Enriqueta Augustina Rylands held in Kensington, London, on 6 October. The marriage was childless but two children were adopted: Arthur Forbes (a cousin of Enriqueta) and Maria Castiglioni. When John Rylands died in 1888, Enriqueta as the inheritor of most of his estate of £2,574,922 became a major shareholder of his family textile firm and in the Manchester Ship Canal. In memory of her husband, Enriqueta founded the John Rylands Library. She admired the design of Basil Champneys's library for Mansfield College, Oxford, and contracted him to develop something similar, on a more lavish scale. She secretly negotiated the purchase of the 2nd
Peter Rylands parliamentary by-election in Burnley, where he was re-elected in 1880 and 1885. When the Liberals split over the First Home Rule Bill, Rylands joined the breakaway Liberal Unionists, and was returned to the House of Commons at the 1886 general election as a Liberal Unionist. He held the seat until his death on 8 February 1887 at the age of 67. Rylands lived at Massey Hall, Thelwall which he left to the local authority for educational purposes. Rylands married twice. He had three sons by his second wife Caroline Reynolds, whom he married in 1861. His eldest son, the author