John Fiennes Twisleton Crampton

John Fiennes Twisleton Crampton was born in 1805, the son of the Irish surgeon Philip Crampton. He entered diplomacy at Turin in 1826 and served in St. Petersburg, Brussels, Vienna, and Berne before becoming secretary of the Washington legation in July 1845. He worked under Richard Pakenham and Henry Bulwer, taking charge during their absences. His two acting periods, from 1847 to 1849 and from 1850 to 1852, preceded his appointment as minister in January 1852. ¹

His Washington career ended in the controversy over British recruitment in the United States for the Crimean War. Crampton maintained that he had halted recruitment promptly after receiving notice of London's instructions. Attorney General Caleb Cushing challenged his account, arguing that a direct order sent in June 1855 should have stopped the operation weeks earlier. The dispute concerned both American neutrality law and the minister's handling of British orders. On 28 May 1856 President Franklin Pierce ended official intercourse with Crampton and three British consuls. ^{2, 1}

Britain continued to employ him. Knighted in 1856, he became minister in Hanover in 1857, transferred to St. Petersburg in 1858, and represented Britain in Madrid from 1860 until his retirement in 1869. He inherited his father's baronetcy in 1858. Crampton spent his later years in Ireland and died near Bray, County Wicklow, on 5 December 1886. ¹