Pte 94178 John Hollas Mathews

 

By 1901 they have moved to 21 Slade Street, Northwich. His father John H. is aged 49 and is a saddler, mother Elizabeth R. is 45.. They have seven children at home; Sidney J. 22 railway locomotive cleaner, Herbert P. 21 also a railway locomotive cleaner, William is 18 and a domestic groom, John H. 12, Jessie 11, Harold 9 and Stanley 3.

The 1911 Census finds them at 26 Ollershaw Lane, Marston, with five sons at home.  His father, 58, is a saddler, doing odd work. His mother is 55. His parents advise that they have been married for 34 years and have had 9 children, 5 of whom are still in the household; John is 22, single, and a general labourer (casual). His older brothers Sidney, 31, and William, 28, are railway engine stokers, Harold, 17, is a shop assistant and Stanley, 13, is at school.

John married Annie Poole in St. Paul’s, Marston, in 1912. Their daughter Phyllis was born on 29th January 1913, followed by a son Sydney on 23rd September 1916.

He enlisted in Northwich and was formerly Private 244804, in the Cheshire Regiment before transferring to The King's Liverpool Regiment.

His father died in the June quarter of 1917, aged 64.

The Chester Chronicle of 01st December 1917 reported the marriage of his sister Jessie  who married Lance Corporal John Hughes of the Royal Defence Corps.

John Hollas Matthews was serving in the 17^th Battalion as Private No 94178 when he was killed in action on the 28^th March, 1918, aged 29, during the German Spring Offensive. 

The Battalion diary gives an insight into the events of the day:

28^th March 1918

FOLIES – MEZIERES – ROUVREL

10.00am Enemy attacked our immediate front but was driven off – Half an hour later enemy was seen in large numbers through ROUVROY to WARVILLERS. About 11 am orders were received that the Battalion would be relieved by 133^rd French Division. The relief was carried out shortly after noon, after a message had been received by telephone that the French were satisfied with the position and that we were to withdraw at once.  

4pm The enemy were then in BEAUFORT. The Battalion assembled at MEZIERES and marched to ROUVREL to billets arriving about 6.30pm.

John has no known grave and is commemorated on the Pozieres Memorial in France.

The POZIERES MEMORIAL relates to the period of crisis in March and April 1918 when the Allied Fifth Army was driven back by overwhelming numbers across the former Somme battlefields, and the months that followed before the Advance to Victory, which began on 8 August 1918. The Memorial commemorates over 14,000 casualties of the United Kingdom and 300 of the South African Forces who have no known grave and who died on the Somme from 21 March to 7 August 1918.

The cemetery and memorial were designed by W.H. Cowlishaw, with sculpture by Laurence A. Turner. The memorial was unveiled by Sir Horace Smith-Dorrien on 4 August 1930.

The amount of the War Gratuity suggests that he served for about six months before he was killed, enlisting or being conscripted in about September 1917. His father died in the months before.

 

His daughter was 5 and his son 18 months old when John was killed.

 

His youngest brother Stanley served as Private 32585, in the 15th Lancs Fusiliers, and was killed on 02nd December 1917, age 19. He, like John, was not found, and is commemorated on the Memorial to the Missing at Tyne Cot.

 

His widow, Annie, living at 25 Ollershaw Lane, Marston, Chester, was awarded a pension of £1-5s-5d a week from October 1918.  She received John’s Army effects, including a War Gratuity of £3.  John’s mother and siblings live at number 24.  His mother died in 1920.

 

Annie lost not only her husband, and brother in law, but two of her brothers in the war:  Walter Poole, age 21, on 14th November 1916 whilst in training with the Army Service Corps. He is buried at St Paul's Churchyard, Marston, John attended his funeral. Also James Poole on 29th October 1917,  serving with the 1/6th Battalion, Cheshire Regiment when aged 19. His body was not recovered and his name is recorded on the Tyne Cot Memorial in Belgium..

 

Annie remarried in 1919.

In 1939 Annie, 48, now Lloyd and again widowed, is living at 25 The Crescent, Northwich, with son Sydney, 23.  Phyllis is married, and living in Crewe.

 

Both Annie and Sydney died in 1976.  His daughter Phyllis died in 2001.

 

John and his brother Stanley are commemorated on the following memorials -

Marston Memorial

Cheshire Roll of Honour

And on the website MarstonLads.com