Richard Bentley - Marriage and Family

Marriage and Family

In 1701, Bentley married Joanna Bernard, daughter of Sir John Bernard, 2nd Baronet of Brampton, Huntingdonshire. They had three children together: Richard (1708–1782), an eccentric, playwright and artist whose engravings for Thomas Gray’s ‘A Long Story’ were published in 1753, and two daughters, one named Johanna. His wife died in 1740.

Johanna Bentley married Denison Cumberland in 1728, a grandson of Richard Cumberland the bishop of Peterborough, and himself later a bishop of the Church of Ireland. Their son Richard Cumberland developed as a prolific dramatist, while earning his living as a civil servant.