Also known as Joe Mazurki
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Born in Bradford on 20th May, 1914, Joseph William Hill was a central part of the British wrestling scene for four decades, initially as a middleweight wrestler and latterly as one of the country’s top referees. We remember a portly, thinly haired man who appeared an elder statesman of the ring but could only have been in his early fifties.
Following an amateur career that he shared with his friend, Les Kellett, Joe turned professional in the 1940s, we find him as Sergeant Joe Hill of the R.A.F. in 1943. Whilst his billing as Northern Area Middleweight Champion may not be overly impressive, his narrow loss in Paris to Gilbert LeDuc in a long bout for the latter’s world title was more so.
Following active wartime service pursued his ring career, and encouraged his friend Les Kellett to join him. Les had wrestled for a short time in 1939 but become disillusioned. Les told the story that he met his friend Joe one night in Manchester when he went along to the wrestling and saw a Polish wrestler names Josef Mazurki. Yes, it was Joe Hill, a name used occasionally between 1944 and 1950, selected from his mother’s maiden name of Mazurkeiwicz.
In the 1950s Joe began to cut down his wrestling commitments and gradually moved into a refereeing role, our last active wrestling sighting being in February, 1956 against Cyril Knowles in Edinburgh. All hope of wrestling again were brought to an end in April 1956 when he was seriously ill with thrombosis. This followed on from an incident one month earlier when he had been injured whilst refereeing a match taken to hospital in Portsmouth. Norman Walsh accidentally knocked Joe over and then fell heavily onto his leg. Joe was taken to hospital with a suspected broken leg and ruptured groin.
He is the only referee we can think of that was supported by a fan club. the Kelvin Fan Club. Another impressive fact is that Joe appeared on television as a wrestler (in 1946), referee and Master of Ceremonies.
As a referee Joe Hill developed quite a feud with Mick McManus. We can gauge some measure of his status by the fact that he seems to have been the only referee to cross over promotions, coming south to officiate at the Royal Albert Hall and even disqualifying Mick McManus in a title bout there, the British Middleweight Championship decider of January 1968, in which Clayton Thomson retained his belt. From then on, McManus and Hill were forever embroiled in arguments and, at the Nottingham Ice Rink on one occasion, McManus famously refused to wrestle if Hill was the referee, and Gordon Smith duly stepped in. The heat eased off and, in 1971, it was Joe Hill who refereed both Nottingham bouts between Vic Faulkner and Mick McManus, with McManus winning both, in the second claiming the European Middleweight Championship.
Joe Hill died in 1999.
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