Benton
Introduction
Text-to-speech Audio
Images
A somewhat obscured view of th ehome in 2007 ((By Jerrye & Roy Klotz, MD (Own work) [CC BY-SA 3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)], via Wikimedia Commons))
![A somewhat obscured view of th ehome in 2007 ((By Jerrye & Roy Klotz, MD (Own work) [CC BY-SA 3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)], via Wikimedia Commons))](https://storage.googleapis.com/clio-images/medium_25369.55673.jpg)
Backstory and Context
Text-to-speech Audio
William Benton, a landowner and resident of Loudoun County, Virginia, was a brickmaker and builder by trade, born in Lincolnshire, England in 1788. Benton gained his own land in Loudoun County in 1822 through working at President James Monroe’s home of Oak Hill. That same year, William was called to Wales in 1822 in order to collect an inheritance he was owed. While he was there, he came upon a house that struck him, and he decided that he would replicate the home, or at least make a house in the style of the home, on his land in Loudoun. It was not until around 1831 that Benton actually got around to constructing the home, and when he did complete it, he referred to it as Spring Hill. Benton and his family retained ownership of the home and lived there until 1894, at which point the home was sold at auction.
The home eventually made its way into the hands of Daniel Sands in 1908, after which he renamed the home Benton and made a number of architectural changes and extensive renovations to the building. It was sold to Mr. and Mrs. James Nicklin in 1954, and it was sold again in 1961 to the Leith family. On May 17th, 1983, it was designated on the Virginia Landmark Register, and on June 14th, 1984, it was added to the National Register of Historic Places.