William Ayrton FRS FSA (22 February 1777 – 8 May 1858) was an English opera manager and music critic.
The following year he directed the productions, staging the first-ever performance of Mozart's Don Giovanni in England, and also introducing English audiences to such great artists as: Giuditta Pasta, Violante Camporese, Gaetano Crivelli and Giuseppe Ambrogietti.
In 1821, under the management of John Ebers, Ayrton again took the post of musical director but, owing to opposition he encountered from the committee, he was again forced to resign.
Ayrton died at Bridge Street, Westminster, on 8 March 1858, and is buried in the Kensal Green Cemetery, London.
She was a prominent Suffragette - though no direct relation of fellow-Suffragette Barbara Ayrton - having joined the Women's Social and Political Union (WSPU) in 1909.
[12] Earlier, Drummond and Ayrton had also trailed the Prime Minister on a visit to women workers in Manchester.
[15] Following the outbreak of the Second Sino-Japanese War in 1937, Ayrton went back to the Far East to help the 'refugees' (in modern parlance: Internally Displaced Persons (IDP)).
She was in Hong Kong when the Japanese launched their series of attacks on 8 (or 7, East of the date-line) December, 1941 and spent nearly four years in captivity, in Stanley Internment Camp.