Benford Family
Reunion

A Benford Family Proclamation

Family History

Greetings family and friends. My name is Roy Lee Benford. I am the eldest son of Finis and Fannie Benford. I’m sharing what I know about our immediate family. The Benford family can be traced back eight generations on my dad’s side.

Let’s start with my dad, Finis Roland Benford. Finis was the only child from the marriage of Andrew Lee Benford and Dora Wilburn. Dora’s dad was Jack Wilburn. Dora’s uncle, Joe B. Wilburn, who lived on Allwise Road, was the patriarch of the Wilburn family that we grew up with. He acquired over 200 acres of land in the Allwise community which was later distributed to other members of the Benford and Wilburn families. The Wilburn family can be traced back to the early 1800s.

My grandfather, Andrew Lee Benford was born through the marriage of Robert Binford and a formerly enslaved woman named Sarah. Robert Binford, Andrew Lee Benford’s father, was the son of plantation owner Peter Binford in Grimes County where Sarah was enslaved. She was given her freedom when Robert Benford married her. Andrew later changed his last name from Binford to Benford.

Andrew had two brothers, Tom and William, and a sister named Pollie. Andrew and his brothers built the home that my father Finis grew up in and later raised his own children: Dorothy Jean, also known as Aunt Doll, Roy Lee, Travis Earl, Lawrence Roland, Melvin Lee, and Madelyn Dora.

Our father instilled core values in us early in our lives. He reminded us that we could be anything we wanted to be. He taught Christian values of hard work, honesty, truthfulness, service to others, and kindness; to stand for what is right, help the less fortunate, and stand for my brothers and sisters, not against them. He taught us that “if one of you has something, all of you have something.”

This is why I can say, like the psalmist, “I once was young and now I am old. Yet I have never seen the righteous forsaken or his children begging for bread.”

From these values, I learned that I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.