John Marshall

1930 – 1957

The 18-year-old John Marshall burst on to the Olympic swimming scene with a silver medal in the 1500m and a bronze medal in the 400m freestyle events at London 1948. Within a year he was attending Yale University in the United States and breaking world records whilst swimming on the university circuit and at the United States Championships. By mid-1951 his form had dropped away markedly and he was only a shadow of his former self when he swam, rather unsuccessfully at Helsinki 1952. At Melbourne 1956 Marshall, now a butterfly swimmer, finished a creditable fifth in the inaugural staging of the 200m butterfly. Within a few weeks of the closing of the Olympics he died as result of a road traffic accident in country Victoria.