The daily morning journal and courier., 1907-03-04
GRETNA GREEN PRIESTS. !"
MEN WHO MADE MONEY FROM
 SCOTCH MARRIAGES.

Merely Witnesses to Declaration in
 Certificates Which They Issued-Gor-
 don Explains His Authority-PasIey
 and His Two succcssors-Fate of the
 Registers.
 A sharpwitted fellow named Scott hit on the ingenious Idea of opening place on the border for professionally wit messing ths uniting of couples by Scotch law. He commenced his career at Rigg, near Gretna, and his success soon brought him a rival in the person of an old soldier called Gordon, who officiated in antlquated military uni form, cooked hat, jackboots, scarlet tcnic and sword. When Gordon was asked by what authority he joined persons in wedlock he bodily answered. T have a special license from the Government fer which I pay fifty pounds year" Hence the common people grew to believe that some such privilege really existed
 JAS matter of fact, says a corres- pendent of the Westminster Gazette, writing of the clandestine marriages that were performed north of the En- glish border in the latter part of the eighteenth and the first half of the nineteenth centuries, although the Gretna priests played at officiating a rite, either to satisfy their own vanity or to humbug the consciences of the brides, they were careful not to claim any locus standi above that of having acted as professional witness to a legal declaration in the form of certificates which they Issued. When Gordon died there arose several aspirants for the office ''chief priest" and the lions share of the plunder fell to the lot of Joseph Paisley, fisherman, smuggler, tobaccon- ist and reputed blacksmith.
 The following specimen of Pasley's marriage certificate shows how he begged the question of being in any way licensed to act, while it also de- rnonstrates the illiterateness of the men who fulfilled the office; This is to sartify all who may be concerned that on from the parish off in England, and both comes before me, and declayred themselves to be single persons and hereby now married by the form of the Kirk of Scotland, and agreeable to the Church of England, and therefore given under my hande'
 Paisley off1ciated from 17O$O till his death in 1911 at the age of 84. His first residence was at Megg's Hill, on the green between Grentna Springfield, to the latter of which villages he removed in 17S2. He never was blacksmith, this description of him arising from the mythological conceit of Vulcan be- ing the forger of hymeneal chains, and he never held the ceremony in forge. For many years he gave a false name In attesting declarations of marriage, till a solicitor advised him that it would < be safer if he signed his own. Eventu- ally, emboldened by success he borrow ed some of the formula from the Chuch of England service to read over couples and arrayed himself in sham canonic- als.
 Pasley's regime formed the golden days of the Border village. He estab- lished code of signals with the post boys who thus let him know what his clients were good for; he was reputed often to earn G100 a week and to rake in a steady income of 9600 or G70O a year He was an arrant coward and went in constant fear of prosecution by the authorities, while to keep tip his courage he consumed two quarts of brandy a day without ever appearing drunk in public.
 Two persons claimed to succeed Pas ley-Robert Elliot who said that he had inherited the good will by marrying the ''blacksmith's, granddaughter, and David Lang, who posed as an ex-pedler although under cross examination he confessed to having been tramp. Elliot, who died at a great age in re- tirement; officiated as a priest till the early '40s. In February, 1S43, he wrote to the times stating that he had mar ried 4,444 persons from 1911 to 1889, the largest number in any one year being 19S and the smallest 42. Elliot was the author of rare little book on Gretna marriage customs and describing the aristocratic runaway marriages which had taken place there.
 John Murray, the son of slater, succeeded to his share of the business, and officiated at Alisons bank toll house, adjacent to which and on the English side of the border he built the Sark Bar inn David Lang was sub poenaed as a witness in the celebrated Wakefield abduction case tried in 1927 and which concerned an elopment with q, ward in chancery to Gretna Green. He died at York on his return home Among the prosecuting counsel in that case was MT, afterwards Sir, Fitzroy Kelly, created Lord Chief Baron of England in 1866, In September, 1856, a few months before the act came into force. Kelly, then Solictor-G General, married his second wife at Gretna Green.
 David Lang was succeeded by his son Simon, who died in April, 1872, at Fell ing near Newcastle the sole survivor of the long line of self-appointed dig initaries, the Gretna "priests." It is told of Simon that the last ceremony he ever performed was in complete disha- hille-shirt and drawers-the ceremony being perforce a very hurried one. Minor priests in the "ffties' were Thomas Blythe and Linton. For ten years previous to the passing of the act the annual number of marriages averaged TOO The Gretna priests" claimed to have kept registers of all marriages performed by them but a 'priestp confessed under cross-ex-