Benjamin Greenacre

{{Short description|English-born South African politician and businessman}}

{{Use dmy dates|date=April 2022}}

Sir Benjamin Wesley Greenacre (24 December 1833 – 22 April 1911) was an English-born South African politician and businessman who was member of the Legislative Assembly of the Colony of Natal. He was a three-time Mayor of Durban.{{cite news |title= Obituary: Sir Benjamin Greenacre. |work=The Times |date=24 April 1911 |page= 11 }}

He was knighted in 1901.{{cite book |title=South African Who's Who |date=1911 |publisher=Ken Donaldson |page=175 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=HzeuV2PpFCIC&dq=Benjamin+Wesley+Greenacre&pg=PA175 |access-date=7 March 2024 |language=en}}{{cite book|author=Shaw, William Arthur|title=The Knights of England: A Complete Record from the Earliest Time to the Present Day &c.|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=l4xUsPyL6koC&pg=RA1-PA409|volume=I.|year=1970|publisher=Clearfield|isbn=978-0-8063-0443-4|page=409}}

Greenacre was born into "humble circumstances" in Caistor, Norfolk, the son of Benjamin Greenacre, a shoemaker,1841 England Census and Jemima Mallet. In the 1850s, he moved to Durbana and opened a hardware store. He ran a successful trading business with his department store Harvey, Greenacre, & Co.{{cite book |title=Commercial and Industrial Transvaal: Her Resources, Industries, and Finance ... |date=1905 |publisher=Eyre and Spottiswoode. Transvaal Publishing Company. |location=Johannesburg |page=80 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=h6JLAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA |access-date=7 March 2024 |language=en}} In 1905, he cofounded another business that would become Defy Appliances, South Africa's largest appliance company.

In 1863, he married Mary Stott, with whom he had two sons, Walter and Edwin. Walter Greenacre also served as Mayor of Durban, in 1909–10. Sir Benjamin died in Durban.