William Crooke (baptised 4 August 1815 – 10 December 1901) was a surgeon and politician in colonial Australia. He served in both houses of the parliament of Tasmania during the 1850s.^[1]

Born in Derreen, County Cork, Ireland, Crooke was baptised on 4 August 1815.^[2] Around 1839–41,^[1][3] he arrived in Van Diemen's Land, which would become known as Tasmania.^[4] He was a surgeon in the convict department of St Mary's Hospital in Hobart Town.^[5][6] From 1843 to 1847, he held the position of house surgeon at the General Hospital, Hobart Town.^[7] He served as a member of the Tasmanian Legislative Council for Buckingham from 1855 to 1856,^[8] which he unsuccessfully contested in 1853,^[1][9] before serving in the Tasmanian House of Assembly for Franklin from 1856 to 1857.^[1] He proposed unsuccessfully for the Tasmanian government to fund £20,000 per year (equivalent to more than A$3 million in 2015) for the establishment of a state-owned university to rival mainland Australia.^[10]

In 1857, Crooke moved to Victoria, where he ran a surgery in Fitzroy, Melbourne. He was appointed Victorian public vaccinator after successfully identifying an outbreak of smallpox.^[3] He was also Australia's first medical practitioner to identify diseased milk as a factor in the production of diphtheria.^[3] He died at age 86 at St Vincent's Hospital, Fitzroy, on 10 December 1901.^[5]