Sir William Bull, 1st Baronet
British politician (1863-1931)

Sir William James Bull, 1st Baronet, (29 September 1863 – 23 January 1931) was an English solicitor and Conservative Party politician.
Biography
Bull was the son of Henry Bull, a solicitor, and his wife Cecilia Ann Howard, daughter of James Peter Howard. He was returned to Parliament for Hammersmith in 1900, a seat he held until 1918, and then sat for Hammersmith South until 1929.
Bull was knighted in 1905. That year Walter Long became Chief Secretary for Ireland, and Bull was his Parliamentary Private Secretary. A few years later, the Anti-Socialist Union was set up, and Bull served on its executive committee with R. D. Blumenfeld, while Long was a vice-president. He ran Hammersmith meetings for the Union, with those attending having to sign affidavits of opposition to socialism, and ejected hecklers.
Around 1911 Bull became involved with Frederick H. Crawford in running guns to the Ulster Volunteer Force. He did that in partnership with Herbert Augustus Budden, who was married to his sister Charlotte Annie Howard. They used two firms in Hammersmith, one set up as a front and the other a motor parts supplier set up by Bull's former chauffeur.
The public source identifies “Sir William Bull, 1st Baronet” as british politician (1863-1931). This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around William, Bull and Baronet.
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Biographical claims are most persuasive when dates, appointments and relationships can be traced to records created close to the events described. The source revision retrieved here is dated Mar 25, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q7529516. VIAF identifies the subject as 53219259. The Library of Congress control number is n87895292. 3 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1863, 1931, 1900 and 1918.
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This entry incorporates text from “Sir William Bull, 1st Baronet” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.