"WILLIAM WALLACE BENNETT, son of Eli and Mary C. Bennett, was born in the city of Richmond, February 24, 1821. He was reared under the fostering care and social surroundings of Methodism, and was the subject of religious impressions from an early period.
"In 1839, under the ministry of Rev. Gervas M. Keesee, he made a profession of religion, and united with the Methodist Episcopal Church in Portsmouth. Here, with the help of class-meetings and other social, as well as the public means of grace, his religious experience had a healthful beginning, that developed the elevated character and useful life that our beloved brother has bequeathed to the church. Soon after his conversion, he, and several others who were exercised about a call to the ministry, met and conversed upon the subject, and prayed for divine guidance, giving evidence that when he entered the itinerancy it was no rash adventure. In the fall of 1841, he removed to Mecklenburg county, where his brother, Rev. John R. Bennett, was in charge of the circuit. There he pursued his studies, obtained license to preach, and began his ministry, passing through what he conceived to be the crucial test of his call to preach. Discouraged, as he informed the writer, by what he conceived to be a failure in the pulpit before a large congregation, he was tempted to give up the ministry; but falling in the hands of an experienced and godly class-leader, who encouraged him by his counsel and his prayers, he returned to his work with renewed consecration, and a conviction too strong to be jostled again.
"From the best information obtained (the records of four years of this Conference being lost) he was admitted on trial into the Virginia Conference in 1842, and travelled as junior preacher on Louisa and Bedford Circuits. In 1845-'46 he was in charge of Powhatan Circuit, and in 1847 was stationed in Charlottesville, where he availed himself of the educational advantages of the University of Virginia, and graduated in several of the schools in 1850. At the Conference of this year he was stationed in Washington city, organizing the first society of the M. E. Church, South, at our national capital. In 1851 he was elected Chaplain of the University of Virginia, but on account of sickness resigned the position. He soon, however, regained his accustomed health, and in 1852-'53 travelled Loudoun Circuit with W. W. Berry and John C. Granbery, respectively, as junior preachers. In 1854-'55-'56-'57 he was Presiding Elder of the Washington District. While on this appointment he was married, December 20, 1855, to Virginia Lee, daughter of Edward and Mary Kendall Lee Sangster, of Alexandria. A wise and happy union. In 1858-'59 he was appointed to Union Station, Richmond, and in 1860-'61 was stationed at Centenary, in the same city.
"In 1862 he was appointed Chaplain in the Confederate Army, and assigned to the superintendency of the Tract Association. Seeing the necessity of a more generous distribution of Bibles and religious literature among the troops, he arranged to go abroad for a supply, and during the last winter of the war successfully 'ran the blockade.' He had scarcely, however, entered upon the work in London when the war ended, and he returned to Virginia.
"In 1865-'66 he travelled Nottoway circuit, and in November, 1866, was appointed editor of the Richmond Christian Advocate. By judicious management and editorial ability, this necessary and popular journal was established on a promising basis. In 1874 Rev. J. J. Lafferty became his associate, who, in 1877, by satisfactory negotiations, assumed control, and was appointed editor of the paper. The motives influencing Dr. Bennett in this change were characteristic of the man and the result of thoughtful conversation. His successor well understood him, and tells us, in his affecting notice of his death, that 'he made known to him his uneasiness in conscience as to his position—that he was too stout in health to be out of the regular ranks. With much emphasis, he declared his wish to be found in the pastorate when God called him.' Before the Conference met in Lynchburg Dr. Bennett had arranged to change his position. It was then made to appear his duty to go to the college, and he yielded. But there must have been a peculiar joy when the summons came that he was in his loved employ—the shepherd of a flock.
"In 1877 he was elected President of Randolph-Macon College. This position he held for nine years, during, perhaps, its most critical history; but by able, kind, and impartial administration, with the confidence of his brethren in the ministry, the active co-operation of his professorial associates, and the affection of the students, the College accomplished a noble work. By his activity in visiting throughout the Baltimore and Virginia Conferences and elsewhere, and under his stirring appeals, the number of students compared favorably with other institutions, and a large amount of money was raised in the interest of the College. The sentiments of a writer from the Pacific coast, we are sure, find echo here, that 'Virginia Methodism owes Dr. Bennett a great debt for the work done by him at Randolph-Macon at the crucial period of its history.' He left the College an enduring monument of his heroic devotion, but, as many think, at the cost of his life. At the close of the session in 1886 his health was so impaired that he resigned the presidency of the College, and secured a retired home near Trevilian's, in Louisa county, hoping that relief from the burdens and cares of college work and the quiet of the country might nurse him back to health again. But, alas! his disease baffled the best medical skill and the loving attentions of his family and friends. He was prevailed upon during the summer to visit the mountains, and, with some slight improvement, he was in his place at the last Conference, believing that he could even then attend to the work on some fields that would be open, but naming none. The change disease had wrought in his robust frame was a subject of mournful remark by all that knew him, and grave apprehensions were felt that he would never recuperate. From that Conference he was sent to Gordonsville and Orange, where he gave for a time pastoral care and pulpit work that was surprising to his friends. But as the summer advanced, he was compelled to yield, and after a short confinement to his bed, his earthly labors ended.
"Dr. Bennett, in health, will always be remembered by his acquaintances as an incomparable specimen of physical manhood, with a face bearing the lines of strong character. Indeed, he seemed moulded for any work or position in Methodism. His mental endowments were of a high order. His early advantages were such as to secure a good English education, with some knowledge of Latin; and from our knowledge of the man, we may safely conclude that his opportunities were well improved. A schoolmate says of him: 'He was studious, with great grasp of intellect and steadiness of purpose.' The writer, and others, perhaps, will remember his modest reference to his fondness for reading while a boy, in using 'the first money he could command to subscribe for the Richmond Advocate,' which he subsequently edited with so much ability. By judicious reading and study, and by such collegiate helps as his appointments favored, he became the peer of any. Ten years before he was elected President of Randolph-Macon College he received from that institution the degree of D. D., was a member of every General Conference since 1858, and was a representative of our church at the Ecumenical Conference in London in 1881. The opinion of the editor of the Richmond Christian Advocate, no doubt, is the judgment of his brethren, that 'he was the best-rooted man in the Conference in theology, and saturated with church history, dogma, and doctrine.'
"As a preacher, he occupied the front rank in pulpit power, and his discourses were such as lived in the memory and hearts of his hearers. 'His sermons,' says Bishop Granbery, 'were stately, elaborate, and massive, mighty discussions of great truths, with wide range of thought, lucid and forcible argument, earnest, solemn, and often impassioned application.' Bishop Doggett says of him: 'Bennett, at times, is the greatest preacher I ever heard. His sermon at the late camp-meeting, on Matthew xxiii. 37, 38, surpassed anything I ever listened to from the pulpit. His description of the desolate house I can never forget. I remember,' says he, 'to have heard him at Charlottesville, on the flood, when for more than an hour the congregation seemed dazed by the power of his eloquence.'
"His character was differently analyzed by some of his friends, though all accorded him unexceptionable integrity, a high order of piety, and a noble, generous heart. His occasional serious expression and brusque manner awakened the suspicion with some that he was wanting in sympathy, but those who knew him best indulged no such estimate of him. With all his firmness of conviction and stern independence, where was to be found greater gentleness and consideration of the feelings of others? He was emphatically the friend of the friendless, the persecuted and neglected, and was unchanging in his friendships. He was slow to find fault, and indulged in no depreciation of others. At any time it required a great provocation, and something more than mere personal affront or injury, to evoke rebuke; but when it did come, it was felt, but was more the utterance of conscientious impulse than the ebullition of personal resentment.
"He was the head of a Christian household, where piety was fostered and practised, and where Methodism was honored. He, with his devoted wife, sought to make home attractive, and succeeded. While the proprieties of religious training and filial respect were never relaxed, there was no constraint on the freedom of social and religious intercourse, and no lack of sympathy for such enjoyments as were proper, entertaining and improving in a Christian home. He was looked up to by his family as a practical and safe counsellor, and beyond whom there was rarely even the desire to appeal. His brethren, I am sure, will endorse the sentiments of his distinguished eulogist: 'His virtues were many, steadfast and bright. The whole church will feel his loss. The Virginia Conference, as one man, will cherish his memory with deep admiration and love.'