PEERS' ROMANCES.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LIII, Issue 16408, 9 December 1916, Page 2 (Supplement)

PEERS' ROMANCES.

YOUTHFUL BRIDES. - — jglj ARISTOCRACY AND THE STAGE,' SI Viscount Uffixctox, who iccently wedded at 19 a youthful bride of similar Si age, is not the only member of the peajft||; age who has made an early marriage, - ik; In fact his own father, the present. Lord f| Craven, took for his bride a schoolgirl o* 16, the daughter of Mr. Bradley Martin* the well-known American millionaire, ItV-S has* been said that Lady Craven only Dnt up her hair on the day of her marriage W* And, as a rule, these early marriage*. ".ij amongst members of the aristocracy tiimiPflP out very well, indeed, thus belying" , n their ca*e, at all events, the truth, of* the ancient proverb which says that "a vounz man married is a young man ift The first Earl of Kimberley, for instance the father of the present Lord Kimberley ' J if attained his majority and wedded the • beautiful young daughter of Lord Clare in the same, year, and their married life wag '" 4 "V j a long and exceptionally happy one. rh« i late Earl Spencer, half-brother of the pre. j sent carl, was a married man at twenty, two. Lord Armstrong, the famous inven. % tor and multi-millionaire, married at 24 " The late Lord Salisbury, then an ob. ''•% scure younger son with small means, and 4 almost less prospects, had the temeritr •& to wed at 27, although he had to take h« girl-wife to a poor house in the purlieus slof the Strand. . Lord Lansdowne married |at 24. Viscount Stuart, the son and heif iof the Earl of Castlestewart. who warfSp?- ! killed in the present war. was 23 at thJStfe ; time of his marriage: and Captain theffi® : Hon. Kenneth Kimutird. Lord Kinnaird's' ? - ; son and heir, who fell fighting in Franca tf- ' | soon after the war broke out. was the Sf: ; same age when he took to wife Frances •- i Victoria, youngest daughter of the late T S " I H. Clifton, of Lytham Hall, Lancashire. * Belle Bilton. . Then, again, there was the famous, cassitfc' of the Earl of Clancartyor _ Viscount) 58 ; Dunlo, as he was at the time of his jna?4 riage whose espousal of Miss Belle Bilton;, a music hal! artist, created so big a sen! sation in 1889. jw|§! The pair, who were only Just turned 21, walked into the Hampstead registry ] office, and were made man and wife with- Jd§ lout more ado. Afterwards Lord Clancarty i tried hard to get the wedding between tins ; ■ ! " silly boy and girl," as he termed the|§B§ : young couple, dissolved, but without avaiL ; | Lord Dunlo went into the witness-box ~ ! and testified that- he loved his wife," wd'i did not wish to be seDarated from her -Si: and that was the end of the matter. . * After a similar fashion the present Ear! of Orknev was'wedded, in 1892. to Mm* Vi Connie Gilchrist, the Gaiety " star," and lat the time the most be-photographed I woman in London. Miss Gilchrist. wasaS% : born in a street adjoining- Camden Road, and had followed by turns the calling oJJB|S a pantomime "fairy," artist $ model,mnsidSS hall " serio," and burlesque actress. - Pha earl was barely 25 at the time, his bride being 21. They lived most happily Will gether.

Viscount Dangan. son and heir of Ear! Cowley, was married in February, 1914, to iliss Mary Piccard, a " show girl" »if great beauty. Bride and bridegroom wera the same age23and each was born on M the same Christmas Day, and within sfgg| few hours' time of each other.

In 1901 the present Marquis of Head- - fort fell in love with and married Miss Rosie Boote, of the Gaiety Theatre. Thv marquis was only 22 at the time, and his beautiful wife was a year-or two -younger. J'.i Once again Mrs. Grundy prophesied dir« things, and once again she was wfong itf-pH her forecasts, the marriage turning 'out a t most happy one, and this despite the factfSf that the mutual acquaintanceship which terminated in matrimony was a matter of m days only. 'jifjjg Even more impetuous was the wooing of that Duke of Hamilton who, in tha | middle of the 18th century, wedded one "4 of. the beautiful Miss Gunnings, a girl Tr±**| her teens. So impatient was he that,' after the very briefest of courtships he sect far " a clergyman at ten o'clock at night, vow* ing he would not wait another hour,_ ''811 Bed-Curtain Ring. .■> -ill Not unnaturally the reverend gentlemart refuse's to perform the ceremony withoutl license or ring. "The duke swore roundM. that the ceremony had got to be per-) formed, even if he had to send for thtfcf; Archbishop of __ Canterbury. In the end! they were married with a ring off. the bedcurtain at half an hour after midnight, ati vC May Fair Chapel. . ,-^p

One of the strangest and most remark* able stories of the many that centre round ® the noble house of Berkeley concerns, itself Itwith the abduction-or was it an elope* S ment —of Lady Henrietta Berkeley by bef kinsman by marriage, Lord Grey of Wark/g The lady had only recently * celebrated $ her 17th birthday, when the affair tooij B* ace " a - :"■ ' HI Loi*C Grey carried her off one dark night fromfler parents' —whether by fores or gu'.e, or with her own consent, was never known— the marriage between the pair was about to be celebrated when the Earl of Berkeley burst in and stopped the wedding, at the same time ordering his daughter in no very, gentle terms tcrjgl return home at once. " •- ' In order to avoid this, Lady Henrietta made the astounding announcement that, despite her youth, she was already a married woman, having gone through a cere* mony of marriage some months previously, ;S with a gentleman named Tumour, who was still alive. Lord Grey thereupon <3e--gS dined to have anything more to do with her, her father also cast her off, and die prior marriage with Turnout turning out p to be an invalid one the unhappy lady soon afterwards shut herself up in. her p private apartments, and refused, until fhaj| day of her death, to look upon the facfl) of any man. ?vff|