Gretna Green, just one mile inside the Scottish border, has been associated with marriages for nearly 250 years. Many places in and around this small village can lay claim to being marriage venues, but Gretna Hall was the first official stop in Scotland for the travelling stagecoaches and private carriages. This made it the obvious first choice for a “Blacksmith’s Wedding”… a hastily performed ceremony according to the law of Scotland, where a couple could marry by declaration in the presence of two witnesses, “striking while the iron is hot”!
Gretna Hall mansion house was built, right in the centre of Gretna Green, in 1710 as the home of the local lord of the manor. However, by 1792 it had been turned into a coaching inn and, being much grander than the local “tippling house” it secured a high-class clientele. Many a nobleman or aristocrat was joined in matrimony within these walls as the Marriage Registers confirm.
