In a 2007 article in The Independent (UK), sports historian Nicholas Hobbes explains that gloves were introduced to make competitions bloodier and briefer. Gloves distribute a blow, but they also add weight to a punch, making it more destructive:
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The Marquess of Queensberry rules took off not because society viewed the new sport as more civilised than the old, but because fights conducted under the new guidelines attracted more spectators. Audiences wanted to see repeated blows to the head and dramatic knockouts.
By contrast, the last bare-knuckle heavyweight contest in the US in 1897 dragged on into the 75th round. Since gloves spread the impact of a blow, the recipient of a punch is less likely to be blinded, have their teeth knocked out or their jaw broken. However, gloves do not lessen the force applied to the brain as it rattles inside the skull from a heavy blow. In fact, they make matters worse by adding 10oz to the weight of the fist.
A full-force punch to the head is comparable to being hit with a 12lb padded wooden mallet travelling at 20mph.[...]
As the bare-knuckle campaigner Dr Alan J Ryan pointed out: "In 100 years of bare-knuckle fighting in the United States, which terminated around 1897 with a John L Sullivan heavyweight championship fight, there wasn't a single ring fatality." Today, there are three or four every year in the US, and around 15 per cent of professional fighters suffer some form of permanent brain damage during their career.
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In actuality, gloves are there to protect the opponent's face and reduce cuts.
Cuts end fights and shorten careers. Anything boxers can do to reduce or eliminate cuts contributes to the sport.
On the other hand, I dont think at that time none of the bare knuckle fighters were at the their highest point of training. May be a few but not all, if they had the same facilities like now they would have killed one person in 1 or 2 rounds. Now days boxers train very hard, using many gym equipments to increase their stamina, strength and power.
Just give this a thought, what would hurt more getting hit by a regular baseball bat or one wrapped with cousin?
Bare knuckle may seem safer, but we are judging this by record not experience. According to "record" it is safer, less people died, there were less brain injuries, etc. But, if experience was applied, you'd would see that there is more reason to those records. For example, punches often didn't land with much force. The reason is because they didn't use much hip rotation or follow through; if they had, they would have been wrestled to the ground, which was allowed in the rules. That alone meant that many punches didn't do as much damage. If we got rid of gloves in boxing today,but kept the rules the same, then the only thing that would "slow the punches down" would be the boxer's own fear of hurting his hands.
Rounds were also different back then as a round was over as soon as someone went down, which happened often because of the wrestling aspect. A round could last 10 seconds if they wrestled soon enough. As for the longer fights that lasted for hours, it was a combination of factors including wrestling, round times, fatigue, and lack of powerful punches. If gloves were removed today, they wouldn't have to worry about wrestling, round times would be set, and they could punch as hard as they wanted and likely do more damage to themselves and their opponents.
I understand where you're coming from with the brain damage argument, but that isn't necessarily the glove that causes this problem. The problem is that fighters are allowed to continue. If they can get up within the 10 count, they can keep going. A boxer could easily have multiple concussions in one fight this way.
Anyway, interesting read and I'm glad to share opinions.
Also in bare-knucle fighting, most punches were thrown to the body/arms/chest for the same reason. You can't punch someone in the head for 15 rounds.
About the injuries, boxing gloves allow for extended rounds of punches being delivered to the head, so while it reduces acutes injuries, like cuts and broken hands, it increase brain-related trauma, which is far worse.