Ernest Benzon 

Edmund Ernst Leopold Schlesinger Benzonrnst was born in 1819 and died on 14th September 1873. He had Hillsborough Hall from 1860 to 1865.  

He was a German born industrialist associated with the Vickers Company in Sheffield, the Chamber of Commerce and he was a patron of the arts.

The Vickers Company was expanding in the 1840s with its introduction into the booming U.S. market. For this, the company enlisted the aid of Ernst Benzon. Unlike the founding families, Benzon’s background was in sales, and he would become responsible for bringing the company’s steel and iron products to the United States and other foreign markets. Benzon quickly became a partner in the company, which changed its name to Vickers Sons & Company in 1867.

As a patron of the arts the Benzons were associated with Wilkie Collins, Robert Browning, Felix Mendelssohn and George Eliot.

One of Wilkie Collins’ oldest friends was Nina Chambers who Wilkie met in the early 1850s.  In November 1852 she married Frederick Lehmann and Wilkie’s friendship with the couple lasted the rest of his life. Frederick Lehmann’s sister Elizabeth married Ernst Benzon.

In 1871 Ivan Turgenev, the Russian novelist who was in Scotland for the Scott Centenary, injured his leg grouse shooting while staying at Allean House in Perthshire.  The invitation to the shoot was from the Benzons.

The Benzon’s appear in correspondence from Wilkie Collins and Robert Browning.

Sheffield Chamber of Commerce

The Sheffield Chamber of Commerce had its first ever Board Meeting on March 2nd 1857 which led to its formation. 

Attending the first gathering were some of the city’s most powerful men including the first ever President Edward Vickers. Also present were Fred Mappin, Thomas Jessop, W. Smith, Ernst Leopold Schlesinger Benzon and Mark Firth.

In 1862 the Benzons bought 10 Kensington Palace Gardens in London and three years later Hillsborough Hall was sold to James Willis Dixon.