Enriqueta Smail

Enriqueta Bokenham was born in Iquique, Peru in 1853, the daughter of Dr Frederick Bokenham and Maria (nee Tinajas). Frederick had trained as a doctor in England and had travelled to Peru where he met Maria Tinajas, from a wealthy Peruvian family that owned nitrate and silver mines. Enriqueta was the eldest of 5 children, all born in or near Iquique, a town which had developed largely due to the discovery of mineral riches, particularly the presence of large deposits of sodium nitrate in the Atacama Desert.

In 1862 Maria took the 4 oldest children to London to live with their Bokenham aunts and to be educated in England. Maria returned to London in 1868, in order to bring Enriqueta, now aged 15, back to Peru, but during their return trip there was a devastating earthquake and subsequent tsunami with its centre near to Iquique. The earthquake caused almost complete destruction in the southern part of Peru, resulting in an estimated 25,000 casualties including Enriqueta’s father. The tsunami drove three ships anchored in port nearly 800m inland.

Enriqueta married Arthur Tudor Humphreys Trevor, a doctor from Anglesey who was working in the Iquique area. Two children were born in 1879 and 1881. Enriqueta and Arthur Trevor had returned to the UK by 1883 and were living in Beaumaris, Anglesey, Arthur’s home town, where he practised as a doctor in partnership with a Dr Owen. Arthur died on April 25 1887 aged 42 after a long illness.

Enriqueta returned to South America with her children where in about 1889 she married John Isdale Smail, a Scottish merchant and director of a large nitrate company. John Smail said he would care for Enriqueta’s two children as if they were his own. The family soon returned to England but Enriqueta died on the 3rd March 1890 aged 38 from complications in pregnancy. Her brother William was the informant and was present at her death at Ernstein House which was a lodging house at 83 Mount Ephraim Tunbridge Wells.

In 1891 John Smail, his two stepchildren, their maternal grandmother Maria Bokenham and a governess were lodging in Bournemouth. John returned to Iquique on business in December 1898 with his stepdaughter Elizabeth, and both returned in early 1900. On the 9th January 1901 John Smail married Laura Caroline Trevor, the niece of Arthur Tudor Humphreys Trevor, Enriqueta’s first husband. John Smail died in January 1916 at his mansion Warren Wood, Hayes, Kent a house of over 20 rooms. His estate was valued at £150,265 (approx £10m in today’s value).

Enriqueta’s grave stands in an impressive double plot with a cross beautifully carved with lily of the valley symbolising humility and purity. Her time in Tunbridge Wells was fleeting and the rest of her family are buried elsewhere.