Miss Osborne asks: Why does everyone go to Gretna Green to get married?
Mrs. Fitzpatrick’s short answer: Vegas, baby—Vegas!
Mrs. Fitzpatrick’s longer answer: Miss Osborne is really asking why everyone who elopes does the deed in Gretna Green. Or at least, why does everyone assume that eloping couples have fled to Gretna Green? The only Austen couple I can recall who actually make it there are Julia Bertram and Captain Yates (whose rates were smaller than his rants—good one, Miss Crawford. 
). Everyone thinks Wickham and Lydia have gone there, but actually they went to London. I mean, why Gretna Green? Why not Penzance or Stonehenge or Edinburgh?
This really is a Vegas thing. Gretna Green was the first village you got to in Scotland along the road at that time. And Scotland makes it easier to get married than England does. You don’t have to hang around for 21 days being “in residence” and you don’t need your parents’ consent. You don’t even need a priest or a church. All you need is two witnesses, a blacksmith, and an anvil! Woohoo! Elvis impersonators are optional.
Blacksmith and anvil? Why?
Actually, I think it’s still easier to get married in Scotland than it is in England… (Am curious about the anvil and the blacksmith too… for rings?)
Wow, it really is like Vegas! There’s even a wedding bureau:
http://www.gretnaweddings.co.uk/gretna_green_weddings.html
To answer the anvil question (per Wikipedia):
“The local blacksmith and his anvil have become the lasting symbols of Gretna Green weddings. Scottish law allowed for ‘irregular marriages’, meaning that if a declaration was made before two witnesses, almost anybody had the authority to conduct the marriage ceremony. The blacksmiths in Gretna became known as ‘anvil priests’.
Gretna’s two Blacksmiths’ shops and countless inns and smallholding became the backdrops for hundreds of thousands of weddings. Today there are several wedding venues in and around Gretna Green, from former churches, to purpose built chapels, but the services at all the venues are always performed over an iconic Blacksmiths anvil.”
I suppose I could have looked it up for myself, but it’s must for fun to ask Mrs. F to answer historical questions.
Why a blacksmith? Well, the barbaers were stll too busy practicing medicine and denistry to do weddings as well. We all know what the scottish priests were doing.
I got married for the first time in Gretna Green. The permission thing is for those who are 16 and 17 years old – in Scotland, no parental consent is needed. This actually applied to me, since I was 17 at the time…
Having also been to Vegas (and not got married), I can assure you that 1) the weather and 2) the gambling are both *very* different