Clandestine marriage in England, 1500-1850
"While marriages were supposed to be celebrated publicly by priests, in churches where the parties were known, many couples had reasons - among them parental disapproval, religious nonconformity, property considerations and previous entanglements - to marry in other ways." "Clandestine marriage had represented a problem to the church and state, and to the rights of property, since the middle ages, eluding a variety of attempts to control it. By the eighteenth century it had become a scandal, with Fleet parsons marrying thousands of couples a year. In 1753 Lord Hardwicke's Marriage Act nullified such irregular marriages, only to drive couples to seek other forms of privacy down to, and beyond, the introduction of civil marriage in 1836." "In this intriguing book Brian Outhwaite explores the nature and scale of clandestine marriage. He describes why it attracted so many customers and why it was so hard to suppress."--Jacket
History
xxiv, 196 pages, 4 pages of plates : illustrations, map ; 24 cm
9781852851309, 1852851309
32236670
1. The Law and Clandestine Marriage
2. Forms of Clandestinity
3. Why Clandestine Marriage?
4. The 1753 Act: Passage and Debate
5. Controversy and Attempted Repeal
6. The Consequences of the Act
7. The Process of Reform
App. 1. The 1753 Bill
App. 2. The 1753 Act