COLONEL J. W. BENET, EX-ARMY OFFICER, DIES  Father of Well-Known Authors, William Rose and Stephen Vincent Benet PHILADELPHIA, Pennsylvania, March 30, 1928 – Colonel James Walker Benet, USA, retired, father of William Rose and Stephen Vincent Benet, well-known authors, died today of heart disease at Westown, Pennsylvania, in his seventy-first year.  He had been ill only four days.  Burial will be in the National Cemetery at Arlington, Virginia.

Son of Brigadier General Stephen V. Benet, Chief of the Ordnance Department, United States Army, Colonel Benet followed his father’s footsteps literally, spending practically his entire life in the Ordnance Department.  He was born in Richmond, Kentucky, on July 16, 1867, and graduated from West Point in 1880.  Four years later he graduated from the artillery school.

He was transferred from his station at Fort Hamilton, New York, in 1886 to the Ordnance Department.  From 1890 to 1894 he was assistant at the Frankford Arsenal, Philadelphia, and from 1894 to 1898 he was at the Bethlehem Iron Works, South Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. He served in order named at Watervliet Arsenal, New York; Rock Island, Illinois, Arsenal, Benicia, California, Arsenal and Augusta, Georgia, Arsenal, then became commander of the Ordnance Training Corps and later returned to Watervliet as Commander.  He retired in 1921.

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