SAMUEL L. BENNETT, hardware, Hutsonville, was born in Sullivan County, Ind., Nov. 13, 1847, to Vance and Elizabeth (Armstrong) Bennett.  His father was born in Virginia Apr. 13, 1806, emigrated to near Lancaster, Ohio, in 1822, and to Sullivan County, Ind., in 1824, where he died Oct. 15, 1866.  He was a farmer.  His wife, the mother of our subject, was born in Fayette County, Ky., in Feb., 1810, and died in Sullivan County, Ind., Oct. 3, 1865; her father, Thomas Armstrong, was a soldier in the Revolutionary War.  Samuel was the tenth child of the eleven children born to his parents; he was raised on a farm and educated from the common schools, and the U. C. College at Merom.  At seventeen years of age, he enlisted in eth late rebellion, serving from Feb., 1865, to the close of the war, in Company G, One Hundred and Forth-ninth Indiana Volunteers, under command of Col. Fairbanks.  After the close of the war, he returned home, and assisted to till the home farm until 1867, when he entered the college at Merom.  In 1869, he began teaching the common schools of Crawford County; in 1872, engaged in the drug business at Robinson, continuing the same but a few months, when he engaged as clerk in the dry goods house of Frank Lucas, engaged in the clothing business; in Oct.,, 1875, he came to Hutsonville, where he was been engaged in the hardware business, the firm being Draper & Bennett.  In Crawford County, in 1873, May 6, he married Miss Mattie Draper.  He is an active member of the Masonic order.  Politically, is a Republican.
Source:  History of Crawford & Clark Cos., Illinois - Illustrated - Publ. Chicago: O. L. Baskin & Co., Historical Publishers, Lakeside Building - 1883 - Page 291