Sir William Phips (1651-1695) was an American shipbuilder and soldier and became the first royal governor of the British colony of Massachusetts.

Born of humble parents in Woolwich, Maine on Feb. 2, 1651, William Phips was early apprenticed to a ship's carpenter in Boston and afterward followed that trade there. Following his marriage to Mary Hull, he became a shipbuilder, and at one time he captained a vessel. In 1683 the British king Charles II provided him with H.M.S. Rose to make an expedition to recover gold from sunken Spanish galleons off the Bahama Islands. The first attempt was unsuccessful, but in a second venture off Hispaniola, which was backed by the Duke of Albemarle, Phips recovered treasure valued at £300,000. For this he was knighted in 1687. As an additional reward, James II appointed Phips provost marshal general of the Dominion of New England under Edmund Andros.

Phips was received...