Sport: Service Sluggers

First there was a little talk about the “spirit of good fellowship,” then 32 boxers went to work on each other. The Allied boxing championships had moved up from Algiers to Rome’s Brancaccio Theater.

The middleweight final, between French Sailor Marcel Cerdan and Technical Sergeant Ralph Burnley of Philadelphia, a Negro, stole last week’s” show. Both were pros before they went into the service. The Negro, who is crew chief of a P-51 fighter group, ploughed into the Frenchman with abandon, took Round One. Cerdan’s right scored three skull-jarring hits in Round Two, floored the Philadelphian three times for a count of nine. Cerdan took the title on a technical K.O. at the bell.

Lieut. General Joseph T. McNarney, deputy Mediterranean Theater commander, awarded championship wristwatches to nine Americans (six of them Negroes), five Frenchmen, two Britons.