Virtual
War Memorial
Australia

Born 8 March 1895.

Son of the late Edward Champion and Edith Hosking.

His father was a grocer, and at the outbreak of the Great War he resided with his parents at Magill Road, St Peters.

He passed the State Civil Service Examination in 1910, and was subsequently appointed a junior clerk in the accountant's branch, Surveyor-General’s Department, commencing duties on 19 April 1910, but resigned from the Public Service on 12 May 1912.

He was a compulsory trainee, and received his first commission as a 2nd Lieutenant in the 79th (Torrens) Infantry on 31 May 1913 and on 16 July 1914 was promoted to the rank of Lieutenant in the same regiment.   He held this commission at the time of joining the AIF.  He was appointed a Lieutenant in the 10th Battalion at Morphettville on 19 August 1914, and was posted to original A Company with which he embarked per HMAT A11 Ascanius on 20 October 1914

At Mena Egypt when the company merged with original F Company and became the new A Company he was appointed a Platoon Commander in same.   He accompanied the Battalion to the Dardanelles on the Ionian and landed with his company from the destroyer Foxhound at the historic landing on 25 April 1915.  He remained on the Peninsula until 20 August 1915, when through illness he was compelled to evacuate, and proceeding to England was admitted into hospital. 

He subsequently returned to South Australia in 1916 but proceeded overseas again as OC of the 19th Reinforcements of the 10th Battalion, which embarked per HMAT A70 Ballarat, at the Outer Harbour on 12 August 1916. 

He joined the Battalion in France on 11 November 1916 and on 4 January 1917 evacuated sick, leaving France for England on 14 January 1917. 

He subsequently returned to Australia, his services with the AIF terminating on 6 August 1917.

He was one of the youngest Officers of the original Battalion, and with Lieutenants R J M Hooper and W H Perry shared this distinction. 

In 1918 he commenced a first-year course in the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Adelaide, and under the Commonwealth Vocational Training Scheme completed his second to fourth years, both inclusive.  His academic career was outstanding.   In 1920 he topped the 2nd year students, and won the Elder Prize, later tied with another student for the Everard Prize and finally won the Dr Charles Gosse Medal for ophthalmology.

In 1923 he graduated MB, BS, his degrees being conferred on 12 December 1923.  He was appointed Junior Medical Officer at the Parkside Mental Hospital on 1 March 1924 and by 31 December of that year had become Senior Medical Officer. 

On 1 January 1925 he was appointed Deputy Superintendent, which position he resigned on 3 February 1925.  On the same day he was appointed a medical officer in the Commonwealth Public Service, Department of Health, and subsequently proceeded to New Britain to take up his new appointment. 

On 22 August 1927 at the Kent Town Methodist Church he married Lorna Ellen, daughter of William Reynolds Bayly, and in 1935 he was stationed at Ravalion, Rabaul.

He was a member of the British Medical Association and was a local secretary of the Royal Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene.

It will be remembered that whilst on the Ascanius in November 1914 he and Major M F Beevor staged the first boxing bout in order to popularise the ring with the troops.

His name was removed from the Retired List of the Australian Military Forces on 11 November 1916, but was replaced on same with rank of 2nd Lieutenant on 23 July 1925.

Extract from “The Fighting 10th”, Adelaide, Webb & Son, 1936 by C.B.L. Lock; supplied courtesy of the 10th Bn AIF Association Committee, April 2015.