Admiral Sir William Bowles
(1780-1869)
28 March 1861

Volume 3, page 18, sitting number 2771.

Admiral of the Fleet Sir William Bowles, KCB, was a senior Royal Navy officer and Conservative Party politician. After serving as a junior officer in the French Revolutionary Wars, he became commanding officer of the sloop HMS Zebra and took part in the bombardment of Copenhagen in September 1807 during the Napoleonic Wars. As commanding officer of the fifth-rate HMS Medusa, he took part in operations of the north coast of Spain and led a naval brigade in a raid on Santoña.

Bowles went on to be Commander-in-Chief, South America Station before becoming Third Naval Lord in the Second Peel ministry as well as the Member of Parliament (MP) for Launceston in Cornwall. He published a number of papers arguing for innovations in naval warfare and naval administration before becoming Commander-in-Chief, Portsmouth. 

On 9 August 1820, he married the Honourable Frances Temple, daughter of the late 2nd Viscount Palmerston. Her brother was 3rd Viscount Palmerston, Secretary of War and later Prime Minister.

Admiral Sir William Bowles died, aged 89, on 2 July 1869 at 14 Hill Street, his residence near Berkeley Square. He left an estate valued at £40,000. 

According to his obituary in the Illustrated London News (10 July 1869), 'The Admiral was an ardent patron of the Royal Naval School at New-cross. He was also one of the best friends of the National Life-Boat Institution, having been one of its founders nearly fifty years ago, and having, through the rest of his life, acted zealously and liberally in its support. [...] Sir William was a man of great intelligence and amiability, and was much beloved by his relatives and friends. [...] Sir William was one of the executors of his distinguished brother-in-law, Viscount Palmerston.'