Joseph Augustine Benton

He graduated with the highest honors at Yale College in 1842, and at Yale Theological Seminary in 1846. He went to California in July, 1849, to preach the Gospel, and to help build into this new land Christian life and civilization He was organist and pastor of the church in Sacramento for thirteen years, editor of "The Pacific," and senior professor of the Pacific Theological Seminary. He was for more than fifteen years a member of the Home Missions Committee, and a writer of missionary hymns. He was devoted to the cause of education, and one fo the foremost in founding the College of California, and of the acatdemy that preceded it. He made a trip around the world in 1859, and was pastor of the Plymouth Church in San Francisco for five years from 1863. After this date he devoted himself chiefly to teaching theology, received from Yale the degree of S.T.D. in 1870, and was a member of the International Council of Congregational Churches in London in 1891. He married July 7, 1863, Frances Sargent, who died June 27, 1899." From Descendants of John Eliot (1905) Father: Daniel Benton b: 3 SEP 1772 Mother: Fanny Ledyard Eliot b: 3 JUN 1783 in Guliford, New Haven, CT Marriage 1 Frances Sargent * Married: 7 JUL 1863