LIEUT.-COL. FREYBERG.

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume XXXVI, Issue 4881, 23 September 1925, Page 2

LIEUT.-COL. FREYBERG.

EXPLOITS IN THAMES VALLEY. TE AROHA PAEROA SWIM. The courageous but unsuccessful attempt of Lieut.-Colonel B. C. Freyberg, V.C., D. 5.0., to swim, the English Chnanel from Cape Grisnez to Dover recalls feats which Freyberg was wont to perform in the Thames Valley district some fifteen years ago. “Tiny,” as he was then known to his intimates, was practising at his profession as a dentist in Morrinsville, and often took jaunts across to Te Aroha for a constitutional in the Waihotr River.

In those days there, were but three motorboats, at Te Aroha, one being run privately by Mr B. O’Neil (now of Tauranga). One can imagine the latter’s surprise one Sunday morning when he was asked if he would acr company a swimmer from Te Aroha to Paeroa. The feat was easy to “Tiny” Freyberg, and his surgery at Morrinsville was opened at the usual time next morning.

Another feat which only an intrepid swimmer like Freyberg would take on was the “shooting” of the falls in the Piako River just outside Morrinsville. This he would do several times in succession. These feats were little heard of at the time, for B. C. Freyberg was far rfom ostenattious; he just had to do these things and he chose a time when few were about.