Young Eloping Couple

Western Kentucky couples often traveled to adjoining states to get married, especially when there was opposition to a marriage. Because the marriages occurred outside the Commonwealth of Kentucky, the license had to be obtained in the state in which they married. The following article from the Evansville, Indiana Courier of Friday, 19 July 1895, illustrates once again that newspapers often contain information that is not found in vital records.

When a couple of young Kentucky people take it into their heads to get married, they are like young people everywhere else in the respect that they generally do so. If there is parental objection on either side they simply come to Evansville and have the knot tied here.

It was an eloping couple that alighted from a cab at the Ruston House about 10 o’clock yesterday morning and asked for the use of the hotel parlor for a few minutes. The girl was tall and fair, blonde haired and blue eyed - a pretty creature. The groom-to-be was smooth shaven, dark and rather heavy. He looked like a solid sort of citizen, perhaps 20 years old and probably hailing from the country.

The cabman had driven the couple from the morning Ohio Valley train. They had come past the court house and had stopped there long enough to get the necessary papers. Furthermore, as they had rolled by the office of Justice of the Peace Poole, the cabman had summoned that gentleman to come at once to the Ruston House.

It was a few minutes after 10 o’clock that the little party assembled in the main parlors of the hotel, hushed and expectant. Those in the leading roles had previously announced their name to day clerk McNeeley and he had written them, in a big, sprawley hand, in the register. They were "Americus T. Wooton, Hopkins County, Kentucky," and "Georgie A. Parrish, Hopkins County, Kentucky." Two young men were with the couple, but they did not register. One of them is known to have been a brother of the young woman.
Squire Poole was not slow about reaching the scene. He entered the parlor in a dignified and business-like way, taking up a position in front of the party and asking if everything was "ready." Everything was. The ceremony was promptly performed and the company broke up.

Mr. and Mrs. Wooton, with one or two friends, repaired to the dining room, where quite an elaborate dinner was spread for them. After they had eaten and while Mr. Wooton was enjoying a cigar in the lobby, the clerk approached him and said:
"I trust your marriage has made you altogether happy."
"Well," said Mr. Wooton, "we hope to have some happiness now; we have had very little thus far."
"Opposition to your courtship?"
"Yes"
"And you ducked?"
"That’s what we did."

Mr. Wooton is a well-to-do young farmer of Hopkins County and his bride was brought up in his neighborhood, the daughter of well known and highly respected parents.