Sir William Elford, 1st Baronet (August 1749 – 30 November 1837) was an English banker, politician, and amateur artist.

He was elected MP for Plymouth from 1796 to 1806, when he was defeated, bringing an unsuccessful petition against his antagonist, Sir C. M. Pole, Bart.

[1] Elford was a friend of William Pitt the Younger and frequently visited Bath, where he was noted as a whist-player and was acquainted with many of the leading literary characters and artists of his day.

His most important picture was 'The White Lady of Avenel', exhibited in 1822, and now in the possession of his grandson, Colonel Henry Cranstoun Adams of Lion House, Exmouth, and Crapstone, Buckland Monachorum.

Elford was ruined when his bank failed in 1825 and after being forced to sell his Bickham estate lived the latter part of his life at the Priory, Totnes, the home of his son-in-law.

James Northcote was an intimate friend of the Elford family, and painted numerous portraits of them, most of which, with others, are in the possession of the grandson, already mentioned, Colonel H. C. Adams, at Exmouth.