He was the fourth son of Thomas Arnold, the headmaster of Rugby School. His older brothers included the poet and critic Matthew Arnold and the literary scholar Tom Arnold. He was educated at Rugby School and Christ Church, Oxford, matriculating in 1846.[1] Not long after his father's death in 1842, William, a pupil at Rugby, was part of a committee of three, Arnold, W. W. Shirley and Frederick Hutchins,[2][3] that drew up the first written rules for football at Rugby School.[4] These rules were approved in August 1845 and published that same year, becoming the first known published set of rules for any code of football.[3]
Later, William served as an educational administrator (during 1855) in Punjab, in British India; as the first director of public instruction in the Punjab, he was responsible for implementing "Halkabandi" in that province.[5] One of his most significant achievements was to enact a law separating church and state in public schools. As a result, Hindu pupils who attended these schools were no longer required to study the Bible or the Koran in public schools. This policy would later influence public schools in England as well. While working in India, William wrote several articles for Fraser's Magazine, mainly concerning "the India question" (see bibliography). In 1853, William published a novel of Anglo-Indian life, Oakfield; or, Fellowship in the East, which explores commonalities between spiritual traditions of the East and the West, while also predicting the "mutiny" that would occur soon afterward. The main character of Oakfield is dying of disease contracted in India; its author was afflicted with the same disease. William died aged 31, at Gibraltar, on his way home from India. Matthew Arnold's poem "A Southern Night" mourns his early death.[6]
Family
On 3 April 1850, Arnold married Frances Anne Hodgson, known as Fanny, the daughter of Major-General John Anthony Hodgson of the Bengal army.[7]
Their children were:
Edward Penrose Arnold-Forster DL (1851–1927), military officer and worsted wool manufacturer in Yorkshire
Florence Mary Arnold-Forster (1854–1936), craftswoman and author, founder of the Limerick Lace School, married Robert Vere O'Brien
After the deaths of Frances in March 1858 and William in April 1859, the children were adopted by William's sister Jane Martha and her husband William Edward Forster, later adopting the surname Arnold-Forster.[6]
^Macrory, Jenny (1991). Running with the Ball: The Birth of Rugby Football. London: HarperCollins. p. 93. ISBN0002184028.
^Allender, Tim. "William Arnold and Experimental Education in North India, 1855–1859: An Innovative Model of State Schooling." Historical Studies in Education 16, no. 1 (2004): 63–83.
Trilling, Lionel (1939) Matthew Arnold. London: George Allen & Unwin Ltd.
Gander Ostrander, Diana L., Ph.D. An Anglo-Indian in Search of Wisdom: W. D. Arnold's India Pilgrimage. University of Minnesota, 2007, 237 pages; AAT 3252500.
Gander Ostrander, Diana L., Ph.D. "Wordsworth in the Himalayas: Indian Narratology and Sacred Space in William Delafield Arnold's Oakfield: Fellowship in the East." Religion and the Arts 14.1–2 (2010): 34–58. Print.
Arnold, William Delafield. “An Anglo-Indian Lament for John Company.” Fraser’s Magazine, Vol. 57, No. 342. May 1858, 635–642.
"An Anglo-Indian View of the Indian Crisis.” Fraser’s Magazine Vol. 57, No. 339, March 1858, 269–282.
“An Anglo-Indian View of the Indian Crisis: The Second Part.” Fraser’s Magazine Vol. 57, No. 340, April 1858, 473–487.
“The Curate of Edenholm.” Fraser’s Magazine. Volume 57, 473–480.
German Letter on English Education, by Dr. L. Wiese. Translated by W.D. Arnold. Longmans, 1854.
Essay. Short Essays on Social and Indian Subjects Calcutta, 1869, 156–73.
“How Queen Victoria Was Proclaimed at Peshawar.” Fraser’s Magazine, Vol. 59, January 1859, 120–126.
“India in a Mess.” Fraser’s Magazine, Vol. 58, No. 348. December 1858, 730–741.
“India in Mourning: From the Punjab, September 29, 1857.” Fraser’s Magazine. Vol. 56. December 1857, 737–750.
