Roger Williams (21 December 1603 – 15 March 1683) was President of the Colony of Rhode Island from 1654 to 1657, succeeding Nicholas Easton and preceding Benedict Arnold.
Biography[]
Roger Williams was born in London, England in 1603, and he sacrificed his aspirations for a career with the Church of England to become a Puritan in college. He regarded the Church as corrupt and false, and he became a Separatist before moving to the Plymouth Colony in North America in 1631. He advocated for separatism, liberty of conscience, and separation of church and state while working as a minister, and his views regarding the "unjust usurpation" of Native American lands and religious freedom led to his sedition and heresy conviction in 1635. He fled from the Massachusetts Bay Colony and took shelter among the Wampanoags, buying land from their chief Massasoit in Rumford, Rhode Island. Williams and twelve friends founded the settlement of "Providence", and he kept the peace between his new colony and the local Indians for 40 years, befriending the Narragansetts. In 1643, Williams returned to England to secure a charter for his colony, and, in 1652, he launched a failed attempt to outlaw slavery in Rhode Island. Williams and Dr. John Clarke went on to found the Baptist faith in America, and, as an old man, he served as a militia commander during King Philip's War; the war saw Providence (including his home) be burned down by the natives. He died in 1683.