Philip and Son

Philip and Son

Philip and Son boatyard
Former type	Public limited company
Industry	Shipbuilding
Fate	Defunct
Predecessor	William Kelly
Successor	Noss Marina Limited
Founded	1858
Founder	George Philip
Defunct	October 1999
Headquarters	Dartmouth, Devon, England

Philip and Son (also Philip & Son) was a shipbuilder in Sandquay, Dartmouth, Devon, England. Operating from 1858 until the late 1990s, the company provided employment opportunities for nearly 141 years for many people of Dartmouth. It was Dartmouth's last industrial shipyard. A documentary film, Philip and Son, A Living Memory, presents the story of the industrial shipyard from its beginning to its eventual closure.

William Kelly began modernizing Dartmouth's Sandquay yard in the 1800s. George Philip (d. November 1874, aged 61 years) left Aberdeen for Dartmouth in 1854, becoming Kelly's foreman shipwright, and managing three slipways at Sandquay. With Kelly's retirement in 1858, Philip took over the yard. Shortly afterwards, Philip's son Alexander (nickname, Alec; d. 1899) entered the business. In 1874, Alexander inherited the yard. In the 1880s and 1890s, Philip & Son collaborated with Simpson, Strickland and Company of Noss Shipyard on recreational craft production.

Alexander died in 1899, leaving the yard to his sons, George Nowell Philip and John Nowell Philip. G.N. Philip became managing director, and was assisted by his brother, J.N. Philip and his brother-in-law, John Jules Sautter (d. 1951). In 1905, the business became a limited liability company. Its 1908 advertisement in International Marine Engineering stated that the company produced steam and sailing yachts; passenger and cargo steamers; tugs, steam and motor launches; admiralty launches and pinacces; as well as all classes of main and auxiliary machinery and boilers.

Philip & Son took over Noss Works from Simpson, Strickland in 1918, and within two years, they opened a machine shop at Noss. During these years, Philip & Son specialized in the construction of tugboats, first in wood and later steel. By 1923, Swan, Hunter and Wigham Richardson, Ltd. had a controlling share in Philip and Son, Ltd. In the mid-1920s, the shipyard began construction of coastal tankers, ferries and excursion boats, while in the next decade, in addition to ships, boats, and barges, the company produced kits for overseas assembly of small crafts. In 1934, after the death of G. N. Philip, Sautter became the company's Managing Director. It became a public limited company in 1937.