Diagonally opposite the George Corliss House, this ample, two-story Federal house, built for the partner of John Brown and Thomas Poynton Ives in China Trade ventures, typifies the substantial wooden houses built in Providence in the 1790s: correct one-story entrance porch, balustraded hipped roof, and paired interior chimneys. Like his partners, George Benson chose to locate his new house on what was then an isolated, commanding site, overlooking the town, with distant views of its waterfront.