Admiral of the Fleet Sir William Bowles, KCB (25 May 1780 – 2 July 1869) 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 off 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 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.
Promoted to rear admiral on 23 November 1841, Bowles became Commander of the Squadron of Evolution (formerly known as the Experimental Squadron), with his flag in the first-rate HMS Caledonia in May 1843 and was instructed to test various innovations in naval warfare. He became Third Naval Lord in the Second Peel ministry in May 1844 and was also elected Conservative Party Member of Parliament (MP) for Launceston in Cornwall following a by-election brought about by the resignation of Field Marshal Sir Henry Hardinge that same month. When the Government fell in July 1846 Bowles resigned from office. In a republished paper issued in 1847 he additionally called for a centrally organised system of naval recruitment and in a paper published in 1848 entitled Thoughts on National Defence he argued for a system of fortifications 10 miles deep around the United Kingdom.
Promoted vice-admiral on 8 March 1852, Bowles published a paper entitled Considerations on the Late Naval War in 1856 and, having been promoted to full admiral on 28 November 1857, he published another paper entitled A Recommendation for Abolishing the Rank of Commander in the Royal Navy in 1858. He became Commander-in-Chief, Portsmouth in March 1859 but was obliged to resign after mishandling the response to an alleged mutiny in the second-rate HMS Princess Royal in November 1859. Bowles had wanted to court-martial the offenders but the Government would not authorise that course of action. He was advanced to Knight Commander of the Order of the Bath on 10 November 1862, appointed Rear-Admiral of the United Kingdom on 23 September 1865 and appointed Vice-Admiral of the United Kingdom on 26 November 1866. Promoted to Admiral of the Fleet on 15 January 1869, he died at his home at 8 Hill Street, London on 2 July 1869.