Matthew nathan purchased the Manor House, West Coker, near Yeovil, in 1907. His earliest known ancestor of whom we have any record was his great-great-grandfather, who is supposed to have come to this country from Dessau in Germany in about 1725.

This man's second son, Myer Nathan (1734–1811), was in business as a cutter of quill pens; the quills were purchased, in lots of 20,000 and over, from the Hudson's Bay Company, and there remain in the possession of the family the originals of receipted bills dated 1759 and 1760. According to contemporary editions of the Post Office Directory, Nathan and Sons, quill merchants, carried on business at 45 Mansell Street, Whitechapel, E.C., and the last entry of the firm is that in the directory for 1831.

Matthew Nathan's father was Jonah Nathan (1810–86), the third child of Nathaniel Nathan (1760–1850). At about the time he arrived at manhood various changes and improvements were taking place in the manufacture of writing implements, the most important of these being the substitution of steel pens for quill pens. So the Mansell Street House of Nathan and Sons ceased to exist and the latest-joined of the sons went into that of Thomas de la Rue and continued in it for the greater part of his life, becoming eventually the senior partner.