contributor: Gloria A. Olson

Oconto Reporter, 
January 1910. Died on January 14, 1910  

PIONEER IS NO MORE
John Matravers One Oldest Residents County Dead
RESIDED HERE 55 YEARS
Settled on Homestead Where He Died 54 Years Ago--
Civil War Veteran

John Matravers was born in Sommersetshire, England, April 10, 1827, and was a son of Philip and Eliza (Sweetland) Matravers, also natives of England. He was married April 12, 1854, at St. Heller's, Isle of Jersey, on the Channel Islands, off the coast of France, to Miss Matilda Clark. After their marriage Mr. and Mrs. Matravers crossed the Atlantic to American and took up their residence in Oconto County. Mr. Matravers was employed in the mills of Oconto and surrounding towns until in 1855 he purchased a tract of timber land of 53 acres, built a log cabin and began clearing the property and making a home for himself and family, where he has since resided.

He was a man of remarkable constitution, due largely, undoubtedly to his abstinence from the use of liquor and tobacco, together with the simple life that his earlier surroundings necessitated. Strong in his faith in God he has lived a faithful and consistent Christian life having united at an early age with the Methodist church in which he served His Master as a loyal member. Upon the organization of the First Presbyterian church of Couillardville he was elected an elder, in which capacity he served this church until his death.

During the civil war he manifested his loyalty to the government by enlisting at Chicago on January 6, 1865 as a member of the Thirty-ninth Ill. V. I., of the First Division, First Brigade, 24th Army Corps. He was mustered in to service at Springfield, Ill., and then went to Camp Distribution, near Washington, D.C., where he remained until the opening of spring. The regiment then marched to Deep Bottom, near Richmond, and participated in the battle of Hatzhez Run, after which the went to Appomattox court house, being there stationed at the time of Lee's surrender. He was honorably discharged in September 1865, and at once retuned to his farm at Oconto.

Since the death of his wife in July, 1906, he has been very lonely and has often expressed the desire to "depart and be with Christ' which he knew to be far better. During this time he has gradually failed in health and when a short time before his death he took to his bed it was belt by all that he could not long survive. During the last few hours he did not regain consciousness at all, and when the end came it was like the burning out of a candle or going to sleep of a tired child.

Mr. Matravers was the father of a large family, all of whom live in the immediate neighborhood; Edward, Matilda wife of Samuel Couillard; Mary Ann, wife of Edward Couillard, Amber, wife of Edmund Classon, Grant, Hugh, Yarwood, who lives upon the old homestead, and Martha, wife of John Porterfield.

The funeral was held from the First Presbyterian church of Couillardville, January 17, with pastor, Geo. V. R. Sheppard, officiating, with interment in the family lot in Evergreen cemetery. Six of his grandsons, Guy and James Couillard, Harvey, Herbert and Arthur Matravers and Asa Couillard, acted as pallbearers. The large number present, in spite of the inclement weather was a testimony to the high esteem in which he was held in the community in which he has resided for 55 years.