Ruth Felton was born in Virginia in about 1710. In about 1730 she married Richard Freeman and the couple moved to Chowan County by 1753. Ruth survived her husband's death in 1767 and shortly after she married John Benbury, a planter from Chowan. John Benbury died in early 1774 and later that year Ruth Benbury signed a nonimportation agreement that later became known as the Edenton Tea Party Resolves. Living out the remainder of her life as a widow, she died in Chowan County in 1793.