Early Life
He was son of Stephen Goffe, puritan rector of Stanmer in Sussex, and brother of Stephen Goffe (Gough), royalist agent. He began life as an apprentice to a London salter, a zealous parliamentarian. Goffe was a man of religious feeling, nicknamed "Praying William".
By his marriage with Frances, daughter of General Edward Whalley, he became connected with Oliver Cromwell's family and one of his most faithful followers. Goffe's political aims appear not to have gone much beyond fighting "to pull down Charles and set up Oliver". He was imprisoned in 1642 for his share in the petition to give the control of the militia to the parliament.
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“Many a woman shudders ... at the terrible eclipse of those intellectual powers which in early life seemed prophetic of usefulness and happiness, hence the army of martyrs among our married and unmarried women who, not having cultivated a taste for science, art or literature, form a corps of nervous patients who make fortunes for agreeable physicians ...”
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