Scope and Content Note
The papers of William Shepherd Benson (1855-1932) span the years circa 1791-1952, with the bulk of the material dating from 1915 to 1928. The papers consist of family papers, correspondence, reports, dispatches, telegrams, memoranda, speeches, orders, appointments, printed matter, newspaper clippings, maps, photographs, broadsides, and miscellaneous related material and are organized into the following series: General Correspondence, Subject File, Speeches, Miscellany, and Oversize.
General Correspondence pertains primarily to Benson's naval duties from 1915 to 1928, except for considerable correspondence concerning various activities of the Catholic Church. The greater part of the collection concerns Benson's service as chief of naval operations, 1915-1919; as member of a commission appointed by President Woodrow Wilson to confer with the Allied and Associated Powers in Europe, 1917-1919; and as member of a special mission abroad as naval representative in drawing up naval terms of armistice with the Central Powers, and naval adviser to the American Commission to Negotiate Peace, 1918-1919. The remaining material chiefly concerns Benson's service on the United States Shipping Board, 1920-1928; his term as president, National Council of Catholic Men, 1921-1925; the Naval Conference of 1917; and his service as commandant of the Philadelphia Naval Yard, 1913-1915. There is little material concerning Benson's career preceding 1913 and after 1928.
Among the prominent correspondents in the collection are Bernard M. Baruch, Reginald Rowan Belknap, Tasker Howard Bliss, William Banks Caperton, Michael Joseph Curley, Josephus Daniels, Duncan Upshaw Fletcher, Guy Despard Goff, Edward Mandell House, Edward N. Hurley, Harry Shepard Knapp, John La Farge, Robert Lansing, Albert Davis Lasker, Peyton Conway March, Samuel McGowan, C. J. Peoples, John J. Pershing, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Hugh Lenox Scott, William Sowden Sims, Joseph Nathan Teal, Benjamin R. Tillman, and Henry B. Wilson. The Subject File is organized within three major headings: Armistice, Allied Naval Council, and Peace Conference, 1918-1919; Naval Conference of 1917 (Edward Mandell House Mission); and naval matters (miscellaneous), 1917-1926. Correspondents of note at the Paris Peace Conference include Norman H. Davis, Joseph C. Grew, Woodrow Wilson, and Admirals Philip Andrews, William Hannum Grubb Bullard, and Albert P. Niblack.
The Miscellany series includes material concerning the Army and Navy Country Club, transcripts of congressional hearings on the Navy Department, a bound volume of letters and miscellaneous items from a testimonial dinner in honor of Benson, scrapbooks, broadsides, and other printed matter.
Additional Benson papers received by the Library in 1963-1977 include letters received, transcripts of congressional hearings, speeches, orders, scrapbooks, and miscellaneous printed matter. Much of the correspondence pertains to letters of congratulations on Benson's various naval appointments, but there is also considerable information on the Versailles Peace Commission, on naval disarmament, and on the United States Shipping Board. Two additional topics of importance in this segment of the papers are the 1920 Senate Naval Affairs Committee hearings regarding naval operations in World War I, and Benson's extensive involvement in Catholic religious and fraternal organizations. Correspondents include Charles Francis Adams, Newton Diehl Baker, Montague C. Browning, James Gibbons, Herbert Hoover, Edward Mandell House, James D. Phelan, Franklin D. Roosevelt, and Woodrow Wilson.