US Navy Art Collection:
Benton was deeply moved by the attack on Pearl Harbour in 1941, and shortly thereafter he completed "The Year of Peril," a series of grim and powerful war paintings financed by Abbott Laboratories. In 1943 he collaborated with Georges Schreiber in producing the Abbott Collection of Submarine Paintings, a project largely executed aboard the American submarine Dorado, which was later lost in action with all hands.
Later in the war, classified as a "camoufleur," Benton had to draw camouflaged ships that came into Norfolk harbour. His work was required for several reasons: to ensure that U.S. ship painters were correctly applying the camouflage schemes, to aid in identifying U.S. ships that might later be lost, and to have records of the ship camouflage of other Allied navies. Benton later said that his work for the Navy "was the most important thing, so far, I had ever done for myself as an artist."
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| (not dated) Barroom pen and ink with brown wash |
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| 1942 WWII Shipping Out |
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| 1943 Down the Lower Mississippi pen and ink wash |
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| 1943 Score Another for the Subs oil on board |
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| c1943 All Work pen and ink wash |
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| c1943 Loading the LST pen and ink wash |
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| c1943 Look Out Below pen and ink wash |
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| c1943 Preliminary Shake Down, New Orleans pen and ink wash |
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| c1943 Salt and Steel pen and ink wash |
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| c1943 This Way In pen and ink wash |
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| 1944 She's Off watercolour |
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| 1944 Stow Her Away Mates pen and ink wash |
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| 1944 WWII Back Him Up |
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| c1944 War Isn't All Mechanised pen and ink |
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| c1944 Battle Stations Submerged ink wash |
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| c1944 Bow Up pen and ink wash |
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| c1944 Coffee and Chow pen and ink wash |
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| c1944 Note Well pen and ink wash |
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| c1944 On the Old Ohio pen and ink wash |
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| c1944 (Unknown) pen and ink wash |
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| c1944 Slumber Deep watercolour |
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| c1944 Stern Task pen and ink wash |
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| c1944 This Way Out pen and ink wash |
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| c1944 Up Periscope oil on canvas |
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| c1944 Up the Hatch oil on pressboard |
