East Africa & Rhodesia - 26/8/54 - Mr John Berkley-Matthews, chairman and managing director of Kikuyu Estates Ltd., Kenya, and proprietor of the Sigona Golf Club and an adjacent inn about 10 miles from the city boundary of Nairobi on the main road to Nakuru, was shot and killed by Mau Mau terrorists last Thursday evening. Born in 1901 in County Durham, he was educated at Wellington College and Cambridge University, and then called to the Bar. He went to Kenya in 1928 as managing director of BEA Wattle Estates and Extract Co. Ltd., a private company of which his father was chairman; later the factory was sold to the Forestal Land, Timber and Railways Co. Ltd. Then he registered Kikuyu Estates Ltd. To grow wattle and pyrethrum (being one of the pioneers of the crop in Kenya) and run a herd of high-grade Jersey cattle. In 1938 he laid out the Sigona golf course. During the last war he served with the East Africa Reconnaisance Regiment as an armoured car troop leader in the Northern Frontier Province of Kenya, Somalia, Ethiopia, Ceylon and India.

Pioneers - Wattle - Black wattle was first grown to supply wood fuel to the railway. Later it was grown mainly for the sake of its bark, which contains tannin. A tannin extract factory was built by Mr Berkeley-Matthews in 1929 near Sigona Golf Club.

Carnelley - Naivasha - Berkley Mathews who also owned Sigona Golf Course.

Gazette 30 Nov 1954 probate

EAS 26 Aug 1954  He was secretary of the Sigona Golf Club near Nairobi. He was shot dead by a gang of about about 10 terrorists, who entered the club building by the kitchen, bearing Home Guard armlets. The kitchen staff put up some resistance before it was overpowered. One of them was struggling with an armed gangster when the gun fired, injuring its owner. Hearing the shot, Mr Matthews went to the door and fired at the gang with a pistol, without success. He was then shot. They ransacked the premises, taking a pistol, a shotgun, and money from the till. They visited the house of an Asian clerk but did not enter it. The gang left about an hour later after having had drinks. As soon as they had gone the servants communicated with the police, who made a search with tracker dogs for the culprits, in the course of which two terrorists were killed and 2 wounded. The search continues. Several of the caddies have been detained. Mrs Matthews, who returned to this country on leave a few months ago and was due to return in about a month's time, is in Howick. Their 13- year- old son has been at school in England for some years.