WIDOW AND YOUTH ELOPE.

Northland Age, Volume 2, Issue 2, 15 January 1930, Page 2

WIDOW AND YOUTH ELOPE.

MARRIED AT GRETNA GREEN. A widow of 27 and a youth of 18 were the parties to a romantic elopement which had a sequel in a wedding at Gretna Green. The story of the dramatic marriage was related by Richard Rennison, the blacksmith at the famous Gretna Green forge. The bride was Mrs. Annie Hurst Bates, and the bridegroom, Mr. Eric Murthen, of South Harrow. They ran away to Gretna, because the youthful “groom” could not get his parents to consent to the wedding. “The young couple,” said Mr. Rennison, “drove up to my forge in a car and said, “We want to be married.”

“I asked ‘A/hen?’ and they said, ‘Right here and now.’

“I asked them the usual questions, and got the usual ‘I will’ for an answer, and then they were man and wife.

“They said I must come and have tea with them, so the three of us jumped into the car, and .the bride drove us to Carlisle.” The youth met his wife for the first time a month ago at a party in Chelsea, where he was introduced to her by some of hts boy friends. Her late husband, Mr. Roger Bate, a Chester solicitor, died about two years ago. The bridegroom was employed at an Uxbridge printing wotks, which he joined on leaving school last summer.

Latterly Mis. Bates, who is an attractive woman, drove him to work regularly in her motor car. His parents made every effort to prevent a wedding taking place.