ELOPEMENTS

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume LXXXI, Issue 19048, 27 June 1924, Page 8

ELOPEMENTS

HISTORIC TRIPS TO GRETNA GREEN. The birth of a son and heir to tht young Earl of Westmoreland, the Prince of Wale’s intimate friend, recalls the romantic marriage of his great-grandfather, the tenth Earl, to the daughter of a great banker, Mr.j ’ Child, writes a correspondent of ih< Manchester Guardian. Mr. Child was opposed to the marriage, and the story goes that Lord Westmoreland asked him at dinner what he would do if he loved a girl and she loved him, but the father would not give hi« consent. “Why, I should run away with her, of course,” replied Mr. Child. The young Earl followed his advice, and next morning he and Miss Molly Child were speeding on horseback to Gretna Green. The banker followed in hot pursuit, and, according to the tradition, the lovers only escaped by Lord Westmoreland shooting the horse of the groom, —ho actually overtook them. At all eventt Gretna Green was reached in safety. Mr. Child never really forgave hit daughter, but left his immense fo* tune to her daughter, Lady Sarah, who carried it with Osterlcy Park 1< the Jersey family. Sir Algernon West says that when Lady Jersey’s daughtet followed her grandmother’s example, also eloped, Lady Londonderry wrote a letter of condolence to her* mother. She deplored the event, but said that it was the natural consequence of bad bringing up- A little later Lady Londonderry’s daughter eloped too and Lady Jersey, who had kept hei letter, at once copied it out and dii patched it back to Lady Londonderry. “A correspondence,” ' Sir Aigernoi West comments “worthy of a place among ‘Punch’s’ best fyelinc amenities.”