Stephen Vincent Benét (1898–1943) was an American poet and author. He remains best known for three masterful works—the book-length narrative poem of the American Civil War, John Brown’s Body (1928), for which he received the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry, and for the short stories “The Devil and Daniel Webster” (1936) and “By the Waters of Babylon” (1937). “The King of the Cats” (1929) is also quite popular.
John Brown’s BodyBenét was born in Fountain Hill, Pennsylvania to a family with a strong military tradition. His father, James Walker Benét, was a colonel in the United States Army. His grandfather and namesake led the Army Ordnance Corps from 1874 to 1891 as a brigadier general and served in the Civil War. His paternal uncle, Laurence Vincent Benét, was an ensign in the United States Nav
