Downstream

point for a race which
‘severely tested the strength
of amateur swimmers,’
reported The Times, ‘as they
had to go nearly across the
river and back again’. But by
the early twentieth century
newspaper reports on Thames
swimming in this area tend to
focus on tragedies. In the
summer of 1920 two men
jumped into the river at
midnight ‘for a wager’ and
attempted to swim across,