of 18th /early 19th century newspapers and even own a few Gentlemen's Magazines of our period. And yes it is true that marriages were announced in these publications. But not many compared to the general population;-) Not everyone did it. But some couples from most classes of people from the professional classes upwards seem to have made announcements if they so desired. And there was certainly no Georgette Heyer inspired rule that everyone of note had to announce their marriages thus : it was much a more fluid situation than that, IMHO ;-)

For example, here are the figures for the half year, ,July to December, 1805:

July: 22 marriages announced

August : 59

September:33

October: 29

November: 32

December : 30

The status of the parties announcing their marriages in this section varied: they ranged from Earls to bookseller. Marriages conducted abroad were sometimes inliucded-e.g ones conducted in Calcutta figure twice in the above figures.

So it's not an absolute rule as Georgette Heyer would have you believe ;-) .I think, in relation to Anne Elliot's search, its more about the lack of proof of a positive: if Anne was reading newspapers and monthly publications like the Gentleman's Magazine and she saw no announcement of a marriage it could not absolutely prove that Frederick Wentworth had not married, but of course finding such an announcement would have been. The lack of the announcement was not absolute confirmation that he had not married therefore ;-)

Poor girl, every month scouring the newspapers for the news she most dreads and still not able to be certain even after reading all she could.