J.P. Philips Mansion
301 Fort Street West, Detroit, Michigan
Built 1874, for John Percival Philips (1845-). This is one of the many magnificent late 19th century mansions that once lined Detroit's Fort Street, such as the Shelden Mansion. Like many, it no longer stands today, it's fate at present unknown.
J.P. Philips (later spelt Phillips) was the third, but eldest surviving son of John P. Philips (1799-1886). A native of New York, the father had accumulated his fortune as a lumber merchant, mill operator and steamship owner, making his home at 278 Fort Street West, Detroit. After serving with the 1st Michigan Cavalry during the Civil War, the younger Philips was brought into his father's firm (known from 1864 as J.P. Philips & Son, lumber dealers), headquartered at Bay City.
Shortly before his thirtieth birthday, Philips built his elegant Detroit townhouse close to his parents' home on the same street. Designed in the popular Second Empire style, it stood three stories high over a basement with an elaborately ornate copper roof. In 1878, the same year as his marriage to Hattie L. Robertson, he acquired a "fine estate" of 224 acres in Wisner Township.
The fate of Philips' townhouse is unclear as it seems that after 1878 he settled down to family life between his "first-class" farm in Wisner, rural Michigan, while maintaining several business interests in nearby Bay City. His sons included among them Judge Raphael G. Phillips (1895-1969), of Bay City, and his brother-in-law built Fontbonne Hall over the border near Hamilton, Ontario.
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