GRETNA GREEN MARRIAGES

Hokitika Guardian, 17 May 1929, Page 2

GRETNA GREEN MARRIAGES

Jt is surprising that clandestine marriages -at, Grtetna Green. should have continued for so long in spite ol Irerpient attempts to get them abolished. Mr. Id,: Day, the Labour member for Southwark Central, has again called attention to the matter in the II on so of Commons, by suggesting- a .commission to inquire.-into the whole question of marriages ' under Scottish' law. Gretna Green is in Dumfrieshire, on the border of England and Scotland. Alter the abolition of Fleet marriages by Lord Hardwncke’s Act in 1754 English persons, wishing to marry clandestinely had to got out of England, to which alone that Act bad reference. Thus the practice arose of crossing the border into Scotland, where Gretna Green was the first village reached. The officiating “clergyman ” was generally a blacksmith, hut he might he anyone and was sometimes the 'leiryman or the tollkceper. His fee ranged from half a guinea to £IOO, and the “ church ” was generally the toll-house though later Gretna Hall was used. At the tollhouse seven hundred couples were sometimes united in a twelvemonth. These marriages were a source of great profit, and every effort to get them declared invalid was stoutly , resisted. In 1856 a considerable blow was struck by a law which declared that all these marriages would lie invalid unless one of the parties had been residing in Scotland lor tluee weeks previously. According to Scottish law any man and woman taking eac h other for husband and wife before witnesses are legally married, and ordination is not needful in the celebrant. lint it became the custom at Gretna Green for one individual to have the monopoly, and lie used bis own form of service and kept a register of the names. For a long time that was called the “priesthood” was in the Lning family, but the precenfc officiating celebrant is a .Mr Harry Smith, who was formerly a billiard marker at Lerwick. From figures given by Millay it appears that there 215 marriages contracted at Greetna Green last year, of which only 18 were registered. The Solicitor-General for Scotland admitted there were many irregular marriages not only at Gretna Green but also at many other places. He said he was considering the question of an lnnuirv, and possibly this historic place which has witnessed so many runaway niatches will shortly lie shorn ol its importance and become a quiet village again.