John Mark Frederick Smith

Sir John Mark Frederick Smith, KH (1790–1874) was a British general and colonel-commandant of the Royal Engineers. He was also the Conservative Member of Parliament for Chatham from 1852 to 1853 and 1857 to 1865. He was a Gentleman Usher and Fellow of the Royal Society.

He was son of Major-general Sir John Frederick Sigismund Smith, K.C.H., of the Royal Artillery (died 1834), and grand-nephew of Field-marshal Friedrich Adolf, Count von Kalckreuth, commander-in-chief of the Prussian army. He was born at the Manor House, Paddington, Middlesex, on 11 January 1790. After passing through the Royal Military College, then at Great Marlow, and the Royal Military Academy, Woolwich, Smith received a commission as second lieutenant in the royal engineers on 1 December 1805, and in January 1806 joined his corps at Chatham.

In 1807 Smith went to Sicily. He served in 1809 under Major-general Sir Alexander Bryce, the commanding royal engineer of the force of Sir John Stuart, at the siege and capture of the castle of Ischia and at the capture of Procida in the Bay of Naples. He also took part, in the same year, in the capture of the islands of Zante and Kephalonia under Major-General Frederick Rennell Thackeray, commanding Royal Engineer of the force of Sir John Oswald. Smith was deputy-assistant quartermaster-general and senior officer of the quartermaster-general's department under Sir Hudson Lowe in 1810, in the battle before Santa Maura. He resigned his staff appointment in order to serve as an engineer officer in the trenches during the siege of Santa Maura under Oswald, the only engineer officer in addition to Thackeray and himself, Captain Parker having been wounded. The deficiency of engineer officers threw on Smith most of the executive work of the siege. He was mentioned in Sir John Oswald's despatches, and some years afterwards an effort was unsuccessfully made to get him a brevet majority for his services at Santa Maura.

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