Constituency : Liverpool 1868-80, Carnarvonshire 1881-85, Arfon 1885-95
William captured the extra seat Liverpool had been given.
William was a scion of a prominent Liverpool merchant and shipowning family. He started out as a Quaker but became a Unitarian. He was a friend of Florence Nightingale and, inspired by the care his dying wife had received, set up a scheme for training district nurses in Liverpool which spread throughout the country. He wanted to introduce quality nursing into workhouses. He helped set up the Queen's Nursing Institute and members of his family have continued as trustees ever since. William regarded wealth as "a trust for which he owes an account to himself, to his fellow men and to God; it is not an absolute freehold which he may use solely for personal enjoyment and indulgence." He was an austere man who eschewed sentimentality. He was chairman of Gladstone's election committee in South Lancashire in 1865.
In the late 1870s William fell out with the Liverpool Irish and switched to Wales though he fell into line on Home Rule.
William published pamphlets on local taxation and the Suez Canal.
William was involved in the formation of both Liverpool University and University College of North Wales.
He died in 1902 aged 83. His daughter Eleanor was a prominent campaigner and later an independent MP.
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