Olive Louise Bennett was the youngest of thee daughters of Walter Bennett and Lucy Louise Cook who married on 19 May 1879 at Holy Trinity Church, Heigham, Norfolk.  Walter was a grocer and the couple began their married life at his shop in Great Yarmouth. Lucy had a daughter, Grace, the following spring and a second daughter, Elsie, in the autumn of 1882. Olive’s birth was registered in the first quarter of 1887 in the Yarmouth registration district.

When the 1891 census was taken the family lived at 110 & 111 Middlegate Street in the centre of town. Walter still earned his living as a grocer, and employed a live in domestic servant, but at some point changed careers and moved to Plymouth - over three hundred miles away.

By 1899, the family had moved to Plymouth and when the census return was made in April 1901 the family lived at 6 Salham Place.  Olive’s older sister was a teacher and neither 18 year old Elsie nor 14 year old Olive were employed. Walter described his occupation as a saffron flour manufacturer and saline maker.  It seems that business was good; Walter advertised his saffron flour in the Western Evening Herald, describing it as ‘a new system of making saffron cake, entirely superseding the old’ and declaring himself to be the sole patentee. He was selling his flour to over three dozen shops, and offered 1d (a penny) off purchases for customers who presented a clipping from the newspaper.

Olive’s sister Grace married in 1902 and sadly Elsie died in 1905 at the age of 23. This left just Olive at home with her parents when the next census was taken in 1911. At that time the family was living an an eight roomed house at 4 Western College Road in Plymouth. The size of the property indicates that Walter was doing well in his business, which he described as self raising flour manufacturer. 

With the advent of war, Olive decided that she wanted to play her part and on 3 November 1915, whilst living at 6 Home Park Avenue, Plymouth, was engaged by the Red Cross as a nurse. She served at 4th Southern General Hospital, known locally as the Ford Military Hospital, in Plymouth until three days before her death on  30 October 1916.

She was the first nurse from the 4th Devon V.A.D. to die in service.  Olive was buried with full military honours in Ford Park Cemetery in Plymouth, and the matron of the hospital where she worked described her as ‘a brave, loving and faithful member of the staff, who had given herself to the work for King and Country.’

For some reason her death was not recorded as a war casualty, though Soldiers’ Effects record her death and her accrued pay was sent to her father. Official documents cite diabetes as the cause of her death. This resulted in her not being afforded a CWGC headstone or being included in the Roll of Honour. Work by the In From the Cold project helped to rectify this, and more than 100 years after she died, a CWGC headstone was erected at her burial place.  On 6 September 2017 a ceremony took place at Olive’s graveside commemorating her life.

There is an excellent description of the event on the CWGC website. Note the description beneath the image of Olive above: "Died on active service as the result of her too constant and strenuous work".

Olive’s father was living at 6 Home Park Avenue in 1921 when the census was taken and continued to live there until at least 1926. Her mother was with older sister Grace in Colchester visiting the Tooley family, interestingly describing herself as a widow.