He was educated at Rugby School, where he had no rowing experience, and Trinity Hall, Cambridge.

Swann won the University Pairs in 1913 and the Grand Challenge Cup at Heley in 1913.

He returned to Trinity Hall as Chaplain, where he helped with Cambridge rowing in the early 1920s.

[2] Swann moved to Nairobi as Archdeacon from 1926 to 1927, to Egypt in the same position in 1928, and returned to England in 1933, where he became vicar of Leighton Buzzard.

[5] In 1937 he became vicar of St Mary Redcliffe, Bristol and in 1941 was appointed Chaplain to King George VI.