He is a Recipient of the Order of Princely Heritage Maurice Hope was born in St. John's, Antigua, and moved at a very young age to the UK.
On Hope's second fight, held on 25 September of that year, he scored his first knockout win, a victory in three rounds over Len Gibbs in Shoreditch.
After these three wins, Hope went up in weight to fight for the vacant British Middleweight title, vacated by Kevin Finnegan, who, in turn, lost four times to Alan Minter.
This was the beginning of a four knockout win streak that took him to fight Tony Poole, 12 April 1976, for the vacant British Commonwealth Jr. Middleweight title.
On 26 November, he defended his crown against well known Argentina[3] contender Carlos Herrera (not to be confused with the Argentine boxer of the same name who was born in 1983) in London, winning by a fifteen-round decision.
On 23 May 1981, at the Caesars Palace, Hope lost the world Jr. Middleweight title to Wilfred Benítez,[4] suffering a twelfth-round knockout that later made television sports show highlights.
While Benitez became the first Latin American to win world titles in three different divisions, the youngest boxer in history to do so, and the first in 40 years to achieve the accomplishment, Hope had to be hospitalised, but he recuperated and was able to marry his girlfriend before returning to England.
Throughout his career Hope was managed by his mentor Terry Lawless, whose stable of top-quality boxers also included John H Stracey, Jim Watt, Charlie Magri and Frank Bruno.