A SOLDIER'S SEARCH FOR A WIFE

Ashburton Guardian, Volume V, Issue 1571, 30 May 1887, Page 3

A SOLDIER'S SEARCH FOR A WIFE

Private William Hall, of the G4tfi Foot (North Staffordshire Regiment)', was •harged at West Bromwlch with being absent without leave from his regiment on the previous night. The prisoner is the man who some weeks ago wrote to the Chester board of guardians asking them If they could find him a wife. The letter found its way into the newspapers, and has brought Hall some 800 replies from all parts cf the country from young women willing to throw la their lot with him for better or worse. On Friday night the prlione'r absented himself from duty for the purpose of meeting one of the girls, with whom he had made an appointment at Stourbridge. This young woman wrote from Bromegrove, and stated that she was the daughter of a farmer, but added that her father wa« dead Be had, however, left her £120 m mocey, and Bhe was now getting a very good living, and raving a little, which she was puttiDg m the bank. Bhe was living m a house with a servant glrly bat «ho thought of petting married, m a good hnsVand would be useful to her to attend to the cows, and ehe wsb sure they oonld do well together. She was going totakeafarm In Gloucestershire, and DO one would know where they bad gone to. If he meant business and intended leaving the army, she would buy him out with her own money, if they liked each other ; but to be sure he would not make a fcol of her, the asked him to slhd her railway fare to Lichfield, and she would give it him back .when rhe met him. She enclosed her photograph, and rt quested him to tend his, so that she woold know him when they met. If be was true, he would Always have a good home with hor and a hard-working wife The sequel to all this romancing was that the prisoner was remanded m custody to await an atcort from his regiment;