eventually able to obtain a commission separating the island from the mainland towns, and making him governor of the island for an indefinite period. He was initially welcomed as governor, but complaints from both the mainland towns and members of the island towns prompted Roger Williams, John Clarke, and William Dyer to go to England to have Coddington's commission revoked. They were successful, and Dyer returned with the news in 1653. However, disagreements kept the four towns from re-uniting until the following year. With the revocation of his commission, Coddington withdrew from public life, focusing on his mercantile interests, and becoming a member of the Religious Society of Friends. After nearly two decades away from politics, he was elected deputy governor in 1673, then governor the following year, serving two one-year terms. The relative calm of this period was shattered during his second year as governor of the colony when the King Philip's War erupted in June 1675. It became the most catastrophic event in Rhode Island's colonial history. He was not re-elected in 1676, but he was elected to a final term as governor of the colony in 1678 following the death of Governor Benedict Arnold. He died a few months into this term, and was buried in the Coddington Cemetery on Farewell Street in Newport. England and Massachusetts William Coddington was born in Lincolnshire, England, most likely the son of Robert and Margaret Coddington of Marston. His presumed father was a prosperous yeoman; the younger Coddington possessed a seal with the initials "R.C." when he was in Rhode Island, which were likely the initials of his father. The source of his education is not known, but it is apparent that he was well educated because of his correspondence, and from his considerable command of English law. As a young man, he married by about 1626 and had two sons baptized at St. Botolph's Church in Boston, Lincolnshire. Both died in infancy and were buried at the same church. His first wife was Mary, and speculation exists that she was Mary Burt, because Coddington once mentioned his "cousin Burt" in a letter. King Charles circumvented Parliament in 1626 by raising funds through the Forced Loan, and Coddington was one of many Puritans who resisted this royal loan; his name was recorded on a list for doing so the following winter. Coddington was elected as a Massachusetts Bay assistant (magistrate)