With its goal finally accomplished, the high class of San Juan did its part to erase Enríquez's presence from the collective memory of Puerto Rico. His loyalty to the Crown was also ignored by the same authorities that he fervently served in life and his role in history eventually faded from the records. Throughout the following centuries Enríquez's work became fragmented, with the bulk remaining obscure. Locally, authors Salvador Brau, Arturo Morales Carrión and José Luis González played a role introducing him to Puerto Rican literature, while his figure was established within the education system by 1922's "Historia de Puerto Rico". Internationally, the early accounts of his life reflect their source, with British versions depicting him as a privateer while the Spanish ones describe his accomplishments. An example was published in 1940 by historian Jean O. McLachlan who lived in British India, who after revising the declarations of the South Sea Company's factors concluded that Enríquez "have been the most famous of the "guarda costas"" and that he "may have been a desperado". McLachlan contends that Enríquez was an ex-slave who got his fortune by "betraying a gentleman to the Inquisition" and used this to become a privateer. He then further goes on to claim that Enríquez was "given a gold medal and the title of Don […] as a result of giving presents to the royal officials and even to His Catholic Majesty". A direct contrast is established in the eleventh volume of "Historia general de España y América", a collaboration written by several professors of the University of Córdoba and the University of Seville detailing the history of Spain, which asserts that "all the Spanish corsairs, the most accomplished one was the Puerto Rican Miguel Henríquez", whom they describe as a "famous and feared [… mythological figure in the Caribbean" during his lifetime.