Now I remember why I wanted to spend so much time in Dublin - the Quaker library. Today I found the request with Joshua planning to leave for America, no real details.
* Spoiler Alert!* (don't read this if my book is out and you haven't read it yet)
A while back I wrote about a Character Conundrum, thinking I'll never find out why Elizabeth English never married. She came to S.C. at age 18, during colonial times, and lived late into her 60s. Today the answer fell into my lap, in the Moate minutes. The truth was that she did marry, at an early age, apparently running off with a non-quaker and getting married by a priest! They don't mention the man's name, just that it had been done without her father's permission. So apparently, maybe a year later, the family whisked her away to colonial America - without the husband. Very sad in real life, but very exciting for my book. In the South Carolina histories, Elizabeth English never married, living as an old maid, because she already WAS married. Wow.
I still have to make up a lot of details, questions racing around my head. Who was the husband? young or old, Catholic or Church of Ireland, Romeo or wicked scoundrel taking advantage of a young girl? How did the family or community convince them to separate?
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