Philip Harry painted a series of street scenes of Boston shortly after his arrival in the town. In his New South Church, his shadowing in the foreground is even more dramatic than in his Brimstone Corner. The bow-fronted buildings provide a framework for a lively street scene. Here a peddler with cart on the left is balanced by a pair of finely dressed women on the opposite side of the street. The center of the canvas is filled with small groups of strollers. However, the highlight of the scene is Bulfinch's granite New South Church (1814; destroyed 1868) in the background. (Footnote 1) The stately three-story spire adds a strong vertical element to the composition. Both paintings by Harry display his ability to observe a myriad of urban activities as well as a sensitivity to the built environment of Boston in the early 1840s. Unlike most of Harry's other work, this painting, along with his Brimstone Corner is well known through their reproduction as part of a set of four tinted lithographs entitled Boston Street Scenes, published in 1843.

Little is known about the artist's background and training. Philip Harry, believed to have been a native of Cornwall, England, was living in Hartford, Connecticut, in 1841, and in Boston by 1843, when he worked on the "Streets of Boston" series. He noted in his diary for November 8, 1843, "Worked at finishing City Views," the four scenes which were reproduced in the popular lithographs. (Footnote 2) The first lithograph of the series, called simply "Tremont Street" is undated. It was printed by 'haver and Company and based on a Harry painting now at the Sawyer Free Library, Gloucester, Massachusetts. Harry himself was responsible for the lithography for the other three views which were all printed by the Boston firm of Bouve and Sharp in 1843. The view of Brimstone Corner, number two in the series, was titled Tremont Street, South, while the view of the New South Church, Summer Street, was number four. The other lithograph, number three, is also called Tremont Street, and was taken from the original painting by Harry, now part of the Karolik Collection, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.

During the same year that Harry worked on his "Streets of Boston" series, he showed twenty works at Harding's Gallery in Boston and the next year exhibited at the Fourth Exhibition of the Massachusetts Charitable Mechanics Association as well as the American Art Union. In 1844 the Boston Athenaeum included some of Harry's paintings in their annual exhibition of local artists. (Footnote 3)

While Harry primarily painted landscapes, he also tried his hand at portraits and history painting. His surviving diary indicates that in January 1844 he traveled to New York and visited Thomas Cole, William Sidney Mount, and Caleb Bingham, three of the most important American painters of the period. (Footnote 4) On his return from New York, Harry and his wife settled in Cambridgeport, Massachusetts, until they relocated to New York in 1846. Harry's two final diary entries indicate that he moved to Washington, D.C., in 1852. He exhibited some paintings at the Washington Art Association in 1857. (Footnote 5) During the Civil War, he worked as a clerk in the war department and probably died in Washington sometime after the war. (Footnote 6)