Richmond Press, Inc.                          Richmond, VA                          1938

Ye Olden Swimmers

In the early eighties (XIXth Century), Captain Paul Boynton, the great English swimmer, came to Richmond and swam through the Falls in a swimming suit he had invented and was exploiting all over the world. It was of rubber, with a little space for air inflation; and he would float on his back and propel himself with a small double-bladed paddle.

Boynton entered the river just below the old Pumphouse (Municipal Power-house to you, youngster!). He lighted a cigar and took to the stream. Crowds gathered at all points of vantage along the river banks. I was in the crowd, as Boynton passed Johnson's Island between the Hax-all-Crenshaw millrace and Heaven Stream. The swimmer stuck on a rock there for a brief instant and had to shove himself over it. He finished the cigar as he landed at Warwick Bar, and threw the stump into the waves. He remarked afterward that these were the roughest falls he had ever gone through.

Boynton's manager, that morning, had gone to Sweeney's Point (at the Lock Gates) and drummed up a crowd of boys to swim with him from the Point to the finish.

"Those four can," replied Mr. Sweeney, pointing out a quartet. "That black-haired boy can swim twice as good as the others, but all four can make it. I don't know about the rest of the crowd."

The manager rubbed all of them with olive oil. They repaired to the sandbar above--Justis' Bar, that was later taken over by the Trigg Shipyard--and when Captain Boynton came along they took to the water and swam alongside.

Sure enough, the four whom Sweeney had indicated were the only ones to finish, the black-haired one being the strongest at the end. He was Dick Allen, who always did everything in perfect shape and outdid everybody with whom he ever competed. The others were Forrest Bailey, Jim Booker, and Charlie Goodwyn.

There was a large crowd at Warwick to witness the finish. Captain Boynton made the boys a neat little speech and told them they might become professional swimmers, if they would but try, and gave each of them a gold-piece, a quarter eagle.

The swim from Mayo's Island to Warwick was a favorite trial with the swimmers of Richmond. George Pegram made it, in my time; my father swam it along in 1843, to show that Edgar Allan Poe was not the only swimmer hereabouts who could make it. He had a hard time, as the tide was coming in strong and there was a strong head wind that sprung up and blew against him, so that it took five hours to reach Warwick Bar. Poe had swum it a few years before, to show that Lord Byron was not the only poet who could swim. Byron, twenty years or so before that had swum the Hellespont, just to show that old Leander was not the only water-dog in the world.

This brings us to Leander, the greatest swimmer of them all. For while others swam for reputation, or the glory of the exploit, he, poor fellow! swam for love. He might not pick his time, in daylight and fair weather, accompanied by a guide boat, acclaimed by the multitude, encouraged by friends, in safety and good fortune. But he swam secretly, telling no one of it, at night, and then swam back again; night after night, through tempest or calm, for the eternal glory of mankind, that is to say, for love. And the danger that he faced is proved by the final outcome, when the storm at last overwhelmed him and cast up his cold body on the marble staircase of the temple, where his beloved Hero awaited him.