Claude (Claudius?) Champion De Crespigny (1620 - 1697) 
Huguenot and officer in French army 
1687 Left chateau de Vierville in France for England after the revocation of the Edict of Nantes. 
He became a Colonel in the English army. 
1697 Died. Buried in Marleybone.

Thomas Champion De Crespigny (1660 -?) Son of Claude 
1717  Champion Lodge built on corner of Love Walk and Denmark Hill. 30 acres of parkland.

Sir Claude Champion De Crespigny (1847-1935) 4th baronet
1847 Born in Chelsea on 20 April, the eldest son of Sir Claude Champion de Crespigny, and his wife, Mary, second daughter of Sir J. Tyssen Tyrell, bt, MP. 
He attended Temple Grove School, East Sheen, 
1862 Entered the navy, serving as a midshipman in the Warrior. 
1866 Transferred to the army as an ensign, and was with the King's Royal Rifle Corps (60th) in Ireland and India. 
1868 Became 4th baronet
1881 Became bankrupt.
1882 Sir Claude took up ballooning
1883 Became the first man to cross the North Sea, winning the Balloon Society's gold medal for this feat. 
1896 Wrote his memoirs: Memoirs  of Sir Claude Champion De Crespigny


                                   
1909 Photographed as a balloonist


                       
1914 Retired from steeple-chasing at age of 67
1920 photograph (not his son as stated)
1935 died at his home, Champion Lodge, Maldon, Essex, on 26 June, and was buried in a mausoleum he had built in the grounds for his eldest son, who died in 1910 
His unusual life is covered in The Emperor of the United States of America and Other Magnificent British Eccentrics by Catherine Caufield (RKP 1981)