List of people from the Isle of Wight

This is a list of notable people born in or strongly associated with the Isle of Wight, alphabetically within categories.

This list is incomplete; you can help by expanding it.

Born on the Isle of Wight

• Dr Thomas Arnold, headmaster of Rugby School and immortalised in Tom Brown's Schooldays, born in Cowes
• Sophie Dawes, Baronne de Feuchères, born in St Helens
• Thomas Fleming, judge and Lord Chief Justice
• Uffa Fox, yacht designer
• Vivian Fuchs, Antarctic explorer
• Mark King, Born in Gurnard nr.Cowes, Bass Player and vocalist in Pop/Funk Band Level 42
• Marius Goring, born Newport
• Maxwell Gray (Mary Gleed Tuttiett), novelist
• Bear Grylls, climber, youngest Briton to reach the summit of Mount Everest and live, survival expert, host of Man vs. Wild.
• Sheila Hancock, actress born Newport
• Robert Hooke, scientist, born in Freshwater
• Jeremy Irons, actor, born in Cowes and raised in St Helens
• Phill Jupitus, comedian, born in Newport
• Albert Midlane, failed ironmonger, poet and hymn writer was born in Newport
• Anthony Minghella, film director, born in Ryde, whose parents run the Minghella's Ice Cream company on the Island. On accepting his Best Picture Oscar for The English Patient he said, "This is a great day for the Isle of Wight!" The film includes footage of Shanklin Pier
• Brian Murphy, actor, born in Ventnor
• Queen Osburga, daughter of Oslac, Chief Butler of England and mother of King Alfred the Great.
• Albert Pollard, historian, born in Ryde
• Horace Rawlins, golfer, winner of the first U.S. Open in 1895
• Henry Sewell, first Prime Minister of New Zealand was born on the island in 1807 and lived there until emigrating to New Zealand at the age of 45.
• Harry Frederick Whitchurch V.C. born in Sandown
• Eric Charles Twelves Wilson V.C. born in Sandown in 1912

Raised on the Isle of Wight

• E. Power Biggs, concert organist
• Nicholas Dingley alias Razzle, drummer for Hanoi Rocks, raised in Binstead
• Uffa Fox was raised in Cowes
• William Hutt, MP and colonial administrator, educated in Ryde
• George, 2nd Earl Jellicoe, at St. Lawrence Hall, Ventnor.
• Fidelis Morgan, actress and writer, raised in Bonchurch
• Algernon Charles Swinburne, poet, raised in East Dene, Bonchurch

Ronald Foulk, organiser of Isle of Wight festivals of Music 1968-1970 Raymond Foulk, organiser of Isle of Wight festivals of Music 1968-1970

Lived on the Isle of Wight

• Peter de Heyno, defended the Carisbrooke Castle 1377 against French–Castilian troops
• Sam Browne, soldier, retired to Ryde.
• Julia Margaret Cameron, photographer, lived in Freshwater Bay.
• Winston Churchill visited Ventnor for extended periods throughout his life.
• Lewis Carroll lived at Sandown while working on "Alice in Wonderland".
• Sir Christopher Cockerell, inventor of the hovercraft, spent two years in East Cowes working on his prototypes.
• Charles Darwin lived for a period in 1867 in the Kings Head Hotel in Sandown.
• Charles Dickens, author, lived near Ventnor.
• Uffa Fox, yacht designer, lived in Puckaster
• David Gascoyne, 20th century surrealist poet
• Robyn Hitchcock, musician, lived in Yarmouth from the mid 1980s to the early 1990s, and cited it in many of his works of the period.
• John Oliver Hobbes (Pearl Mary Teresa Craigie), novelist, lived part-time in Steephill, 1900–1906.
• Admiral Sir John Jellicoe, lived at St. Lawrence Hall, Ventnor.
• John Keats, poet, moved to the island in 1814; areas of Shanklin are named after him.
• King Charles I was held prisoner in Carisbrooke Castle for a year.
• Marek Larwood, actor and comedian.
• Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, American poet, spent the summer in Shanklin in 1868.
• Guglielmo Marconi did radio experiments in Alum Bay and Niton around 1900.
• Karl Marx lived in Ryde in the 1870s and in Ventnor in the 1880s.
• John Milne, inventor of the horizontal pendulum seismograph, retired from the Japanese Imperial College of Engineering in Shide, Isle of Wight
• David Niven, actor, lived in Bembridge as a child.
• Isaac Pitman, who invented a shorthand system, lived for a time in Sandown.
• John Morgan Richards, cigarette and patent medicine entrepreneur, lived in Steephill, 1903–1918.
• Legh Richmond, preacher and writer of the famous religious tract "The Dairyman's Daughter", was curate for Yaverland and Brading.
• John Edward Bernard Seely, 1st Baron Mottistone, Secretary of State for War during the years leading up to the First World War; MP and Justice of the Peace for the Isle of Wight.
• Michael Sheard, actor, lived in Ryde.
• Algernon Charles Swinburne, writer, lived in Bonchurch.
• Alfred, Lord Tennyson, poet, lived in Farringford in Freshwater Bay.
• Margaret Thatcher rented a house in Seaview.
• Queen Victoria, had one of her residences at Osborne House in East Cowes.
• Barnes Wallis, inventor of the bouncing bomb, lived and worked in Cowes.
• Trevor Duncan, composer (Dr Finlay's Casebook theme), lived in Bonchurch.
• Ken Dodd, comedian, has a holiday home at Freshwater Bay.
• Master Gunner Daniel Cambridge VC (later Yeoman of the Guard) was stationed at Redoubt Battery, Fort Redoubt, Freshwater Bay, until 1871 (Census)
• King Ethelred the Unready fled to the Isle of Wight in 1012 from the Danes under Sweyn Forkbeard.
• King Harold II and his brother Tostig Godwinson have estates at Kern and Nunwell respectively.
• Jet Harris, musician with The Shadows.
• Jack Douglas, actor from a series of Carry On films.
• Dave Ellison, documentary film maker. Creator of world famous award-winning children's TV series Tales of the Riverbank. Often used the island for location shooting. Now lives in Whippingham.^{[citation needed]}

Still resident

• Raymond Allen, television scriptwriter best known for Some Mothers Do 'Ave 'Em, lives in Ryde
• David Icke, conspiracy theorist, lives in Ryde
• Melvyn Hayes, actor, lives in Sandown
• Geoffrey Hughes, actor, lives in Newport
• Ellen MacArthur, sailor, based in Cowes
• Mark King, Level 42 musician.
• Dick Taylor, Pretty Things musician
• M J Trow, author and teacher
• Alan Titchmarsh, author and T.V. presenter
• The Osbournes have a holiday home in Yaverland.
• Shaw Taylor , t.v. presenter, "keep 'em peeled", lives at Alum Bay
• Edward Upward, socialist novellist lives in Sandown
• Dave Ellison, documentary film maker and creator–writer–producer of world-famous children's TV series Tales of the Riverbank. Lives in Whippingham.
• Patrick Buckland, CEO Stainless Games, creator of "Carmageddon".

External links

• Mike Plumbley's IOWRock website, concentrating on music and the festivals
• A website listing many current and former renowned residents of the Isle of Wight