[3] When the family properties in London were sold around 1632, Richard and Thomas used their share to purchase lands near Babraham in Cambridgeshire, [4] Humphrey to buy the manor of Shalden, in Hampshire.

[7] Bennet was part of the force led by Hopton instructed to march into Hampshire and Sussex; this would threaten London from the south, and close the iron foundries that produced most of Parliament's artillery.

[8] Although the advance was delayed until late October, the Royalists quickly occupied much of Hampshire and Sussex; however, by seeking to hold every town Hopton left his troops isolated and unable to support each other.

Appointed governor of Bishop's Waltham, Bennet was also ordered to hold Romsey and on 12 December his regiment was attacked and scattered by a detachment from the Parliamentarian garrison in Southampton.

[9] It was reformed in time to fight at the Battle of Cheriton in March 1644, a defeat which "necessitated his Majesty to alter the scheme of his affairs and replace an offensive with defensive war".

Defeat at Naseby in June reduced the Royalist presence outside South West England to a few isolated garrisons and on 28 September, a detachment of the New Model Army under Oliver Cromwell besieged Winchester.

He continued to engage in Royalist conspiracies during the Interregnum, while Thomas Bennet had his estates confiscated in 1651 for his part in a plot initiated by Eusebius Andrews, executed in August 1650.

[16] In 1653, Bennet was forced to sell Shalden to his nephew John Lewkenor; as one of the ‘Action party’ of Royalist conspirators, he was arrested in 1655 for his role in co-ordinating the failed Penruddock uprising.