Private First Class Champion was a member of Company K, 3rd Battalion, 38th Infantry Regiment, 2nd Infantry Division. He was taken Prisoner of War while fighting the enemy in South Korea on February 12, 1951 and died while a prisoner on May 3, 1951. At the time, his remains were not recovered. Through the work of the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency, the remains of Pfc. Champion were accounted for in 2017. His name remains permanently inscribed on the Courts of the Missing at the Honolulu Memorial.