Daphne Wilkinson

Daphne Wilkinson was born in Birmingham but moved to nearby Leamington Spa in 1947 after her father retired from the police force. She had started competitive swimming two years earlier at the age of 13 and became the British 100 yards junior champion. Wilkinson won the first of four consecutive senior ASA 440 yards titles in 1950. She also won the 220 title in 1951, and between 1951-53 was named Swimmer of the Year.

Wilkinson held the British 440 yards record between 1951-58 and at the 1952 Helsinki Olympics broke the Games record for the 400 metres despite officially being placed second behind Evelyn Kawamoto of the USA, who she shared the new record with. Wilkinson captained the English ladies´ team at the 1954 British Empire and Commonwealth Games in Vancouver where she won a bronze medal in the 4x110 yards relay with Fearne Ewart, Jean Botham, and Valerie Nares-Pillow. After the Games, Wilkinson was selected to compete in the European Championships at Turin, but was later withdrawn from the squad.

After a brief retirement in 1956, Wilkinson made a comeback in the hope of making a second Olympic appearance at Melbourne, but she never made the British team. Having been a radiographer at Warwick Hospital, and then worked in her parents’ florists, Wilkinson relinquished her amateur swimming status in 1956 to become a swimming instructor. Over the years she taught hundreds of Leamington Spa children how to swim.