Was sent a small family tree this morning from someone asking if I was related to them - yes, I am. But a few if the weddings have been in what look like private dwellings i.e. 10 High Street, Bishopmill, Elgin during 1889. This is the first time I've come across non church weddings prior to the early 1900's Was this a common occurance ? My parents were not married in church but in the Tower Hotel in the 1950's - was that similar to a Register Office wedding ? Carol Admin Moray Mailing List www.wakefieldfhs.org.uk/morayweb

> But a few if the weddings have been in what look like private dwellings > i.e. 10 High Street, Bishopmill, Elgin during 1889. This is the first > time I've come across non church weddings prior to the early 1900's I am astonished, because that's exactly the opposite to what I have come across. > Was this a common occurance ? Very common indeed. The vast majority of the marriages in my tree between 1855 and about 1920 were not celebrated in a church. > My parents were not married in church but in the Tower Hotel in the > 1950's - was that similar to a Register Office wedding ? No, because they would still have had a religious wedding - been married by a minister. As I understand it, until recently you could be married pretty much anywhere the minister was prepared to go if you were either married by a minister or (until about the 1930s) by declaration before two witnesses anywhere you chose. The recent change allows a non-religious marriage in places other than a Register Office which has been the only possible place for a secular wedding since marriage by declaration was done away with. I just did a wee experiment. In my tree I have some 1100 marriages in Scotland between 1855 and 1930. I looked at each in turn (alphabetically by surname) and it was about the 30th one before I came across one actually celebrated in a church - and that was in 1926. Almost all those before 1900 were celebrated either in the bride's home, her place of work, or the parish manse. From the late 1800s there began to be weddings in hotels and such-like places, and from about after the first World War there began to be church ceremonies. Anne