Arthur Sherman Phillips Family Papers 1727-1986; bulk: 1850-1945 Guide to the Collection

Table of Contents Collection Summary Biographical Sketches Collection Description Acquisition Information Organization Detailed Description of the Collection Preferred Citation Access Terms Materials Removed from the Collection

Collection Summary

Biographical Sketches

Below are brief biographical sketches of the individuals represented most prominently within the collection.

Ellen Pratt Currier (b. ca. 1840) lived in Bloomington, Ill., where she corresponded with members of the Phillips family and made observations on events related to the Civil War. Although she referred to Susan Sherman Pratt Phillips as "sister" in her letters, her relationship to Susan is unclear.

Arthur Sherman Phillips (1865-1941) was born in East Bridgewater, Mass. to Mark and Susan S. Pratt Phillips. In 1872 the family moved from East Bridgewater to Fall River, where Phillips graduated from Fall River High School in 1883. After graduating from Williams College in 1887 and Boston University Law School in 1892, he worked as a legal assistant for the defense in the Lizzie Borden case and opened his own law practice in 1894. A genealogist by avocation, Phillips was a member of several New England genealogical and historical societies and authored The Phillips History of Fall River.

Phillips's first marriage was to Elizabeth Lurena Cheney (1870-1905), with whom he had three children: Lurena Phillips (b. 1894), Kathleen Phillips (b. 1895), and Elizabeth Aubrey Phillips (d. 1965). After Elizabeth's death, he married May Churchill Wiggin (d. 1943), with whom he had a daughter, Margery May Phillips.

Kathleen "Kay" Phillips (b. 1895) was the daughter of Arthur S. Phillips and Elizabeth Lurena Cheney. In 1921-1922 she traveled around the world with three female companions and documented many of her experiences in her diaries and photograph albums. Her first husband was Frank Royden Sweet, and her second, Harold Davie. After her father's death in 1941, she became custodian of his genealogical records.

Mark Phillips (1768-1851) was the grandfather of Mark Phillips (1835-1911) and great-grandfather of Arthur S. Phillips. He was a Massachusetts farmer and a dealer in ship timber, which he purchased from other farmers.

Mark Phillips (1835-1911) was the father of Arthur S. Phillips and Lillian Phillips (later Easton), and the second husband of Susan S. Pratt Phillips. A native of East Bridgewater, Mass., he moved to Fall River in 1870. He was a millwright, and later worked for Kilburn, Lincoln & Co. and the American Printing Co.

Susan Sherman Pratt Phillips (1841-1928) was the daughter of Anthony Sherman Pratt (1815-1869) and Susan Loring Holmes Pratt (1818-1899). Her first marriage to Isaac Wilbar ended in his death in 1862; in 1864 she married Mark Phillips (1835-1911) in East Bridgewater, Mass. She was the mother of Arthur S. Phillips and Lillian Phillips (later Easton).

Enoch Pratt (b. 1844) was the brother of Susan S. Pratt Phillips and maternal uncle of Arthur S. Phillips. From 1862-1864, Pratt served as a Union soldier in the 1st Massachusetts Volunteer Heavy Artillery Regiment.

Collection Description

The Phillips family papers consist of 6 document boxes and 1 oversize box spanning the years 1727 to 1986, with the bulk from 1850 to 1945. The collection contains the papers of the Phillips family of East Bridgewater and Fall River, Mass., and documents the family, their travels, 19th century daily life in Massachusetts and Bloomington, Ill., and observations on the Civil War. The collection has been arranged into three series: the Arthur S. Phillips papers; the Phillips family papers; and Scrapbooks.

Materials in this collection consist of family and personal correspondence, personal papers, genealogical papers, financial and legal papers, estate records, school materials, scrapbooks, travel papers and diaries, notebooks of daily memoranda, printed material, and other miscellaneous papers and ephemera. The bulk of the collection is comprised of the papers of Fall River attorney Arthur S. Phillips, in particular his letters to his parents Mark and Susan Phillips during his time as an undergraduate at Williams College. Other family correspondence within the collection includes the letters of Ellen Pratt Currier, Kathleen Phillips, and Enoch Pratt.

Of interest are the 1862-1864 letters of Civil War soldier Enoch Pratt to his sister, Susan S. Pratt Wilbar (later Phillips) in which he describes his experiences as a soldier with the 1st Massachusetts Volunteer Heavy Artillery Regiment and the conditions of the camps in which he stayed. Also of interest are Ellen Pratt Currier's letters to Susan, which describe 1861 Civil War activity in Bloomington, Ill. The travel journals of Kathleen Phillips, which record her 1921-1922 journeys to Europe, Asia, South America, and the Near East, are also of particular note .

Acquisition Information

Deposited by John Wood Sweet in December 2006 and donated in October 2009.

Organization of the Collection

The collection is organized into the following series:

Detailed Description of the Collection

Preferred Citation

Arthur Sherman Phillips family papers, Massachusetts Historical Society.

Access Terms

This collection is indexed under the following headings in ABIGAIL, the online catalog of the Massachusetts Historical Society. Researchers desiring materials about related persons, organizations, or subjects should search the catalog using these headings.

Materials Removed from the Collection

Photographs have been removed from this collection and are stored onsite in the MHS Photo Archives. They include: portraits of Phillips family members, notably Arthur S. Phillips at various stages in his life; portraits of Fall River High School students, faculty and administration; portraits of Boston University Law School faculty; three travel photograph albums compiled by Kathleen Phillips documenting her 1921-1922 trip abroad, particularly of Asia, Egypt, and the Mediterranean.

A copy of a silhouette of Ruth Noyes McConihe, Merrimack, New Hampshire, ca. 1848 has been removed from this collection and placed in the MHS silhouette collection.

A 1933 profile pencil sketch of Arthur Sherman Phillips, signed and stamped by Baumgarten Studio, Chicago World's Fair, has been removed from this collection and placed in the MHS art collection.

The following items have been removed from the collection and placed in the MHS printed collections:

Phillips, Arthur S. The Phillips History of Fall River (Fall River: Dover Press, 1944), 2 vols.

Phillips, Arthur S., My Wilderness Friends (Fall River: Munroe Press, 1910).