Claude de Crespigny balloonist

Claude Champion de Crespigny (1847-1935), the fourth baronet, was my fourth cousin three times removed.

He was a notable sportsman and he wrote several books about his sporting adventures, including "Forty Years of a Sportsman's Life", published in 1910.

On the publication of this book, the New York Times quoted a review in the Globe which had commented that Sir Claude appeared to have never begun a day without considering in what new and unheard-of way he could put his life and his limbs in danger.

The book is at https://archive.org/details/fortyyearsofspor00decr

New York Times 9 October 1910

Claude's first experience of balloons was shooting at them outside Paris during the summer of 1870 during the Franco-Prussian war. He was with the Prussian army at St Denis.  Small balloons were ascending from Paris for the "purpose of disseminating false information about the state of things prevailing in the front". As they weren't flying at a great height, "we were sometimes able to riddle them with bullets". (page 38 of Forty Years)

Claude's first balloon voyage was in 1882, an attempt to cross the channel from Essex to Calais. He was accompanied by Joseph Simmons, who had attempted the crossing previously. When the balloon was being launched, assistants held onto the basket for too long. The basket collided with a wall and Sir Claude broke his leg and some ribs fending off. Simmons continued without him and made it to France. According to Sir Claude, Simmons travelled one hundred and seventy miles in just over an hour and a half. This claim seems unlikely. (pages 127-131 of Forty Years)

In July 1883 Claude crossed the North Sea with Simmons, landing near Flushing.  He was awarded the Balloon Society's gold medal for the voyage as the first man to cross the North Sea in a balloon.  (pages 134-142 of Forty Years) The journey was described in newspapers around the world. An account of this adventure appeared in New Zealand's Timaru Herald on 27 September 1883.

In July 1909 Claude was pictured in a balloon at Hurlingham. Based on his reminiscences this was probably in the "St Louis" piloted by John Dunham (whose wife accompanied them). (page 316 of Forty Years)

There were several races that year from Hurlingham, and in May Claude also participated in the  1909 Hurlingham International Balloon Race.. Claude travelled in a balloon with H. Hassac Buist, the author of an article for the Flight Magazine published 29 May 1909. They were passengers of Mr Griffith Brewer on the "Vivienne," of 75,000 cubic feet capacity, the biggest balloon of the afternoon.

There were five of us aboard, and everyone was busy throughout, including Sir Claude, as the self-appointed honorary look-out man, than whom none could have been better chosen for the purpose in that hereabout was all his own country, every hedge and ditch of which was familiar to him through hunting. In brief, what he did not know, had he chosen to communicate it, concerning such-and-such a hall that had been in the hands of three generations of drunkards; such-and-such a house, where is the finest cellar of port to be found in England; such-and-such a lodge, the heir to which married so many tens of thousands a year and got through the lot in as many months; such-and-such another place, where a disastrous fire had reduced a palatial residence to Goldsmith's "four naked walls that stared upon each other," and so forth, was not knowledge. Seemingly, our genial fellow-passenger and impromptu cicerone had advised all his friends for miles around to be on the look-out for us so that we should be sure of a hearty welcome anywhere within a wide range of the winning post, not omitting Champion Lodge.

 The "Vivienne" came fourth. His son, Captain V. C de Crespigny (Vierville 1882-1927), flew in "Kismet" with Philip Gardner but they were unplaced.

1909. Griffith Brewer's 'Vivienne' balloon and Frank McClean's 'Corona' balloon. retrieved from http://www.gracesguide.co.uk/Griffith_Brewer

 More pictures of the balloon race can be viewed at http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2483460/Rare-pictures-Victorian-gentleman-balloon-race-sale.html

Sir Claude also took part as a passenger in the race in 1908. The winner that year was Mr Griffith Brewer in the "Lotus" and Claude was a passenger in that balloon. (Race in the Air. (1908, July 18). The World's News (Sydney, NSW : 1901 - 1955), p. 9. Retrieved March 24, 2014, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article133965770) (pages 312-314 of Forty Years)

A pirate in the family tree

Sir Henry Mainwaring (1587-1653) was an English seaman who spent some of his career as a pirate on the Barbary coast. He was afterwards pardoned and knighted by King James.

My son, who is studying history, came across the pirate Henry Mainwaring and asked if we were related to him.  I replied that I did not think so, but I decided to check for a relationship.  Henry Mainwaring, I discovered, is my third cousin eleven times removed, a relative indeed, though not a close one.

The common ancestor of me and the pirate is Sir John Mainwaring (1470-1515) my 13 times great grandfather.  Sir John had gone to the French wars in the train of the Earl of Shrewsbury. He was knighted at Tournai in 1513. ( Metcalfe, Walter Charles, ed., Book of Knights Banneret, Knights of the Bath et., IV Henry VI to 1660, London (1885) page 50 ) Sir John Mainwaring was Henry Mainwaring's great great grandfather.

Henry Mainwaring was the second son of Sir George Mainwaring and Ann More.  Henry studied at Oxford University. In 1604, about seventeen years old, he was admitted to the Inner Temple as a lawyer.

It is not clear how Henry became a seaman, but in 1610, at the age of about twenty-three, he was commissioned by the Lord High Admiral, Charles Howard, 1st Earl of Nottingham, to capture the pirate Peter Easton, who had been raiding Newfoundland.  Mainwaring was unsuccessful.  He was then given a letter of marque, becoming a privateer against Spanish shipping in the West Indies.  En route there he decided instead to attack Spanish shipping from the coast of Morocco.


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Mainwaring was based at La Marmora, present day Mehdya, on the Morocco coast near Rabat, for four years from 1612. He had a fleet of thirty captured Spanish ships.  He claimed that he never attacked English ships.  The French and Spanish governments complained about Mainwaring to the English government and King James I sent an envoy with an offer of a free pardon if he promised to give up piracy. He was pardoned in 1616 and all those who served under him were granted an amnesty.

Later, Mainwaring became a hunter of pirates. He wrote a book on piracy, Discourse of Pirates, which he dedicated to the King.  He was knighted on 20 March 1618 and became one of King James's courtiers and a friend of the King.

In 1620 he was appointed Lieutenant of Dover Castle and Deputy Warden of the Cinque Ports. In 1621 he was elected Member of Parliament for Dover. Around this time Mainwaring wrote the Seaman’s Dictionary. It was not published until 1644 but manuscript copies were distributed before then. It is considered the first authoritative treatise in seamanship.

Mainwaring offended Lord Zouche, Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports, and was dismissed from his post at Dover Castle. Mainwaring sought the patronage of the Duke of Buckingham. At that time Buckingham was Lord High Admiral and it has been asserted that Buckingham and his masters made a serious attempt to reform the naval administration, and that in this Mainwaring played a considerable part. However Buckingham was assassinated in 1628 and Mainwaring lost his patron.

Mainwaring was not wealthy, and after Buckingham's death, he attempted to improve his fortunes by marrying a rich widow.  She rejected him and in 1630 he eloped with a twenty-three year old heiress.  His father-in-law refused to provide a dowry until Mainwaring had made a settlement. Mainwaring's wife died in 1633 and their only daughter died about 1640. Mainwaring was outlawed for debt in 1641. In 1651 an assessment of his worth in considering his debt stated that his entire property consisted of ‘a horse and wearing apparel to the value of £8’.

Mainwaring had joined the navy as a captain in 1636.  He was a Vice-Admiral by 1639.


During the English Civil War (1642-1651), Mainwaring joined the King at Oxford. Later he served with Royalist fleet.  He was with the sixteen-year-old Prince Charles, later King Charles II, at Jersey in 1646.


Mainwaring died in 1653, leaving no will.  He was buried at St Giles, Camberwell.  No gravestone, if there was one, has survived.


References and further reading

E. Hunt, “MAINWARING, SIR HENRY,” in Dictionary of Canadian Biography, vol. 1, University of Toronto/Université Laval, 2003–, accessed March 20, 2014, http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/mainwaring_henry_1E.html.

Mainwaring, G. E. (ed.). 1920. The Life and Works of Sir Henry Mainwaring. London: The Council of the Navy Records Society. https://archive.org/details/henrymainwaring02manwuoft

Pringle, Patrick Jolly Roger : the story of the great age of piracy. Dover Publications, 2012. pages 43-45 retrieved from Google Books http://books.google.com.au/books?id=WqXDAgAAQBAJ&pg=PT43

Thrush Andrew "MAINWARING, Sir Henry (1586/7-1653), of Dover Castle, Kent; later of Camberwell, Surr." The History of Parliament: The House of Commons 1754-1790, 1964. Member Biographies from The History of Parliament Online. Web. 20 Mar. 2014. <http://www.historyofparliamentonline.org/volume/1604-1629/member/mainwaring-sir-henry-15867-1653>

"SIR HENRY MAINWARING.*." The Spectator Archive. The Spectator, 19 Feb. 1921. Web. 20 Mar. 2014. <http://archive.spectator.co.uk/article/19th-february-1921/19/sir-henry-mainwaring>.

(Library Assistant), Nabila. "The Seaman's Dictionary: 'This Book Shall Make a Man Understand'" Royal Museums Greenwich. National Maritime Museum, 2013. Web. 20 Mar. 2014. <http://www.rmg.co.uk/researchers/collections/by-type/archive-and-library/item-of-the-month/previous/the-seaman%27s-dictionary>

PEN PICTURES OF THE PAST. IN PIRATE DAYS. (1914, July 9). Cobram Courier (Vic. : 1914 - 1918), p. 6. Retrieved March 21, 2014, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article129536151 

Family stories

In the fifth week of Shauna Hicks's series of blog posts about genealogical records the topic is family stories.

Before we had computer databases, family history was largely passed down by stories.  For example, my mother-in-law had a very clear idea of who her forebears were for several generations and was able to give brief outlines of their lives for ancestors back to the early nineteenth century from the top of her head. I have been able to verify the family history with records, and what she set out for me from memory was remarkably accurate.

On my side of the family, several relations have written family history books thereby preserving many family stories.

My father wrote Champions of Normandy which covers the early history of the Champion de Crespigny family to the time they migrated to England at the end of the seventeenth century.  Among other documents, it is based on a number of manuscripts held by different family members, as well as the registration of the family with the College of Arms in 1697. (de Crespigny, Rafe Champions in Normandy: being some remarks on the early history of the Champion de Crespigny family. R. de Crespigny, Canberra, 1988.)

My third cousin twice removed, Stephen de Crespigny, has gathered an enormous amount of family history. He collected information, documents and stories, but also had drawn up a comprehensive family tree in the early 1990s.

One of the three sheets of the Champion de Crespigny family tree compiled by Stephen de Crespigny

Helen Hudson née  Hughes (1915 - 2005) my first cousin twice removed, was an enthusiastic family historian.  She compiled a book, Cherry Stones,  covering her forebears (which coincide with my father's father's mother's family). I have found it a useful resource and am very pleased she wrote it.  It was published in 1985 and is an amazing effort considering she too had no computer database or access to the material we now have through the internet.  Helen's father Reginald Hawkins Hughes (1886 - 1971), brother of my great grandmother, had collected papers and paraphernalia of his ancestors and kept it in what she called a "tin trunk" which Helen inherited.  The book has much original material such as transcriptions of early letters. (Hudson, Helen Lesley Cherry stones : adventures in genealogy of Taylor, Hutcheson, Hawkins of Scotland, Plaisted, Green, Hughes of England and Wales ... who immigrated to Australia between 1822 and 1850. H.L. Hudson, [Berwick] Vic, 1985.)

My great great great grandfather Philip Chauncy wrote  memoirs of his sister and his second wife.  These were republished in 1976. (Chauncy, Philip Lamothe Snell Memoirs of Mrs Poole and Mrs Chauncy. Lowden, Kilmore, Vic, 1976.) The State Library of Victoria also holds a manuscript of his journal of his trip to Australia and other family history and biographical notes he made.

My Great grand uncle James Gordon Cavenagh-Mainwaring (1865 - 1938) wrote a history of the Mainwaring family back to the entry of Whitmore estate in the Domesday Book of 1068. (Cavenagh-Mainwaring, James Gordon The Mainwarings of Whitmore and Biddulph in the County of Stafford. An account of the family, and its connections by marriage and descent; with special reference to the Manor of Whitmore. J.G. Cavenagh-Mainwaring, about 1935.) The estate of Whitmore where my cousins now live has never been sold since the entry in the Domesday book but always been transferred through inheritance, albeit sometimes through the female line.

More recently the wife of my father's cousin, Christine Cavenagh-Mainwaring, has produced an updated  history of Whitmore and the family. (Cavenagh-Mainwaring, Christine and Britton, Heather, (editor.) Whitmore Hall : from 1066 to Waltzing Matilda. Adelaide Peacock Publications, 2013. ) I was very pleased to be given a copy of the book by Guy and Christine when I saw them in Adelaide last month.

Christine provides an update on what happened to Gerald Mainwaring (1854 - ?) though she also has not been able to trace what happened to him eventually.  My blog entry deals with him being tried for murder but he was not hanged as the jury effectively cast a ballot to decide his fate. His sentence was commuted to penal servitude. Apparently he was released on licence on May 16, 1894. The family story is that Gerald made his way to Whitmore where his brother Percy (1857 - 1927), the Rector of Whitmore, would not let him into the house, gave him a five pound note and an overcoat and sent him away.  Perhaps Gerald changed his name and returned to Canada. There seems no record of him after that time.

There are lots of other family stories in Christine's book to follow up on and to research further.

In the 1990s James Kenneth Cudmore (1926 - 2013), my second cousin once removed, of Quirindi New South Wales, commissioned Elsie Ritchie to write the Cudmore family history. The work built on the family history efforts of many family members.  It was published in 2000.  It is a very large and comprehensive work and includes many many Cudmore family stories. (Ritchie, Elsie B. (Elsie Barbara) For the love of the land: the history of the Cudmore family. E. Ritchie, [Ermington, N.S.W.], 2000.)

A collection of family history books.

Emma Rothschild, a Professor of History at Harvard University, has studied the Johnstone family in a scholarly history of the eighteenth century in order to gain an insight into the development of the British Empire.  Barbara Johnstone (1723 - 1765) was my sixth great grandmother and it is she and her siblings who are the subject of this book. The source material included the oldest brother's letter book which was in an Edinburgh library. (Rothschild, Emma The inner life of empires : an eighteenth-century history. Princeton University Press, Princeton, N.J. ; Woodstock, 2011.  Book review: http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/books/reviews/the-inner-life-of-empires-by-emma-rothschild-2347490.html)



Among other stories, I learned from the book that in 1759 Barbara separated from her husband Charles Kinnaird (1723 - 1767). He had succeeded to the baronetcy as 6th Lord Kinnaird in 1758. Barbara awarded £130 per year and £100 pounds for furniture. She did not have access to her children. Her husband stated she had committed no crime other than ill nature.

Barbara, Baroness Kinnaird by Allan Ramsay, 1748 portrait retrieved from http://thepeerage.com/p3036.htm . Barbara Johnstone was the daughter of Sir James Johnstone, 3rd Bt. and Barbara Murray. She married Charles Kinnaird, 6th Baron Kinnaird, son of George Kinnaird and Lady Helen Gordon. She died on 21 October 1765

It is a bit intimidating when so much family history has been written to attempt one's own study.  However, I have found plenty more family history to research while enjoying the stories published by others.