked for trouble but I had one of those faces, and wherever we went, the hardest guys seemed to want to try their luck. It was everywhere I went. Once, in Liverpool, we were doing the earth-moving for the new docks there. I was in a pub, not looking for trouble, in fact I was phoning my mother, which I always did to let her know I was okay and where I was, when this guy comes up to me and tells me to get off the phone. I looked up and he was a big guy with a flat nose and a thick neck. I tell him I’m using the phone. With that he shouts, “I want a taxi,” then picks up a crutch and goes to put it over my head. I step forward and butt him straight on the forehead, and over he goes on his arse. As he fell he knocked over a table and ashtrays, so the barman wasn’t happy and phones the police. I leave the pub a bit sharpish and try to make it through town without getting picked up but they managed to catch me and once more I’m banged up again. I could hear my mate Schofield outside arguing with the police. When they came to see me, the sergeant said, “You know the guy you hit is in bad shape? In fact they are putting stitches in him right now. You split him open. You’re in a lot of trouble Taffy.” “But it wasn’t my fault,” I told them. With that, another policeman comes in and says to the sergeant, “Do you know who that big Welshman has done over?” and he whispers in his ear. The sergeant starts laughing his head off and shouts out, “Well he bloody deserves it. I’ve waited for years to see someone beat that bully up. You can go and get your arse back home Taff. I don’t want to see you here again.”

  Another place I got banged up in was Macclesfield. We had gone to a Chinese to get a takeaway when these big Scots took our bags off the counter. I’m not going to stand for that so I told them that we had paid for them. The biggest one turns to me: “Don’t worry Taff, you can have the next lot.” There were six of them and three of us and they were big lads as well. My mate Tommy English goes in with the head, so I pick up this big chair and put two straight down with it. All the time this little Chinese woman is shouting at us, we can’t understand her so we just ignore her. Anyways, I’d put the window through behind me with the chair as I lifted it to smash some more Scots up with it. With that the police cars came from everywhere. They surrounded us with all the sticks out and the police dogs going mad. The sergeant says, “Listen Taff, get in the wagon, one way or another you’re getting in.” I tell them, “I’m not getting in, it wasn’t out fault so why should I?” With that, Little Mallan comes up to me and says, “Bloody hell Pricey, it’s like Custer’s last stand.” (This wasn’t the first time I heard this.) So off we go, banged up for three days, then court. Fair play, the Scots said they started it but I still ended up with nine months, so off I was sent to Strangeways Prison in Manchester.

  I get my head down inside and get on with doing my time. I’m working in the kitchen and this big guy walks through, all over my clean floor. There was no screw around so after a few choice words, he says, “I’ll see you later Taff.”

  I answer straight back, “No, you’ll see me now,” and off we go to the toilets.

  He turns round. “Right come on,” he says.

  “Yeah right, let’s have you,” I answered and with that he lets out this mighty big kick. He wasn’t a mug or anything – I found out later he was a right hard bugger. I put a left and right into him and I grab him and push his head straight down the shithouse and I was trying to pull the chain at the same time. One of the screws had seen me, so the alarm bells go off. I was on the weights in those days and I was so big he wouldn’t tackle me on his own. Then the entire heavy mob came and I was still holding his head down the toilet. Anyway, they booked us both. When we went in to see the governor, I find out he had told them it was his fault, which I thought was fair of him. I told them, “Look, I was to blame, you know how things can flare up in here. I started it all.” They gave us three days’ block and we were kept apart from each other for a while. It was getting a bit stupid; with them on our cases, each of us couldn’t go near the other, so that made prison life even harder. I get chatting with a screw and he tells me, “Thing is, he’s like you Pricey, a hard bloody bastard who don’t take telling.” So I ask him, “What’s the crack keeping us apart all the time? What’s done is done. I don’t hold a grudge. Can’t I just shake hands with him?” Well they left us alone together and he says, “Bloody hell, I wouldn’t have walked on your floor if I knew you were such a handy fucker.” We got to be big mates after that. Funny how things work out.

  I was working away from home on the motorways again when we all decide to go out for a few drinks. Now you must remember that we were all good mates. We all stuck together, all helped each other out if needed. Well, this big guy was working with us and he didn’t really fit in. He was a bit of a bully really, always pushing his luck too far. We are all in this pub and he tries his luck with me. Big mistake. He was acting the big hard man, trying to wind me up. Well, I didn’t want trouble that night but as you can tell, it always seems to find me.

  Out we go to the car park and he’s a big guy so I don’t mess with him. Bang, straight on the jaw and down he goes, broken jaw and all his teeth kicked out. The next morning I’m walking to work when the manager tells me, “Pricey, he’s waiting for you and he’s got an iron bar, says he’s going to smash your skull in. You had better go home mate.” But I decide to carry on and sure enough there’s the big ape standing there with the iron bar, so I walk up to him and I tell him if he’s going to use the bar he had better use it good because I’m going to take it off him and break every bone in his body. Anyway he thinks twice and walks straight off the job.

  I was out drinking with big Mickey Mochan, we had been in a club out of Merthyr and were rather the worse for wear. Now Mickey was a big guy like me, in fact we often got mistaken for each other. We had just come out of a chip shop and we are walking across the forecourt when I notice these pricks on motorbikes, they were racing back and fore playing hell with people. I shout to them to stop, when this motherfucker races straight at me full pelt. I step to the side and, BANG, I hit him with a straight right hand. I catch him a good one and off comes his helmet and he disappears into the night with his head down. Mickey can see the helmet rolling towards him and says, “You’ve done it this time, you’ve decapitated the fucker!” So there we were, creeping up to this helmet, half expecting to find the bugger’s head in it.

  We all went to this right dive of a pub in Risca one day when this fight broke out. We laid guys out all over the shop like something out of a Western saloon brawl. Women were coming in and lifting the heads up on each guy who lay there sleeping to try and find out which was their boyfriend. Now that was a mental night.

  Working away from home again, I decide to go in this pub for a few drinks and I didn’t know it was a pub where all the wrestlers hung out. Well this big wrestler bumps me and his drink goes everywhere. The guy tries to get me to pay for the drink, so I tell him, “You want me to pay for your drink when it was your fault, no way.” So I started to lose my head when his two friends came over and started a row. I go to put the glasses down and next thing I’m bent over in a headlock. I can’t move and all his mates are trying to kick me between the legs. I lean down and grab him between the legs and twist like hell. Well he lets me go and I start fighting with them all, and they were big guys. I smashed a glass and sliced one of them across the face and a piece of flesh flies across the room and hits the wall.

  Well, he said, “So it’s with a glass is it?”

  I tell him straight, “I’m outnumbered here, so it is.”

  He says, “Well it’s my a
rgument, not theirs, so let’s me and you have it.”

  He ended up in hospital that night in a right state. I had put the boots into him as well.

  I was always fighting in every town I travelled through, with working on the roads. I fought the hardest in a place called Kendal once, a big guy called Glen. He was about 6ft 3in, 18 stone and very fit. He offered me out so we went outside. He came at me like a big bear. I caught him with a straight right hand and he comes crashing down. So I stuck the boots in as well to keep him down but after that night we became good friends, so it’s a pity we fought really.

  I must have had hundreds of street fights in my life and sometimes I’ve come close to being killed myself. One close call came in my hometown of Merthyr with a friend of mine called Carl. We had a run-in and I went to his house. I put a bowie knife straight through the front door, kicked the door in and climbed the stairs. Now I didn’t realise Carl’s wife and kids were in the house or I wouldn’t have gone there, that’s something I just wouldn’t do. Well up the stairs I go and Carl was a big bugger and he’s got this hatchet swinging around. Fair play, he put it in my head and there was blood everywhere. I kept on climbing the stairs until the loss of blood made it impossible to carry on. Well I talk to Carl these days. I must admit I do like him, in fact you could say we buried the hatchet . . .