Henry Hyde Champion

Henry Hyde Champion (22 January 1859 – 30 April 1928) was a socialist journalist and activist, regarded as one of the leading spirits behind the formation of the Independent Labour Party. Up to 1893, he lived and worked in Great Britain, moving after that date to Australia.

Champion was born in Poona, India on 22 January 1859, the son of Major-General James Hyde Champion, and his wife Henrietta Susan, née Urquhart, of aristocratic Scottish descent.

Henry was sent to England at four years of age to attend a day school and from 13 was educated at Marlborough College, later he attended the Royal Military Academy, Woolwich. He entered the army and fought with the artillery in the Afghan War of 1879. There he caught typhoid and was sent back to England.

A radical friend showed Champion the London East End slums; his friend also accompanied Champion to the United States where Champion was influenced by the writings of Henry George.

Champion resigned his army commission 17 September 1882 in disgust over conduct of the Egyptian War of that year and joined the socialist movement. He became assistant secretary of the Social Democratic Federation (SDF) and wrote for the socialist paper, Justice. In 1886 with John Burns, Henry Hyndman and Jack Williams he was indicted for seditious conspiracy in connexion with the Trafalgar Square riots, after conducting his own defence he was acquitted.

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