William Henry Benson

William Henry Benson (1803, probably in Dublin - 27 January 1870) was a civil servant in British India and an amateur malacologist. He made large collections of molluscs and described numerous species from the U.K., India and South Africa.
He joined Haileybury College in 1819 and joined the East India Company at Bengal. He reached Calcutta on 30 October 1821 and worked in a number of positions including a District Collector and Officiating Judge in Meerut, Bareilly and other parts of northern India. During his stay in India he collected specimens of numerous land snails some of which he sent to Hugh Cuming in England. On the return from a trip to Mauritius he brought a couple of living Achatina fulica which he gave to a friend in Calcutta in April 1847 who subsequently released them in a garden at Chowringhee. The species is today a pest in many parts of India.
His son-in-law Major Richard Sankey was executor of his estate and the collections that he bequeathed went to Sylvanus Hanley, who removed the locality labels of all the specimens thus decreasing their value.

Genera:

• Pterocyclus (Benson, 1832)
• Oxygyrus (Benson, 1835)
• Batillaria (Benson, 1842)
• Diplommatina (Benson, 1849)
• Streptaulus (Benson, 1857)
• Dioryx (Benson, 1859)
• Clostophis (Benson, 1860)
• Rhiostoma (Benson, 1860)

Species:

• Carinaria cithara (Benson, 1835)
• Carinaria galea (Benson, 1835)
• Musculista senhousia (Benson, 1842)
• Indrella ampulla (Benson, 1850)

• Benson W. H. (1835). "Account of Oxygyrus; a new genus of pelagian shells allied to the genus Atlanta of Lesueur, with a note on some other pelagian shells lately taken on board the ship Malcolm". Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal 4: 173-176. Oxygyrus is on the page 174.
• ^ Benson, W.H. (1835). Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal. G.H. Rouse, Baptist Mission Press. Asiatic Society (Calcutta, India). pp. 215–216. 
• Gofas, Serge (2015). "Musculista senhousia (Benson in Cantor, 1842)". World Register of Marine Species. Retrieved 2015-04-18.