Enriqueta Rylands (VPH.309.15)
Enriqueta Rylands – her story
Enriqueta Augustina Tennant was born in Cuba in 1843. Her mother's family owned a sugar plantation there and her father was an English merchant in Havana. Enriqueta spent her childhood in Cuba, New York, Paris and England. Her parents both died suddenly - her father in 1848 and her mother in 1855.
Enriqueta came to Manchester when she was about twenty. She worked as a companion to Martha, the second wife of the cotton magnate John Rylands. Enriqueta cared for Martha until her death in February 1875. John and Enriqueta were married in London eight months later. John and Enriqueta had no children of their own, but adopted a son and a daughter. John died in 1888, leaving his fortune to his widow.
Over the next twenty years Enriqueta worked tirelessly to establish The John Rylands Library. Enriqueta was 65 when she died in 1908.
“There is truly a great deal of romance in the story of Miss Tennant”
JRL/7/7/2 Cuttings Book, 1889-1908 p. 111: Manchester Courier 5 February 1908
