Hugh Champion de Crespigny


Hugh Vivian Champion de Crespigny, , often referred to as Vivian Champion de Crespigny, was a Royal Flying Corps pilot who fought in France during the First World War, and senior Royal Air Force officer who commanded British Air Forces in Persia and Iraq during the Second World War.

Early years

De Crespigny was born in Brighton, Victoria, the third son of Philip Champion de Crespigny, general manager of the State Bank of Victoria in Melbourne, and Annie Frances de Crespigny née Chauncy, who married on 25 September 1877. He was a younger brother of C. T. C. de Crespigny, both being educated at Brighton Grammar School. In August 1914, following the outbreak of the First World War, he enlisted with the 5th Battalion of the Australian Army as a private.
In 1915 he was recommended for a commission in the Suffolk Regiment, and from there graduated to the Royal Flying Corps' special reserve.

RAF career

De Crespigny joined the Special Reserve of the Royal Flying Corps in 1915. He went on to be Officer Commanding No. 29 Squadron on the Western Front and then Officer Commanding No. 65 Squadron also on the Western Front.
Apart from three months' sick leave, he was at the front in France continuously from June 1915, and was promoted Major in April 1917.
After the war he went to India where he commanded No. 60 Squadron and then No. 39 Squadron and finally No. 2 Wing.
He served in the Second World War as Air Officer Commanding No. 25 Group, as Air Officer Commanding Air Headquarters Iraq and then as Air Officer Commanding No. 21 Group.
In 1945 De Crespigny joined the Labour Party, and stood as their candidate for the British Parliament in Newark, but was narrowly beaten by the sitting Conservative member, Lt-Col. Sidney Shephard.
He was a leader in the campaign to fly great numbers of children from the devastated regions of Germany to England before the winter of 1945, when it was predicted millions of homeless would die from the cold.
De Crespigny retired from the RAF in 1945. and was appointed Regional Commissioner for Schleswig-Holstein for the Control Commission for Germany one of four civilians appointed to oversee the de-Nazification of Germany and Austria.
He oversaw relief efforts for the area, much of the population being in a pitiable condition, exacerbated by mass migration from East Germany, and with rising incidence of tuberculosis.
In 1948 De Crespigny was succeeded as commissioner by William Asbury and stayed in Kiel as British consul until 1956. He later lived at Vierville in Natal, South Africa.
He died at Pietermaritzburg, Natal, South Africa.

Recognition

De Crespigny married Sylvia Ethel Usher in Fovant, Wiltshire, on 7 October 1926. They had three sons and one daughter. He was closely related to other notable members of the Champion de Crespigny family in Australia: Raoul de Crespigny Tunbridge; Colonel Geoff Champion de Crespigny; Rafe Champion de Crespigny; Francis Philip Champion de Crespigny; Richard Champion de Crespigny, Group Captain Claude Montgomery Champion de Crespigny; and Sir Henry de Crespigny.