Although it is unfortunately impossible to pinpoint their origin, these pictures were almost certainly published in a London magazine circa 1909-1913. Between those dates, and given the presence of tatami mats on the floor, it is highly likely that they were shot in one of three locations. The first candidate would be jujitsu instructor Edith Garrud‘s own dojo (training hall) at #8 Argyll Place, Regent Street, which advertised classes for women and children; the second would be the Golden Square dojo that Edith and her husband William had taken over from former Bartitsu Club instructor Sadakazu Uyenishi when the latter returned to Japan circa 1908.
However, given that one of the women in the second photograph is wearing what is apparently a Suffragette sash, reading “Women’s (indecipherable) Week”, perhaps the most likely location would be the “Suffragettes Self Defence Club”, which Edith had advertised in the Votes for Women newspaper in December of 1909. The club was based at Leighton Lodge in Edwardes Square, Kensington, which included a number of studios for classes in sculpture, painting and voice. The Suffragette self defence classes started at 7.00 p.m. each Tuesday and Thursday evening and cost 5s, 6d per month.
Posted inJiujitsu, Suffrajitsu|Comments Off on Jujitsuffragette Photographs?
Originally published on the Bartitsu.org site on Friday, 12th April 2013
Bartitsu founder E.W. Barton-Wright once expressed the wish to export his “New Art of Self Defence” to the United States, and several of his articles for London magazines were subsequently re-published in American newspapers. While Bartitsu itself was not, as it happened, exported to the USA, a small number of somewhat similar self defence systems did arise in North America during the early years of the 20th century. This article deals with evidence for one of those methods, and more particularly with the mystery and extraordinary scandal that enveloped the proponents of that method in the year 1911.
In 1906, the famed New York City photographer Percy C. Byron was commissioned to take a series of studio photographs depicting “Dr. Latson’s Method of Self Defense”. The pictures show an athletic young woman demonstrating an unarmed combat stance, several techniques of self defence with an umbrella and a stamping side kick to the attacker’s knee. There is also one picture that appears to show a dance or calisthenic posture.
Dr. W.R.C. Latson
New Yorker William Richard Cunningham Latson had graduated from the Eclectic Medical College of New York City in 1904 and quickly became something of a self-help celebrity. The editor of Health-Culture, an influential magazine, he was also a prolific author of health and fitness books and his articles appeared in newspapers all across America. As a keen physical culturist with a particular passion for boxing, Latson’s subjects ranged from correct posture to natural diet and from the moral benefits of athletic training to the physiology of knock-out punches.
The 1906 self defence pictures may have been intended to illustrate one of Latson’s planned books or articles, but they appear to have remained unpublished until they were featured as historical curiosities in the book Once Upon a City: New York 1890 to 1910 (1958) and then in the June, 1972 issue of American Heritage magazine. The apparent absence of any references to “Latson self defense method” classes, demonstrations, etc. during the early 1900s may suggest either that the method remained undeveloped, or simply that it was not taught publicly.
During the first decade of the 20th century, Latson’s writing increasingly tended towards self-improvement in the psychological and even spiritual senses.
Scandal and mystery
On May 11, 1911 Dr. Latson’s body was discovered in the library of his well-appointed apartment at 660 Riverside Drive. He had been killed by a single shot from a revolver, which was found underneath his body; also nearby was a note reading “Gertie and Mother, I have done my best – death.”
The subsequent investigation by coroners and police aroused a storm of media controversy that included allegations of “sex cult” activity, murder, hypnotism, a suicide pact gone awry and “mystical psychology”. The controversy focused on the relationship between the late Dr. Latson and his 21 year old secretary, protégée and lover Ida Rosenthal, who used the name “Alta Marhevka” (also rendered by journalists as “Marhezka”, “Marhelka” and numerous other spellings). She was seen climbing out of the window of Dr. Latson’s apartment several hours before his body was discovered and, incidentally, is also believed to have been the woman who posed for the Latson self defence method photographs in 1906.
Several days after the shooting Miss Rosenthal, who had been named as a co-respondent in Dr. Latson’s divorce several years earlier, attempted suicide by gas poisoning in her bathroom. The room strewn with note papers bearing scraps of poetry and philosophical musings. Rescued by her landlady, Rosenthal spent the next several days in hospital. She made a number of statements to reporters, describing Dr. Latson as “a theosophist and Buddhist, learned in the occult”, expressing the belief that Latson’s spirit had risen to a higher plane of existence and referring to him as her “gourah” (guru). The latter word was typically translated by reporters as “god-man”, leading the scandal to be referred to in newspaper headlines as “the God-Man Mystery”.
On June 29, despite a stark disagreement between the coroner in charge of the investigation and his associate – one was convinced that the gunshot that killed Latson was self-inflicted, the other insisted that it could not have been because of the lack of powder burns around the fatal wound – a coroner’s court jury quickly found that Dr. Latson had committed suicide and no charges in connection to his death were ever laid against Ida Rosenthal.
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Originally published on the Bartitsu.org site on Monday, 15th April 2013
Comparatively little is known about the period that Bartitsu founder E.W. Barton-Wright spent living in Kobe, Japan. Arriving during mid-1895, he spent the next several years supervising an antimony smelting operation for E.H. Hunter and Company, a large manufacturing business. Most of his free time was apparently spent training at the Shinden Fudo Ryu jiujitsu dojo of his sensei, Terajima Kuniichiro.
However, we do have a curious detail of Barton-Wright’s activities in Kobe one evening during November of 1895, when he was part of a committee invited to test the purportedly supernatural powers of a young French-American woman known as “Annie May Abbott, the Georgia Magnet”.
Who was the Georgia Magnet?
“Annie May Abbott”, whose real name was Matilda Tatro, was actually one of the most successful of several “Georgia Magnet” performers. This “Magnet act” had been touring music hall and vaudeville stages since 1883, when Lulu Hurst, the original Magnet, first rose to prominence in the USA. “Magnets” were typically slender young women who claimed to be able to manipulate a hitherto-unknown power, said to be akin to electricity or magnetism, that allowed them to perform superhuman feats of strength, under certain conditions. This description of a Magnet’s performance from a Minnesota newspaper dated October 15, 1890 is typical:
It was the most wonderful and utterly inexplicable exhibition – a genuine phenomenon – ever witnessed in this country. People may scoff and turn up their nose at the supernatural or, unnatural forces, if you please. Hypnotism until recently had but few believers. Mesmerism and kindred phenomena were thought to be high-flown titles for “fraud” and “fake,” but science has taken a hand and dispelled such ideas. It sounds a little “fishy” to state that she lifted two feet clear from the floor nine heavy men at one time, piled upon two heavy chairs, and as easily as the reader would this paper; in fact two gentlemen had their hands interposed between her hands and the chair, with no other contact when the entire mass came up, and those gentlemen assert that there was no more perceptible pressure against their hands than the weight of the hand.
Her muscles were examined during the tests and no sort of muscular action was found. What does it? The committee all tried singly to lift her, which the smallest man could do (she weighs not over 95) when she willed it, but when she preferred not, it remained not. Men tugged till their eyes bulged and they were red and blue in the face, but she remained smiling and as immovable as a block of buildings. Two, three four, six and eight men together expended all their strength in vain to hoist her a particle. She picked men up by the ears, by the head, hoisted them on poles, by her fingers tumbled them around like paper balls.
Many believers in the Magnet’s powers attributed them to a mysterious energy known as the odic force, which was held to be similar to the energies employed in spiritualist seances.
Barton-Wright meets the Magnet
By November of 1895, “Annie May Abbott’s” world tour had brought her to Japan. She and her manager, Richard N. Abbey – who had previously managed another Magnet, whose real name was Dixie Haygood – joined forces with a Professor Frank E. Wood, who served as their translator. They performed a series of shows, or “demonstrations”, at theatres throughout Japan, eventually arriving in Kobe.
The Magnet’s act consisted of two main parts. First, manager Abbey would deliver a short lecture on the mysterious forces that were Miss Abbott’s to command, his speech translated for their largely Japanese audiences by Professor Wood. Then, a committee would be invited onto the stage in order to test these feats as the Magnet herself performed them. The committee was typically made up of volunteers from the audience, ideally large, strong men. The athletic E.W. Barton-Wright would have made a fine candidate, also possessing the distinct advantage of speaking English, so that he would have no difficulty in following Mr. Abbey’s instructions during the “experiments” on stage.
After the show, the committee was required to sign a testimonial as to the Magnet’s success in the various feats performed on stage.
How to Pose as a Strong Man
E.W. Barton-Wright’s true impressions of the Magnet’s performance became clear several years later, when he authored a detailed expose of “Georgia Magnet”-type stunts. The illustrated essay How to Pose as a Strong Man (PDF available here) was published in Pearson’s Magazine in January of 1899, and included the statements:
It must not be supposed that it is necessary to possess any unusual strength to pose as a strong man; indeed, in many strong men’s feats, strength plays a less important part than knack and trickery.
… (The Georgia Magnet) declared that it was solely owing to the fact that she possessed remarkable magnetic and electric powers that she was able to perform these feats. This, of course, was not the case, for anyone of average strength, who follows these instructions, will be able to perform them.
Armed with his intimate technical knowledge of “balance and leverage as applied to human anatomy”, which was to become a cornerstone of his Bartitsu martial art, Barton-Wright proceeded to explain how to perform numerous illusions of superhuman strength. He also addressed the psychological aspect of the Magnet’s act, referring to techniques of distracting the audience’s attention from the actual methods employed through “patter” and misdirection.
In fact, aspects of the Magnet act had been repeatedly exposed by academic skeptics in various newspaper and magazine articles dating back to the 1880s, but Barton-Wright’s concise essay, well-illustrated with step-by-step photographs, was unusually accessible to the lay-reader. Therefore, it was with some evident delight that the editor of the New Zealand Graphic newspaper decided to re-print How to Pose as a Strong Man during Annie May Abbott’s extended tour of New Zealand in 1899. In the same issue, the editor printed a satirical cartoon suggesting that the Magnet might use her powers to “lift” certain recalcitrant City Council members out of their seats.
Response from the Magnet’s representatives was swift and came in the form of a politely blistering letter to the editor of the Auckland Star, which was published on September 11th:
I shall be glad if you will allow me space to point out the essential differences between the feats set out in the article and the tests accomplished by Miss Abbott. As a preliminary, I may state that the article in “Pearson’s Magazine” was written by a Mr E. W. Barton-Wright, and was published as a sort of counterblast to a complimentary testimony to the “Georgia Magnet’s” ability, which appeared in the “Strand Magazine.” It must also be remembered that at this time the rival firms of Newnes and Pearson were sparing no effort to go one better than the other.
The above facts are well known, and only require being brought to mind, but it is not generally known that Mr. Barton-Wright attended one of Miss Abbott’s performances in Kobe, Japan, in November, 1895, and as a member of her committee signed his name to a testimonial almost similar to the one signed by the Auckland committee on Tuesday week. Perhaps he was “led by the nose” in the manner so elegantly suggested by Mr. Kent in a recent letter; but probably he signed the document of his own free will. In any case, the publication of his article in the “Graphic” Is calculated to throw discredit upon Miss Abbott, for it attempts to explain her feats as purely mechanical operations.
The Magnet’s defender in this instance was a man named Danvers Hamber, who was at that time the assistant editor of the New Zealand Sporting and Dramatic Review. In a high dudgeon, he proceeded to point out the various ways in which Miss Abbott’s performance differed from Barton-Wright’s descriptions, before finishing:
Mr. Barton-Wright undoubtedly used Miss Abbott’s performance as the foundation of his article. He forgot much in the three years which elapsed between witnessing Miss Abbott’s tests at Kobe and writing the paper. He probably forgot all about signing the testimonial to the lady’s ability, and he certainly let the truth slide in concocting many of the above little stories. His article may probably harm Miss Abbott’s tour through New Zealand. Here in Auckland we have already seen the effect it has upon the medical profession. If it can so disturb members of what is considered a calm and judicious calling, what may it not do with persons who have less control over their judgment?
There may well have been divergences between Barton-Wright’s descriptions and Miss Abbott’s demonstrations. Barton-Wright had addressed the fakery of “Georgia Magnet”-style feats in broad terms, and his article also included several feats that were not part of the Georgia Magnet repertoire. It would be interesting to read the exact wording of the testimonials signed by the various committees, there being a significant difference, for example, between the statements “I saw Miss Abbott resist the strength of several men” and “I saw Miss Abbott use odic force to resist the strength of several men.”
Moreover, as Barton-Wright had explained, there are several ways to perform the various Georgia Magnet “experiments” without resorting to odic force, all of them requiring the practiced application of leverage and balance combined with the ideomotor effect – the influence of suggestion or expectation on unconscious bodily movement. Less spectacularly, the same phenomenon can explain the apparently mysterious workings of spiritualistic phenomena including ouija boards, table turning and dowsing at the psychophysiological level. Some twenty years later, magician, escapologist and arch-skeptic Harry Houdini would also pick up on the relationship between martial arts techniques and those of the music hall charlatans …
… who gave the world of science a decided start about a generation ago.
The jiu jitsu of the Japanese is, in part, a development of the same principles, but here again much new material has been added, so that it deserves to be considered a new art.
– Harry Houdini, Miracle Mongers and their Methods, 1920
Mr. Hamber’s fears were somewhat justified, as several other New Zealand newspapers followed the Auckland Star’s lead and printed skeptical editorials as the Magnet’s tour continued through the provinces. The consensus was that, while the show was very entertaining, the “odic force” patter was past its prime. The editor of the Timaru Post asserted that:
.. the “Georgia Magnet” possesses no power, psychic or otherwise, that is not possessed by every member of her sex. As an example. The “Georgia Magnet” holds the downward end of a stick in her clenched right hand, and one or two men are expected to force it through. Why, almost a child could resist their efforts. We know it is claimed that she does not grasp the stick, but we have seen her do it. Every one of her tricks is explainable in as simple a manner, even to the rising of her temperature and simultaneous lowering of her pulse, which seems to have puzzled the doctors so much. Of course, the temperature is raised by her exertions and the surrounding atmosphere, while a couple of minims of tincture of aconite does the rest, as far as the pulse is concerned.
Twice has the “Magnet” been lifted from the local platform, despite her exertions and anatomical distortions, and twice has it been clearly demonstrated that there has been no magnetism or “new force” holding her down, and the nonsense talked about “flesh contact” is as meaningless as it is void of truth.
As previously stated, we have no objection to such exhibitions as shows, merely; but we are bound to protect truth and science from incursions of that description. It is unlikely the Magnet will attract much more in New Zealand, as all the papers are busy exposing her tricks. We have had one “feat” explained to us, and see the impossibility of standing still while clasping a chair in both arms, even though the contrary force is exerted only by some one’s little finger.
It’s unlikely that E.W. Barton-Wright was even aware of the part played by his article in this controversy, but there’s no reason to doubt that it would have pleased him.
Originally published on the Bartitsu.org site on Tuesday, 16th April 2013
The Hatpin Inflicts a Severe Wound and Can Be Got Ready for Action in a Moment
“What shall we do in case we are attacked by some thief or ruffian?” is the question women have asked in every part of the country. The man to whom the question is put will generally answer: “Carry a revolver.” But women dread revolvers. Few women possess the nerve necessary to use a pistol with effect when attacked. Then there is the objection to a revolver in the possession of a woman that she would be averse to suspecting the motive of every man she met and would probably fail to draw the revolver until too late, for fear of making a foolish mistake. What, then, can be provided for her that will be formidable to a foe, yet absolutely safe, so far as she is concerned, and ever ready at hand, whether wanted for use or not?
The answer to the puzzle has been provided by those who make women’s hatpins. A hatpin has been designed that is intended primarily for use as a weapon of defense. It is in reality a stiletto, masquerading as an innocent hatpin. It is made of fine steel, that will bend, but will not break, as sharp as a needle, and hardened at the end so that it can be used with deadly effect as a dagger, and a handle that enables a woman to grasp it for use as a weapon and hold it so that it cannot easily be pulled from her hand.
There are two ways of holding this hatpin. It can be held with the thumb pressed against the top or with the button grasped in the palm of the hand. In either way it is a weapon not to be despised. The method of using it to the best advantage when attacked is to aim at the face of the highwayman. A woman armed with one of these stilettos is able to do more damage in a few seconds than a man unarmed. The wicked little blade is so small that it is impossible to grasp it to wrench it away from her, and yet so keen is it that, thrust home by a woman frenzied by fear, it is likely to pierce through any ordinary clothing into a vital part of a highwayman’s anatomy.
There are times in most women’s lives when a suspicious looking character comes into the offing and prudence whispers: “Beware of him.” While most women would shrink under these circumstances from pulling out a revolver, it is an innocent act to put the hand to the hat and draw out one of her stiletto-like hatpins. With this in her hand the nervous woman is ready for the stranger, whatever his Intentions. If he is an honest man he will probably take no notice of the woman’s action. If he is a thief, it is more than probable that he will mark the act and let the woman pass unmolested.
Posted inAntagonistics|Comments Off on “Woman’s Handiest Weapon”: the Stiletto Hatpin (New York Tribune, 1904)
Originally published on the Bartitsu.org site on Wednesday, 17th April 2013
Attributed to the Lumiere brothers and dated circa 1898, this film appears to be one of the earliest cinematographic representations of la boxe française. The athletes may be soldiers at the famous Joinville-le-Pont military physical training school.
The “Four Point” drill, which is probably what is being demonstrated in this film, was basically a formal exercise designed for group practice, in which students perform a set of postures, flourishes etc. while turning sequentially to each of four directions. This type of drill was popularised through the physical culture training of the Joinville school and was later adopted by the French education system.
Posted inSavate, Video|Comments Off on Savate (Boxe Française) on Film, Circa 1898
Originally published on the Bartitsu.org site on Saturday, 20th April 2013
Thanks to Maxime Chouinard for forwarding this item.
Please click on the picture below to view it at full size.
Mlle. Gelas Shows Audience Tricks by Which a Woman Can Repel Attacks of a Ruffian with Hatpin or Twist to Break Arm or Upset Him
A Woman’s Art of Self Defence
Mlle. Gelas’ Demonstration of a Forearm Twist Which Will Break the Bone or Upset a Ruffian
HATPIN NOT HER ONLY WEAPON
Little Strength, Properly Applied, Is Wonderfully Effective
Tricks Men Can Employ
The ease and certainty with which a young woman may defend herself from attacks by ruffians or highway robbers was demonstrated by Mlle. Marie Gelas before an audience which comfortably filled Association Hall last night.
Prof. J.M. Gelas Sr. and Prof. J.M. Gelas Jr. gave an exposition of their system of self-defence, and the demonstration was as novel as it was entertaining.
The program was an exhibition of the art of self-defence given by the Gelas family, assisted by Capt. Seaholme, A.G. Adams and H.H. Davis. There were many interesting bouts with foils, fencing swords and single-sticks, in the handling of which Prof. Gelas and his son are masters, but the number of absorbing interest was Mlle. Gelas’ illustration of the ease with which unexpected attacks may be repelled by the young woman who has a bit of knowledge of the proper manner of going about it, coupled with a bit of presence of mind.
Mlle. Gelas was assisted by her brother, Prof. J.M. Gelas, Jr., and effectively repelled every manner of attack with the employment of no more force than is possessed by the average woman. One or two of her methods of meeting attacks were effective enough, if employed with only ordinary force, to leave a street ruffian either absolutely powerless or writhing in agony. In one or two of her demonstrations, Mlle. Gelas made use of the ever-present feminine hat-pin and an umbrella, but just as efficient were the methods to repel attack with little strength properly and quickly applied.
Seized by the throat by her brother, as they met each other, Mlle. Gelas seized his wrist with both hands and, with a quick outward turn, the young woman whirled her supposed assailant with leverage enough to throw him upon his back or to break his arms if he struggled. This is perhaps the only one of the demonstrations which resembled the Japanese system.
Taken again by the throat by the imaginary ruffian, Mlle. Gelas seized his wrist with a sudden jerk and, turning suddenly and drawing the arm over her shoulder for a fulcrum, bore down upon the wrist with leverage enough to snap the bone, with the exertion of a little force.
The young woman, in a dozen different movements, showed the simple method of extending the arm and planting the first and second fingers of the hand in the eyes of her assailant, to the more complex moves by which an attack from the rear is rendered harmless, showing that while the hatpin and umbrella may be used commandingly at times, they are by no means necessary. The only weapons a young woman needs when seized hold of, according to Mlle. Gelas, are a ready wit and the knowledge of what to do at the proper moment.
Prof. Gelas and his son demonstrated how east it is to render the assailant powerless by the use of the simplest devices and a proper application of strength. The exhibition included illustrations of the proper employment of hat and cane, whether that attack be with a slungshot, a cane, knife or even a revolver thrust into the face within reach.
Other entertaining numbers on the programme were bouts with foils between Prof. Gelas and Capt. Seaholme, a fencing bout between A.G. Adams and H.H. Davis, both pupils of Prof. Gelas, and sword, foil and singlestick bouts between the Gelases, father and son.
Addendum: although little more is currently known about the Gelas method of self defence, it’s worth noting that Mlle. Marie Gelas bears a marked resemblance to the unidentified woman demonstrating umbrella self defence in these pictures, which were apparently taken at the Philadelphia Institute of Physical Culture in 1908:
Posted inAntagonistics|Comments Off on “Woman Repels Ruffian” (Boston Globe, 1904)
Originally published on the Bartitsu.org site on Wednesday, 24th April 2013
Text from “The Official Report of the Japan British Exhibition 1910 at the Great White City, Shepherd’s Bush, London”. The heavyweight wrestler standing in the top two pictures has been identified as Akitaro Ono, a 4th-dan judo black belt and one of the Japanese athletes who toured internationally, “taking on all comers” in wrestling competitions during the early 1900s.
The Kano system of Ju-Jitsu … is demonstrated by the leading experts in this Japanese method of self-defence. The lessons given will be found both valuable and entertaining. How a weak person may master a stronger by the knowledge of a few of the more simpler tricks will be shown. Physical culture by the Ju-Jitsu system will no doubt interest many. The more skilled professors in this art will hold wrestling contests, principally to show that the practice of Ju-Jitsu is not dangerous as many Westerners seem to suppose.
The Kuatsu system of restoring “disabled” and unconscious persons will be fully demonstrated. This restorative science is worthy the attention of the physician and layman alike. The Japanese claim a knowledge of this science would be the means of saving many lives. The methods of Kuatsu are efficacious in cases of sunstroke and drowning where ordinary medical means fail.
Posted inJiujitsu|Comments Off on “Kano Jiu Jitsu” at the Japan-British Exhibition (1910)
Originally published on the Bartitsu.org site on Thursday, 25th April 2013
Possibly inspired by E.W. Barton-Wright’s coining of the word “Bartitsu”, Punch cartoonist E.T. Reed imagines the martial arts of British politicans including Joseph Chamberlain’s “Jo-jitsu” and Arthur Balfour’s “Balf-itsu”, a “peculiar method of contortionist gymnastics and telescopic dislocation”.
Click on the image to see it at full size …
Posted inEdwardiana, Humour, Jiujitsu|Comments Off on Political Jujitsu Cartoon by E.T. Reed (1902)
