The Abingdon mermaid

“My eyes were fixed with thousands of others on the slight, gracefully-poised figure which was being drawn upwards to that tiny aerial platform… up, up it went, the prettily-rounded girlish figure set off to perfection by its dainty garb of turquoise-blue and white… Suddenly the band ceased playing and silence, absolute and awesome, fell… She gave a smiling glance around… and then – was gone, a flashing streak of blue and white that disappeared with a terrific splash… There was a second of awful, thrilling suspense and then… the heroine of the hour was being drawn out… to the accompaniment of cheer upon cheer that would not be silenced.” So said the enchanted reporter from “ after watching Abingdon-born Annie Luker perform her famous high-diving act.

Once described as a “quiet, innocent-looking” little figure, with “timid dark eyes; the sort of girl one would expect to scream at a black beetle”, Annie was born Hagar Ann Luker in 1870 in St Edmund's Lane in Abingdon, one of eight children. 

The family moved to Quarry Road and Annie was a regular at the Grosvenor Baths. She related how her father, swimming trainer John Pearson Luker, taught her to swim almost before she could walk. Indeed, she claimed, she attained her two hundred yards' medal at the age of only five. By the 1890s she was thrilling London on a nightly basis by diving seventy feet into a shallow tank at the Royal Aquarium. How had this extraordinary career come about?

At around 16 Annie began her career as a competitive river swimmer, attempting to set records rather than win races. In August 1892 she attempted to swim from Kew to Greenwich (eighteen and a half miles) to establish claim to the female championship of the world. Spectators might accompany her in a specially chartered steamer from Charing Cross. By London Bridge, the press reported, she was showing signs of tiring but “struggled on with the utmost gameness.” However, after nearly five hours and having covered sixteen miles with “no refreshment at all”, she left the water at Tunnel Pier and was helped on to the accompanying boat. 

Annie went on to become a famous high diver. In January 1894 she was appearing at the Royal Aquarium, diving from the mid-air platform into the shallow tank used by the male divers. Apparently the effect on the public of her first attempt was electric, and Annie's wages rose to twenty pounds a week. She took part in an aquatic entertainment at Earls Court, sometimes sharing the billing with a boxing kangaroo and a talking horse. An extra sensation was was added when her little niece May Elizabeth Waters, “Baby May” – born in 1890 – began to perform with her. 

Annie married Essex-born oyster merchant Frederick Parker in 1890. They lived in London, but Frederick found Annie's performances too nerve-wracking to attend. “He never comes to see me,” Annie said. “He couldn’t stand it. We live close by, and he waits for me at home.”

After her performing career ended Annie devoted her later years to teaching others to swim. And then something drew Annie back to Abingdon, perhaps a family connection, because she died there in 1916. She is just one of a group of remarkably enterprising Oxfordshire women of the period. Whether they were cycling the surface of the river Thames, tripping long distances on top of a giant rubber ball, or high-diving into a shallow tank, they recognised the commercial value of the female performing a novelty feat.

This is an expanded extract from my book “"On this day in Oxfordshire: volume 2”, available on Amazon.com.