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Lieutenant Colonel <em>John Howard Bennett</em> was born October 10, 1903 at Jeanette, PA., but was appointed to West Point from Steubenville, Ohio where his distinguished Revolutionary War ancestor came from Virginia in 1801 as one of the pioneer families of that city. He was the son of John H. Bennett who died in 1934 and Gertrude Hill Bennett. He had two brothers, Fred H. Bennett of Washington, PA., and Edward B. Bennett of Steubenville.</p>
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From his earliest childhood the principles of Duty, Honor and Country had been instilled into his young mind and that fine basic training had later been tempered in the crucible of West Point into an enduring firmness of character which stood by him through the weary years which began with the Japanese attack, the tragic surrender of Bataan, prison life in Cabanatuan and Bilibid to the day when he gave up his life for his country on the ill-fated prison ship Oryoka Maru.</p>
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After graduation from West Point in 1925, his first station was at Governors Island with the 16th Infantry. Here he met Miss Frances Snow of Henry, South Carolina, who was visiting her cousin, Captain La Gette, and on March 17th, 1927 they were married in the church at Henry. The young couple’s next station was Schofield Barracks in Hawaii in 1928. And there their son, John Crawford Bennett was born November 29, 1930. February 1931 found them at Fort Thomas, Kentucky. From 1932 to 1938 Fort Benning was their station, where Colonel Bennett was first a student, then an instructor in the Tank School, and then Secretary of the Tank School for two years. In the autumn of 1939 he and his family came home to bid us all goodbye. And this was the last time we ever saw our beloved son, brother and loyal friend, “Tony” Bennett. He had a premonition that there would be trouble with the Japanese and felt he was being sent there for a purpose which he intended to see through to the end, as he wrote later in a message to his mother. On his arrival in the Philippines a month later be became Commander of the Service Company of the 31st Infantry, which regiment was to cover itself with immortal glory at Bataan. Rumors of the pending Japanese attack became so rife in the Autumn of 1940 that he sent his wife and young son back home.</p>
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At the outbreak of war Colonel Bennett was on General Parker’s Staff as Regimental Transportation Officer.</p>
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The story of the gallant yet hopeless stand of the 31st Infantry on Bataan, its surrender, the Death March and all the subsequent suffering in Cabanatuan and Bilibid prisons is also the story of Colonel Bennett’s part in the immortal glory of that regiment.</p>
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There came a notice from the War Department to his family that Colonel Bennett was missing after the surrender of Bataan, then months of anxious waiting. The Japanese Government announced him a prisoner of war on December 7, 1942 and later several post cards were received from him stating that his health was excellent and he was uninjured. The War Department officially notified Mrs. Frances Bennett in July of 1945 that her husband had been killed on the Oryoka Maru while being transported to Japan by the Japanese Government.</p>
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In a letter from a fellow prisoner and officer who survived that trip his friend wrote Mrs. Frances Bennett: “Benny and I were together throughout the war and every moment until December 15, 1944. We were in the same hold of the ship Oryoka Maru which was first bombed December 14th and rendered unseaworthy and during the night anchored about 500 yards from shore in Subic Bay. All but the prisoners were evacuated during the night.</p>
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The Navy bombers hit us again the next day about dawn. They put a bomb right into our hold and Benny was killed instantly by the bomb.</p>
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“In the four years we spent together not more than three feet from each other, there weren’t many secrets between us. He was a right guy Frances and you and John should be forever proud of him.</p>
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“I knew him as no one else did except you. He was a grand soldier, a marvelous officer. He received the Silver Star citation for unusual and conspicuous gallantry in action. General Parker has all of them and you will receive it in due time. He wanted you and John to have it. I want you to know that through this whole thing—and I was with him when it was ‘dog eat dog’—he was always the finest example of an officer, West Pointer and gentleman”.</p>
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Last Easter vacation the young son, Cadet Corporal John C. Bennett of the Carlisle Military Academy, South Carolina and his mother received a review of the troops at Fort Jackson in company with Brigadier General Donald Richart, Post Commander, who at that time presented the Silver Star to John C. Bennett which had been earned by his father Colonel John H. Bennett. Memorial services also had been held at the Carlisle Military Academy on Easter Sunday in honor of Colonel Bennett and at the Calvary Methodist Church in Steubenville, Ohio, where he had been a member.</p>
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Those of us who knew him from early childhood, remember him for his loyalty, his happy disposition, his steadfast character and as a talented violinist. We are sure that when he joined that “Long Gray Line” he was welcomed as one who had lived up to its highest traditions and who had kept the faith with all those who had gone before.</p>
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Truly it is not fulsome praise when we quote:</p>
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“We dream a dream of good and mingle all the world with thee.<br />
Thy voice is on the rolling air; I hear thee where the waters run,<br />
Thou standest in the rising sun, and in the setting thou art fair.”</p>
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<em>—Elinor J. Neidengard</em></p>
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