William was born at Crosby Hall, Lancashire, the son of Nicholas Blundell by Jane, daughter of Roger Bradshaigh, of Haigh, near Wigan, into a family of ancient landed gentry.

[2] At the outbreak of the Civil War in 1642, William accepted a captain's commission from Sir Thomas Tildesley, authorising him to raise a company of one hundred dragoons for the Royal cause.

Under a law of 1646 by which no Papist delinquent could compound for his estate, all his real property was seized and remained in the control of the commissioners for nine or ten years.

Eventually he repurchased it at a cost of 1,340l, but he was further burdened with the arrears of the rents reserved to the Crown, arising out of frequent grants for recusancy, some of which had never been discharged.

[2] After the Civil War Blundell retired to Crosby Hall, where he died 24 May 1698 in the seventy-eighth year of his age, and was buried in the family chapel of St Helen's Church, Sefton.