BENTHALL, WILLIAM HENRY, younger son of John Benthall (qv) and his first wife; b. 3 Jul 1837; adm. 6 Jan 1844; left 1846; at Marlborough Coll. Feb 1851-Mich 1856; Clare Coll. Cambridge, adm. pens. 11 Jun 1856, scholar, matr. Mich. 1856; BA 1860; MA 1864; played rackets (doubles) for Cambridge 1858, cricket for Cambridge 1858-60, for Gentlemen v. Players 1859, 1861-3, and for Middlesex 1862, 1864, 1868; a clerk in the Board of Control, afterwards in the India Office; Precis Writer and Assistant Private Secretary to Sir Charles Wood, Lord Cranborne and Sir Stafford Northcote when Secretaries of State for India; Private Secretary to Duke of Argyll, Secretary of State for India, 1868-74; m. 5 Apr 1866 his cousin Edith Mary, dau. of Edward Benthall, EICS Bengal; d. 4 Jan 1909.
BENTHALL, WILLIAM, son of William Searle Benthall (previously Bentall), Totnes and Buckfast Abbey, Devon, woollen manufacturer and banker, and Mary Ann, dau. of William Marshall MD, Totnes; b. 21 Jan 1803; adm. (G) 7 Jun 1815; KS 1817; elected head to Trinity Coll. Cambridge 1821, adm. pens. 9 Jun 1821, scholar 1822, matr. Mich. 1821; a banker at Totnes c. 1823-41, when his partnership went bankrupt; m. 8 Sep 1831 Elizabeth Charlotte Cornish; d. 16 Jun 1877.
BENTHAM, EDWARD; b.; adm. (aged 11) Jan 1725/6; in under school list 1728. [Probably Edward Bentham, Clerk, Ticket Office, Navy Office 8 Apr 1730 – Feb 1732; Clerk, Treasurer’s Accounts, Navy Office 28 Feb 1732 – May 1733; again Clerk, Ticket Office 3 May 1733 – 20 Feb 1744; Second Chief Clerk, Ticket Office 20 Feb 1744 – Aug 1750, First Chief Clerk, Ticket Office, from 5 Aug 1750; d. 16 May 1774 (will proved PCC 20 May 1774)]
BENTHAM, JEREMY, son of Jeremiah Bentham, attorney-at-law, Red Lion Street, Houndsditch, London, and his first wife Alicia, widow of --- Whitehorne, and sister of George Woodward Grove (qv); b. 15 Feb 1747/8; adm. 1755; (Morel's according Bentham's memoir); elected KS 1759, but remained a Town Boy; left Aug 1760; Queen’s Coll. Oxford, matr. 28 Jun 1760; BA 1764; MA 1767; adm. Lincoln’s Inn 26 Jan 1763, called to bar 6 Nov 1769; did not practise his profession, but resident in chambers in Middle Temple 1766-9, Lincoln’s Inn from 1769; turned his mind to science and to speculations on politics and jurisprudence; his Fragment on Government, a masterly criticism of Blackstone’s Commentaries, appeared anonymously in 1776; friend and protege of Earl of Shelburne (later 1st Marquis of Lansdowne); a successful promoter of law reform and one of the ablest propagandists of the doctrine of utilitarianism; exercised great influence in the fields of ethics and jurisprudence; his published works were collected and edited by Sir John Bowring and John Hill Burton, in an eleven-volume edition published in 1843; his reminiscences of his school-days at Westminster appear in vol. x, 26-35, where it will be seen that his opinion of the instruction, discipline and usages of the School in his day was by no means flattering; two small MS volumes containing school and college exercises by him are preserved in the School Library; d. unm. 6 Jun 1832; his skeleton is preserved at University Coll., London. DNB.
BENTHAM, JOSEPH, son of Rev. Joseph Bentham DD, Rector of Broughton, Northants., and Frances, sister of Lewis Maidwell (qv); bapt. 8 Jun 1653; adm.; KS 1669; Peterhouse, Cambridge, adm. pens. 22 Feb 1670/1, Hale Scholar 5 May 1671 (see his father’s letter of 8 May 1671 to Sir Joseph Williamson (qv), CSP Dom 1671, 221-2), matr. 1671; BA 1674/5; MA 1678; DD 1696; Fellow of Peterhouse 1677-87; ordained; Minor Canon of Westminster; Rector of Stevenage, Herts., from 29 Oct 1680; subscribed the petition to William of Orange requesting him to assume the Crown, 1688; an unsuccessful candidate for the Mastership of Peterhouse 1699; Prebendary of Lincoln from 7 Mar 1703/4; Rector of Abington Pigotts, Cambs., from 25 Jun 1718; m. ---, dau. of Thomas Ducket, Steeple Morden, Cambs.; d. 5 Apr 1723.
BENTHAM, SIR SAMUEL, brother of Jeremy Bentham (qv); b. 11 Jan 1757; adm. c. Apr 1763; in school list 1764; left 1770; apprenticed to William Gray, Master Shipwright at Woolwich and Chatham Dockyards, 2 Aug 1770 - Jan 1778; left Engand Aug 1779 with a view of studying “the ship building and naval economy of foreign powers”; arrived in Russia May 1780; superintendent of Prince Potemkin’s shipbuilding yard at Kritchev, with rank of Lieut. -Col. in Russian Army; directed the equipment of a fleet at Cherson, by which the Turks were severely defeated; rewarded with Russian knighthood of St. George, the rank of Brig. -Gen., and a sword of honour; returned to England 1791; Inspector-Gen. of Navy Works 25 Mar 1796 - Oct 1807; on mission to Russia 1805-7; Civil Architect and Engineer to the Navy 3 Dec 1808 - 25 Dec 1812; resident in France 1814-27; his pamphlets on professional subjects were published in a collected form in 1827; m. 26 Oct 1796 Mary Sophia, eldest dau. of George Fordyce MD FRS; d. 31 May 1831. DNB.
BENTHAM, SAMUEL; b.; in school lists 1727/8; BB 1729-33. [Possibly Samuel Bentham, son of Joseph Bentham, bapt. St. Martin, Coney Street, York 16 Jun 1718 (IGI)]
BENTINCK, LORD EDWARD CHARLES CAVENDISH, brother of William Henry Cavendish-Bentinck, 3rd Duke of Portland (qv); b. 3 Mar 1744; in school list 1754; a boarder at Mrs Morel’s house, where he “occupied as many as two or three rooms” (Bentham, Works, x, 27); Christ Church, Oxford, matr. 7 Nov 1761; Grand Tour (France, Netherlands, Gemany) 1764-6; MP Lewes 23 Dec 1766-8, Carlisle 1768-74, Nottinghamshire 11 Jan 1775-96, Clitheroe 1796-1802; m. 23 Dec 1782 Elizabeth, eldest dau. of Richard Cumberland (qv); d. at Brussels 8 Oct 1819.
BENTINCK, WILLIAM HENRY EDWARD, elder son of Lord Edward Charles Cavendish Bentinck (qv); b. 2 Feb 1784; adm. 3 Jul 1794 (Clapham); in school lists 1795, 1797, 1801; Christ Church, Oxford, matr. 4 Feb 1802, Canoneer Student; BA 1805; MA 1808; private secretary to his uncle, William Henry Cavendish-Bentinck, 3rd Duke of Portland (qv), when Prime Minister; ordained priest 7 Feb 1808 (York); Rector of Sigglesthorne, Yorks., 21 Mar 1808 (still 1829); Canon Residentiary of Westminster 7 Oct 1809- Oct 1864; instrumental in getting the knee-breeches which used to be worn by the KSS abolished in 1843; built and endowed at his own cost Holy Trinity, Bessborough Gardens, completed 1852; Clerk of Signet (sinecure) 11 Dec 1802 - 7 Aug 1851, when office abolished; m. 19 Jul 1814 Frances, dau. of Ven. Thomas Constable, Rector of Sigglesthorne, Yorks., and Archdeacon Yorkshire East Riding; d. 29 Sep 1868.
BENTINCK, WILLIAM; b.; adm. Jan 1803 (Clapham); in school list May 1803, Oct 1803; left 1805. [Presumably William Frederik Christiaan Bentinck, Graf von Bentinck, second son of Jan Carel Bentinck, Graf von Bentinck, and Lady Jemima Ellen de Reede de Ginkell, eldest dau. of Frederick de Ginkell, 6th Earl of Athlone; b. 15 Nov 1787; Chamberlain to King of Holland; m. 16 Apr 1841 Countess Pauline Albertine, second dau., of Frederick Francis, Graf von Münnich; d. 8 Jun 1855. No other William Bentinck among the descendants of the 1st Earl of Portland seems to have been of the right age to have been at the school between 1803 and 1805]