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1st week April 1814: An Elopement! This Week in the Regency

1st week April 1814: An Elopement! This Week in the Regency

Why did Miss Lydia Cooke and Mr Thomas Hughes have to elope? Find out as Elizabeth pulls apart the Clandestine Marriage Act and explains why you probably didn’t need a ‘special licence’. Also, why Gretna Green? And why the blacksmith’s forge as the place to elope to? A romantic tale of successul elopement!

You can find Elizabeth’s book at www.elizabethleydin.com (check out The Youngest Son – it’s all about an elopement). Subscribe to Elizabeth’s Substack blog at elizabethleydin.substack.com.

Elizabeth Leydin

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author elizabeth leydin

About Elizabeth Leydin

My story

I write Regency stories because I love them. I decided to get serious about writing these when my Regency novella, A Generous Heart, won the RWA Ruby Award (maybe the universe was sending me a message). I came late to writing in this genre, and for many years before that I wrote for children as Pamela Freeman and mystery novels plus early 20th Century novels as Pamela Hart. I started out in the Regency writing romances. Now I’m bringing my mystery writing together with a thread of romance in a Regency murder mystery which will be out in 2026. A classic country house mystery set in 1814: Bridgerton meets Agatha Christie, you might say!

Elizabeth Leydin was my great-grandmother, and I have her dressing table in my bedroom. Elizabeth is my second name, and it was my mother’s middle name too; a family tradition. My plan was to name any daughter I had Elizabeth, but I had a son, so the name was free for me to use when I decided to write Regencies.

Why the Regency for both mystery and romance? Well, when I first started reading adult books, my wonderful local librarian steered me towards Agatha Christie and Georgette Heyer. I loved them both, and it’s so much fun bringing those two genres together!