When Rockstar released Red Dead Redemption 2 back in 2018 few could have guessed that the world’s game would be so expansive that players would still be uncovering mysteries more than two years after its release. However, one Red Dead fan has gotten to the bottom of one strange story in the town of Annesburg: the deaths of the Bennett brothers.
The mystery of the Bennet brothers in Red Dead Redemption 2 is a master class in environmental storytelling, leading players from a family drama to a treasure hunt as they try to track down the truth. Here’s what happened to the brothers and how players can uncover the mystery themselves in game.
Three Brothers
The mystery of the Bennett brothers begins with a newspaper scrap which drops off of random Red Dead 2 NPCs out in the game’s world. The Bennett brothers newspaper scrap is from the New Hanover Gazette, August 12 1896 and reads “Brothers Slain in Bloody Murder Triangle.” It continues:
“Three brothers from the town of Annesburg in Roanoke Ridge are believed to be dead, reportedly murdered by their own hands. Friends of the family say the brothers, Gideon, Ira and Earl Bennet, were extremely close but had fallen out recently over some gold which each believed the other had stolen from them.”
To gain more information on the story players can head northeast of Bacchus Station, where they’ll run across a camper. The main reveals that he is from Mexico, but left after he was betrayed by his best friend, and now prefers the company of strangers. To make his point, he tells the tale of the Bennett brothers, who found gold before one stole it and ran off. He claims that the brother who stole the gold buried it by a spot marked with tree carvings but was followed there and killed by one of the other brothers. The story also grimly foreshadows the deterioration of Arthur's relationship with Dutch.
The Hunt for the Bennett Brothers' Gold
If players investigate the town of Annesburg itself they will find a clue hidden in the Annesburg coal mine. Carved into the wall is some writing which reads “North Bennet Flew/ North Bennett Flue/ Red Roof, Green Door/ Brothers I’ll be poor no more.”
If the player travels north they’ll come across the Reed Cottage. It has a red roof and a green door. This Red Dead 2 treasure map is hidden inside of the chimney: a flue is the name for a chimney’s channel to the outside. Inside of the cabin players can also find a photograph of the three brothers before their falling out.
The map guides the player to the northwest of the Elysian Pool in the Roanoake Ridge region of New Hanover, just south down the river from Annesburg itself. There the players can find a tree with an X carved into it. The instructions on the map tell them to take 20 steps north and 5 steps east, where the player can find the gold.
However, the story of this Red Dead mystery doesn’t end there. Players can find a bounty poster for Gideon Bennett in the world, which says that he was last seen on the outskirts of Butcher Creek, near where the treasure map leads. This means one of the brothers may still be alive, which makes sense – he could have killed the other two while searching for the gold, but without the map from the Reed Cottage he never would have been able to find it.
Red Dead Redemption 2 is available now for PC, PS4, Stadia, and Xbox One, with PS5 and Xbox Series X/S versions coming in 2021.