On August 14th, 1828, Ned Stockman and Sweeney were matched to fight at Old Oak Common; the affair being arranged at a dinner at Alec Reid’s, at Chelsea. The ring was pitched, the expectant crowd assembled, and “time” was called. Peter Sweeney showed in battle array, but where was the “Lively Kid”? and echo answered “where?” He didn’t show at all, and a forfeit of the stake being then and there declared, his representative urged as a reason for what Sweeney called “making a fool of the public,” that Stockman “preferred his match with Harry Jones” (in which he was deservedly thrashed on September 16th, 1828). As the day’s draw thus proved a blank, and the meet could hardly separate without sport of some kind, a whip was made for an impromptu fight. The hat went round, and the cash being gathered by Alec Reid and the renowned Frosty-faced Fogo, a hint from one of the Clare Market Guild of Kill-Bulls that Tom Hands would like to cross hands with Jem Burke, there and then, if the namesake of “the author of The Sublime and Beautiful” dared face him, was at once seized with avidity. A shout went up from a hundred lungs as the burly butcher, his hair shiny with grease, and his cheeks red as a peony, drew his blue smock over his head and proceeded to divest himself of his upper clothing; nor was “poor Jack” without friends. Behind him stood Joe Parish and Alec Reid; Hands being seconded by Sweeney and a Clare Market amateur. The fight was a sad exposé of Tom Hands’ want of skill in the opening, and lack of what a slaughterman never should be deficient in――pluck. The Deaf’un, who looked hard as iron and solid as the trunk of a tree, fought the first three or four rounds on the retreat, jobbing the butcher fearfully, and bleeding him from every vein of his fleshy jowl; then, having got him down to his own weight, he reversed the process, and fought him all over the ring so effectively that in the 10th round, 17 minutes only having elapsed, Hands’ second threw up the sponge in token of defeat, the butcher being terribly punished, while the Deaf’un was scarcely marked.