“He was also a loyal and informed Jew; so the Jewish community of New York was glad to appoint him as shohet and bodek (ritual slaughterer and examiner of meat), a position in which religious loyaltyand complete trustworthiness were a sine qua non. His duties were ‘to use his best endeavors to keep the Markets sufficiently furnish’d with Meats for Supplying of this Congregation…. he is not to make any Quantity of Beef, without first obtaining the Consent of the Parnassim and adjuntos…’
“This position he held from April 22, 1765, to the end of March 1770. His family obligations were increasing so substantially that it is not surprising to read that on May 16, 1768, he complained that ‘his Labor is very Heavy and the sallary [£3 5 a year] small and no perquisites.’ The community, however, did not see its way clear to increasing his allowance by more than ten pounds for wood on Rosh Hashanah, and even that, by consent and agreement of all parties ‘was Relinquished, and he is only to Receive his Sallary as formerly.’ Therefore, when in the following year he described his family as ‘poor, but honest,’ we can well give credence to both the adjectives though we may question the conjunction.
“Seeing no prospect of financial advancement in the service of the community, in 1769 he gave up the position of shohet and bodek and entered business once more. Like many of his contemporaries, he went through some hard years, but eventually he earned the rewards of his perseverance and integrity. A year and a half later, on April 25, 1771, he became naturalized, Myer Myers testifying to his seven years of residence. The years 1770 and 1771 were for him and his wife years of trying bereavement. On June 28, 1770, their daughter Sarah died. Three months later, on September 19, another daughter, Judith, passed away, while a third daughter, Hindlah, was claimed by death some nine months later, on June 17, 1772.
“Sometime thereafter he moved to Philadelphia, his address in 1774 being 110 North Second Street. Again he went into retail business, at one time at the upper end of Third Street, and later on Market Street.”
Phillips sold a variety of merchandise including dry goods, brandy and wine, raisins, spices, beaver and raccoon skins, fine and coarse linen sheeting, pins and needles, writing paper, and Scotch snuff.
“Jonas Phillips was an ardent American patriot. While he was still in New York his name appears among the signatories of a letter in the New York Gazette of January 23, 1770, asking that the Non-Importation Agreement of the colonists be made more stringent. On October 31, 1778, this father of a [large] family joined the Philadelphia militia as a private in Captain John Linton’s Company of Col. William Bradford’s Battalion. In July, 1783, he was one of the 800 Philadelphia citizens who signed an address to Congress declaring their loyalty and urging Congress to return to Philadelphia.”
Phillips passed away on Shabbos, January 29, 1803. At the time he was residing in Philadelphia, but at his request he was buried in Congregation Shearith Israel’s cemetery in New York.
[i] For information about this remarkable woman see “Rebecca (Machado) Phillips (1746-1831): Colonial Jewish Matriarch,” The Jewish Press, Glimpses Into American Jewish History,April 7, 2006, pages 41 and 46.
[ii] See “David Mendes and Zipporah Nunes Machado,” The Jewish Press, Glimpses Into American Jewish History, July 6, 2007, pages 32 and 69.