Benjamin Dunham was born in Berkeley county, Va. on the 30th day of Oct. 1822. He is the son of David and Catherine (Burkhammer) Dunham. His father was born and raised in the state of Virginia, his mother was a native of Pennsylvania. Benjamin was the youngest of a family of 10 children. When he was four years of age his parents moved to Hamilton county, Ohio, locating about 18 miles from Cincinnati. After they had lived there about eight years, his father died. They lived in Ohio 10 years, then came by wagon to Illinois, in the month of October 1836, and located in Macoupin county, northeast of Greenfield. While living there his oldest brother, Samuel, who had consumption, died during that winter. Benjamin and his mother remained in that county one year, and then moved to English township, Jersey county, and raised on crop on the farm now owned by John Garrel. From here, Benjamin and his mother moved in with his next older brother, Amos Dunham, and lived with him until Benjamin purchased 40 acres of land from Mr. Eastwood, about 1844, where his present residence now is. Benjamin's mother lived here with him until her death in 1853. She is buried in what is called Armstrong cemetery, in English township. Benjamin was married on the 30th of Oct. in 1850 to Ann Eliza Reddish, born Jan. 10 1831 in what is now Jersey county. She is the daughter of Stephen and Sallied Reddish. Mr. and Mrs. Dunham have been the parents of 14 children, 11 whom are living: Henry C., born Aug. 30, 1851; John, born May 8, 1853, died March 18, 1873; Walker, born Aug. 2, 1854; Juliette, born Feb. 28, 1856; Virginia Ann, born April 22, 1857, died June 24, 1869; Stephen A. Dougles, born June 11, 1858; Emmer, born Dec. 3, 1859; Lloyd, born March 30, 1861; an unnamed infant born Sept. 25, 1862, died Mary 3, 1863; Benjamin F., born Jan. 20, 1864; Charles H., born Feb. 6, 1866; Oscar, born Oct. 16, 1867; Oliver P., born Nov. 18, 1869; Hattie Belle, born Sept. 8, 1871. Mr. Dunham's farm at first contained 40 acres, but he has added to this until it now contains 213 acres, and on this he built a new residence in 1884. He raises stock, as well as grain. The extent of improvements on his and neighboring farms may be seen by comparing the present condition with what it was when he first located there. It was then a wild country, with deer and wild game to be found in abundance. He has seen as many as 15 deer at one time, and has killed numbers of them. The last one killed in this neighborhood was shot by him, it being in among the sheep. He has also killed great numbers of wild turkeys and other choice species of game, which were then more plentiful than the most common kinds now are. It is difficult to imagine the changes that have taken place in that time, but Mr. Dunham, in the half-century that he has spent here, has witnessed its transformation from a wilderness to a continued series of cultivated fields and the homes of hundreds. In those early days, like other pioneers, he had to haul his grain to a mill and grind it himself, with his own team.