7 MARCH 1826
Heiress is abducted in a shocking extortion attempt
Lies about a father’s finances drive a young girl to accept an unwanted marriage
In late spring 1827, the House of Lords reviewed a petition for the annulment of a marriage. William Turner, a successful calico printer and the owner of Shrigley Hall in Cheshire, claimed that Edward Gibbon Wakefield, a diplomat, did "steal and carry away" his only child, Ellen Turner, then coerced her into marriage.
Wakefield, aware that William Turner was extremely wealthy, had hatched a plan to marry the merchant's 15-year-old daughter and claim her substantial inheritance. According to Turner's furious petition, on 7 March 1826, Wakefield's servant Edward Thevenot arrived by carriage at her boarding school in Liverpool. There he persuaded the schoolmistresses, sisters named Daulby, to allow
