He was born on May 30, 1878 in Beverly, Massachussets, United States, the son of John Charles Phillips and Anna Tucker. Descended from a family of some wealth and considerable distinction, Phillips had the means and the connections to forge a distinguished public career without undue concern about compensation.
After attending Milton Academy and Noble and Greenough's School in Boston, Phillips enrolled at Harvard in 1896. After receiving his B. A. in 1900, he attended Harvard Law School for two and a half years.
In 1903, Phillips joined Joseph Choate, the United States ambassador to the Court of St. James's, as an unpaid private secretary. Phillips' first real appointment came in 1905, as second secretary of the United States legation in Peking. From then on, Phillips served in the diplomatic service under every president from Theodore Roosevelt to Harry Truman.
In 1907, Phillips went to Washington, to work at what was literally the Far Eastern Desk. He also served as the first chief of the Division of Far Eastern Affairs. In 1910 he returned to London to serve as first secretary to the embassy and Ambassador Whitelaw Reid.
During his career of forty-four years (with brief stand-downs), Phillips alternated between appointments in the foreign service and the State Department. From 1912 to 1914 he was secretary of the Corporation of Harvard College. He was assigned to Washington (1914 - 1920), achieving rank as first assistant secretary of state; the Lowlands (1920 - 1922), as envoy extraordinary and minister plenipotentiary; Washington (1922 - 1924), as undersecretary of state; Belgium and Luxembourg (1924 - 1927), as ambassador and minister, respectively; Canada, (1927 - 1929), as first minister ever; Washington (1933), as undersecretary of state; and Italy (1936 - 1940), as ambassador.
While in Italy he repeatedly tried to persuade Mussolini to not enter the war against the Allies. He was then assigned to India as personal representative of the president of the United States and ambassador (1942 - 1944) and to London as resident director of the Office of Strategic Services and then ambassador to Supreme Headquarters, Allied Expeditionary Force (SHAEF), where he worked closely with General Dwight D. Eisenhower (1943 - 1944).
As wartime ambassador to India (and special envoy of the president), Phillips had the difficult task of representing the United States without antagonizing the British over the issue of an end to colonialism. The Indians expected much of him, but he could not antagonize the British. For example, he was not allowed to meet with Gandhi. In the process, he changed from Anglophile to Anglophobe and represented his views strongly in the only place he could - in reports to the president. One letter, dated May 14, 1943, was leaked by Drew Pearson to the Washington Post, on July 25, 1944. It was uncomplimentary toward Winston Churchill and his views on Indian independence and his disregard for the Atlantic Charter. By then, Phillips was at SHAEF, and the letter made him unpopular with the British. He officially retired in 1944.
In 1946, President Harry Truman assigned Phillips to a committee with the thankless task of pulling the British chestnuts out of the Palestinian fire. Phillips became a member of the twelve-man Anglo-American Committee on Palestine, which reviewed the problem of Jewish refugees still detained in Europe, more than a year after the war had ended.
In 1947, Phillips headed a commission established to help settle the boundary between Siam and French Indochina. Because the French were intransigent, arrogantly holding on to an empire they had morally lost, the mission failed.
During his long retirement in Beverly, Phillips composed his memoirs, Ventures in Diplomacy (1952), a period piece from an age and a way of life now long gone. He retained his interests in foreign affairs, participating in various international conferences.
He died while on vacation in Sarasota, Florida.
William Phillips had a career of the official during forty-four years, he was appointed as Ambassador to Italy and Belgium, became the first Minister to Canada. Later he was made a Special Advisor on European political matters to then - General Dwight D. Eisenhower. Besides, he served on the Anglo-American Committee on Palestine, opposing the British plan for partitioning the country. He was the author of his well-known memoir, Ventures in Diplomacy.
He was a Republican all his life.
He was a valued member of Massachusetts Historical Society.
He had great tact and diplomacy.
On February 10, 1910, Phillips married Caroline Astor Drayton, a granddaughter of William Astor and a second cousin to Franklin D. Roosevelt. They had six children, one of whom, Christopher Hallowell Phillips, served in ambassadorial posts for the United States at the United Nations.
