"Whilst these things were doing on shore, Sir Wm. Phips with his men of war came close up to ye City. He did acquit himself with ye greatest bravery. I have diligently enquired of those that know it who affirm there was nothing wanting in his Part, either as to Conduct or Courage. He ventured within Pistol shot of their cannon, and soon beat them from thence, and battered ye Town very much. He was for some Hours warmly entertained with their great Guns. The Vessel wherein Sir William commanded had 200 men. It was shot through in a hundred places with shot of twenty-four pound weight; yet through ye wonderful Providence of God, but one man was killed and two mortally wounded in that hot Engagement, which continued ye greatest part of ye night and ye next day several hours."
Another letter written by Sir William Phips, addressed from Boston to William Blathwayt, soon after he was made Governor, shows him in a light even more engaging. The witchcraft frenzy was at its height, and only three weeks before this date, October 12, 1692, fourteen men and women had been hanged in Salem. This letter, as copied from the original document, runs as follows:
"On my arrival I found this Province miserably harrassed by a most horrible witchcraft or possession of devils, which had broken in upon several towns. Some scores of poor people were taken with preternatural torments; some were scalded with brimstone; some had pins stuck into their flesh, others were hurried into fire and water, and some were dragged out of their houses and carried over the tops of trees and hills for many miles together.
"It has been represented to me as much like that of Sweden thirty years ago, and there were many committed to prison on suspicion of witchcraft before my arrival. The loud cries and clamor of the friends of the afflicted, together with the advice of the Deputy Governor and Council, prevailed with me to appoint a Court of Oyer and Terminer to discover what witchcraft might be at the bottom, and whether it were not a possession. The chief judge was the Deputy Governor, and the rest people of the best prudence and figure that could be pitched upon.
"At Salem in Essex County they convicted more than twenty persons of witchcraft, and some of the accused confessed their guilt. The Court, as I understand, began their proceedings with the accusations of the afflicted persons, and then went upon other evidences to strengthen that. I was in the East of the Colony throughout almost the whole of the proceedings, trusting to the Court as the right method of dealing with cases of witchcraft. But when I returned I found many persons in a strange ferment of dissatisfaction which was increased by some hot spirits that blew upon the flame. But on enquiry into the matter, I found that the Devil had taken upon him the name and shape of several persons who were doubtless innocent, for which cause I have now forbidden the committal of any more accused persons.
"And them that have been committed I would shelter from any proceedings wherein the innocent could suffer wrong. I would also await the King's orders in this perplexing affair. I have put a stop to the printing of any discourses on either side that may increase useless disputes, for open contests would mean an unextinguishable flame. I have been grieved to see that some who should have done better services to their Majesties and this Province have so far taken counsel with passion as to declare the precipitancy of these matters.... As soon as I had done fighting the King's enemies, and understood the danger of innocent people through the accusations of the afflicted, I put a stop to the Court proceedings till the King's pleasure should be known."
It was Governor Phips who suppressed the witchcraft persecutions and the special court that had passed so many wicked death sentences was shorn of its powers by his order. Other prisoners were later acquitted, and a hundred and fifty released from jail. No sooner was this burly figure of a man finished with the witchcraft business than he was leading a force of Indian allies against the French. "His birth and youth in the East had rendered him well known to the Indians there," says Cotton Mather, "he had hunted and fished many a weary day in his childhood with them; and when these rude savages had got the story that he had found a ship full of money, and was now become all one a King, they were mightily astonished at it; but when they further understood that he was now become the Governor of New England, it added a further degree of consternation to their astonishment."
He was too strenuous a person, was this astonishing William Phips, to remain tamed and conservative when there was no strong work in hand. With that gold-headed cane of his he cracked the head of the Captain of the Nonesuch frigate of the royal navy, and with his hard fists he pounded the Collector of the Port after swearing at him with such oaths as better befitted a buccaneer than the governor of the province. These quarrels arose from a dispute over the authority of Sir William to lay down the law as he pleased. By virtue of his commission as Vice Admiral of the Colony he held that he had the right to judge and condemn naval prizes. The Collector claimed jurisdiction and when he refused to deliver a cargo of plunder brought in by a privateer, the governor blacked his eyes for him.
As for the naval skipper, Captain Short, his experience with the Phips temper was even more disastrous. He refused to lend some of his men to man a cruiser which the governor wished to send after coastwise pirates. When next the twain met, Captain Short was first well threshed, then bundled off to prison, and from there skipped home to England in a merchantman.
Such methods of administration had served admirably well to rule those mutinous dogs of seamen aboard the Rose frigate, but they were resented in Boston, and after other altercations, Governor Phips found it necessary to go to England to answer the complaints which had been piling up in the offices of the Lords of the Council of Trade and Plantations. He sailed in his own yacht, a brigantine built in a Boston shipyard, and we may be sure that he was ready to face his accusers with a stout heart.