62 Facts About William Phips

Sir William Phips was born in Maine in the Massachusetts Bay Colony and was of humble origin, uneducated, and fatherless from a young age but rapidly advanced from shepherd boy, to shipwright, ship's captain, and treasure hunter, the first New England native to be knighted, and the first royally appointed governor of the Province of Massachusetts Bay.

William Phips's father died when the boy was six years old, and his mother married a neighbor and business partner, John White.

William Phips's mother is known to have had six children by James Phips and eight by White.

William Phips watched over his family's flock of sheep, according to Mather, until the age of 18, after which he began a four-year apprenticeship as a ship's carpenter.

William Phips established a shipyard on the Sheepscot River at Merrymeeting Bay in Maine in 1675 at the outbreak of King Philips War.

William Phips learned that his mission was to aid in the hunt for a large treasure near Hispaniola.

Around this same time, the thirty-two-year-old William Phips had made his way to England, where he gained an audience with Narborough and Charles II.

Unlike Falcon and Bonetta, William Phips was not sent directly to search near Hispaniola where Narborough believed a great treasure lay buried.

William Phips' instructions were not kept secret but were signed by the entire crew, thereby broadcasting their designs through the harbor and shipyards.

William Phips was never a writer and so much of his story comes from others, with Knepp's Journal at the top of this pile.

William Phips cites personal instructions from the King, and indeed Charles II was known to have insisted on a salute to his flag.

William Phips later followed the same procedures of requiring ships to strike in the West Indies and with a new crew in Bermuda.

William Phips had been a town born child, Captain William Phips answering him, 'Let him be what he would, he had been sworn at sixteen years of age to be true to the King and his government.

Two days after William Phips left the Boston area, Increase Mather gave a rousing speech to the deputies and freemen advising them not to submit to the Crown and to resist the quo warranto.

The decisiveness with which William Phips later returned and quickly located the treasure suggests that he was able to gather valuable knowledge and began to formulate a clear plan, though he would have to wait two years to bring it to fruition.

William Phips had shown that he was serviceable: willing to harass the harbor of his hometown and to compromise between his own interests and the interests of the Crown.

William Phips was tasked with finding suitable ships and these came to be the James and Mary, a 22-gun 200-ton frigate, and the 45-ton Henry of London, a sloop commanded by Francis Rogers, William Phips' second mate on the previous voyage.

William Phips utilized experience as a sailor and shipwright to select high quality anchors, chains, and cables to hold their ships securely in close proximity to the shoals for months as they tried to fish treasure from it.

Concerned about the possibility of mutiny, William Phips guaranteed to the crew, who had been hired for seaman's wages, that they would receive shares in the find, even if he had to pay them from his own percentage.

William Phips carefully avoided putting in at any ports before anchoring at Gravesend, where he dispatched a courier to London with the news.

William Phips was treated as a hero in London, and the find was the talk of the town.

Some economic historians argue that William Phips' find significantly affected history, because it led to a major increase in the formation of joint-stock companies and even played a role in the eventual formation in the Bank of England.

William Phips arrived back in Boston in the summer of 1688 and was welcomed back as a hero.

William Phips was celebrated in sermons and at the Harvard College commencement he was compared to Jason fetching the Golden Fleece.

William Phips served for a time as an Overseer guarding Andros and Randolph in the prison at Castle Island.

William Phips had not demonstrated military interests as a young man.

Yet William Phips' control of a naval gunship, and his subsequent actions, seem to have suggested he was a good candidate to lead a large military expedition.

Sir William Phips offers himself to go in person, the Governor [Bradstreet] sends for me, and tells me of it, I tell the [General] Court; they send for Sir William who accepts to go, and is appointed to command the forces.

Sir William Phips had been sent to at first; but some feared he would not go; others thought his Lady would not consent.

Records of the North Church show William Phips' name added to admissions.

When William Phips came ashore the next day, it was discovered that Acadians had been removing valuables, including some that were government property.

William Phips, whose motives continue to be debated by historians today, claimed this was a violation of the terms of capitulation and consequently declared the agreement void.

William Phips allowed his troops to sack the town and destroy the church, acts that he had promised to prevent in the oral surrender agreement.

William Phips had the fortifications destroyed, removing all of their weaponry.

William Phips received a hero's welcome and was lavished with praise, although he was criticized in some circles for allowing the sacking of Port Royal.

William Phips sent a message into the citadel demanding its surrender.

William Phips then held a war council, which decided to make a combined land assault and naval bombardment.

Many of the expedition's participants and creditors were unhappy at being paid this way, and William Phips generously purchased some of the depreciated paper with hard currency, incurring financial losses in the process.

William Phips was outraged when the General Council heard Meneval's case.

Not counting William Phips, there seem to have been a total of four agents acting on behalf of Massachusetts in seeking to restore the old Charter.

Unlike his arrival in HMS Rose in 1683, when William Phips showed little regard for the sabbath, on this occasion William Phips was highly deferential toward the theocracy.

William Phips promised to rule as a weak governor, according to the tradition of his predecessors.

William Phips later claimed to have chosen nominations for the Court from "persons of the best prudence and figure that could then be pitched upon" and indeed, as Thomas Brattle pointed out, most were well-known and respected merchants from the Boston area.

William Phips granted a reprieve to one of these, but was impressed upon "by some Salem gentlemen" to take it back.

At this point, William Phips seemed to wash his hands of the proceedings, not relishing the idea of gaining the enmity of his own Lieutenant Governor and powerful clergymen including the fully committed Cotton Mather, and the somewhat more waffling Increase Mather.

William Phips recruited Major Benjamin Church to lead a 450-man expedition eventually leading to a tenuous peace agreement with the Abenaki people.

At this point William Phips finally let it be known that the Court of Oyer and Terminer "must fall".

All eight were cleared by William Phips' proclamations, leading Stoughton to storm from the Court.

William Phips' leadership was dependent on the support of the powerful Mathers, father and son, as well as their pick to be his lieutenant governor.

When William Phips stood up to Stoughton, he gained a terrible foe.

William Phips' pick for a replacement captain, Dobbins, is accused of the same.

William Phips is accused of corruption, which was a standard charge, and a standard problem for colonial leadership at this time.

William Phips expressed outrage at the execution of Leisler and harbored enemies of Fletcher and the New York government that replaced Leisler.

William Phips was accused of violating the Navigation Acts, as his predecessor had been.

Blathwayt was slowly and steadily working to standardize the flow of tributes from the colonies to the Crown, and if William Phips was clogging these pipes, he would need to answer for it.

William Phips was still trying to maintain a bond of loyalty to Increase Mather.

William Phips seemed slow to realize that Increase Mather should no longer be his trusted adviser.

William Phips spent much of the summer in Maine, at Pemaquid, securing a peace treaty and overseeing the frontier defenses near his birthplace.

William Phips sailed from the harbor after sunset on the sabbath, firing guns from his ship.

William Phips was no longer sensitive to the customs of the Puritan clergy, he was loudly defying them.

William Phips was buried in London at the Church of St Mary Woolnoth.

William Phips went on to serve as Lieutenant Governor of Massachusetts, including two periods as acting Governor.