Smith CJ – Appendix 2

This page should be read in conjunction with the account of CJ Smith’s life.

At some unknown date Charles’ sister Henrietta left New Zealand and travelled to England and, according to papers deposited in the Wiltshire archives, entered into an inappropriate relationship with Major Edward Mairis R.M. As a result of their behaviour Henrietta, or Miss Quetta Maude, alias Maud Smith, was arrested as a spy under the Defence of the Realm Act (D.O.R.A).

Dr. & Mrs. Yorke-Trotter, described as friends and champions of Miss Quetta Maude, firmly believed in her innocence and were apparently “keeping her” at that time.

Within the forty odd deposited papers and telegrams is a fascinating ten-page report, dated 26 December 1917, concluding the investigation that eventually cleared Henrietta’s name.

Charles was described in the report as “a plain spoken little soldier” who was outraged that his sister had been imprisoned with prostitutes in Holloway Prison and treated in such an outrageous manner. He also threatened, “that if justice was not done he will know the reason why or “he will fill up someone with lead”.

Relevant highlights from the report are that Henrietta/Quetta had previously claimed, when questioned, to be aged 28, (so born in 1889 not 1880), and that she had been born on a yacht at sea and therefore did not have a birth certificate. She said there had been a mystery about her birth that she could not untangle and suggested that she was the illegitimate daughter of an English peer. Her ‘foster’ mother was Mrs. Smith of Auckland, New Zealand who allowed her, or paid her, £10 a month. A witness, Mr. Large, added that his mother and Mrs. Smith were old friends and that he remembered Mrs. Smith bringing a baby girl in to the room and saying she was a new sister to her sons, he thought the baby, who was named Maude Smith, had been adopted by Mrs. Smith.

Charles was then questioned about his true relationship with Henrietta:

“You speak of your sister. You mean half-sister surely?”
“Yes”, he said “My half-sister.”
“May I enquire if she is the child of your father?”
He hesitated a moment and said “Yes.”
Then said I “As she is obviously younger than you she would be illegitimate?”
He coloured “No, I have made a mistake, She is the daughter of my mother.”

Within the report was also the question of the true relationship between Charles’ sister and Mrs. Yorke-Trotter who Quetta kept referring to as “Godmother”. The writer of the report wrote, ‘I believe no such relationship exists between them’. It had been uncovered that sometime earlier Quetta, Mrs. Yorke-Trotter and Edward Mairis had been disciples of an American philosopher who came to London under the name of Almoyiran Jones or some such name. He started a new occult religion in London, one of whose tenets was ‘From Pain and Passion to Grace’. So unsavoury was the American and his religious rites, that the police deported him and confiscated his ‘vulcanite instruments’.

The rest of the report concerns the relationship between Quetta and Major Edward Mairis R.M. and their possible threat to the Nation, and bears little connection with Charles’ story.