My Genealogy Hound

PHILIP PHILLIPS. The first Philip Phillips to live in Chautauqua county was born in Massachusetts, July 29, 1764. In 1816 he moved to Cassadaga. Five children made up his family, and the fourth, an uncle of the subject of this sketch, was the second Philip Phillips to live in the county. To his eldest brother, Sawyer, born in 1791, was given a family of fourteen children, ten of whom lived to attain maturity. One of these, the subject of this sketch, was born August 13, 1834, and has lived to be more famed at home and abroad than any man Chautauqua county has given to the world. He was the seventh of the family of fourteen which blessed the humble farm-house near Cassadaga, at that time doing duty as the Phillips homestead. Whether his infant lungs were exercised to any greater degree than those of his brothers and sisters is not recorded; certain it is, that at a very tender age his musical proclivities asserted themselves. Once the village choir — by no means an accomplished body of singers — tried a new tune to the words “When I can read my title clear.” A moment the melody went along smoothly enough, then somebody struck a false note and somebody else followed, and the rout became general. The minister — a Rev. Mr. Peckham — had chanced to hear young Master Phillips sing the same tune a few days before, so he called on him to help the choir out, and up stood the future “Singing Pilgrim,” scarce ten years of age then, and rendered the new tune all alone, from beginning to end. In a short time he was a member of the choir to whose rescue he had so chivalrously come a few years before. When nine years of age he lost his mother, but the memory of her blessed teachings and tender thoughtfulness toward her children in the midst of manifold household cares, has remained with him as a benediction in after life. As can thousands of others, to whom the memories of sainted motherhood have proved perennial springs of comfort, he can say,

“Happy he
With such a mother; faith in womankind
Beats with his blood, and hope in all things high
Comes easy to him.”

At about the age of fourteen young Phillips was apprenticed to a farmer of the vicinity, a Mr. B. W. Grant. The terms of his apprenticeship stipulated that he was to assist in ordinary farm work as required, in return therefor receiving his board, being allowed to attend school during the winter months, and when he became of age to be “set off” with one hundred dollars cash and two suits of clothes. It was while serving this apprenticeship to Mr. Grant, that Philip Phillips had his first opportunity of attending singing school. Here, during the winter of 1850, he mastered the rudiments of music. The winter of 1851 proved one of the most important of his life, for with it came an old-fashioned revival of religion in the region, and with the revival young Phillips’ conversion. The light that came into his heart those winter months has grown brighter ever since, and more than once the Singing Pilgrim has proved its power when darkness sought to reign over his pathway. Too poor to purchase a musical instrument himself, the young apprentice found a sympathizing friend in his employer, Mr. Grant, who purchased for his use one of the old-fashioned melodeons then just coming into vogue. It proved the fruitful friend of his leisure hours, for they were all spent in its companionship, and here the “Singing Pilgrim,” largely self-taught, acquired, or rather developed, that originality which is the handmaiden of genius. Noting this restlessness under farm duties when his heart was really in musical work, Mr., Grant released young Phillips from the remainder of his apprenticeship, and at the age of nineteen the young singer opened his first singing school in Allegany, N. Y. This work set the pattern for his career, although it was not until some years later that all his talents were directed in the channel of Gospel singing. Fame soon came to him, and in 1858 he responded to an invitation to visit Marion, Ohio. It was while here that he found one of his music pupils peculiarly interesting, and on the 27th of September, 1860, he was united in marriage to Olive M. Clark. To her loving help and companionship, Mr. Phillips owes much of his success; and no sketch of his life would be complete which failed to mention that other star that through the long years

“has shone so close beside him
That they make one light together.”

From 1861 to 1866 Mr. Phillips was in business in Cincinnati, O., having associated with him Messrs. William Summer and John R. Wright, two of the most able and respected financiers of the west. Here they built up an extensive trade in music books and instruments, but the large and well-arranged store burned down in 1865. Then the “Singing Pilgrim” gave his attention solely to the writing and singing of his songs and the sale of his books. Of these latter, while the “Musical Leaves,” “Hallowed Songs,” and “Singing Pilgrim,” have been most popular, the aggregate of all sales, largely in foreign countries, has reached over six million copies.

In January, 1865, at the great anniversary of the United States Christian Commission, held in the Congressional chamber at Washington, just a few days after its completion, Philip Phillips sang “Your Mission.” President Lincoln was there; all the cabinet advisers who had held up his hands so faithfully during the war; the Chief Justice and Justices of the Supreme Court, senators and representatives, soldiers, sailors, commoners; these all united to make up that vast and brilliant assemblage. Never was the power of a single song, rich with music-set gems of truth, so demonstrated before; and when at quarter before twelve President Lincoln sent to the Hon. William H. Seward, chairman of the meeting, the written request, still in Mr. Phillips’ possession, “Near the close let us have ‘Your Mission’ repeated by Mr. Phillips. Don’t say I called for it. Lincoln,” the great President had only voiced the desire of every other auditor, and again the soul-stirring words left the singer’s lips to seal their mission of renewed inspirations and determinations to more helpful living. When the sad shock of the President’s assassination followed in April of that year, calls came from every hand for Mr. Phillips to sing the song which had so pleased the martyred President while yet he was in the active fulfillment of his mission. Since that time, with slight variation, the Singing Pilgrim’s life has been spent in answering these calls to sing the story of Jesus and His love over every part of the world. He has traveled more than any other man. Ira D. Sankey caught his first inspiration from him, and through his direct influence became associated with Mr. Moody; he has given over forty-five hundred evenings of song, leaving behind him a net profit to different churches and charities of well-nigh one hundred and fifty thousand dollars; he has belted the world, and many times traveled throughout Europe; he has enjoyed the friendship of such men as Spurgeon, Lord Shaftsbury, Dr. Bonar, Beecher, and many others of the most noted ecclesiastics and philanthropists both sides of the water; and at the time of this writing, the fifty-sixth year of his age, seems to have lost none of that power and originality in sacred song which has made him a master in his work. The intricacies of classical music would never reveal their hidden beauties if no hand more skilled or voice of larger compass or finer training than Philip Phillips’ attempted them. Of the two great teachers, earlier surroundings limited him to but one — that one, fortunately, the greater — and art can claim but little honor for the developed gifts with which nature was here so lavish. As a farm-boy, he heard the brooks, the birds, the sighing winds; and the low purling of the one, the lighter strains of the other, the sad monotones of the third — all the myriad voices of nature which to many a lower heart than David’s have only chanted the praises of their Creator, were not more spontaneous outpourings than the simple, stirring melodies that have come from the pen of this “Singing Pilgrim.”

Philip Phillips’ residence at “Ft. Hill Villa,” Fredonia, is a most beautiful one, and it is evident from its comfort and cosiness that years of traveled life have not made its owner in the least oblivious to the joys and allurements of home life. It was while resident here, in February, 1884, that he lost his eldest son, James Clark Phillips, a young man whose musical gifts were of the highest, and whose genial character made him the favorite of all who knew him. He lies buried in Forest Hill cemetery, and on the plain headstone are his last words: “Tell everybody I die a Christian.” His loss was a peculiarly severe one to his father, for he had been, and would have been, his associate and co-worker for many years. His youngest son, Philip Phillips, Jr., the fourth of the name to live in Chautauqua county, is to enter the ministry of the Methodist Episcopal church. In 1890 he graduated from the Ohio Wesleyan University, the largest western institution under the control of that denomination; and in the spring of 1891 he was married to Mary Semans, only daughter of Prof. W. O. Semans, of the faculty of his alma mater.