Elder Benjamin Clement was born in the Parish of Hungerford, Berks County, England on the 31 of July, 1817; and died January 13, 1907, making his age 89 years 5 months and 13 days. His parents, John and Hannah White Clement, were conscientious, God fearing people, and his mother a devoted member of the Methodist Church.
When he was just a teenager, his sister and her husband decided to come to America, and they gave Benjamin a opportunity to come with them. His seventeenth birthday was spent on the Atlantic Ocean, and they were eight weeks and four days on the voyage. Landing in Quebec, Canada, he soon found work among farmers in harvest fields at good prices.
After harvest of the year he went with his brother-in-law 130 miles farther west where the latter had purchased land, and worked for him two and a half years. Not satisfied in Canada, he started on foot for the United Stated, walking 120 miles to Detroit, enroute for southern Indiana; but his money ran out before reaching journeys end.
He worked for the state of Ohio for a while in extending the canal. After a few weeks of that he hired out to a carpenter. By then he was 21 years old, and the next 20 years he lived in Shelby County, Ohio.
On January 31st, 1839 he was married to Lydia Ann Baker, who died April 3rd, 1857, leaving six living children-four boys and two girls. In July 1858, he married Eliza Jane Lippincott, who died December 11, 1885, leaving him 12 children.
In 1859 he moved to Iowa, where he spent the next twenty years.
In September 1875 he had the misfortune to loose his left leg by being thrown under the train in Clinton, Iowa. Two years after this accident, in 1877 he moved to Nebraska and settled on Davis Creek.
The last years of his life were spent in North Loup. At the time of his death he left, 17 living children, sixteen grandchildren and 53 great-grandchildren. Theo. L. Gardiner
