NOVELIST'S ROMANCE.

King Country Chronicle, Volume XXI, Issue 2260, 20 April 1926, Page 7

NOVELIST'S ROMANCE.

A. S. M. HUTCHINSON WEDS

CEREMONY KEPT SECRET. DREAD OF PUBLICITY. After being regarded for long as a confirmed bachelor, Mr A. S. M. Hutchinson, author of "If Winter Comes,'' and other immensely popular novels, surprised his friends in February by marrying and departing for a honeymoon abroad. The affair was carried out with the greatest secrecy, for Mr Hutchineson has always shunned the public gaze. He and his wife left England when the marriage became known. The bride was Miss Una Rosamjnd Bristow-Gapper, of Harrow. Their first meeting was a sequel to a letter which Miss Bristow-Gapper wrote to Mr Hutchinson about one of his novels. Only the nearest relatives of the bride and bridegroom—Miss BristowGapper's mother and sister, and Mr Hutchinson's sister, Yere, who has herself made a reputation as a novelist— and one old friend of Mr Hutchinson, were present at the wedding, which took place at Christ Church, Westminster. A WRITER OF SONGS. The bride is described as a charming, pretty, and very clever girl of 23. She is gifted musically and poetically, and several of her songs, ol which she composed both words and music, have been incorporated in musical plays. In a recent season of the Co-Optimists she wrote a song which was sung by Miss Betty Chester. "It is,a very charming and romantic marriage," said Mrs Brisiow-Gappvr, mother of the bride, to a newspaper representative after the wedding. "Mr Hutchinson and my daughter have known each other for many years and have been extremely fond of each other. Their tastes in literary and artistic matters generally are very much alike. They were both anxious to keep the wedding a secret until, at any rale, they got out of the country, as they have so many friends and admirers.

Mr Hutchinson kept the secret of his marriage even from those with whom lie had the closest business relations. "He telephoned us," said a representative of his literary agents, "and stated that he was going abroad to-day. Your intimation is the first 1 have had of his marriage. 1 would never have dreamed of sucb a thing as I have always regarded Mr Hutchinson as a confirmed bachelor."

If is expected that the couple will be six months away, and that they will visit America.

liver since the meteoric success of "If Winter Comes," Mr Hutchinson, always a vet\\ shy and retiring man, even in the days when he was almost unknown as an author, has become more and more reserved. FLED FROM POPULARITY. He has been known 10 explain lo friends when entertaining them at the Royal Automobile Club, that he chose that club because it was so large that lie could move about there unknown and unrecognised. He was devoted to his mother, who was an invalid, and until her death last year .-pent a great deal of time with her .

AI one time lie Hod from popularity In Palma de Majorca, in the Balearic Islands, where he stayed with an old friend, Mr 11. C. Shelley, a former London journalist: and the sequel U) that visit was sen the other day, when Mr Shelley's hook on .Majorca appealed with a'preface by A. S. M. HutchSOTI.