Right up there with the 'Officers and their
wives, enlistees and their
ladies' and 'the
baronial privilege of the first night"
mentality'( IE movie:
Braveheart & The Warlord)! The standard wording use was ended by a Navy admiral as the distinction was disrespectful to
all married women. The
baronial privilege was actually cited in the famous treasure salvage case of La Nuestra Seņora de Atocha vs the State of Florida, which had tried to assert sovereignty $$$ over waters and the
fabulous treasure-not in its territory! Simply..."beyond the PALE!"<
old Norman expression; Florida lost!
Similarily, after the Civil War, many young women would marry old Confederate veterans for their war pensions and collected well into the 2000's. One was Alberta Stewart, b.1907. After her first husband died, she married 81 year old Jasper Martin, b.1845, who had served in the 4th Alabama Infantry and collected $50.00 pension, then a considerable security to a young (1927) bride. Jasper Martin immediately passed into eternity(one child born??! fixed bayonets if ever!
) and the ever-connubializing Ms Stewart married HIS grandson!! (from a previous marriage-no consanguinity here!) and stayed married for 50 years until his death in 1983. In 1996 the state of Alabama recognized Ms Stewart's claim to the first Martin pension and awarded her back-pay as well! She died, a minor re-enactment celebrity, immortalized in Confederates in the Attic in 2004 at the age of 97,(gray indeed!) and was buried with full Confederate honors as the widow of a veteran! 139 years after Appomattox! The last known confederate veteran spouse, Maudi Hopkins died in 2008. REB GALS ROCK
I trust the honor of England can keep up with the LOST CAUSE!