Edward William Barton-Wright 1860-1951: British Martial Arts Pioneer
E.W. Barton-Wright was born in Bangalore, India in 1860, as one of six children William Barton Wright, an English mechanical engineer, and his Scottish wife Janet. Having been educated in France and Germany, he got a job as a railway clerk, before training as an engineer and travelling the world working for various railway and mining companies.

Barton-Wright stated in an interview towards the end of his life that he had always been interested in self-defence, and had, during the course of his education and work, learned many forms of martial arts, including Boxing, Single-Stick, Savate (French kickboxing) and western wrestling, often putting these into practice, particularly during a 'long period of residence' in rough part of Portugal, where he claimed to have been compelled to defend himself on several occasions from assailants wielding clubs and knives.

In 1895, Barton-Wright arrived in Japan as an employee of the EH Hunter Company as an antimony smelting specialist. 

Whilst living in Kobe, B-W learned Jiu Jitsu under Sensei Terajima Kuniichiro (of the Shinden Fudo Ryu School) and occasionally, under Sensei Jigaro Kano (the founder of Judo, which was derived from Jiu Jitsu). 

Meanwhile, in England...

In the late 19th century, England's cities were plagued with violent gangs. 'Hooligans' (named after a possibly apocryphal London-based Irish criminal named Patrick O'Hoolihan) plagued the rougher parts of London, whilst 'Scutlers'* did the same in Manchester and Salford, engaging in violence and thuggery for its own sake as well as for the purposes of theft. 'Garroters' (or 'Thugs') also roamed the streets of Britain's cities, mugging people by half strangling their victims whilst accomplices relieved them of their money and valuables. Along with the usual mixtures of 'ruffians', 'footpads' (pedestrian muggers) and other scoundrels, There was a widespread perception in British cities that a respectable citizen must take precautions against predatory violence perpetuated by the lower orders.

Many respectable people protected themselves through the simple expedient of carrying around a swordstick or a pistol, or if those were unaffordable, clubs, brass-knuckles, knives or other nasty implements (Britain's laws on the carrying of dangerous weaponry in public in those days was even more permissive than those of modern-day Texas!)**

There was however, a large strand of thought amongst some Englishman that the carrying of weapons to defend oneself was somehow unmanly, unsporting and quite frankly, despicably foreign. Not fit for the civilised subjects of the World's mightiest Empire living in the epicentre of civilisation itself (or so the theory went anyway). Barton-Wright himself alluded to this 19th Century view of Anglo-Saxon moral superiority in one of his earlier articles, in which he stated:

“In foreign countries people never fight for amusement or diversion, as is often the case in England and the United States. Bearing this fact in mind, it will be more easy to understand that when foreigners fall out and fight, they recognise one goal only, and that is to overcome and defeat their adversaries, and any means is considered justifiable and is resorted to, to attain this end.
Of course, what constitutes honour in this sense is entirely a matter of early training and education. In this country we are brought up with the idea that there is no more honourable way of settling a dispute than resorting to Nature's weapons, the fists, and to scorn taking advantage of another man when he is down.
A FOREIGNER, however, will not hesitate to use a chair, or a beer bottle, or a knife, or anything that comes handy, and if no weapon is available the chances are he would employ what we should consider are underhanded means.”***
Barton-Wright proposed a new system of self-defence, an eclectic mix of Eastern and Western styles, as a means to combat beastly sorts, foreign or otherwise."

Bartitsu
In 1899, EW Barton-Wright returned to England and established a dojo in Shaftesbury Avenue, London, where he taught a brand new system of self-defence, inspired by all the various fighting styles he had learned on his travels. He rather modestly referred this new system as 'Bartitsu', a portmanteau of 'Barton' and 'Jiu Jitsu'. 
Despite its obviously Japanese-inspired name, Bartitsu was a fusion of Eastern and Western styles of fighting. In addition to Jiu Jitsu and Judo, Bartitsu also incorporated western-style boxing and wrestling, as well as French Savate and single-stick fighting, the latter of which played a particularly significant role in this system. 

EW Barton-Wright eschewed the use of firearms, blades and other purposely designed weapons as self-defence tools, instead emphasising the use of ones own body, as well as incidental weaponry (such as walking sticks, hats, umbrellas and even bicycles) to use against an aggressor.****

Barton-Wright wrote many articles in Pearson's Magazine, an Anglo-American periodical, expounding on the techniques and methods of Bartitsu, in order to promote his martial art. Another contributor to Pearson's Magazine, Sir Arthur Conan-Doyle famously incorporated Barton-Wright's system into his Sherlock Holmes series, whose protagonist used a form of 'Japanese wrestling' which he called 'Baritsu' to defeat his arch-nemesis Professor Moriarty at Reichenbach Falls in Switzerland. 

As a multi-discplinary self-defence system, B-W employed specialist instructors to assist him in teaching the different aspects of Bartisu. Among these were Yukio Tani, Sadakazu Uyenishi from Japan, and Pierre Vigny, a Swiss stick-fighting expert and Savate practitioner. 

In addition to using the principles of Bartitsu to promote self defence, B-W also made a concession to contemporary western sensibilities by showing his readers how to show off to their friends and members of the opposite sex by using martial arts as well as mechanical principles to perform feats of apparently amazing strength by utilising core strength and balance. 

Following the appearance of his articles in Pearson's Magazine, Bartitsu came to the attention of many notables, including as mentioned, Sir Arthur Conan-Doyle, and also Herbert Gladstone (William Gladstone's youngest son), Lord Alwyne Compton and Sir Cosmo Duff Gordon*****

Barton-Wright was probably particularly gratified however, thanks to the ringing endorsement given to Bartitsu by a certain Col. George Malcom Fox, the recently retired Inspector-General of the British Army's Physical Training Corps, who stated:

I have no hesitation in pronouncing Mr. Barton-Wright’s system as absolutely sound in theory, exceedingly practical and very scientific. I was much impressed with the extremely easy and graceful way in which he seemed to disturb the balance of his opponent and render him helpless. And although Mr. Barton-Wright repeatedly allowed his opponent to choose his own hold and take him at the greatest possible disadvantage, he never seemed to be at a loss what to do, and how to throw his opponent instantaneously. I am quite certain that if our police were to learn some of his throws and grips, they could cope much more successfully with every kind of resistance." 

Barton-Wright later recalled that Edward VII, whilst still the Prince of Wales, had once requested an audience with him to demonstrate his skills, but had to drop out when he broke his hand at a demonstration. 

Decline and Obscurity

Sadly for the world of martial arts, B-W's school of Bartitsu only lasted 3 years. A series of disastrous and poorly managed public demonstrations (at which unseemly public disagreements between B-W and his fellow instructors were reported in the press) led to a decline in its image of respectability and effectiveness. 

A disagreement between Ukio Tani and Barton-Wright allegedly descended into physical violence, and although B-W later claimed to have won the fight, Tani nevertheless left B-W and set himself up as a strongman and wrestler, later establishing his own school teaching Japanese Jiu-Jitsu, as did Sadakazu Uyenishi.
The fees demanded from members proved too high for most, and as members dropped away, a shortage of money forced him to close the Bartitsu Club permanently in March 1902. Most of Barton-Wright's instructors went on to become travelling showmen and/or set up their own self-defence schools, catering to people interested in learning martial arts but for a more sensible fee. 

Following the collapse of his martial arts school, Barton-Wright turned his attention to another of his interests, the use of electricity and magnetism as a form of therapy, and operated a clinic out of his flat in London to treat people with various ailments including arthritis and rheumatism with electro-magnetic machines of his own invention. 
Not surprisingly, his treatments were little more than quackery and were widely discredited by qualified medical professionals. Towards the end of his life, Barton-Wright remained largely forgotten, and spent his old age in virtual destitution holed up in a small flat in London.

He was however, briefly plucked from obscurity one last time in 1950, when he was tracked down by Gunji Koizumi, the 'Father of British Judo', who interviewed him for a contemporary martial arts magazine, and then introduced him to an audience at the Budokwai Judo club as the 'Pioneer of Japanese Martial Arts in Europe'. In spite of this valedictory act of kindness by a fellow martial arts legend, when William Barton-Wright died the following year, aged 90, he was largely forgotten unmissed, buried in an unmarked grave in Kingston Cemetery, Surrey. 

EW Barton-Wright remained in posthumous obscurity until the 1990s when martial arts scholars and Sherlock Holmes enthusiasts began to reveal the origins of the mysterious 'Baritsu' used by Conan-Doyle's fictional detective. The articles Barton-Wright had written, as well as the lectures given to the Japanese Society, and accounts of demonstrations were rediscovered and allowed modern martial artists to recreate the techniques described and re-establish a martial art that had lain dormant for almost a century. 

Legacy

Although Barton-Wright's martial art ultimately failed to flourish in his lifetime, he was, as Koizumi himself acknowledged, instrumental in introducing Japanese martial arts into Britain. The instructors he invited over from Japan, chiefly Yukio Tani and Sadakuzi Uyenishi, helped to establish Jiu Jitsu in Britain and provide a foundation upon which the adoption of other styles and schools (including Judo) could be based. 

Yukio Tani went on to teach Bill Underword, the British-born Canadian who eventually established the arts of 'Combato' and 'Defendo' and who played a prominent role in training US and Canadian soldiers in unarmed combat during World War II. 

Barton-Wright was also notable as a pioneer in promoting martial arts to women as well as men. For women to learn violent sports like boxing or wrestling was considered unladylike and unseemly, and something that should remain an exclusively male preserve.

However, as a man who was always chiefly interested in the 'self-defence' aspect of martial arts (rather than competition), B-W took the view that it was important for women to know how to defend themselves as well as men. He believed that his system, geared as it was towards the use of technique, rather than strength, was ideally suited to women as well as weaker men and his articles in Pearson's Magazine frequently featured scenarios involving women defending themselves from insalubrious male characters bent on doing unmentionable things to them, clearly aiming his art at more than just men seeking new forms of showing off their manliness and sporting prowess.

Edith Garrud, a former student of Bartitsu, continued her studies by learning Jiu Jitsu under Sadakazu Uyenishi, who eventually left the club in charge of Edith's husband, William Garrud when he returned to Japan in 1908. Edith Garrud would later play a prominent part in the Women's suffragette movement, training an elite group of physically robust suffragette's known as 'The Bodyguard' to defend suffragette meetings from violence meted out by the police and hostile members of the public.

Today, Edward William Barton-Wright's defence system is undergoing something of a revival thanks to martial artists from around the world with an interest in history, and clubs teaching Bartitsu have been established in New York, London and Vancouver amongst other places, making the style much more successful and widespread than it ever was during it's founder's lifetime. But its legacy, and the impact of EW Barton-Wright on the development of martial arts in Britain and the West, has long been woefully under-recognised and unappreciated. 

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*The foundation of Manchester City FC in 1880 by the Rev Arthur Connell was part of an initiative to give the Manchester boys who typically became scuttlers something more wholesome to do with their time, 'A gentleman's game played by thugs' indeed...

** Large sections of the British public were in fact often better armed than the police, who have always been routinely unarmed. In fact, during the 1911 siege of Sydney Street, the police apparently resorted to asking members of the public if they could borrow their guns! Despite the existence of street violence in Victorian/Edwardian Britain, the fact that the existence of a citzenry that was better armed than the police themselves and yet still allowed itself to be policed without too much trouble testifies to the fact that Britain back then had much more civilised mindset than is the case today. 

*** A quaint perception, to say the least!! 

**** Today, even more so than back then, the legal emphasis remains on the use 'incidental' rather than 'purposeful' weaponry in the context of self-defence in Britain. However, even in the 1890s, B-W indicated that using a gun to defend yourself from even a knife-wielding assailant might have unpleasant legal consequences that might be better avoided by using his system instead. 

***** Sir Cosmo Duff Gordon was later notorious for being a prominent male passenger who managed to survive the wreck of the Titanic when many women and children died for lack of lifeboats.