Grayson Perry a transvestite. At the age of 15 he moved in with his father's family in Chelmsford, where he began to go out dressed as a woman. When he was discovered by his father he said he would stop but his stepmother told everyone about it and a few months later threw him out. He returned to his mother and stepfather at Great Bardfield. Perry frequently appears in public dressed as a woman, and he has described his female alter-ego, "Claire", variously as "a 19th century reforming matriarch, a middle-England protester for "No More Art", an aero-model-maker, or an Eastern European
History of cross-dressing as a dragoon in 1740. Hannah Snell served as a man in the Royal Marines 1747–1750, being wounded 11 times, and was granted a military pension. Dorothy Lawrence was an English war reporter who disguised herself as a man so she could become a soldier in World War I. The British writer and doctor Vernon Coleman cross-dresses and has written several articles defending men who cross-dress, stressing they are often heterosexual and usually do not want to change sex. British artist and Turner Prize winner, Grayson Perry often appears as his alter-ego, Clare. Japan has a centuries-old tradition of male