PHILIPS or PHILLIPS, RICHARD (1661–1751), governor of Nova Scotia, was born in England in 1661, and seems to have entered the army as lieutenant in Lord Morpeth's regiment of foot on 23 Feb. 1678. He served under William III in the war against James, and was present at the Boyne in 1690. Later he was commissioned to raise a regiment for service in New England, and was made its lieutenant-colonel in 1712; this regiment was afterwards the 40th foot. In 1717 he seems to have administered the province for some months, but returned to England before 1719, when he came out with a commission, as ‘captain-general,’ and with instructions to form the first separate council of Nova Scotia. He stayed at Boston from September 1719 till 6 April 1720, and was honourably received as the new governor (Sewall, Diary).
On his arrival at Annapolis, Nova Scotia, in April 1720, Philips found some difficulty in forming his council. He composed it largely of his own officers without reference to their military rank; this led to internal dissensions, which hindered Philips from dealing effectively with the discontent of the French settlers. The latter refused to take the oath of allegiance to the governor, and thus set on foot what is known in history as the Acadian affair. Philips seems to have inclined towards coercing the disaffected Frenchmen, but was discouraged by the home authorities. In 1722, accordingly, he went home for further instructions, leaving his lieutenant, Paul Mascarene [q. v.], to continue the struggle. He had returned to Annapolis by 1729, and came to a better understanding with the Acadians, making a beginning of local government for the French inhabitants. Returning again to England after 1730, he remained nominally governor, but neglected his duties. His deputy, Mascarene, according to his own account, could not properly attend to the needs of the troops because of ‘the parsimony or peculation of Philips.’ Philips apparently became a general before he resigned the government of Nova Scotia in 1749. He died in England in 1751.
[Collections of Massachusetts Historical Society, passim; Nova Scotia Historical Collections, vol. ii. 22–4, v. 69–76; Haliburton's History of Nova Scotia, i. 93; Drake's Dictionary of American Biography; Winsor's Hist. of America, v. 122, 409–10.]
PHILIPS, ROBERT (d. 1650?), confessor to Queen Henrietta Maria, and an oratorian or father of the Oratory, is described as of Scottish origin. He was attached to the service of the queen after the expulsion of her French priests and attendants in August 1626. He left Rome for England in order to take up this position on 29 Aug. 1628, in company with Father Henry Morley. He seems to have possessed influence over the queen, and it was to him that she appealed to intercede with the pope for aid against the Long parliament in 1640. Philips represented to her, as the pope's nuncio Rossetti had already done, that help could not be given unless her husband were a catholic. He afterwards informed Rossetti that the queen had promised him that, if the pope would send her money, the king on regaining his authority would grant liberty of worship in all his kingdoms. These negotiations, in which the queen was probably the only serious participator, became known by rumour to the House of Commons, and were construed by them to signify a ‘popish plot.’ Early in 1641 a letter from Philips to his friend and fellow-oratorian Walter Montagu [q. v.] was intercepted, and he was sent for by the house. Having managed to evade the first summons, a warrant was issued for his arrest. But when the sergeant-at-arms arrived at his rooms in Whitehall, Philips was not to be found. On the following day, however, 25 June 1641, by the king's direction, he appeared before the house, and excused his previous non-appearance on the ground that the warrant was in the name of Francis Phillips (the name of another of the queen's priests). After some delay he admitted the authenticity of the letter. Subsequently articles of impeachment, containing a number of vague charges, such as that he had attempted to pervert Prince Charles and was, together with Sir Tobie Matthew [q. v.], a secret emissary and spy of the pope, were exhibited against him. Richard Browne, the English ambassador at Paris, reported that Richelieu was much displeased by the mention made of his name in these articles. The articles were ultimately allowed to drop, as was also the proposal, substituted by Pym, that Philips should be banished as ‘tending to prejudice the state,’ together with the queen's capuchins. Philips was merely ordered to hold himself in readiness to appear again when sent for. The lords' committee summoned him on 2 Nov. 1641 to be sworn and examined ‘touching state matters’ by the lords' committee. Thinking that some one had betrayed the secret of the queen's negotiations with Rome, he raised the preliminary objection that the English bible was no true bible, and that he could not be sworn on it. The lords committed him to the Tower. There it was stated that numerous catholics resorted to see him. During the month the queen wrote
