Willie Nelson is one of the most written-about figures in American country music. His career, his marriages, his music, and his personal life have been covered in books, interviews, and documentaries for decades. Yet the woman he married first — before the fame, before the records, before the long road — remains largely outside the public record.
Her name was Martha Matthews. She was Willie Nelson’s first wife, and she was the mother of three of his children. Beyond that, confirmed public information about her is limited. This article covers what is reliably known about her life, her marriage to Nelson, the family they built together, and what sources report about her later years and death.
Who Martha Matthews Was
Martha Matthews was not a public entertainer. She was not an industry figure or a performer. Her connection to public life comes entirely from her marriage to Willie Nelson and her role as the mother of three of his children.
Some sources identify her full name as Martha Jewel Matthews. IMDb lists her birth date as April 3, 1936, and gives Corsicana, Texas, as her birthplace. That said, IMDb is a secondary database, and those details should be treated as reported rather than independently confirmed.
Little verified information exists about her family background, education, or occupation. Major entertainment profiles mention her mainly in the context of Nelson’s personal history. Her story is that of someone whose life intersected with a famous person — well documented in relation to that connection, but largely private beyond it.
It is also worth noting that Martha Matthews is a fairly common name. Any details tied to her should be understood in the specific context of her connection to Willie Nelson — the Texas background, the 1952 marriage, the three children, and the reported 1989 death.
Her Marriage to Willie Nelson
Martha Matthews and Willie Nelson married in 1952. Published accounts generally report that Nelson was 19 at the time and Matthews was 16. This was a historical marriage, and those ages are reported here as factual context rather than as something unusual for the era.
The marriage came during a formative period in Nelson’s life. He had recently left the U.S. Air Force following a back injury and was working to find his footing as a young adult. At the time of the wedding, he had not yet achieved national recognition or commercial success in country music. That would come years later.
The two were married for approximately ten years. They divorced in 1962. The 2023 Paramount+ documentary Willie Nelson & Family revisited this period of his life and drew renewed public attention to the early marriage, including some personal recollections from Nelson himself.
The reasons behind the divorce are not fully established in the public record. Some accounts describe difficulties during the marriage, but it would be an overreach to reduce a decade-long relationship to a single explanation.
Their Three Children
One of the most consistently confirmed parts of Martha Matthews’ public record is the family she and Nelson had together. The couple had three children: daughters Lana and Susie, and a son, William “Billy” Hugh Nelson Jr.
These children were born and raised during the years when Nelson was still building his career, well before his breakthrough as a major country artist. Their early years unfolded in a household far removed from the spotlight that would later surround their father.
The three children are confirmed across multiple sources, including Yahoo Entertainment, CNN/KESQ fast facts on Willie Nelson, and Hollywood Life. This is one area of Martha Matthews’ biography that does not require much qualification — it is well established.
Tragically, Billy Nelson died in 1991, two years after his mother’s reported death. That loss is a part of the family’s broader history, though the personal details surrounding it remain private.
The Divorce and Willie Nelson’s Later Marriages
Matthews and Nelson divorced in 1962 after ten years of marriage. The following year, in 1963, Nelson married Shirley Collie. He would go on to marry twice more — Connie Koepke and then Annie D’Angelo, to whom he remains married.
Placing Matthews in this sequence helps clarify her role in Nelson’s life. She was his first wife, the woman he married as a young man before his career took shape, and the mother of three of his seven children. She was not a professional collaborator, a career manager, or a figure in his music industry life.
Her significance is personal and familial. The family she and Nelson started together is a real and documented part of his history, even if her own biography beyond that marriage is not widely known.
What Happened to Martha Matthews After the Divorce
This is where the public record becomes thin. Verified information about Matthews’ life after 1962 is sparse. Major entertainment profiles about Willie Nelson mention her in the context of his early life but do not offer a detailed independent account of her later years.
Some genealogy-style sources and secondary databases suggest that Matthews later married twice more — a man named Mickey Scott and then Charlie Andrews. These details appear in sources like IMDb and certain biographical pages, but they are not consistently documented in major reporting. They should be understood as records-based information rather than confirmed biography.
It is also reasonable to simply note that Matthews appears to have lived a private life after the divorce. There is no evidence in the public record that she sought public attention or maintained a public profile. Many relatives of famous people live this way, and the absence of information is not itself a story.
Her Reported Death in 1989
Several published sources report that Martha Matthews died in 1989 at the age of 53. Liver failure is listed as the cause of death in multiple entertainment profiles, including coverage from Yahoo Entertainment and Hollywood Life.
IMDb provides a more specific date — November 29, 1989 — and identifies Austin, Texas, as the location of her death. As with her birth details, these specifics come from a secondary database rather than a primary record, so they are worth noting with that caveat in mind.
Her son Billy Nelson died in 1991, two years later. The proximity of those losses is part of the family’s history during that period, though it would be speculative to draw conclusions about how any individual family member experienced them.
For readers doing their own research, Alpha Business Daily is a useful reference point for understanding how to evaluate secondary sources when researching public figures and their families.
Why So Little Is Known About Her
Martha Matthews was not a celebrity. She did not record music, appear in films, or give interviews. Her name became searchable primarily because genealogical databases, celebrity-family articles, and documentaries connect her to Willie Nelson’s early life.
This is a pattern familiar to anyone who has researched the relatives of famous people. The connection is well documented. The person’s own life — their work, their routines, their inner world — often is not. That gap is not unusual, and it does not mean she was unimportant. It simply reflects how public records and entertainment journalism tend to work.
The strongest, most reliable picture of Martha Matthews is this: she was a young woman from Texas who married Willie Nelson in 1952, raised three children with him over the course of a decade, divorced in 1962, and lived outside the public eye for the rest of her life. She reportedly died in 1989.
A Final Note on What the Record Confirms
To summarize what is reliably established about Martha Matthews:
- She was Willie Nelson’s first wife, married in 1952 and divorced in 1962.
- She and Nelson had three children: Lana, Susie, and Billy.
- IMDb lists her birth as April 3, 1936, in Corsicana, Texas — attributed to that database rather than a primary record.
- Multiple entertainment sources report her death in 1989 at age 53, with liver failure as the listed cause.
- Her life after the divorce is largely undocumented in major public sources.
What is not established — her occupation, her family of origin, her personality, her role in Nelson’s career — should not be invented or assumed. The honest answer to many questions about Martha Matthews is that the public record simply does not go that far.
She was Willie Nelson’s first wife. She was the mother of Lana, Susie, and Billy Nelson. That much is clear, and it is enough to give her a place in the story of one of country music’s most enduring careers.
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