PLUCKY ENGLISH SWIMMER.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XLIX, Issue 3889, 29 December 1928, Page 4

PLUCKY ENGLISH SWIMMER.

COAHNG TO (NEW ZEALAND. THE COOK STRAIT yENTURE. New Zealand is to have a visit from Miss Mercedes Gleitze, the London typist, who has come into world prominence for her pluck and endurance as a long-distance swimmer, says the London correspondent of, the Auckland Herald.. She 'is going out by the .Oorinthic on December 7, and,is once more in strict training to make herself fit for her next sea to conquer. Miss Gleitze wants to attempt to swim Cook Strait. She says she is tired of bathing in cold water, and 'she longs to try what she hopes will b e warmer conditions of New Zealand’s sea. Also she says she has heard so much about the Maoris that she longs to see them. What she has been told of the Dominion inspires her with enthusiasm to go out. She was 'born in Brighton and learned to swim when 10 years old. iShe was educated at the East Hoe Higher Grade School, and came to London eight years ago. She has never been 'keen to attain swimming speed records, her interest being in .the long distance events.

In the summer of 1922 Miss Gleitze made her first attempt to .conquer the English Channel, and she tried on eight occasions before she attained her ambition. She claimed to have succeeded on October 7, 1928, but as the swim was not officially attested, and some doubt was cast on her Channel performance by Dr. Dorothy Logan’s confession as to her own Channel Swim hoax, Miss Gleitze made another trial in icy water on October 22. The accompanying boat was manned by pressmen and official witnesses. After swimming for over 10 hours she was taken cut of the iWater exhausted when a little over five miles from Dover.

REWARD OP PERSEVERANCE. Miss Gleitze then proceeded to Gibraltar, with the intention of swimming the Straits, a feat never before accomplished. She had a competitor in the person of Miss Millie Hudson, another typist, and the two swimmers left England in the same steamer. Miss iiiidson, however, failed to achieve the feat, and! returned home.

"Miss Glei'tze’s first effort was made from Tangier on December 16, 1927, but she gave up when halfway across. On January 2, 1928, she got to within a mile of Tarifa, but was overcome by the cold. On January 25 she was nearly drowned on her third attempt, being caught in a whirlpool . Other unsuccessful attempts were made on March 12, and on April 3, the latter effort being from Tarifa, she gave up when a mile from the Moorish coast.

But victory came on April 5. She started from Tarifa, the most Southerly point of Spain, and arrived at Punta Leona, on the coast, of Morocco, after swimming 12hr. 15min. “I entered the water at 7.55 a.m. on the morning of April 5,” she said, after she landed. “After \ls minutes I almost decided to rejturn owing to the rough sea and unfavourable tide. • I swam on, however, and, the tide becoming gradually more favourable, I began to' make good progress. The water .continued rough. During the last four and a-half hours of the swim it was gaining all the time.. «T\Vo fishing smacks carried about 60 Spanish ivitnesses. Feeling very fit, I swam steadily, being carried rip and down the Straits until I landed at a deserted spot on the Moro'ccan Coast after a 121-hours’ swim. In the (middle of the (Straits it was very rough, owing to a freshening wind, but I struggled (through, using the breaststroke. I was ravenously hungry the whole of the time, AUTHENTICITY OF THE SWIM. “There is n'o doubt about the authenticity of my swim. Sixty ox--70 people would not lie about it. None but the 'malicious-minded '.can question.it. A fuller affidavit, signed by a large number of witnesses, who are being fsworn, will be forwarded to me. These signatures will include Dr. Benigio Espinosa, my medical attendant, Professor Alora Roja, and eight others who were in the rowing boat. There was no Englishman aboard, except Mi’. Henry .Solis, who is the son of a retired Britisher.”

Armed with jagged fragments of rock from Morocco and a handful of Moroccan, s'and, Miss Gleitze returned to Tarifa by boat. She was greeted with (the strains of “God Save the King,” from a band, and by cheering, crowds. Apparently the actual distance swum was 24 miles, although (by direct line it is only nine miles.

(During the past summer Miss Gleitze was at Blackpool taking part in ,swimtming carnivals, and then she went to Ireland, hoping to conquer the Irish Channel. But after four attempts she decided to give up because of the intensely -cold water. “I just long to feel some warmer water in New Zealand,” she said, “far removed from ice-floes from the North Pole.”