Sir John Evans, K.CB. lv 
him in its ranks. For eight years, from 1866 onward, he was one of its 
secretaries until, in 1874, he was chosen to be its President. In 1880 he 
received its Lyell Medal “in recognition of his distinguished services to 
geological science, especially in the department of Post-Tertiary Geology.” 
For the last thirteen years he has been its Foreign Secretary—an office which 
he only resigned last February, when he found that his increasing feebleness 
of health prevented him from reeular attendance at the meetings of the 
Council. At the Society of Antiquaries, the Royal Numismatic Society, 
the Anthropological Institute, the British Association, and many other 
societies he has held the highest offices, and has for many years been a 
familiar and valued asscciate. 
Those who met him only at scientific meetings in London might naturally 
take him to be a denizen of the capital, entirely engrossed in the work of the 
various societies in which he played so prominent a part. In reality, his 
headquarters were always at his home, in Hertfordshire. Not only was he fully 
immersed in the conduct of the paper-making works at Nash Mills, but at 
the same time for many years he stood out as the most active and prominent 
public man in the county. He was appointed High Sheriff of Hertfordshire 
in 1881, and for some years he filled the offices of Chairman of Quarter 
Sessions and Chairman of the County Council. The friends and neighbours 
who chose him for these responsible positions, whether or not they could 
appreciate his reputation in the scientific world outside, knew him at home as 
a worthy county gentleman, more capable than most of them of grasping and 
directing business matters. The universal testimony of the authorities in 
Hertfordshire at the time of his death was a touching tribute to the influence 
which he exerted among them, to their high personal esteem for him, and to 
the great value of the services which he had, in many varied ways, rendered 
to his county. It was a fitting recognition of these great public services, as 
well as of his reputation as an antiquary and man of science, when his 
neighbour, Lord Salisbury, in 1892, asked Queen Victoria to confer on him 
the honour of K.C.B. 
Sir John Evans was married three times. His first wife, to whom allusion 
has already been made, left three sons and two daughters. One of these sons 
is the well-known explorer of Knossos, and now a Fellow of the Royal Society. 
The second wife, daughter of Mr. Joseph Phelps, died without children. 
Lady Evans, who survives her husband, is the daughter of Mr. Charles 
C. Lathbury, Wimbledon, and an accomplished classical scholar and antiquary. 
She has one daughter. 
Those who were privileged to know Sir John Evans in the intimacy of 
private life mourn the loss of a true friend and a charming companion. His 
advice, so often asked and so freely and cordially given, has been a guide to 
many who survive him, for his long experience of men and things gave to his 
judgment a clearness and decision which were eminently helpful. He would 
spare himself no effort actively to serve one in whom he took interest. His 
invariable courtesy of manner seemed to belong rather to the quiet stateliness 
