The Benedict Books

The Books

Genealogy of the Benedicts in America Volumes 1 and 2

The most comprehensive and extensive paper publication of the history of Benedict families in North America is the two-volume set of Genealogy of the Benedicts in America. 

This valuable collection has been carefully compiled by Elwyn and Esther Benedict of East Syracuse, upper New York State and published for future generations.  They have become the go-to reference for any serious Benedict surname researcher.  The books have extensive index sections, both for persons born of the surname and also persons who adapted the name by marriage or other.

The first volume is an updated reprint of the original book, composed and first printed in 1870.  The second volume was a compilation of extensive work by Elwyn and Esther involving field research, vast correspondence with families across North America, late evening compilation, indexing and typing, followed by the publication into print.  This project spanned many decades and we researchers are fortunate that it was finally in print by 1969.

The books are still available by contacting their son, Darrel Benedict, more information below.  Any excerpts from either book has been granted by Elwyn Benedict during the interviews of 2007 – 2010.

Prelude to the Benedict Books

In the Introduction to Volume 1 by Erastus Benedict, he describes the early capture of the Benedict family line in the Massachusetts Bay Colony and Connecticut areas, starting with Mary, wife of Thomas Benedict:

“Our first American grandmother, who walked in all the ordinances of the Lord blameless, till she looked over the brow of a hundred years into the happy land, must not be omitted as the author of the first Benedict genealogy, and our first teacher of the moral lesson of family pride. Like an old chronicler she told the traditionary story of the family in England, and of its first generation here, to her grandson James, afterward one of the seven deacons of the seven churches….He reduced the tradition to writing and in due time it passed from him, by a copy, to his grandson Abner, then a student in college, and afterwards the first clergyman of the family thence to me, his grandson. My inquiries showed that many copies of it were extant in the original form.”

Lineage from Mary to Erastus — Mary ► John ► James ► Peter  ►  Abner  ► Joel Tyler ► Erastus Cornelius Benedict

Volume 1 – Henry Benedict – published 1870

The Book

The Volume I was first published in 1870, then republished in 1969 by Elwyn Benedict.  It has 477 pages, with full index of Benedict by given names and also of others with a different birth surname.

Henry’s early years

Henry Marvin Benedict was born at Albany, New York State on September 16, 1827 of parents Lewis Benedict (1785-1862) and Susan Stafford (1791-1869).

He was fitted at Albany Academy and at boarding schools in Pittsfield and Williamstown, entered Williams, as Freshman, in 1842, and remained until about the middle of Junior year, when he was compelled, by incipient disease of the hip, to return home. From this disease he never recovered. It doomed him to years of confinement to his bed, and rendered him a cripple for life. At first he met these sufferings with a stoical indifference which amounted almost to a defiance, seeking relief in close reading, careful thought, and the use of the pen. His unusual worldly advantages made him feel it an especial hardship to be cut off from active life.

His enforced leisure allowed him time to become our chronicler and genealogist. Our Latin family motto, Benedictus qui patitur, which
might be translated Blessed is he who endures, truly applies to this man, to whom we owe much for his labor in organizing and preserving the family records up to his time.

Introduction by Erastus Cornelius Benedict

The first volume contains an introduction by Erastus C. Benedict, lawyer in the city of New York, author, and trustee of William’s College,
who had contributed to the work considerable material which he had himself accumulated.  It contains a philosophy that could apply to today’s seekers of Benedict threads:

“When I say interesting, it will of course be understood that I am speaking only to our little family, on a family matter. The outside world will please consider that it is none of their affair, and we are not bound to interest them. We may get ourselves together in our own way and in our own time, and fill up our family record and album without apology. We have a right to be kindly affectioned one to another. We are blood relatives, and like all well constituted families we are a mutual admiration society and no one can complain while we keep our mutual admiration within our own little circle…. In all these dead generations we see ourselves. They are our family mirror.”

A tribute to Henry Benedict by a friend, Henry C. Ryder of Danbury, Connecticut, May 1870: ¹

The full and interesting Introduction from the pen of one of the most distinguished members of the family now living, leaves but little to be said by the Compiler. He forbears to consume the time of the reader by detailing the difficulties which have attended the preparation of the work. The time he has devoted to it may be measured by years. The correspondence would fill volumes; to say nothing of journeys, searches and personal examinations in books, in grave-yards, and in the flesh. It is due to himself to state that he must add his own to the complaints of all genealogists, that letters of inquiry, and appeals for information, have been met with an indifference and neglect that argue unfavorably for the courtesy or family pride of too many of the name. To this cause he refers most of the incompleteness that is to be found in the work; and it would be a source of permanent discomfort to him if he had not the hope, that the sight of the book itself may inspire many with a desire to furnish information they have hitherto withheld, and to provide him with material for a supplementary volume he meditates, which he trusts will correct all errors, and supply all omissions, of the present. He does not consider his work finished as it stands. While the Compiler is conscious of no self-reproach for lack of patience in the preparation of the book, he confesses that it has been hurried in the publication. He has, in fact, delayed his departure from the country to allow himself to print what he had collected and prepared, in order to secure it against loss or dispersion in his absence. This haste excludes from the present volume the Military Roll of the family—a proud one-and certain other tabular statements, for which abundant material exists, and most of which he has collected.

The final years of Henry Benedict

Henry M. Benedict, an adult, died in Saratoga. Late residence was in Castleton, NY. Interment July 7, 1875 in the Lewis Benedict plot, Albany N.Y Rural Cemetery, section 3, lot 38. ²

Volume 2 – Elwyn Benedict – published 1969

Interviews with Elwyn

Elwyn and Esther Benedict were interviewed in May of 2007 by Jim Benedict. Here is part of the transcript.³

 

Jim: So how did it all start? How did it really start?

Esther: Well we got married in 1953, but you started talking about your father [in 1952]. You said, “I wished I had asked more questions.” He finally found out that Henry Benedict that wrote Volume I sent out forms to all the Benedicts that he knew, from all around Connecticut and all over.

Elwyn: I was only 19 at the time. My father had told me a lot of stuff verbally. Once in a while I would ask him more and more. I hadn’t put it down on a piece of paper or anything, just all in my head. So one day I said I’m going to find out what’s going on here. So I knew my great-grandfather was Alexander Benedict and I knew there was one book around, so I went down to the library. She [the librarian] helped me find where Alexander was. There was about 7 or 8 of them in the book. So that wasn’t too bad. I think we got to the seventh of them before we decided we had the right one [chuckles]. We would go on vacations a lot. And as the kids got bigger and bigger…

Elwyn: Well I guess I made eight or ten different trips to the library. So I’d go up and write some stuff. Finally got a Xerox machine up there. So I would sit there and write it. So I wrote and sent stuff off, and sent off forms to all over the States and Canada and everywhere else.

Jim: How many did you send out?

Elwyn: Oh good night! it must have been, I don’t know, sometimes I sent out 30 or 40 out in a day.

Jim: ..The postage alone….

Esther: We didn’t pay any attention to the postage, did we?

Darrell: When I was little he used to work at Carrier Corporation- Air Conditioning. Every year he’d get a longer vacation, so we used to go out on trips to different states every year; we’ve been to just about every state of the Union. He used to go to every telephone book he could and copy down all Benedict names. We used to visit Benedicts in different states. He couldn’t go by a cemetery, so we got out of the car and tromped through every cemetery, trying to find a dead Benedict’s gravestone [laughter]. He wrote all that information down, all the gravestones and stuff.

Jim: Now Darrel, I’m 61; how old are you? “I’m 53.” And so this has been all of your life.

Darrell: Yeah, just about.

Esther: I took care of the two boys while he and his mother did the book. She wrote it in longhand.

Jim: Now tell me about Henry Benedict, and the first book. Do you know much information about that? That was published in 1870, I believe.

Esther: I don’t think he’s got much of a lineage in there, has he? Henry didn’t have any children.

Jim: Oh, so he had to finish the book quickly because he had no sons or daughters to turn it over to.

Esther: We’ve been to Southhold, Long Island to see the old Thomas household. It’s still standing. We stopped right in front of the house and I wanted to walk out by the creek, because you have to have water when you run a mill. The woman came out of the house and ordered me off the property. I was very hurt (chuckle).

Jim: What really inspired you to go as far as a book. I mean, what a commitment!

Elwyn: Well, there was only one book available that you could look at. I figured someone should start getting all these Benedicts together so we all know each other and what’s going on. It’s amazing how many people never even thought about it, to look up their ancestry.

Esther: She [Elwyn’s mother] died in ’64, in February. We got some information after that, and then I copied it in longhand. All those ones you said start typing, so did.

Elwin: Do you remember when my mother was still alive that I used to work on that with her every night…

Esther: Yup, until one in the morning, and then they’d have a little snack and then he’d come to bed, then he didn’t want to get up and go to work the next morning! That was in the winter. In the summer we raised vegetables and peddled vegetables over in East Syracuse. Raspberries and strawberries and sweet corn and tomatoes. We went peddling every night so we had a busy time of it. In the summer we were busy and in the winter we were busy.

Jim: Working on the book was incredibly difficult, because if you had to insert something, how did you do it? Retype?

Esther: Once I started typing, I don’t think we added anything, do you?

Elwyn: We’d buy a roll of this tape, you know… (Jim: “correcting tape?”) Yes, we’d cut it out, cut it out.

Esther: Yes, if I made a mistake I had to cut it out with a sharp; it’s like a rubber sucker.

Elwyn: If we had a mistake going, like a one-word or a two-word mistake, you keep going until you had three or four sheets all whacked out, then you’ve got to type it all over again.

Esther: Those sheets were long, they were 64 lines.

 

1. Genealogy of the Benedicts in America, Volume I, p. vi.[↩]
2. Find-a-Grave for Henry Marvin Benedict https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/175966610/henry-marvin-benedict[↩]
3. From an interview of Elwyn and Esther Benedict and their sons at their residence in Kirkville, NY on April 22, 2007 by Jim Benedict.[↩]