Phillips Family Papers

The Phillips Family Papers digitized here represent materials relating to the shipping activities of Stephen Phillips Jr. (1761-1838), and his son Stephen C. Phillips (1801-1857). The bulk of the non-digitized portion of this collection relates to Stephen C. Phillips' merchant house and other Phillips family business.

In 1793, Stephen Phillips Jr. was placed in command of the brig Rose, owned by Elias Hasket Derby. In 1800, Stephen Phillips Jr. moved to Salem, where he started a prosperous merchant business. He was the owner or partial owner of five vessels and consigned cargo on numerous others. These ships traded in Sumatra, Manila, Calcutta, China, and coastwise America.

Stephen Clarendon Phillips (1801-1857) was the only son of Stephen and Dorcas (Woodbridge) Phillips. He was a Salem merchant whose ships traded in Batavia, Sumatra, Manila, the East Indies, the Fiji Islands, China, and South America. In addition to foreign trade, a number of his vessels engaged in whaling expeditions. As Salem maritime commerce declined in the 1840s, Phillips invested in other businesses. In 1848, the Salem and Lowell Railroad was incorporated with Stephen C. Phillips as its president. It was hoped that the railroad, with a terminal at Phillips Wharf, would provide a faster route for coal and raw materials being sent to the Lowell and Lawrence mills than the Boston and Lowell Railroad. The railroad also helped transport lumber from the Phillips family timber business in Canada to Lowell and other mill towns. Stephen was also a partial owner of Phillips, Goodhue, and Bowker, a commission and forwarding merchant firm.