William Harper Phillips, Marion alderman, wagon maker, implement dealer and Confederate officer, was born in Clarksville, Mecklenburg County, Virginia in July 1846. He was the son of Robert Allen Phillips (1816-1879) and Caroline Leneve (1825) who married in Mecklenburg County December 21, 1840.
In the 1860 census, William’s father, Robert, was a 43 year old wheelwright with real estate valued at $490. His mother, Caroline, was 38 years old. Everyone in the family was born in Virginia and they were living in Mecklenburg County, Virginia near Clarksville. William was 14 years old, living with his parents and four siblings: Rosalie, Mary, Martha, and Pauline. Loney A. Yancey, 18, may be a relative or an indentured servant and was attending school; James Wiles, 17, an apprentice wheelwright, was also living with the family.
William’s father was a wagon maker and flourished at the trade until the Civil War came and paralyzed every industry in the South. Even during that awful conflict he was able to maintain his standing and keep his head above water, difficult as it must have been at times.
William was educated at private schools, and by the time he was ready to leave them and start a business career for his own the war was in full sway. He decided to join the Confederate Army in defense of the political theories in which he had been trained, so he enlisted in Company A, 56th Virginia Infantry and was made a second lieutenant of the company. When the army was reorganized in 1863 he was made captain and later a major; however, his commission for major never reached him. He was active to the end of the war and was mustered out of the service in September, 1865. He was worn in body, wasted in worldly possessions, and with no employment immediately available. He found the conditions in Virginia altogether unpromising for a man without means and likely to continue so for many years.
William left Virginia in 1869 and for a number of years he worked in various places at which he plied his trade of wagon making, which he had learned from his father.
By the 1870 census, William and his parents were living in Wallonia, Trigg County, Kentucky. Sister Rosalie had left home and a new brother had been born, Charles H. L. Phillips who was 7. William’s father was listed as a farmer with real estate valued at $1,000 and William H., 23, was a wagon maker.
On December 30, 1872 William H. and Canzada Jones, daughter of Jefferson Jones and Brunetto Cameron, were married in Trigg County, Kentucky. She had been born in Smithfield, Tennessee.
In 1875 William H. and Cannie located at Carterville in Williamson County, Illinois where he manufactured wagons for a time, then sold farming machinery for some years.
In July of 1879 William’s father, Robert Allen Phillips, died of asthma in Trigg County, Kentucky. In 1880 Caroline was widowed and living alone with her remaining children, Lena and Charles in Wallonia, County, Kentucky.
When the 1880 census was taken in Illinois, William and Cannie were still living in Carterville and working as a wagon maker. Their children were: Otis B., 6; Maude, 4; and Robert A., 10 months. They had a family boarding with them, O. A. Glidewell and his wife Mary and daughter, Bernice, who was three years old.
William Phillips served for some years as president of the board of aldermen in Carterville.
In 1885 he and his family moved to Marion, the county seat, where he remained ten years employed as he had been at Carterville. In 1893, beginning in September, he took charge of the Scurlock estate for the purpose of winding up its affairs. There was a business in the farm implement trade belonging to this estate and when he had the other affairs of the estate all settled and disposed of he bought this business and its equipment and stock, and began to carry on the enterprise himself. Subsequently he added furniture, hardware and builders’ supplies to his lines of commodities. The business was said to have been located in a two-story brick building of substantial construction, forty by one hundred and thirty-two feet in dimensions.
He served as alderman of his ward in Marion in 1891, 1892 and 1894, 1895, serving under three mayors of Marion: Shannon Holland, James W. Westbrook and John H. Burnett.
In the 1900 census, the family was living in Carbondale. William “Bill” was an implement merchant and Otis B., his son, was a saloon keeper. Children, Otis and Maude were both born in Kentucky and Grace in Illinois. Pearl Burnham was a boarder in the home during the census.
William served on the Carterville committee for the Old Settler’s reunion that was held on August 12, 1880 at the Williamson County Fairground in Marion, Illinois.
In 1881 the couple lost an infant son to diphtheria. William was 53 and Cannie was 45. Their children Otis, 26, Maude, 24, and Grace 18 were all still at home.
In 1910 William and Cannie had 3 boarders. They lived at 417 E. Main St. in Carbondale while William worked as a farm implement dealer.
William Phillips died suddenly while living in Carbondale in September of 1913 at the age of 67. Probate records for William H. Phillips were filed on September 26, 1913 with his wife, Cannie Phillips, as the executrix. Cannie, herself, died 10 years later on December 5, 1923, at her home on East Main Street in Carbondale.
Notes on the Children:
Otis Blakely Phillips was born March 23, 1874 and died on April 15, 1922. James E. Mitchell was made guardian of his children at his death: William H. (1905-1962), Otis P. (1909-xxxx), Robert B. (1910-xxxx) and Frances C. (1912-2002). Daughter, Margaret L. (1903-1953), was already grown. Otis’s widow was Nellie Borders Phillips. He was a manager at a hardware store.
Maude Loufello Phillips Daniel was born Sept. 29, 1875 in Cerulean Springs, Kentucky and died April 24, 1968 in Carbondale, Jackson, IL, USA. She married John Franklin Daniel and at one time they lived in Wichita, Kansas. They do not appear to have had children.
Robert A. Phillips was born about 1879. He was 10 months old in 1880, not in family in 1900 and presumed deceased.
Grace Phillips was born Jan. 18, 1883 in Marion, Williamson, Illinois and died Nov. 16, 1932 in Carbondale, Jackson, IL. She married Rush Tarwater Lewis and they lived in Sedgwick and Wichita, Kansas. In 1919 they divorced and she returned to Carbondale. Around 1925 she was admitted to Anna Mental Hospital. In 1930 she was living in Carbondale where she died in 1932 at the age of 49.
(Sources: Smith’s History of Southern Illinois, U.S. Census records, Ancestry family trees, Events in Egypt, compiled by Colleen Norman)