Born Martin Vonier in Ringschnait near
Biberach an der Riss,
Württemberg on 11 November 1875 (the feast of
Martin of Tours). He came from a large family that had emigrated to Württemberg from the
Tyrol. His father was a farmer, who also ran a brickworks. After a few years, the family moved to
Rissegg, where Martin attended the local school and became an altar boy. In 1882, monks from the
Abbey of la Pierre-qui-Vire, who had been exiled from France, purchased the site of a former monastery near
Buckfastleigh in Devon. In 1888, Vonier was one of the youths recruited for the new
abbey at Buckfast. The boys were first sent to a school in
Beauvais run by the
Holy Ghost Fathers in order to learn French. They arrived at Buckfast in the summer of 1889. He was professed the following year, and ordained in 1898 by bishop
Charles Maurice Graham. In 1900, he was sent to study at
St. Anselmo's in Rome, where he received a doctorate in philosophy. In November 1905, Vonier was sent back to St. Anselmo's to teach philosophy. He was returning the following summer in the company of Buckfast's abbot,
Boniface Natter, when their ship, the
SS Sirio, was shipwrecked off the Spanish coast. Natter and Vonier ministered to the steerage passengers in the ensuing chaos. Dom Natter was among the many who drowned. When news of the sinking reached the Community at Buckfast it was believed that both Abbot and Vonier had perished and Requiem Masses were said for the repose of their souls. However, Vonier was saved by a fishing vessel. On 14 September 1906 Vonier was elected by the community to succeed Boniface as the second abbot of Buckfast. He was thirty-one years old. Dom Vonier decided to rebuild the abbey church on the site of the original Cistercian church. The foundation stone was laid in January 1907. He died on 26 December 1938 at Buckfast Abbey, and was buried there four days later. == Work ==