Biographical Info

Phil was born around 1795. He first appears in the historical record in Zachariah Lamar’s will of 1832 when he, his wife Phoeba, and their three children, Philip, Lucinda, and John, were bequeathed to John B. Lamar. Phil, Phoeba, Lucinda, and John were among more than 75 enslaved people that the Cobb-Lamars hired out in 1841. This document also provides a brief physical description that Phil stood 5’ 7½” tall. Phil worked primarily as John B’s cabinet maker in Macon, but also performed miscellaneous other duties. For example, he was sent to Athens in September 1843 to help Mary Ann move furniture. In 1846, he and Phoeba grieved the loss of their daughter Lucinda following an accident in which she was dragged to death by a mule. Lamar evidently hired Phil out again in 1849, but the situation proved unsatisfactory. In September of that year, Phil relayed a complaint to Lamar that he had been whipped twice and otherwise mistreated.

Sketch written by Zachary Doran, Ganden Fung, Sergei Novikov