7. Ella Hattan: The Queen of the Sword

Ella Hattan: The Queen of the Sword

In this episode of 'She Changed History,' Simon and Vicky delve into the life of Ellen Hatton, better known as the Jaguarina. Born in 1859 in Ohio, Ella Hatton broke gender barriers to become a celebrated 19th-century swordswoman and duelist. Trained by the progressive Colonel Thomas Monstery, she excelled in multiple forms of combat, eventually becoming an undefeated champion in fencing and other martial arts. The hosts explore her rigorous training, her spectacular career filled with numerous victories, and her influence as a performer and teacher. Ella's resilience, skill, and showmanship made her not only a sports legend but also an inspiring figure for future generations of female athletes.

Sources are: 

https://martialartsnewyork.org/2015/03/31/colonel-thomas-monstery-and-the-training-of-jaguarina-americas-champion-swordswoman/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ella_Hattan#cite_note-3

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Civil_War#Outbreak_of_the_war

https://clairemead.com/2022/07/03/la-jaguarina/

https://www.northatlanticbooks.com/blog/womens-history-spotlight-jaguarina-and-colonel-monstery/

https://www.rejectedprincesses.com/princesses/la-jaguarina

00:00 Introduction and Launch Celebration

01:08 Listener-Recommended Topic: Ellen Hudson aka Jaguarina

02:54 Early Life of Ellen Hudson

03:23 Understanding the American Civil War

05:00 Ellen's Move to Cleveland and Theatre Involvement

06:43 Training Under Colonel Thomas Monstry

11:47 Colonel Monstry's Progressive Approach to Women's Fencing

19:57 Grueling Training Regimen

21:24 Confronting Sexism

22:47 Rising to Fame

23:59 Dueling Sensation

26:20 Media Savvy and Personal Life

34:24 Retirement and Legacy

36:12 Conclusion and Reflections

Transcript

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above the screen as well, so I can do it. Oh my god, you're illuminated. I know. I'm positively glowing. Yes, you look so healthy. Beautifully healthy. Hey everyone. Welcome back to She Changed History. This is Simon. And. I'm Vicky. How you doing Vicky? I'm good. We're, we're live podcasters now. So this, we've launched, we're This is our first recording since launch, isn't it? Yeah. And I guess the top of the most important thing to say is thank you. It's been, it's been a whirlwind of a week. I was so tired on Tuesday despite, I was like, I need to go to bed. All these, the messages and the comments and the likes and everything. It's just been, um, overwhelming So yeah, it's really cool. Yeah. I've got some lovely feedback. So, yeah, thank you everyone. And remember to share it with your friends, anyone you think would be interested, anyone you think won't be interested, because they probably will. Yeah. And it's already building, you know, because today is the first day where a subject has been recommended by a listener. So this was originally given to me by the wonderful, Cara, who gave me a little article on it and she was like, I don't know if this is up your street, but I really like this story. And then I looked into it and it is an incredible story. So let's get to it, shall we? Yeah. I mean, all I've really got is a picture of her and she's looking badass, really strong, like sword fighting pose. So this is the story of Ellen Hudson, who has a nickname, a. k. a. Jaguarina. She sounds like a gladiator. Well, you're not far off. Shimmering armor. Poised a sword, a fierce grin behind the mask, Ellen Hatton, the 19th century queen of swords, gallops horseback towards her opponent. A public challenge issued, a reward offered, a champion's pride at stake. With each swift strike, she cuts another name from her list, a testament to her skill and audacity, trained by a visionary master who saw beyond the societal norms. Hatton Redis finds the boundaries of women's roles. She's not only a jewelist, she's a spectacle, a legend, the Amazon of the American racetracks. This is the story of Ella Hatton, better known as Jaguarina. Badass. You excited? Great. Sources today are a Martial Arts New York article, various Wikipedia, a episode of Claire Mead's podcast called La Jaguarina and North Atlantic books with some others that I'll pop in our show notes. So we start in, Ohio. So Ellen M. Hatton was born January 1859. She is the tenth child of a Spanish mother called Maria Hinman and Anglo father called William Hatton, who was a tailor. In 1860, the family lived in Meigs Township, Ohio. When Ellen was three or four, her father died in the Civil War. So she didn't have much time with her father. Do you know much about the American Civil War? Me neither, so I did some research. I was like, I can't be on a podcast talking about the Civil War and not really understand it. American listeners will be like, uh, we teach this in school, but some of us don't. We don't know it. So yeah, we don't get it over here, do we? We, we don't get, we barely get our own history, than anyone else's. so the Civil War in America is basically between the north and the south. It was 1861 to 1865, and essentially it was about slavery. the South wanted to break away from the Union, so United States, to permit and to expand into the West, leading to more slave states. So they were slave heavy and they wanted to move West. Northern states were opposed to slavery, they wanted slavery to be permitted. which many believed, would place slavery on the ultimate course of extinction, which makes sense. Ohio, which is where Ellen's father was, that was a northern state, so they were opposed to slavery. So After decades of controversy, it was all brought to a head by Abraham Lincoln, who was opposed slavery. He won the 1860 presidential election. this then upset the Southern states who wanted to break away and they essentially started withdrawing from the United States forming a confederacy. And that's when the war happened. you know, it was a real catalyst point. And that leads to the war in which obviously Ella's family and many others were affected. So that's a little rundown, That is like Sparks Note central rundown of the Civil War. Yeah, yeah, yeah. in 1874, Her mother moved with Ella and one of her brothers, Perry, to Cleveland, which is still in Ohio. As Ella grows up, she joins a theatre company. So this is in 1880. She began performing at a small dramatic school in Cleveland called John Elsa's Stock Company, which eventually made its way to New York. So this guy, he started off in Cleveland and he travelled along. this wasn't his first, theatre company, but he was like an old hat at this. This was like his life's work and he managed to turn this one into the Academy of Music, which eventually became one of the most prestigious theatres and acting schools in America. So he knew what he was doing. Basically. And I imagine, I don't know how true this is, but the way I read it was this was just like Ella's After School Club, and then it just escalated more and more. And because it was so prestigious that kind of put her on the path to success with it all. I'm looking forward to seeing how it escalates from After School Theatre Club to Riding. Well, it's a really interesting connection, I think, because, we'll see later, it's not just Ella. There's other people effects as well. So Ella is part of this company. We're not sure what she performed. We know, some of the plays that this company put on. One of them was called Saratoga, which is, a satirical play, but Ella isn't on those play sheets. Either way, we know that she ends up in New York City. in its, you know, excitement, think greatest showman, I'm kind of thinking at this point. so when she's here, this is when there's a huge pivotal moment When, Ella at the age of 18 becomes a people of monastery, New York school of arms. So, there's a little bit of dispute here, whether This actually happened in New York City or Chicago, but the teacher who I'm about to introduce you to, he was living in New York City at the time, so it kind of makes sense that it was New York City. his name is Colonel Thomas Monstry. He runs this school of arms and upon speaking of meeting Ella, he declared he would make this little girl the greatest woman fencer of her time. So immediately, straight off the bat, saw some talent in her. Yeah. I'd love to know what it is that you picked out. What was her characteristic that made him think, wow, this is the one. Well, Hatton, so Ella, sorry. She actually had begun training in fencing at the age of eight. She had originally learned fencing with the foil and a knife from her mother. So her spanish mother at the start, so we think maybe that's where it comes from. Um, but there's lots of mirrors, the stance, maybe, you can tell if someone's a ballerina. Right. That's exactly what I was just thinking. Like a dancer's stance, maybe there's a fencer's stance. I did a year of fencing in primary school. Did you enjoy it? Uh, yeah, I did. It's tremendously difficult. Is it? Even with all like the lightweight clad and Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, and you're wearing like a lot of protection and you just need to move so swiftly and delicately and swift and delicate are two things I've never been described as. Me neither to be honest. Um, what have I been described as? We probably, we shouldn't open that door, but not today. Um, So let's talk a little bit about Colonel Monstry because it's his school and it was such an important part of Ella's life. this description makes me think, it reminds me a bit of the Dad in Umbrella Academy. I don't know if you've seen Umbrella Academy. Ooh, not watched that, no. There's, a patriarch in it who, is, like, moustache, monocle, eccentric. It turns out he's a baddie. I don't think this guy's a baddie, but it had that kind of vibe in it. So, um, yeah. It's just how I picture anyone, any colonel. Yeah, exactly. A little twiggly moustache. Yeah, if you're a colonel, you must have a moustache. Yeah. so Thomas, monstrous for in numerous wars and revolutions had survived participating in more than 50 duels with the sword, the knife, and the pistol. When you say duel, Are we talking an actual Jill, like he slaps them with the glove and Um, I've written here in parenthesis, Hamilton. Because it's kind of that kind of era, the pistols are very much They're still deadly, don't get me wrong, but they're not the guns of pistols we have today. Okay. But it's still very, very, very deadly. He has 22 scars all over his body to prove that he's been in these, in these duels, he is also, a teacher as well. So, he's got a vast amount of experience. I, I've got a list of weapons that he trained in and trained others in, and in particular Ella. One is called a rapier. Which is a straight single handed sword with a long slender blade that's pointed and that originated in Spain and Italy. A dagger, which we all know what a dagger is, like Macbeth. a broad sword, which is a large heavy sword with a broad blade used for cutting rather than thrusting. My only knowledge of sorts is from Dungeons and Dragons, and like Rapier is, single handed and more stabby, whereas you have two handed and heavy and you're just absolutely clobbering with it. Yeah, okay, maybe that's where we should be thinking. Um, a bowie knife, which is a sheath like fighting knife, a lance, which is long and thin and more spear shape, and then I've put in brackets Red Dead Redemption 2. You know, nothing about the Civil War, our cultural references. So, um, bayonet, which is a weapon that can be attached to the end of a rifle, or a musket. And it's like a spear like weapon, which I I've seen a few of those like in war films and stuff. a quarter staff, which is a wooden shaft, that is usually six to nine feet long

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have a metal tip spike at one or both ends. That sounds absolutely terrifying. No, thank you. Colonel, Monastery was also a professor of sparring and he even developed a special system of bare knuckle defense. So that's kind of, you know, uh, it is what it sounds like punching, grappling, kicking. He could look after himself though. He's a scrappy little man. Yes. Yeah. The big difference with, Colonel Thomas and anybody else in that era is that Thomas encouraged women to take up fencing with a variety of weapons. He encouraged them to take up boxing, long before it was popular and fashionable to do so. He was really a propeller of this. That's cool because so many of these stories that we come across when thinking back to the Olympics, like the Women's Olympics, there seems to be this idea that women can't run, women can't fight, it's very unbecoming for them to do any of these physical activities. So particularly for the boxing aspect, for him to be promoting that. I wonder what gave him, what made him think that way, what made him so different to I love that. Other people of the time. And it's such a similar time frame. So if you think of Aaron Pierre from Alice Milliard's story, so go back and listen to that. If you're interested in a different. Episode 5. Oh, well done. Love that you know that. Marvellous. It's just completely different, isn't it? But I don't think he was popular at the time. Like, this is like a small selection of women he's got, and it tended to be famous people, and actresses, and that was because it was seen as acceptable for actresses, because it was a little bit like choreography. So it's perfectly acceptable for a woman to dance on stage, but if you just change those movements slightly and put a blade in her hand, she's a menace, right? so it was seen as okay for actors to do that, which I thought was really interesting. In Europe, there was a slightly different school that was doing something very similar. So in Vienna, the Joanne Hartel's women fencing class, aimed to train dancers and actresses in proper uses of weapons of props in fight scenes, basically. I get a lot of videos come up on my YouTube feed, but one has come up recently as stunt woman versus gymnast. You're on the right lines. Yeah. Okay. That's, that's what it sounds like. Cause this, uh, highly choreographed, but a lot of the same skills, a lot of the strengths, muscle groups, movements. Yeah. But you can see, as soon as I, it was one of those things that I hadn't thought about it, but as soon as I read it, I was like, Oh yeah, that makes perfect sense. And they're really popular as well. There's Viennese, Fencing women's group actually ended up touring across Europe and America doing these type of demonstrations. Yeah. there's a New York City advertisement of, Colonel's classes that, offered private instructions to ladies and missus. And speaking of it and speaking of why he wants to teach women, he says, it is a great mistake to suppose that women cannot learn fencing as quickly as men. The fact is women are much quicker pupils. They are much more flexible of body, their supple and elastic. That's one advantage. Thank you. Their mental brightness enables them to pick up the strategy of art quicker. That's the second advantage. And the third, they have more nerve. It's a fact. I don't know why, but it's a fact. Isn't that amazing? What a cool contrast between what we're normally talking about then on this podcast, it's just, it's nice. I love the emphasis on the strategy as well. I mean, with the fighting, there's lots of different styles of fighting, obviously. And you might think of boxing with heavyweights. They tend to be the bigger brawlers. Yeah, it's more like you look at any MMA these days, or sort of Eastern martial arts, and it's that speed and suppleness. and movement, you don't, and think back to Bruce Lee even, you just, you need to be quick, real quick. Again, a list of things I don't have. Very, very different realm. I wonder if there's a noticeable difference in ego as well, because like, I just think about sort of men squaring up to each other outside of a pub and they're not going to step down, not because they've got a good plan, but because they can't be seen to lose or to be weak. It's ego, right? I think maybe that transfers across to Ella, but we'll come on to that, in a little bit. Um, so Colonel's teaching two classes of lady boxers in New York City as well at the time. Sometimes he just uses a stick. He just teaches how people to defend with a stick, which is so, being a woman and being in the UK at this time where our crime rates of women is high and Even establishments that are meant to protect us do not. I'm specifically thinking of cases like Sarah Everard, you know, it's crazy that he was on it. He was on it then. one of his most famous things was a parasol drill. So, he wrote a book because of course he wrote a book. Everybody writes a book about that thing. in Thomas's book, he explains that a great self defense weapon is an umbrella. He describes it as a fearful weapon if used with both hands like a bayonet. It will parry the blows of a big bully and you can return him a stab in the face or breast or stomach and that will settle him. Settle. It'll calm him right down. Calm down. And then in my notes, I've put, yes, bring this back, please. That's what I've written after that. And then I've got a lovely image of a lady, So here's a lady in traditional, um, high society dress. Oh, amazing. With an umbrella as a bayonet. that's what was in the book. And he called that the parasol drill. So that's what he did. I hadn't thought about the dress, because the, like the dress back then for women, so restrictive, wasn't it? In terms of movement, they're really sort of trussed up with corsets. You're right. How did they, how can they fight in that? Not very well. So Monastery also insisted that his female students ditch the corsets for loose enough to allow free play and every muscle to allow to move. He was right because corsets were later linked to health problems. Um, and I've put, he would have loved today's fashion. He'd have been all over Gymshark. Yeah. Also, I'm reading this amazing book called Invisible Women at the minute, basically, it's a book about how women are erased from society and how societies are created, and there's a whole chapter in there on PPE and military wear. Now, finally, studies are starting to happen. I think the first study happened in 2017. So that's how late this has been studied. But then basically PPE and military wear are not safe for women. They have higher injury tolls. and they're just completely the wrong proportions because the default, for safety wear is often one size. And that size has been based on a man. The proportions are all male, aren't they? Yeah. I think the most before then that they've ever done for, like female centric PPE is just make it pink instead of fluorescent green. It's so frustrating. And the fact that it was actually causing deaths in some cases. Yeah. The PPE wasn't suitable. it was causing, like grinding away of the bone because the proportions were all weird. It's a fascinating book. It's by Carolina Criado Perez and I would recommend everybody read it. And this is just one chapter, there's so much in it, but he, it just also shows how ahead of his time Monastery was. The fact that this book was released in 2018 just shows nothing's moved on basically, So perhaps due to this progressive attitude, Thomas was able to attract a remarkable number of high profile female students, actresses in particular, including Ella. So Ella went to this school, she became a prodigy under Thomas. Hatton would go on to be recognized as one of the great swordswomen of the 19th century and perhaps of all time. So she was with him for about three years, but it was a grueling three years. It was full on commitment. Ella speaks of her time there as, I fenced three hours a day with foil and sabre for three years before I was really considered qualified enough as a fencer. The road to success as a fencer is paved by aching muscles and bruises from cuts of a sword. She learns to do all the things I mentioned above, so that big list of, weapons. Thomas, knowing how good she is, throws everything at her. He is a really harsh teacher. and then he upgrades her and says, now you've learned to do it all. Learn to do it all on horseback. That was, that was the next level, basically. My mom was the same when she taught me how to cook. Just go again, now do it on a horse. I think you can poach an egg. She says, I was put on a horse and kept on that horse, astride like a man, from seven o'clock in the morning to noon every day. During that time I worked with my trainer, I am fencing mounted. At 12 o'clock I was taken off my horse, stiff and sore, and almost carried to my house. Then came the agony of taking off my riding clothes. So, you know, she works hard. She's putting in, she's putting in the time, she's putting in the effort. What's she, is she training for something in particular? Or just to be amazing? Sport was quite lucrative obviously back in the day, so, you can get rewards and stuff. And I think it was a passion for it as well. And she's trying to compete. But it's really interesting because like you said before, and this is maybe why I compare this Thomas guy to Hargreaves in Umbrella Academy, because he never lets on how good Ella is. Positive reinforcement just doesn't seem to be his thing. She went through this tremendous amount of pain, grueling training, blood sores, bones breaking, bandages, the whole shebang. But she only ever finds out for herself how good she is when one day she's confronted Um, by, um, just a, a sexist prick really in the street. He starts having a go at her, I think because of how she looks, because she's clearly muscley, she's strong, she doesn't look in the traditional sense of high profile at that time. so she's confronted by this guy literally harassing her in the street. Again, not different from 2024. Because she's, high profile and she's known in the local papers and stuff, there was an article written about it and it says, as soon as she comprehended what his words meant, as in the harasser, bang, biff, she landed right and left and he fell to the ground. Get up, you coward, she commanded, a hand he overcame by wringing toes, very foolishly cruel to his knees. Biff, bang, right and left, landed again, and down he went, and this time he refused to get up, sprawled on the ground, calling for help. She was, amazed at how easy that was for her, easy and instinctive and, I'd forgotten as well how much I love the word Biff. It's of its time, isn't it? You can tell that's a quote. Very of its time. It's like an old Batman. It goes on to explain how she punched this dude without damaging herself. So we know she's talented. We know she's a hard worker. So what happens next for Ella basically? the answers is, Um, jewels. So that's her goal. She wants to fight. She wants to travel the world and she wants to become a performer. And she does that. And not only does she does do that, she becomes an absolute sensation. on a Sunday in England, we tend to have the football. That's quite a big thing of our culture. And that's where, some people go on a Sunday afternoon, but back in the late 1880s, crowd watch a series of Jules. This had been part of life in America for decades and a completely normal thing to do. 7, 000 people at one event was a number I read when researching this, this was like big matches. big cultural huge part of society. in these jewels, atmosphere was absolutely electric. They're there to put on a show. Claire Meade describes it as they channeled the glitz and the glamour of tournaments, or the way 19th century people imagined medieval tournaments to be, But that was coupled with the excitement of the atmosphere of the boxing match. Ella wants to be part of this, and this is the next part of her story. So she starts fighting. Some people declined to fight her. Because, you know, she's a woman. her first ever fight was set to be with, a sword champion called Duncan C. Ross, but he refused. We don't know why, but obviously we can speculate those reasons. Maybe he was scared. Maybe he didn't want to hit a woman. Maybe he just wasn't progressive enough for it, but she didn't waste her time moving on, finding new, opponents who would accept her challenge. And she won, and then she won again, and then she won again. It's quite extraordinary hearing some of the descriptions, for example, when she was fighting, heavy blades cut through the air like flashes of lightning, steel rang on steel in a series of movements so rapid in execution as to defy being followed by the eye. Like she was, she was quick, man. She was, she was really good at what she did. She, defeated heavyweights, such as someone called Sergeant Owen Davis of the U. S. Cavalry, a famed knife duelist, a duelist called Charles Engelbrook of the Danish Royal Guard, and the fencing master E. N. Jennings of the Royal Irish Hussars. So she was really in the gambit. She was in front and center in this dueling world.

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she's at the top of her game, she's smashing through these people, making light work of them. The wins get noticed and this is when her spot becomes monetized. She ends up having agents and wages and people to organize her, like it becomes a bit of an operation, not unlike today, I would say. In between her matches, she resides in California. this is just another little quirk that I loved is that it wasn't a known for her to say no to the railway or to cars or to anything like that to get around. She preferred to ride her horse there. So she like sails in like the wild west. Love that. Her horse's name was Chucho and he was very resilient and accompanied his mistress in these fights on horseback as well. So she used traveling on horseback as a way to build up his resilience in long trips. Mm-Hmm. Make sure he's in fighting. Wow. Fighting condition too. Shout out to the horse. It sounds like, like she was really popular and, I sort of continue to be surprised because I just assumed at that time that the idea of women fighting would just be abhorrent to most sports fans back then. Well don't forget she's a performer as well, like she knows how to work a crowd. So before Duels she had been known to lap arenas, um, with, Like her hair flowing, her shirt bellowing, and then, yeah, and instead of, because traditionally you'd get dressed in your armor and you would enter, but she used to do this lap and she used to purposefully get dressed and put her armor in front of the crowd. So she really knew how to work a crowd. She really had the theatrics there. She knew how to get the most out of her outfit as well. words to describe it, a shining, glistening, scratches of previous people who had been defeated. she'd been known to wear Jaguar print because that was her namesake, Jaguarina. She knew, she knew what she was doing. She was a very clever sausage. Did the press at the time embrace her or did she get a lot of flak? They did, they seem to, really take her on board when for example, New York's Sunday Telegraph, describes her as a fear faced Amazon. So that's not derogatory in any way. They let her like, basking this glory, mainly because she's really good. So for example, in one of the fights, she had 11 grueling rounds of three minutes each with one minute rest in between. And you're just being beaten during this time. Yeah. And she was being so many legendary people. So for example, there was, the largest champion at the time was a German swords master called Weidemann. She beat him. I think they took it on meritocracy, really the press. They're like, you're doing well, let's get behind you. It's lovely that finally, one of these stories we have, the person's actually been embraced at the time, rather than just appreciating them a hundred years later. For sure. It's really fascinating, isn't it? I don't know if it was because of her training or because she had someone believing her from such a young age. I think self belief is somewhat a learned behavior. If you've got someone pushing you down and saying you're not good enough all the time, you have a bit of a self fulfilling prophecy about it. But maybe she was just oblivious to it. Maybe she was like, my one job is to beat these people. I'm going to beat them. That's what she did. Um, She also knows how to celebrate as well. So she always basks in her glory. At the end because obviously there's arenas with thousands of people and at the end there's always like a after party She's known to sing and perform at these parties that happen after. She's known to get drunk together with people that, come along. For example, there's one match where she beat this Weidemann, so this king of kings of Swordsman, and actually the Viennese. women's group that I spoke at the top of the show that in Vienna, they were really good. They had traveled to the match to egg her on and cheer her. And then you went out after. Oh, that's sweet. Yeah. So over time the matches take their toll on her. There are, injuries. Hatton has scars on her face, arms and bodies. But she is also known for grace and refinement as well. One reporter in the Cleveland Plain Dealers describes her as, perfect, self controlled and sweet. There was a really cute little bit in the research where, after a bit of back and forth, her and Thomas have a match, her and Colonel Thomas. So they have like this reunited thing they had this duel and, she didn't win, but they drew. Like, I really liked it. You know, I was like, it wasn't like the classic students become the master. It was. holding your own, that was done in public as well. There was at one point where she'd beaten everybody going. She's now full in La Jaguarina mode. she's beaten every swordsman she could, multiple times, mounted, on foot, everything. Like she's basically ran out of opponents. She even takes out newspaper ads offering a 5, 000 reward. this is like back in the 1800s, so that would be a lot, lot more today. To anyone that could defeat her, nobody took her up on the offer. That's a sensible choice. No one's going to do this. So over the course of her career, Ella has 60 wins in total. I've put for context here that Muhammad Ali actually won 56 times. So that just kind of puts them where we're at. 27 60 matches were said to have been with Master of Arms. So that is a statistic that's verified by at least one newspaper they found. Boston Daily Globe say that she, has never been defeated in battle, by general points. So what do you do when you've Beating every man possible on horseback, everything else, and just imagine now she's got an agent, so you can imagine an agent being sat there, being like, well, what are we going to do with you now? The agent says, how about you go and fight bulls? Because we've run out of men. Yeah, the obvious pivot. So that was the next deal was like putting on this massive bull fighting event. She gets in there and she doesn't kill the bull. That's really important. But she makes Charles play with it. She runs it round and round in circles. She dodges it. The crowd are absolutely terrified because there's this massive hundreds of pounds bull coming right at you. And she makes it look like child's play is one of the descriptions. What's the point of being so on horseback? There's like meta levels we could go for, isn't there? There's just so many we could do. And she leaps out of the arena when she's done. She kind of like does her hands off. That's that, bish, bash, bosh, makes it look like child's play. This is where she comes at a bit of a crossroads, like she's not sure what else to do, right? She's kind of dominated every part of the field. I imagine like Serena Williams feels she's got absolutely everything possible. So like any celebrity would, she branches out into different things. If you think about it today, she would definitely have a cookbook today. She would definitely be one of those people who'd be like, now's my time to release my cookbook. So she does a little bit of modeling, some performing because she is a trained actor. She played the comedic kind of foil in a number of plays. She sang, at one point she also marries. Does end in divorce a few years later and there's not really any mention of any other relationships. She does have a very close female associate, but. It's also really important to say that she's very good at drip feeding media. So if you think, I don't know if you're watching the absolute spectacle that is the wicked press tour at the minute. Like those girls are working hard on that press tour, my God. Um, but you can tell all that media training's there. And, she was doing the same thing. So she leaves breadcrumbs in the press of different stories. And it's really hard to ascertain what's true and what's not. like for example, you know, at the start I said, Her mum taught her. That's one of the things she says happened in her childhood, and there's some stuff that's conflicting around it, but it's very interesting. I love that you find this with a lot of our stories. They have skills in many sort of complimentary areas, complimentary, but seemingly totally unrelated. So yeah, she's an incredible athlete and swordsmith, but also somehow seems to have this amazing brain for PR. Lauren. showmanship and things that if you just had one and not the other she wouldn't have been this success. It's a quality isn't it? She managed to bring them together. it's not being put in a box. Yeah, don't, don't put me in that box. I'm more than what you think I am, and I love that. I think that's so cool. But even in retirement, that doesn't mean she stopped fighting. No, There's one account in the Washington D. C. Evening Star that describes that, a drunk was by catcalling her and got in her way, and, she had him by the collar and was shaking him with all the enthusiasm of a terrier over a newly captured rat. His hat went one way and his cane went the other and his teeth played a Casanet obbligato to the solo of good advice that was rapidly breathed into his vibrating ears. They don't write stories like that in the papers they do, it's beautiful writing. When asked why she let him go, like, why she let the catcaller go, she was like, well, I didn't really want to be prosecuted for manslaughter. That was the only reason she stopped. It's like a cat toying with a mouse, isn't it? It's not a fair fight. And this is in her retirement, so, One of the things she does in retirement, to know, is that she opens a finishing school where she also taught women how to fence, so she drops that ladders down ready for the next generation. So she came from the student to the master to the teacher. The school was Raved about in the newspapers at the time. It's where she kept all her trophies and her memorabilia of her absolutely Fantastical career, can you imagine what that hallway would look like? It kind of filled me with really joy. Yeah Glass display case with a shining armor in there. And it would all be like Victorian style, like it would be like that Circus top red color that you see, like the beiges and the brown writing. You can imagine it, can't you? It'd be absolutely beautiful. And she did, she, so she taught women defense further on and just imagine how inspiring she would be as a teacher. That's pretty So, in summary, Ellen Hatton, a. k. a. the Jaguarina, was a pioneering swordswoman of the 19th century who shattered gender norms and dominated the male dominated sport of fencing. Under the guidance of her progressive colonel Monstry, she became an undefeated duelist, a celebrated performer, and a mentor to future generations of female athletes. Her life story is one of resilience, skill and showmanship, making her a legendary figure in the history of combat sports. I want to go and watch her. I wish she was around these days. She sounds amazing. She kicked ass. She kicked ass. Through and through. Yeah. Yeah. I didn't really mention it, maybe we can dub it in later, but she got the name Draguarina from the press and really leaned into that, like it was a compliment, I've not much to add about her just that that's absolutely freaking awesome. I don't know if we have an equivalent and I don't know if that's because I'm not sporty so I don't know who Who is good at fencing today in the female sports space? I don't know. Or if that's because we don't, I don't fencing isn't as popular as maybe it once was. You only really see it in the Olympics these days, generally, don't you? I'm thinking of fighters in UFC, in particular female boxers. So, you know, the Logan, Mike Tyson fight at the weekend, the best bit about that was the pre-fight. Fight, and that was women. Right? So the undercard was women and they, they were incredible. Taylor Serrano And that was by far the best thing like it was legitimate sport and an incredible match to watch. so you can say kind of what you want about Logan, but he's very good at equality in sports. Like he's very good at spreading the female athlete word around and he, that was part of his deal with Netflix is that I want women on there. Maybe similar to, what Ella's realm was would have been at the time because they did bare knuckle fighting. In no circumstance am I saying that I like him. No, but this the one redeeming thing that he's ever done for me. Yes, this is what we're saying. We're saying it's really, he did a really good thing on Friday night, Saturday morning where he, got women into, the biggest, boxing fight that has ever been. And he got women on that stage. So you know, we can't be too mad at him. That is cool. Credit where it's due. Exactly. Yeah. I think it was 60 million viewers, wasn't it? It's insane. And yeah, good for him. So yes, maybe Ella could have been like that if she was around today. Definitely. Yeah. For sure. For sure. Fabulous. Thank you, Vicky.

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nice to have some sort of uplifting badassery. Woohoo! Yeah. yeah, thanks everyone for listening. Remember to like, comment, subscribe, If anybody's got any other stories, like this was submitted to us, whack it to us in the Gmail account, like SheChangedHistory at Gmail. You know Or put it on our Facebook page. Yeah. Yeah, we're here to learn so definitely give us more. Brilliant. Okay. Thanks folks. See you next time. Thank you. Bye