122:, and bouts sometimes continued without pause until one competitor collapsed. Wilkinson was also skilled with daggers, short swords, and quarterstaffs, and the majority of her matches may have been fought with weapons. At the time it was common for women to fight topless, so Thrasher suggests that Wilkinson and her opponents defined themselves as serious athletes by fighting fully clothed, with one advertisement from 1726 stating that the boxers would "fight in cloth Jackets, short Petticoats, coming just below the Knee, Holland Drawers, white Stockings, and pumps".
141:
fight between
Wilkinson and Mary Welch, an Irish boxer, to take place at James Stokes' amphitheatre. In the newspaper announcement, Welch described Wilkinson as "the famous Championess of England", and in her response, Wilkinson claimed to be undefeated, "having never engaged with any of my own Sex but I always came off with Victory and Applause". In advertisements for other fights, she was variously billed as the "Invincible City Championess", the "European Championess", the "Cockney Championess", and "Britania's most puissant Heroine".
149:" in July 1727. Thomas and Sarah Barret gave a similar challenge in December 1728. In his response, James Stokes noted that Elizabeth was "thought not to fight in Publick anymore" but "my spouse not doubting but to do the fame and hopes to give a general Satisfaction to all Spectators". Though she exclusively boxed against other women, one advertisement from 1733 suggests that she may have fought a fencing match against Edward Sutton, who was also a frequent combatant in London's prize rings.
55:" and had a reputation for having fought 45 bouts without defeat, although no official career data survives from the time. Later in her career, she engaged in bouts in which she and her husband, who was also a boxer, fought against other mixed-gender couples. She was also skilled with daggers, short swords, and quarterstaffs. She was one of the most famous
140:
While
British newspapers of the 1720s announced bouts, they did not report on the results, so no definitive record of Wilkinson's wins and losses exists. Based on fight announcements, however, she appears to have been undefeated for most of her career. In October 1726, a London newspaper announced a
165:
According to
Malissa Smith, women's boxing went against middle and upper class attitudes during Wilkinson's career. According to Jennings, Wilkinson's career appears to have been successful even though she defied 18th century gender roles. She was celebrated as a skilled boxer into the early 1800s,
80:
English background. L.A. Jennings speculated that she may have been related to the boxer Robert
Wilkinson, who was hanged for murder on 24 September 1722, shortly after Elizabeth's first advertised boxing match, while Christopher speculated that "Wilkinson" might not have been her real surname and
144:
Later in her career, Wilkinson and her husband were often challenged as a pair by other mixed-gender couples, with her fighting the woman and him, the man. In the first of these, her former opponent Mary Welch and her trainer Robert Baker challenged "Mr. Stokes and his bold
Amazonian
75:
Little information survives about
Wilkinson's life outside the boxing ring. In an announcement promoting one of her matches, she claimed to be "of the famous city of London". Like most English boxers of the early 18th century, she appears to have come from a
152:
In addition to fighting, Wilkinson instructed aspiring pugilists. An announcement for one of
Wilkinson's fights noted that two of her students would fight six rounds with quarterstaffs interspersed among the bouts between Wilkinson and her opponent.
191:
saw a strict redefinition of gender roles, so some writers of that time portrayed
Wilkinson as an historical curiosity, while others derided her and her contemporaries as evidencing the barbarism and moral failings of the 18th century.
156:
Wilkinson continued to appear in boxing announcements until at least 1733, by which point she claimed to have fought 45 matches and gone undefeated. She disappeared from the historical record after her last advertised fight.
137:, Wilkinson declared that "the blows which I shall present her with will be more difficult for her to digest than any she ever gave her asses". By 1726, Wilkinson also frequently fought at James Stokes' boxing amphitheatre.
84:
Wilkinson married the boxer James Stokes. A 1725 promotional announcement for a fight describes her as his "much admired consort". Sometime between 1722 and 1726, she became known as
Elizabeth Stokes.
99:
Market to what may have been one of the earliest advertised female prizefights in London. Her challenge in a London newspaper declared ”I, Elizabeth
Wilkinson, of
607:
836:
613:
782:"Disappearance: How Shifting Gendered Boundaries Motivated the Removal of Eighteenth Century Boxing Champion Elizabeth Wilkinson from Historical Memory"
103:, having had some words with Hannah Hyfield and requiring Satisfaction, do invite her to meet me on the Stage, and Box with me for three
187:
Thrasher has found that references to Wilkinson became increasingly rare and negative later in the 19th century. He argues that the
111:
in each hand, a rule that prevented the gouging and scratching common in eighteenth-century boxing. That year, she also fought a
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After her last documented fights in 1733, no further information about her life can be found in the historical record.
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in her printed challenges. For example, in a published acceptance of a challenge from Ann Field, an ass-driver from
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655:
Guttmann, Allen (1985). "English Sports Spectators: The Restoration to the Early Nineteenth Century".
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that she may have chosen it as a stage name to evoke the particularly infamous fellow boxer.
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129:. Both Figg and Wilkinson were skilled self-promoters, and Wilkinson frequently engaged in
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named Martha Jones, whom she reportedly beat after twenty-two minutes.
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active in the 1720s and early 1730s. She was one of the earliest known
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699:
Radford, Pat (2016). "Women as Athletes in Early Modern Britain".
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This article is about the boxer. For the professor of German, see
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608:"Stokes, Elizabeth (fl. 1723–1733), pugilist and prize-fighter"
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51:. During her decade-long career, she was often described as a "
107:". They went on to specify that each woman would grasp a
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She's a Knockout!: A History of Women in Fighting Sports
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In June 1722, Wilkinson challenged Hannah Hyfield of
736:
Roberts, Randy (1977). "Eighteenth Century Boxing".
590:
Boxiana: or, Sketches of Ancient and Modern Pugilism
125:Wilkinson became a fixture in the boxing venues of
67:celebrated her career into the early 19th century.
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118:In the 18th century, boxing matches were always
184:also referenced Wilkinson in a positive light.
617:(online ed.). Oxford University Press.
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822:English bare-knuckle boxers
807:18th-century English people
759:A History of Women's Boxing
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202:Timeline of women's sports
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817:18th-century sportswomen
763:Rowman & Littlefield
738:Journal of Sport History
682:Rowman & Littlefield
676:Jennings, L. A. (2014).
657:Journal of Sport History
21:Elizabeth Mary Wilkinson
832:People from Clerkenwell
757:Smith, Malissa (2014).
598:2027/njp.32101072325507
623:10.1093/ref:odnb/69283
713:10.1353/emw.2016.0003
827:English women boxers
761:. Lanham, Maryland:
680:. Lanham, Maryland:
178:James Peller Malcolm
43:and practitioner of
29:Elizabeth Wilkinson
701:Early Modern Women
605:Gee, Tony (2004).
41:bare-knuckle boxer
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170:in his 1813 book
39:) was an English
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168:Pierce Egan
101:Clerkenwell
61:Pierce Egan
53:Championess
801:Categories
650:required.)
530:Smith 2014
503:Smith 2014
438:Smith 2014
395:Smith 2014
359:Smith 2014
208:References
131:trash-talk
127:James Figg
109:half crown
729:165047657
347:Egan 1823
792:: 53–75.
750:43610520
721:26431396
669:43611494
588:(1823).
321:Gee 2004
196:See also
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638:26 June
579:Sources
173:Boxiana
105:guineas
97:Newgate
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