AN UNUSUAL WEDDING.

South Canterbury Times, Issue 2465, 11 February 1881, Page 2

AN UNUSUAL WEDDING.

A wedding took place During November last year in Virginia under somewhat peculiar circumstances. The bridegroom, who rejoiced in the highsounding name of Marcus dcLayfeyette Hawley, was under sentence of death for shooting the man who had evicted him from his holding in Poor Mountain in June last. The bride, a Miss Nannie Hawkins, was the mother of two of his children and it was to fulfil his promise to their mother that the wedding took place two days before the execution. In the graphic words of the “New York Herald,” “ the bridal chamber was the prison cell, his attire the black habiliments prepared for his execution, and his bride a veritable bride of death 1 ” During the ceremony, which was performed by a minister of the Protestant Episcopal Church, the bridegroom was permitted to have his hands free, but the irons were not removed from his feet. After the wedding he made a profession of faith, was baptised, and received iuto the Church. The newlymarried couple were separated immediately after the wedding. Next day they had an affecting interview of half an hour, and the day after the bridegroom was hanged. While on the trapdoor “ his last dying speech and confession ” were read by the clergyman, after which “ the minister placed his hand on the doomed man’s head, invoked a blessing on him, and bade him good-bye, Hawley kissing him on the check.”. A moment after the trap was sprung, and Hawley was launched iuto eternity. He was probably the first American citizen who has been married, baptized, and hanged in the brief space of two days.