At the age of 22 she married draughtsman Philip Roy Bennett (1907–1986), converting from Roman Catholicism to the Church of England.
[3] It was here that Bennett also began her reputation for overcoming considerable logistical obstacles:[4] the site was located atop one of Petra's most inaccessible peaks, Umm al-Biyara, and all supplies had to be carried up to the summit by hand or else airlifted in by helicopter.
[2] She subsequently excavated the Edomite sites of Tawilan (1968–1970, 1982), near Petra, where Bennett discovered the first cuneiform tablet found in Jordan; Buseirah in southern Jordan (1971–1974, 1980), identified with the biblical Bozrah, the capital of the Edomite kingdom; and a number of mining sites around Wadi Dana and Wadi Faynan.
The Six Day War of 1967 and Israel's subsequent occupation of the West Bank, meant that Jerusalem was now separated from Bennett's preferred geographical area of Jordan.
[2][5] In the 1970 Queen's Birthday Honours, she was appointed Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) "for services to archaeology in Jordan and to Anglo-Jordanian relations".
[2] Bennett died of liver disease on 12 August 1987 at her home, Tolbury House, in Bruton, Somerset, England.