Compiled by Russell Bastedo
State Curator
1998

First Royal Colonial Governor Benning Wentworth (1741-1766). Benning Wentworth (1696-1770) was the first Royal Governor of the colony of New Hampshire, and he was Governor for 26 years (1741-1767). He was born (and died) at Portsmouth (NH), one of 14 children sired by Massachusetts Lieutenant Governor John Wentworth (1671-1730) and his wife. John Wentworth had responsibility for the Province of New Hampshire (his portrait hangs in Room 207); his son Benning attended Harvard College (Class of 1715) and on his return to Portsmouth he entered the merchant aristocracy, shipping timber, livestock, and provisions to the plantation economies in the Caribbean. Europe was at peace during the years 1713-1739, and the British Navigation Acts (which restricted the colonies' imports and exports to British-owned and operated ships) were routinely violated. Benning Wentworth had many Spanish customers, as did other British North American merchants.

In 1739 France declared that all shipping to and from Spanish possessions in the Caribbean would henceforth be in French-owned and French-operated ships. The weakened Spanish Empire had requested protection from France, and France was responding.

The British merchants who controlled Parliament were not about to allow France to freeze them out of Spanish markets. The War of Jenkins' Ear began. Proclamations of war against Spain were read throughout British North America. And Benning Wentworth was left with unpaid Spanish Caribbean bills and unhonored contracts. He faced financial ruin.

If Benning Wentworth failed in business his English creditors would also. They began a campaign to get Wentworth on the Royal payroll, as Surveyor of the King's Woods in North America and as Governor of New Hampshire. They succeeded.

In this 19th century copy of Wentworth's 1760 portrait, the Governor stands before white pines, the source of his wealth as Surveyor of the King's Woods in North America. His girth is supplemented by heavy cotton padding, to help show his wealth (fat = wealth). He sports a fashionable Malacca cane, and stands on a "marbleized" canvas floorcloth.

Location: State House, Second Floor, Opposit Second Floor Elevator
Painted by U.D. Tenney, 1873, after 1760 original by J. Blackburn