Henrietta Sophia Berkeley

Eldest daughter and co-heiress of Paul Benfield, co-claimant with her sister Caroline Martha Berkeley (q.v.) and their respective husbands.

1.  Henrietta Sophia Benfield married Robert Berkeley the younger 'of St Georges Hanover Square' 24/01/1821 at St Marylebone.  Robert Berkeley was of Spetchley Park, Worcestershire: a memorial in All Saints Spetchley recorded the deaths of Henrietta Sophia 15/12/1857 and of Robert Berkeley in 1874.  

2. Paul Benfield, the father of Henrietta Sophia Berkeley and Caroline Martha Berkeley, was a banker in the East Indies and then a government loan contractor. His partnership with Walter Boyd failed in 1799 and he was made bankrupt the following year. His path to ownership in British Guiana is not yet clear, but he appears to be a rare example of capital flowing from the East Indies to the West Indies. The ODNB entry is silent on his slave-property.

T71/885 British Guiana claim no. 217 (Herstelling [?]).

1. Ancestry.com, London, England, Marriages and Banns, 1754-1921 [database online]; Kelly's Directory 1892 Worcestershire p. 190. FreeUKGen, England and Wales Free BMD Database, Deaths, 1837-1983 [database online] shows the registration of Henrietta Sophia Berkeley's death Q4 1857.

2. P. J. Marshall, ‘Benfield, Paul (1741–1810)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2004), http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/2092 [accessed 26/09/2012].