Lyman G. Bennett

Lyman Gibson Bennett (1832 – 1904) was an American teacher, surveyor, and civil engineer from Schuyler County, New York, who served the Union army during the American Civil War.

Early life Lyman Gibson Bennett was born on 1 August 1832, in Schuyler County, New York, the son of Charles Mitchell Bennett (11 May 1807 – 29 July 1882) and his wife Louisa Canfield (18 May 1810 – 14 April 1886). He was educated in New York state, then in 1849 when he was 17, his family moved to Oswego, in Kendall County, Illinois. On 18 December 1859 in Kendall County, Illinois, he married Melissa Emma Lyon (1838–1904).

American Civil War In 1861, Bennett enlisted as a Corporal in Co. E of the 36th Illinois Volunteer Infantry Regiment, a three-year unit known as the “Fox River Regiment.” Military authorities took advantage of his skills, assigning him to engineering duties at Rolla and St. Louis, Missouri throughout late 1861 and early 1862. His detached duty, which included map-making and work on fortifications, ended in time for Bennett to join his regiment for the Battle of Pea Ridge, Arkansas on March 7, 1862. He was permanently detached from the 36th Illinois after the battle to serve on the engineering staff of Brigadier General Samuel Ryan Curtis. He sketched the Pea Ridge battlefield and was the cartographer of the Army of the Southwest as it marched across Missouri to Helena, Arkansas. In 1863, Bennett took a commission as major of the 4th Arkansas Volunteer Cavalry Regiment (United States), which he helped raise and organize. He resigned and was honorably discharged in August 1864.

As a civilian, Bennett again joined the engineering department of General Samuel Curtis, then commanding the Department of Kansas. He mapped the 1864 battlefields of Price's Raid, and was sent to inspect the army's installations along the stage line to Denver, Colorado.

Later life Bennett left the army's employment in 1866 to return to Illinois. He moved to Springfield, Missouri, in 1880, purchasing a farm on the western edge of the city. He continued to work as an engineer and surveyor, platting additions to the City of Springfield, and surveying railroad lines in Missouri and Oklahoma. Lyman Gibson Bennett died in Springfield, Missouri on 24 February 1904, and is buried there.

Legacy The book Powder River Odyssey: Nelson Cole's Western Campaign of 1865, The Journals of Lyman G. Bennett and Other Eyewitness Accounts by David E. Wagner (2009), was written almost entirely from the journal that Bennett kept in 1865.