Philip H. Murray

Philip H. Murray (1842 – February 17, 1917) was an abolitionist, journalist, phrenologist, and civil rights activist who spent most of his career in St. Louis, Missouri. He grew up in Reading, Pennsylvania, where he participated in the abolitionist movement in that region.

During the US Civil War he continued his work and served as a recruiting officer to help enlist blacks into the Union Army. After the war, he focused on journalism. In 1867, he established the first black newspaper in Kentucky, The Colored Kentuckian. He later moved to St. Louis where he continued to work in journalism and as an advocate for black education and civil rights. He was also the president of the first Negro Press Association.

Early life Philip Houston Murray (or Murry) was born in Reading, Pennsylvania in 1842. His parents were Samuel and Sarah Murray. His father was born a slave in Kent County, Maryland, on the Eastern Shore of that state. His mother was mixed black, Native American, and Irish. His mother's paternal grandfather reportedly was half African-American and half Native-American and paid for a woman to be brought from Ireland and made his wife. Philip's father considered schools for black children to be poor and Philip was only permitted to attend school for a week before he was put under private education by Father Patrick Keevil, a graduate of Minonth College, England. By the age of fifteen, Murray began to study physiology and the physical brain, which would influence his later work in phrenology. Philip reportedly had 13 brothers and sisters. He was frequently threatened by whites in the South for his speeches.

On May 11, 1867, Murray, together with James Mullins, G. W. Peabody, and a Captain Garner, gathered to give speeches in Pulaski, Tennessee. Murray's speech was reported to have elicited a mob against him that night, which was halted only by a large guard posted outside of Murray's room, although this was denied a week later in the Pulaski Citizen.

Journalism and career Murray continued to work in the newspaper business. Together with John Patterson Sampson and a Dr. Butler, he published the first black newspaper in Kentucky, The Colored Kentuckian in March 1867 in Louisville. In 1872, he published a paper called, Colored Citizen at Washington, DC. At about that time he held the position of inspector of public improvements under a board of public improvements. Murray died in 1917, and in the last year of his life he was an editorial writer on the staff of the St. Louis Argus.

Later life Murray was married and had one son and three daughters, including Alice Murray who graduated from Howard University. His wife died in about 1897. Murray died on February 14, 1917, after suffering for many years of asthma. His funeral was at St. Paul Chapel in St. Louis.