I'm not sure why it worked but this is how I got the swap working, even through a reboot.

disable the virtual memory
strat X-terminal
$ sudo gainroot
# fdisk /dev/mmcblk1
: d (deletes a partition)
: 3
: w (writes the deletion to disk)
# fdisk /dev/mmcblk1
: n (makes a new partition)
: p (primary partition)
: enter (select the default start block)
: enter (select the default end block)
: t (set the partition type)
: 82 (linux swap)
: w
# mkswap /dev/mmcblk1p3
# swapon /dev/mmcblk1p3
# exit
$ pb
select SWAP
select mmcblk1p2
select mmcblk1p3
continue through prompts
Cancel out of pb when the swap successful message has come

reboot the tablet!

Free now shows that I am using swap!

Thanks to Fanoush and PB for the vital clues that got this to work. I'm sure that there are lots of extra steps in my process but I can definitely say that this has worked and it should work for you too if you want to try it.

However! I don't really have any technical understanding of why it works. I understand what has happened and I took a lot of shortcuts by making console-tools do some of the work. If you need help I probably am not going to be a great resource but I'm glad that I was able to get this done and I hope it helps someone.

Tom