Special License
Some of my British readers have written to me about my various characters getting married in houses at odd times. As one reader pointed out, “weddings in England and Wales can only take place in authorized or licensed premises, so not in your own home. Following the Marriage Act of 1836 weddings could take place in a licensed ‘Registry Office’, but before that they could only be performed in places of worship.”
True, unless you married by special license. This allowed a couple to wed wherever and whenever they wished. A special license was very expensive, and had to be obtained from Doctors’ Commons. A great many members of the aristocracy married that way: In the Marriages listings in the various periodicals, we find the daughter or son of Lord This or That or Sir Thus & Such married at the family home.
In The Law Dictionary (1810 and later editions) we find this: “But by special licence or dispensation from the Archbishop of Canterbury, Marriages, especially of persons of quality, are frequently in their own houses, out of canonical hours, in the evening, and often solemnized by others in other churches than where one of the parties lives, and out of time of divine service, &c.”
You can see an 1852 Special License in The Etiquette of Courtship and Matrimony: with a Complete Guide to the Forms of a Wedding, which can be found online as part of the British Library’s archives on Google Books.
On my website blog (http://www.lorettachase.com/blog) as well as at Two Nerdy History Girls (http://twonerdyhistorygirls.blogspot.com), where Susan Holloway Scott and I blog on historical fashion and other matters of social history, you can expect to find posts explaining many of the historical references in my stories.
When it comes to historical details, though, a picture can be worth a thousand words. This is why you might want to take a look at my Pinterest page (https://www.pinterest.com/lorettachase), which offers fashions as well as other illustrations for my books. If you want to see the difference between a hackney cab and a hackney coach or a landau and a curricle, that’s the place to look.
If you encounter other historical puzzles in my story, please contact me via my website, www.LorettaChase.com. While my response time can be hideously slow, especially when I’m in the throes of a work-in-snail-like-progress, I do answer eventually, and some readers’ questions have inspired blog posts and/or contributed to future stories.
Acknowledgments
Thanks to:
May Chen, my editor, who is able to read my mind when I can’t, lift my spirits, and, generally, make me write a better book than I expect or hope to;
Nancy Yost, my agent, who takes care of business while inspiring, cheerleading, and coming up with terrific ideas I claim for my own;
Susan Holloway Scott, the other Nerdy History girl, my writerly confidante and bird of a feather, who shares my pain and laughter;
Bruce Hubbard, MD, who once again helped me navigate between the worlds of nineteenth- and twenty-first-century medicine;
Larry Abramoff, who built the footrest and saved my life (and possibly my writing career);
Gloria Abramoff, who said I could store the footrest at their house (and possibly saved my marriage);
Cynthia, Vivian, and Kathy, my sisters, who’ve supported me from the get-go, in both writing and nonwriting matters, and haven’t quit yet—
—with extra thanks to Cynthia, who’s helped resolve more than one plot problem as we walk, stands by me at author events, and is always up for shopping;
Walter, my husband, who patiently brainstorms with me—even though I didn’t listen the last time—takes me to wonderful places, and uses other masculine wiles to keep me from running away from the book.
All errors and poor judgment displayed here are, alas, my own.
About the Author
LORETTA CHASE has worked in academe, retail, and the visual arts, as well as on the streets—as a meter maid—and in video, as a scriptwriter. She might have developed an excitingly checkered career had her spouse not nagged her into writing fiction. Her bestselling historical romances, set in the Regency and Romantic eras of the early nineteenth century, have won a number of awards, including the Romance Writers of America’s RITA®. For more about her past, her books, and what she does and doesn’t do on social media, please visit her at LorettaChase.com.
Discover great authors, exclusive offers, and more at hc.com.
By Loretta Chase
A Duke in Shining Armor
Dukes Prefer Blondes
Vixen in Velvet
Scandal Wears Satin
Silk Is for Seduction
Last Night’s Scandal
Royally Ever After
Don’t Tempt Me
Your Scandalous Ways
Not Quite a Lady
The Last Hellion
The Mad Earl’s Bride
Lord of Scoundrels
Captives of the Night
The Lion’s Daughter
Copyright
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
a duke in shining armor. Copyright © 2017 by Loretta Chekani. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins Publishers. For information, address HarperCollins Publishers, 195 Broadway, New York, NY 10007.
Digital Edition DECEMBER 2017 ISBN: 978-0-06-245739-4
Print Edition ISBN: 978-0-06-245738-7
Cover design and art direction by Guido Caroti
Cover art by Fredericka Ribes
Hand lettering by David Gatti
Cover images: © Getty Images (trees); © Shutterstock (woman and castle)
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HarperCollins is a registered trademark of HarperCollins Publishers in the United States of America and other countries.
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Loretta Chase, A Duke in Shining Armor
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