List of Famous people named William

William Eugene Dickey was an American diver who competed in the 1904 Summer Olympics.

William FitzGerald, 13th Earl of Kildare was an Irish nobleman.

William MacKintosh MacLeod was a Scotland international rugby union player.

William Mathews (1828–1901) was an English mountaineer, botanist, land agent and surveyor, who first proposed the formation of the Alpine Club of London in 1857.

William Dampier was an English explorer, pirate, privateer, navigator, and naturalist who became the first Englishman to explore parts of what is today Australia, and the first person to circumnavigate the world three times. He has also been described as Australia's first natural historian, as well as one of the most important British explorers of the period between Francis Drake and James Cook, he "bridged those two eras" with a mix of piratical derring-do of the former and scientific inquiry of the later. His expeditions were among the first to identify and name a number of plants, animals, foods, and cooking techniques for a European audience; being among the first English writers to use words such as avocado, barbecue, and chopsticks. In describing the preparation of avocados, he was the first European to describe the making of guacamole, named the breadfruit plant, and made frequent documentation of the taste of numerous foods foreign to the European palate such as flamingo and manatee.

William Joseph Petre, 13th Baron Petre was an English nobleman and priest (Monsignor) of the Roman Catholic Church.

William Knox D'Arcy was a British businessman who was one of the principal founders of the oil and petrochemical industry in Persia (Iran). The D’Arcy Concession was signed in 1901 and allowed D'Arcy to explore, obtain, and market oil, natural gas, asphalt, and ozokerite in Persia.

William Turner MA was an English divine and reformer, a physician and a natural historian. He has been called "The father of English botany." He studied medicine in Italy, and was a friend of the great Swiss naturalist, Conrad Gessner. He was an early herbalist and ornithologist, and it is in these fields that the most interest lies today.

Sir William Scott of Scot's Hall in Smeeth, Kent was Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports.