Weddings

[becks]

Why are quick wedding called shotgun weddings? (bear with me if my html hasn't worked) is it always called that when the girl is pregnant? or is it just to do with the speed? eg like bullets? ta

[becks]

Oh. my html hasn't worked but that's because the whole question is in bold

[andy hughes]

the phrase comes from years ago, when the prospect of an illigitimate birth was far more shameful and scandalous than it is now. The father of the girl concerned would natrually try to pursuade the father to marry his daughter in advance of the birth, to ensure that a scandal was averted. Sometimes the young mand would be reluctant, and dad would 'persuade' him, by means of the proverbial shotgun, advising him of the simple choice, marriage, or bullet! The phrase passed into common usage to mean a wedding where the bride is already pregnant, although it may not mean that the groom had to be threatened into doing 'the right thing'. Even today, the phrase is used, simply to infer that the bride is expecting on her wedding day.

[becks]

thanks andy, i thought that's probably what it meant, just wasn't sure if it always meant the girl was pregnant. Ta x

[Quizmonster]

This was originally an American expression and means precisely what Andy says it means above.

Given that it was USA-based and refers to shotguns, I had always imagined it to be from the days of the Wild West in the mid-19th century. But the earliest-recorded use of the phrase dates back only to 1929. By then, women had become vastly more independent of their parents, though the shame of illegitimacy still hung on for another 30 years or so, despite shotguns as such having become rather rarer!