[3] Bent was appointed midshipman at the United States Naval Academy at age 16[4] and served in the U.S. Navy for the next 25 years, during which he became well versed in the science of oceanography.

He was serving under Commander James Glynn in Preble in 1849 when that brig sailed into Nagasaki, Japan, to secure the release of 18 shipwrecked American sailors imprisoned by the Japanese.

Bent was detailed to the Hydrographic Division of the United States Coast Survey, but resigned from the Navy on 25 April 1861 at the outbreak of the American Civil War, apparently because of Southern sympathies.

Bent served as Chairman of the St. Louis chapter of the Missouri Southern Relief Association, which raised funds to support widows of Confederate soldiers after the American Civil War.

[7] Bent served on the Board of Directors of an association which raised funds to erect a monument Sterling Price in St. Louis's Bellefontaine Cemetery.