Alexandria gazette. [volume] (Alexandria, D.C.) 1834-1974, 1885-07-11
Marrying for Fun.

Getting married "for the fun of the thing
may be an exceedingly humorous proceed
ing, but it often turns out to be very grave
matter. Such, at least, seems to have been
the experience of a young San Francisco
lady, nee Miss Flora S. Hastings. Standing
on the platform at Allegheny Station, Vir-
ginia, on October 9, 1876, talking with James
latter abruptly asked her if she would marry
him. She was seventeen, he eighteen. There
had been no courtship, no talk of marriage
between them before. But she was frolic-
some and fresh from school, and he thought
it would be the height of humor to "get
married just for the fun of the thing" He
assured her that he would never regard
it otherwise than as joke and would never
claim her as his wife. A willing priest, the
Rev. William Walsh, was present, who en-
tered into the humorous spirit of the thing.
She nodded acquiescence. In response to
the reverend gentleman's Undergraduates
she said she would take Mr. Kelly to be
her husband and he said he would take her
to be his wife. The joke was only carried
to this poiut. The reverend gentleman s
fluid of humor was exhausted before reach.
ing the point of pronouncing them man and
wife. AS there was nothing to detain Miss
Hastings at Allegheny Station she at once
proceeded on her journey. She never lived
with Kelly rs his wife. She went her way
and he remained at Allegheny Station.
Seven years elapsed as they say in the play.
In January, 1885, she saw Kelly again, and
at the Allegheny Station, as before. She
was no longer the hoydenish girl of their
former meeting, but mature woman, whose
manner betokened business of the most Sc
rous import. She gave hurried resume of
her life in the interval Of seven years since
they last met. Shespoke quickly-excited
~. She had come purposely from Califor-
MIA 10 see him. She had married there and
had child.
"And we lived happily enough" she con-
tined, until my husband heard of our mock
marriage. have come to get you to tell
him that that was all joke"
II can do 70 such thing" was Kelly $
cold response you are legally my wife"
Finding that the quondam humorist,
Kelly, was 10 earnest now, and insisted in
declaring that she was his wife, she at once
began suit to have the marriage annulled
Oh the ground that she had been induced to
give her consent to it through ke!ly's false
representations that the marriage was only
intended as joke and was never consum-
mated. Mr.. Abraham King was appointed
referee in the case. His report to Judge
Andrews, of the Supreme Court, recites
that Miss Hastings, who still retains her
maiden name, was married in San Fran
cisco on April 25, 1878, to Winfield
Scott Reyes, by the Archbishop, at the
Cathedral. Some five years later Mr.. Reyes
heard of the mock marriage to Kelly and the lat
ters claim that it was genuine. He accordingly,
in July, $50, brought suit in San Francisco to
have his marriage set aside on the ground that
his wife had been previously married and had a
husband still living In this suit Mr.. Kevcs also
sought to have the custody of their child. II is
stated that this suit is still pending The report
of Mr.. King has nothing, however, to do with tho
divorce proceedings in San Francisco but simply
to pass upon the question of the validity of the
alleged marriage with Mr.. Kelly. The referee
reported that the marriage with Kelly was illegal,
and Judge Andrews confirmed the report.