Bill Burgess

Thomas William Burgess (15 June 1872 – 5 July 1950) was the second person to successfully complete a swim of the English Channel after Matthew Webb, following sixteen attempts. Burgess was British but spent most of his life in France, and won a bronze medal with the French water polo team at the 1900 Olympics.

Biography Burgess was born at 7 Lyndhurst Place, Rotherham, to Alfred Burgess, a blacksmith from Youlgreave, Derbyshire, and Camilla Anna Peat, a cook from Harthill, South Yorkshire. His father worked for the Earl of Shrewsbury and accepted the Earl's offer to run a branch of the business, Shrewsbury and Challinor Rubber Company, in London. The family moved to Westminster, London, around 1882.

On 6 September 1911, on his 16th attempt, Burgess became the second person to swim across the English Channel, King George V wrote: "I am commanded to convey to you the hearty congratulations of the King upon your determination and endurance in accomplishing the wonderful feat of swimming the Channel today." Burgess replied: "Your majesty's gracious message has touched me deeply. Its receipt has given me more pleasure than the accomplishment of the feat itself. I am proud to be an Englishman and your subject." Around the same time Burgess bought a summer home at Cap Gris Nez near Calais, as a summer base to train channel swimmers from 1922 to 1934, while his main residence was at Clichy, Paris. In 1941 Burgess was taken prisoner by the Nazis and held in a prison camp Frontstalag 142 in Besançon, France. He was released later the same year.

Burgess died on 5 July 1950, in the Levallois-Perret suburb of Paris, France.

In popular culture Some authors suggest that Burgess is the inspiration for the Portuguese word "burgesso", a descriptor for people which is used to mean short, heavy and ungainly, or poorly educated, ignorant and rude.