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Benjamin was another sportsman. He was the youngest son of Jacob and Eliza Caffyn and was born on the 10th February 1880 in Peoria, USA. On his paternal side he was not too far from England, his grandfather Jacob Caffyn was born in West Grinstead, Sussex in 1838 and emigrated to USA where he met and married Jane Harvey in 1863.
Benjamin played baseball in the minor league from 1902 until 1921 although in 1906 he had one season in the major league with the Cleveland Indians. He played at least 866 games, during which he got 931 hits, stole 153 bases and scored 500 runs.
He married in 1908, to Anna Stasia Wiles in Peoria. He was 28 years old and she was just 18. Her family were not impressed by her marriage to a mere baseball player and despite her being pregnant had the marriage annulled. As a result, their son was brought up as a Wiles not a Caffyn.
When Ben’s baseball career came to an end he retrained as a fireman and ran youth baseball programmes in his spare time. He died on the 22nd November 1942.
Many thanks to Tim Wiles for the above photograph.
Letters in the Dirt - Tim WilesBaseball Reference.comBaseball Cube
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