Doing the Business - The Final Confession of the Senior Kray Brother. Charles Kray
‘Reg wants me to thank you all for coming’ he told them. ‘He wishes you all well and he hopes to be among you soon!’
More cheers followed as Reg was led away to the blue Mercedes — it had been a long day, but the gangster, once the head of one of the most powerful criminal organisations in the country, had taken it all and more, and he was still fighting.
This fighting game is in the blood, as it was for all three Kray brothers. And with some 32 years behind him in jail and no date fixed as yet for his release, Reg Kray needed all the strength he could muster. Ron lost his fight back in 1995, Charlie had only recently lost his — so was Reg now to succeed where his brothers had failed? Could Reg survive to be set free, to stroll the streets of London once again — to be a celebrity, to be a man of stature, a man to be reckoned with within the society he scorned? Maybe that was the true meaning of ‘Fight the Good Fight’.
Colin Fry May, 2000
RON KRAY HAD BEEN HIT time and time again and his face was showing the signs of the night’s work. His cheeks were bruised and grazed and his left eye was completely closed, but he had finally beaten his man to the floor in a sudden flurry of pure aggression; winning was the name of the game for Ron and he didn’t care how he did it. His brothers hadn’t fared much better, but it was without doubt Charlie who had come off worst of all. He was in complete agony, doubled up in pain from the severe beating he had taken. It wasn’t a good night for the Krays and it marked a fatal turning point in all their careers.
They vigorously washed the blood from their aching hands as they vowed never to be beaten like that again. Ron and Reg talked about the future and how they would get even; Charlie could only talk of getting out — he had had enough! The purple blur of half-shut eyes, the mangled hands and the bloodied features would soon be a thing of the past for all three Kray brothers. Never would they let this happen again, never would they allow themselves to fight on someone else’s terms.
The day was the 11th December 1951 and the brothers had all been fighting on the same bill at The Royal Albert Hall, the only time this feat has ever been achieved. The boxing days were over for the Krays. Next time they would fight by their own rules — street rules.
Charlie had been a fighter most of his life, both in the ring and on the street. In London’s East End in the 1950s, fighting was a way of life — and death. It was about survival of the fittest. Street gangs and street people all settled their scores in the same way: with their fists. Fight first, ask questions afterwards. Careless talk cost lives.
The Kray boys had pedigree. Cannonball Lee was a champion bare-knuckle fighter. He was also their grandfather, Jimmy Lee. Lee had fought in the days when boxing didn’t have many rules. Just the street. It was every man for himself. He’d entertained the boys for years with tales of prize fights and fighters; the same stories over and over again. They never tired of them. Fighting was in their blood.
When Charlie decided to pick up the gloves, he met with strong resistance from his mother Violet. As Cannonball’s daughter, she had lived through years of watching her father come home hurt after bouts of fighting. She had spent her childhood helping her mother to pick up the pieces of him, only to wait for him to dust himself down and start all over again. but she didn’t want to watch her own boys do that.
Their father, though, took a different point of view. If they wanted to fight, then that was OK with him. After all, he couldn’t do much about it, even if he’d wanted to. But he knew of the advantages that boxing had brought. He had fought as a youngster and was pleased to see his boys carry on the tradition, to keep the punch in the family name. He would help them all he could, if he could. He had his position in the East End to think about. At home, however, it was his wife Violet who ruled the roost; but even she could not persuade her boys away from the boxing ring.
In the East End of London, the name of Kray had become well known in boxing circles. And old man Charlie commanded a lot of respect through the reputation of his three boxing sons. He liked the reflected fame and glory. Life had been tough early on. During the Second World War, Violet had taken Charlie and the twins Ron and Reg to Suffolk, where they could live safely away from the German bombings of London. Although he had visited them every weekend and supported them through it, it hadn’t been easy.
Old man Charlie felt that he hadn’t always been a good father to his sons. Not that he had mistreated them. Not in any way. On the contrary, he’d always tried his best with his family. Even when he had been on the run as a deserter during the Second World War, he had made every effort to go home as much as he could. But he had been absent so much during the War. He had missed much of their growing up then. He could remember when the twins were young, though, how they would always side with their mother Violet in any argument. And how he could never win.
Although old man Charlie may have been the breadwinner in the family, it was Violet who always took care of her boys: their school days, their ill days, their happy days. Violet was always there for them. Old man Charlie went away again, later on, after the War, taking care of business. He travelled extensively throughout England, the south in particular, buying and selling whatever he could. Sometimes gold. He made a good living, enough for Violet and the boys — and just enough for regular nights out with his pals. The drinking and the fighting were both an important part of life in the East End.
Nothing could make up for the fact that old man Charlie hadn’t been part of the family much — not enough for his liking, anyway — in the early years. So, it had become his job to prepare his sons boxing kit. It was his contribution to the smooth-running of the pre-match organization — and his way of showing that he, too, wanted to help out and join in with family life. The three sets of kit were laid out in neat piles in the front room: the black, highly polished boots; white socks; blue satin dressing-gowns; an array of towels and protective cups; and the shorts, black and white for the twins, and light blue silk with a yellow leg stripe for Charlie — a present from the twins. They were Charlie’s first pair of silk shorts, a special memento for what Charlie wanted to be his last fight.
Henry Berry had trained all three boys. He had started with young Charlie, whose boxing career had begun at senior school — and he’d been training ever since. But Charlie hadn’t trained for the Albert Hall. He’d been asked to compete rather late in the day and had decided that although he’d give it a go, this would be his last professional fight. He was only doing it for the money this time. The £25 purse was too tempting to resist. His chances he realized were not good. Lazar came from a great boxing family and was a well-fancied contender. But Charlie had decided to accept the challenge. He didn’t have anything to lose, except his pride. And the money was guaranteed.
Charlie had been in training three nights a week since he was fifteen. He went to a local club and continued when he got home too. Cannonball Lee had rigged up a gym with a canvas kitbag as punchbag in an upstairs bedroom. Once he’d left school he worked during the day as a messenger for Lloyd’s insurance brokers in the City, but at night he would train relentlessly. With a heap of training, no smoking or drinking, he became a good clean boxer.
A few weeks off with rheumatic fever weren’t enough to stop him. He fought to recover quickly and went back regularly to a boxing club in Hoxton. Everything was going well, and once he’d joined the naval cadets at Hackney Wick, he didn’t look back.
With the help of good training facilities and an iron will to succeed, Charlie became increasingly serious about boxing. As a decent welterweight with a string of successful amateur tournaments behind him, he decided to turn professional. It was just post-war and there was good money to be made -often as much as £10 — for just a night’s work. Good money in those days. The coins thrown on stage by fans at the end of a match would have been a bonus, but most of this went to the helpers. As Charlie once said, ‘Have you ever tried picking up coins with boxing gloves on?’