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Joan Cokes: Swimming 1920s, 1930s

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Yarmouth shores High Tide

Yarmouth shores High Tide

When we were at school we went to Love Shore to learn to swim – the boys one side of the jetty, the girls the other side.  I won a cup for swimming a mile. We had to walk from school to Port La Salle (where Johnny Walker, the whisky magnet, had his summer home), then swim to the pier.

Families spent a lot of time at Love Shore in the afternoons.   There was a swimming raft with steps to dive off. We didn’t swim so much at Pier Shore because the tide could sweep you away under the pier.
There were swimming races off the Common with Mr Doe there in his rowing boat for safety.
Joan Cokes nee Cooper b 1918

Barbara Dence: swimming 1920s, 1930s

 From a letter to Yarmouth School
Looking back with pleasure over the years, it seems that school in summer revolved round the time of high tide.  Our daily swimming lesson took up the latter part of the morning or afternoon.  It was not often that we missed.  Occasionally we went to the beach by the Pier, but most often it was down the turning up the High Street.  We all undressed on the beach –  very stony it was too – and we mastered the art of an exceedingly rapid change.  There was a small raft beside a breakwater which good swimmers used.
We were encouraged to learn to swim. Mr Stanway would give 6d to anyone who learnt and to the one who taught the swimmer.  Many people went on to do the mile and to learn life saving.  For this we went to the harbour and were thrown out of a boat fully dressed.

Excerpt from School Log

Excerpt from School Log

We had to undress in the water – get ashore –  and also “rescue” a drowning person – swim underwater and dive off the boat  without capsizing it.

The highlight of the swimming season was the Cowes Regatta, and a great honour to be picked for the team, for which we received a medal.  Also if you were good there was the chance of winning some pocket money at the various regattas.
Barbara Dence b 1920 

Barbara Dence's 1929 swimming certificate

Barbara Dence’s 1929 swimming certificate

Brian Pomroy: swimming

Mill at Yarmouth with Gasworks Cottages beyond

Mill at Yarmouth with Gasworks Cottages beyond

Swimming lessons?  Learnt to swim on my own at the Mill.  We were in and out of the water all summer.
I just learnt to swim in the river. I’d nip over the wall, and into the water if the tide was right. Yes, I spent more time in the river than I did on the beach.
We used to get big oil drums and planks and make rafts and set off paddling. You’d get half way up the river and look round, and one drum’s gone floating off that way and the other one’s gone the other way, and there you were in the water, not on the raft anymore.  Yes, it was good down there. Brian Pomroy b1937

Gerry Sheldon: swimming

There were sometimes dolphins  in the Solent when you were swimming along off Yarmouth.

I do remember one occasion when we had been practising our mile swim, a thin little girl who was a good swimmer set off for the pier before us. As I got near to the pier the current was getting stronger and it was harder work. Florrie Knee called out to me to come and help her. She wasn’t in trouble but the little girl was, under the pier, and Florrie was trying to help her.  Although she was a good swimmer, the tide was pulling her and she was tired. Florrie and I managed to help her ashore, and she ran home. Nobody ever knew what had happened, or what nearly happened.

Gerry Sheldon nee Haward  b1924