He was the fourth son of Thomas Arnold, the headmaster of Rugby School.
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.
[5] One of his most significant achievements was to enact a law separating church and state in public schools.
Matthew Arnold's poem "A Southern Night" mourns his early death.