Moses Benson
Encyclopedia
Moses Benson was a successful British West Indies
merchant, who became heavily engaged in the Liverpool
slave trade
.
, in Furness
.
Having acquired a significant fortune, Benson returned to Liverpool, where in 1775 he entered the slave trade. Between 1775 and his death in 1806, he can be associated with no fewer than 67 slaving ventures.
He bought a large house in Duke Street in Liverpool, which occupied an entire block between Cornwallis Street, Kent Street and St. James’s Street.
In 1797, Benson was appointed to the committee charged with conducting the arrangements for the defence of Liverpool.
In 1802 he built and endowed St. James’s School, in St. James’s Road, for poor children. By 1835, the school was educating nearly 200 boys and about 100 girls.
Benson died on 6 June 1806. In 1807, the trustees of his estate bought an estate at Lutwyche, in Shropshire
, which then passed to his heirs.
Benson’s will was a controversial document. It identified his four children as his children or “reputed” children and made no mention of their mother (Judith Powell). A bequest of £15,000 to his daughter Mary was revoked in the event that she married a native of Ireland. The complications of administering his estate were such as to lead to a private Act of Parliament some 24 years after his death, in 1830.
British West Indies
The British West Indies was a term used to describe the islands in and around the Caribbean that were part of the British Empire The term was sometimes used to include British Honduras and British Guiana, even though these territories are not geographically part of the Caribbean...
merchant, who became heavily engaged in the Liverpool
Liverpool
Liverpool is a city and metropolitan borough of Merseyside, England, along the eastern side of the Mersey Estuary. It was founded as a borough in 1207 and was granted city status in 1880...
slave trade
Atlantic slave trade
The Atlantic slave trade, also known as the trans-atlantic slave trade, refers to the trade in slaves that took place across the Atlantic ocean from the sixteenth through to the nineteenth centuries...
.
Origins
Benson was the son of John Benson (1684-1766), a salt dealer of Mansriggs, near UlverstonUlverston
Ulverston is a market town and civil parish in the South Lakeland district of Cumbria in north-west England. Historically part of Lancashire, the town is located in the Furness area, close to the Lake District, and just north of Morecambe Bay....
, in Furness
Furness
Furness is a peninsula in south Cumbria, England. At its widest extent, it is considered to cover the whole of North Lonsdale, that part of the Lonsdale hundred that is an exclave of the historic county of Lancashire, lying to the north of Morecambe Bay....
.
Career
In the 1760s, Benson became a captain in the West India trade for Abraham Rawlinson, a Lancaster merchant, and acted as Rawlinson’s agent in Jamaica, before commencing trade in the West Indies on his own account.Having acquired a significant fortune, Benson returned to Liverpool, where in 1775 he entered the slave trade. Between 1775 and his death in 1806, he can be associated with no fewer than 67 slaving ventures.
He bought a large house in Duke Street in Liverpool, which occupied an entire block between Cornwallis Street, Kent Street and St. James’s Street.
In 1797, Benson was appointed to the committee charged with conducting the arrangements for the defence of Liverpool.
In 1802 he built and endowed St. James’s School, in St. James’s Road, for poor children. By 1835, the school was educating nearly 200 boys and about 100 girls.
Benson died on 6 June 1806. In 1807, the trustees of his estate bought an estate at Lutwyche, in Shropshire
Shropshire
Shropshire is a county in the West Midlands region of England. For Eurostat purposes, the county is a NUTS 3 region and is one of four counties or unitary districts that comprise the "Shropshire and Staffordshire" NUTS 2 region. It borders Wales to the west...
, which then passed to his heirs.
Benson’s will was a controversial document. It identified his four children as his children or “reputed” children and made no mention of their mother (Judith Powell). A bequest of £15,000 to his daughter Mary was revoked in the event that she married a native of Ireland. The complications of administering his estate were such as to lead to a private Act of Parliament some 24 years after his death, in 1830.
Family
Benson had four children who survived him:- Ralph Benson (died October 1845), who married Barbara, the daughter of Thomas Lewin, and was MP for StaffordStafford (UK Parliament constituency)Stafford is a county constituency represented in the House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. It elects one Member of Parliament by the first past the post system of election. The sitting MP is the Conservative Jeremy Lefroy....
- Moses Benson (1780-1837), who married Margaret, the daughter of John Kendall
- Mary Benson, who married the Rev. Charles Gladwin
- Jane-Dorothea Benson, who married Richard Elmshirst of West Ashby, Lincolnshire