governor naval officer admiral
Arthur Phillip was born on 11 October 1738, the younger of two children to Jacob Phillip and Elizabeth Breach. His father Jacob was born in Frankfurt, Germany. He was a languages teacher who may also have served in the Royal Navy as an able seaman and purser's steward. His mother Elizabeth was the widow of an ordinary seaman.
On 22 June 1751 he was accepted into the Greenwich Hospital School, a charity school for the sons of indigent seafarers. In keeping with the school's curriculum, his education was focused on literacy, arithmetic and navigational skills, including cartography. He was a competent student and something of a perfectionist. His headmaster, Rev. Francis Swinden observed that in personality, Phillip was "unassuming, reasonable, business-like to the smallest degree in everything he undertakes".
Phillip remained at the Greenwich School for two and a half years, considerably longer than the average student stay of twelve months.
His views of predominantly free settlers foreshadowed the sentiments of the later emancipists.
At 48 Captain Phillip was offered a position as governor of a penal colony about to be established at Botany Bay, Australia.
The 11 ships of the 16t Fleet reached Botany Bay in January 1788 after a voyage of 8 months.
As the site for a permanent settlement Phillip chose Sydney Cove inside a great natural harbor a few miles north of Botany Bay.
Three-quarters of the 1, 030 persons who disembarked there were convicts, the remainder marines and officials.
Convicts, mostly lower-class criminals from Britain's burgeoning towns, were granted small farms on the expiry of their sentences, but this did not transform them into an industrious peasantry.
The marines, who initially received no land, were dissatisfied because they could not advance their personal fortunes in such a remote outpost.
Only 13 free settlers of the kind that Phillip wanted in order to create a thriving colony arrived during his term as governor.
Starvation was a constant threat.
The 16t Fleet carried sufficient provisions for only 2 years; the 2d Fleet did not reach Sydney until June 1790, and the 3d Fleet in July 1791.
Until supplies arrived, the inhabitants were allocated rations insufficient for a day's hard work, and stocks of clothing were exhausted.
When Phillip returned to England in December 1792 owing to illness, the small settlement of 3, 000 people could not produce its food requirements.
Because of its cost to the British taxpayer, however, the settlement's long-term future remained in doubt.
But the extensive powers vested in the governor encouraged autocratic rule and led to future conflicts.
In July 1763 he married Margaret Denison, a widow 16 years his senior, and moved to Glasshayes in Lyndhurst, Hampshire, establishing a farm there. The marriage was unhappy, and the couple separated in 1769 when Phillip returned to the Navy. In 1794 Phillip married Isabella Whitehead, and lived for a time at Bath
