These photographs of Edith Garrud in action were originally published in the Daily Mirror of April 13, 1909. At that time, Garrud was inaugurating her “Suffragettes Self-Defence Club” as a separate concern from the Golden Square School of Jujitsu, where she taught along with her husband, William.
A number of short silent films featuring jujutsu were produced and/or screened in London during the very early 20th century. The intriguing list of titles includes:
Unfortunately, aside from their titles and scattered items of production information, these films have defied re-discovery other than The Art of Ju-jitsu documentary of 1912. It’s entirely possible that many of the others may have been lost forever. Recently, however, two major scenes from Charley Smiler Takes Up Ju-Jitsu were found as part of a 1950s-vintage TV compilation of early silent comedies, in which they had been edited together and re-titled Ju-Jitsu-Itus!
Little is known about the original film’s production except that it was directed by David Aylott as part of a series of slapstick comedy shorts starring Fred Evans as “Charley Smiler”. A contemporary and childhood friend of Charlie Chaplin’s, Evans was a highly popular performer during the early 1900s.
Charley Smiler Takes Up Ju-Jitsu was originally released on August 10th of 1911 and then re-released in 1915. Here’s a description of the plot, from The Bioscope of August 3, 1911:
Smiler is one of a number of people who gather outside a booth, inside which a troupe of wrestlers is performing. He is so impressed by the skill of the performers that he seizes a fellow member of the audience and tries to throw him, only himself to be roughly handled by one of the Japs, who pitches him out of the tent.
Smiler begins to practise on others the falls he has been so painfully acquainted with. A pair of lovers are given introduction to the art, and the man takes a flight over Smiler’s shoulder, as does a fisher, who finds himself pitched head first into the water. In a country farmer Smiler meets more than his match, and has such a rough time that he limps away with his liking for ju-jitsu all but cured, though a bout with a tailor’s dummy revives him a little, and he is still further exhilarated by the ease with which he topples over a long row of bobbies.
The next person he runs across, however, knows a little more about ju-jitsu than he does, and though she is only a slight girl, throws him over her shoulder with the greatest of ease.
Although only the opening and closing scenes were preserved in the 1950s compilation, by lucky chance those two scenes are most likely to be of significance to modern viewers with an interest in the early history of jujutsu in the Western world.
Here are the scenes:
At the time this film was produced there was only one full-time martial arts dojo operating in London – the Golden Square School of Jujitsu, which had been founded by former Bartitsu Club instructor Sadakazu Uyenishi in 1903, just about one year after the Bartitsu Club had closed down. Uyenishi himself had demonstrated his art in some film footage shot by the Gaumont Company in 1905 (you can see it reanimated here). When Uyenishi returned to Japan in 1907, management of the Golden Square School passed to his senior students, the husband and wife team of William and Edith Garrud.
Although it’s impossible to be certain, it’s at least likely that the various “stunt performers” featured in Charley Smiler Takes Up Ju-Jitsu were members of the Golden Square dojo. The two gi-clad “booth wrestlers” in the opening scene look like jujutsuka play-acting for the camera, rather than like slapstick actors imitating jujutsu. As a highly trained music hall tumbler, Smiler (Evans) himself was clearly capable of taking his own falls throughout the film.
Most intriguing, though, is the possibility that the jujitsuffragette “Miss U.I. Throwe”, who teaches Charley an object lesson at the end, may also have been a Garrud student, or may even have been played by Edith Garrud herself. She had started teaching a suffragettes-only self-defence club in 1909, and in 1913 she was famously recruited to train the clandestine WSPU Bodyguard; the team of security specialists who defended outlaw suffragettes from assault and arrest.
There are only a few clear photographs of Edith Garrud circa 1911 and the visual quality of the Charley Smiler film isn’t good enough to be able to positively identify “Miss Throwe”, but Edith would have been more than qualified to essay this role – not least because she had previously starred in Ju-jitsu Downs the Footpads, or, the Lady Athlete (1907) – and there is a definite resemblance. While “Miss Throwe” is clearly shorter than Evans, though, it may be that she’s taller than 4’11”, which was Edith Garrud’s reported height.
Regardless of who played “Miss U.I. Throwe”, the jujitsu footage in Charley Smiler is among the earliest known filmed representations of Japanese martial arts, the earliest known moving imagery of a woman demonstrating jujutsu by some 15 years and is literally the only film known to exist of “suffrajitsu” in action during the early 20th century.
Members of the Santiago Stickfighters club exhibit their Integrated Method of stick-fighting, inspired largely by a combination of the Vigny/Bartitsu and Bonafont methods.
The sparring canes are made of a hard polymer composite material, tipped with rubber ball handles.
This non-contact exhibition sparring clip demonstrates the characteristic speed, ambidexterity and versatility of the Integrated Method.
Although it was fairly common for Japanese jujutsuka to engage with Western boxers on the stages of Edwardian London’s music halls, the boxers normally simply wrestled according to jujutsu rules. Occasionally, however, a true mixed-styles bout did take place, as when former Bartitsu Club instructor Yukio Tani took on the pugilist known as Young Joseph or as in this instance, recorded in the Birkenhead News of August 25th, 1909, when Tani’s compatriot Taro Miyake exhibited his jujutsu skills against the boxer Charlie Knock.
The Miyake/Knock “turn” was, however, expressly announced as an exhibition, and it was noted that they would not attempt to hurt each other, so the actual performance was clearly more in the nature of a light sparring contest for demonstration purposes rather than a serious match. They repeated the exhibition at a number of music halls during August and September of 1909.
Noting as usual that the term “Jap” was not used pejoratively in Edwardian English and also that Taro Miyake’s name was frequently rendered by English journalists as “Tarro Myaki”.
AT THE OLYMPIA
A programme of quite exceptional excellence is submitted to patrons of this fine hall this week. From beginning to end the entertainment is of the highest class, and not a dull moment is experienced throughout.
The “top of the bill” is occupied by Tarro Myaki, the celebrated Japanese exponent of the Ju-Jitsu system of self-defence, who not only give a remarkable exposition of the science, but shows how he would defend himself against the attack of a skilled boxer. The representative of boxing is no less a person than Charlie Knock, the welterweight champion of England and the winner of many battles in the ring, so that it will be seen that the Jap has a foeman worthy of his steel.
On Monday evening Myaki endured a good deal of punishment, but brought each of three bouts to a close by throwing the boxer and rendering him helpless by the application of one or other of the “grips” or “holds”, practiced by the Ju-Jitsu expert. The demonstration was much appreciated.
Earlier in the evening a perhaps even more remarkable display of the value of a knowledge of Ju-Jitsu was given by Miss Clarice, the lady champion, who dealt effectually with a realistic looking ruffian impersonated by her partner Euzen, the “soldier juggler,” whose performance, by the way, was one of the features of the night’s entertainment. Every “attack” was foiled with consummate ease, and when the rough, baffled at every turn, produced first a cudgel, then a knife, and finally a revolver, he was even more severely dealt with. There can be no question that a knowledge of the Ju-Jitsu method of defending oneself is extremely valuable, and that the art is well worth the trouble of acquiring.
When Edward Barton-Wright ceased promoting the Japanese martial arts in England, the cause was taken up by the music hall strongman William Bankier, known professionally as “Apollo, the Scottish Hercules”. This series of photographs shows female students at his Great Newport Street academy being trained by Phoebe Roberts (shown standing at the far right). Miss Roberts was, along with Edith Garrud and Emily (Diana) Watts, one of the first female jujitsu instructors in the Western world.
During the very early 1900s the English media was generally supportive of women learning jujitsu as self-defence and for exercise, but there was a notable change in attitude some six years after this photograph was taken. When Edith Garrud began training members of the radical suffragette Bodyguard team in martial arts, the mainstream media reaction veered markedly towards a kind of hostile condescension.
These cartoons from the June 17, 1911 issue of the Illustrated Sporting and Dramatic News illustrate Japanese martial arts displays in the “Ju Jitsu Hall” of London’s Coronation Exhibition. The same venue had also hosted martial arts displays about a year previously, during the Japan-British Exhibition.
“Uncle Frank’s trick” was anecdotally attributed to a “philosophical Apache”, who reasoned that it was better tactics to temporarily disable a mugging victim without endangering their life.
During the early years of the 20th century, the trick attained a degree of pop-culture infamy as part of the “Apache chic” craze. It was frequently showcased in self-defence manuals of the period – along with various counters – and in the media, including this flip-book produced by Leon Beaulieu.
The subject of the following short article was probably inspired by Sgt. George Wheeldon’s self defence and restraint classes for the London police.
New loose-fitting Army overcoats are about to be handed out to the officers of the London police in place of the tight-fitting coats at present worn. The new coat is much lighter than the old. It is believed that the new cloth will be much warmer and more waterproof than the old, and what is more important will prevent the officer being handicapped by tight-fitting clothes in the event of a struggle with a desperate prisoner.
Ju-jitsu, the Japanese mode of wrestling, which is being taught to the police, is mainly responsible for the change, at having been found that, no matter how efficient the officer became, be was virtually helpless when encased in his present tight-fitting clothes.
Edward Barton-Wright’s jujutsu training took place at the Shinden Fudo Ryu dojo of sensei Terajima Kuniichiro between roughly 1895-1898. That dojo was located in the town of Kobe in Hyōgo Prefecture, on Honshu Island. Barton-Wright later noted that he’d taken up jujutsu due partly to his life-long interest in the arts of self-defence and partly because, unlike most other foreign nationals resident in Kobe, he wasn’t a drinker and preferred not to spend his evenings lounging on verandas.
His main occupation there, however, was working as an antimony smelting specialist for E.H. Hunter and Company, whose factory is illustrated above. It’s likely that Barton-Wright had developed his expertise in this dangerous metallurgical specialty while working for various mining concerns throughout Europe and the “Straits Settlements” (in the present day region of Singapore).
E.W. Barton-Wright demonstrates the tomoenage (stomach throw) during one of his first major Bartitsu exhibitions, held at the famous Bath Club in London. This illustration has been adapted from the original, which appeared in the Illustrated Sporting and Dramatic News of Saturday 18th March, 1899.
