John A. Bennett

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Wikipedia

John Arthur Bennett
Bennett shortly after his arrest
Born(1936-04-10)April 10, 1936
Chatham, Virginia, U.S.
DiedApril 13, 1961(1961-04-13) (aged 25)
United States Disciplinary Barracks, Kansas, U.S.
Criminal statusExecuted by hanging
ConvictionsAttempted premeditated murder
Rape
Criminal penaltyDeath
Military career
Buried
Fort Leavenworth Military Prison Cemetery
AllegianceUnited States
BranchUnited States Army
Service years1953–1955
RankPrivate (E-1)

John Arthur Bennett (April 10, 1936 – April 13, 1961) was a U.S. Army soldier who remains the last person to be executed after a court-martial by the United States Armed Forces.[1] The 18-year-old private was convicted of the rape and attempted murder of an 11-year-old girl in Austria.[2] Despite last minute appeals for clemency and pleas to President John F. Kennedy by the victim[a] and her family to spare his life, Kennedy refused; Bennett was hanged at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas in 1961.

Bennett was the only American soldier to ever be executed for rape in peacetime.[3]

Early life

Bennett was the fourth of eight children born to a family of sharecroppers in Chatham, Virginia.[4] His schooling finished in the fourth grade. Despite being epileptic, he managed to enlist in the U.S. Army when he was 18.[2]

According to a medical review after his arrest, Bennett had an IQ of 67, indicating that he was mildly intellectually disabled.[5]

Military career

Although he dropped out of the Ordnance Corps for academic deficiency, he became an ammunition handler and a truck driver with the U.S. Army's 11th Antiaircraft Artillery Battalion (11th AAA Battalion) at Camp Roeder near Salzburg in Austria.[6]

Crime and court-martial

In 1954, just days before Christmas, a heavily intoxicated Bennett left Camp Roeder to find a brothel.[1] Witnesses reported seeing him wandering around, entering random civilian homes asking for a girl (or according to some, for a woman) named Margaret or Margot.[5] He even entered one house asking the local occupants if they had chickens. Later that evening, at Siezenheim, he met an 11-year-old girl named Gertrude returning from Christmas shopping for her parents. In a confession he gave to U.S. Army Military Police, he said:

I walked part way into the field with her and then I carried her the rest of the way about 25 yards. She appeared as though she wanted to go with me. The reason I carried her was because we were too near the road and I wanted to go further into the field. I sat her down in the field ... I laid down on top of her then and inserted my penis into her vagina. My penis was too big for her vagina and she started kicking. I put my hands under her buttocks and forced my penis into her vagina the rest of the way. I had intercourse with her for about 5 minutes. She screamed twice ... I didn't hit her, slap her or anything like that. After we started to have intercourse she tried to get up but she wasn't strong enough ... and I laid on top of her because I was enjoying the intercourse. I wish to state that I did not force her at all.[5]

Although Bennett had repeatedly raped Gertrude before strangling her and dumping her body in a stream, the child survived. An American officer and his wife testified that she came to their home pleading for help. Gertrude was in a disheveled state, wet and dirty, with blood on her legs. When asked what happened, she responded, "a Negro had choked me." Later, while Gertrude was being cleaned up, she stated that the man had taken off her underwear and stuck something in her. Bennett was arrested by MPs at the base movie theater a few hours later.

Bennett was tried at a general court-martial at the Lehener Kaserne, the former military barracks of the 59th Infantry Regiment of the Imperial-Royal Landwehr in Salzburg, on February 8, 1955. The military court heard medical testimony from a doctor who examined Gertrude at the officer's home, as well as another who saw her later that day at the nearby hospital. Both agreed that she had been raped.[1]

A month later the court-martial found Bennett guilty of rape and attempted premeditated murder. He was sentenced to death by hanging. The death sentence was upheld by President Dwight D. Eisenhower on July 2, 1957.[7]

Execution

After his sentence was stayed two times by lower courts, the U.S. District Court in Kansas overturned the rulings on appeal in 1960. On February 27, 1961, the newly appointed Secretary of the Army Elvis Jacob Stahr Jr. ordered that the sentence should be carried out. Days before Bennett's scheduled execution, Gertrude and her parents wrote to President John F. Kennedy, asking for clemency for Bennett. Her father expressed pity for his parents, while her mother said that while her daughter had been "ruined physically and mentally for her entire life," she would not object to a commutation since Bennett's execution would not change anything. Gertrude, now 17, herself said that she consented to clemency since Bennett's execution would not reverse her trauma. She did, however, ask that Bennett never be allowed to return to Europe if he was ever released from prison.[3]

Bennett also wrote to Kennedy, asking for clemency since the girl did not die. Kennedy took no action on the appeals and let Eisenhower's death warrant stand. Bennett was hanged at United States Disciplinary Barracks at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas on April 13, 1961.[2] His last meal consisted of cocktail sauce, hot rolls, cake, peaches, milk and coffee. Asked if he wanted to make a final statement, Bennett said, "Yes. I wish to take this last opportunity to thank you and each member of the staff for all you have done in my behalf."[8] As he walked to the gallows, he said "pray for me". Bennett remains the last person to be executed following a United States Armed Forces court-martial.[1][2]

See also

Notes

  1. ↑ The victim was 17 years old by the time of Bennett's execution.

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 Reid, Tim (April 30, 2005). "Private was hanged in 1961 for raping girl". The Times. London. Retrieved May 30, 2024. Days before Christmas 1954, and very drunk, Bennett crossed a field searching for a brothel outside his army base. Instead he came to a group of private homes before finding an 11-year-old local girl, who was returning home from Christmas shopping.
  2. 1 2 3 4 Serrano, Richard A. (July 12, 1994). "Last Soldier to Die at Leavenworth Hanged in an April Storm". Los Angeles Times. p. 14. Retrieved October 1, 2008.
  3. 1 2 Serrano, Richard A. (2000-09-10). "Pvt. John Bennett Is the Only U.S. Soldier Executed for Rape in Peacetime". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved 2025-11-19.
  4. ↑ "Scheduled to Hang For Rape Tomorrow". Great Bend Tribune. April 12, 1961. p. 15. Retrieved December 23, 2021 – via Newspapers.com.
  5. 1 2 3 "United States v.Bennett, 21 C.M.R. 223, 228 (C.M.A. 1956)" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2016-12-31. Retrieved 2018-09-22.
  6. ↑ "11th AAA Battalion (AW) (SP)". www.usarmygermany.com. Retrieved 11 March 2021.
  7. ↑ "John A. Bennett v. Colonel James W. Davis, Commandant, Colonel Raymond E. Jessen, Officer in Charge, United States Disciplinary Barracks, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas". CourtListener. May 12, 1959. Retrieved 2022-01-28.
  8. ↑ Fantz, Ashley (2013-07-28). "A look at the last U.S. soldier executed by the military". CNN. Retrieved 2025-05-10.