Bartitsu: The Sherlock Holmes Way of Self-Defense
27th May 2013
When the guy swung at Mark Donnelly, his only means of defense was a black umbrella—and a foppish one at that. But, ducking under a roundhouse punch, he jabbed the pointy end of the umbrella into the attacker’s gut, stopping him cold.
Mr. Donnelly, who is 43 years old and several inches short of 6 feet tall, then straightened his waistcoat, and the two men shook hands.
The skirmish was a rare demonstration of Bartitsu, an obscure Victorian system of gentlemanly self-defense practiced by Sherlock Holmes, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s legendary detective.
You can laugh, but in Britain, where their Olympic shooting teams have to practice overseas because the gun laws are so totalitarian, it’s all they’ve got.