Son of Robert Benfield, surgeon; was educated privately and at Hackney Grammar School when Archdeacon Edward Churton was Headmaster. He was then articled to Frederick Carpenter Skey (qv) and entered St Bartholomew’s Hospital Medical School, where he distinguished himself, attracting the favourable notice of Sir George Burrows, J Painter Vincent, and Sir James Paget. After qualifying he became assistant to John Nedham (qv), at Leicester, and married his daughter. In 1850 he and his father-in-law entered into partnership in a large general practice, to which Benfield succeeded on the death of the latter. Appointed Surgeon to the Leicester Infirmary in 1857, he proved a skilful operator, being remarkably successful as a lithotomist. He retired in 1880 and was appointed Consulting Surgeon to the Leicester and Rutland County Lunatic Asylum. He had also been Surgeon to the Leicester Dispensary. He was President of the Midland Branch of the British Medical Association in 1869-1870. Latterly, owing to failing health, he gave up much of his work and took into partnership Dr Herbert Cecil Moore. He died after a long illness involving painful vesical complications, on January 16th, 1890, at his residence in Friar Lane, Leicester. Benfield was gentle, modest, and retiring. He had ready tact in emergency and a singular faculty of obtaining and retaining the esteem and confidence of his colleagues and patients. He always strove to sustain the dignity of his profession, and all good and benevolent work found in him a ready supporter. A Conservative in politics, and in religion a High Churchman, those who most differed from him could live under his roof above all distinctions of politics and of creed. His portrait is in the Fellows’ Album.