Gretna Green the marriage ceremony. The blacksmiths in Gretna became known as "anvil priests", culminating with Richard Rennison, who performed 5,147 ceremonies. The local blacksmith and his anvil became lasting symbols of Gretna Green weddings. Two in particular, The Old Blacksmith's Shop, built around 1712, and Gretna Hall Blacksmith's Shop (1710) became, in popular folklore at least, the focal tourist points for the marriage trade. The Old Blacksmith's Shop opened to the public as a visitor attraction as early as 1887. Victorian chronicler Robert Smith Surtees described Gretna Green at length in his 1848 "New Monthly Magazine" serial, "The Richest Commoner in
Gretna, Dumfries and Galloway diverges significantly from it; similarly, the B724 was the original route between Annan and Dumfries. In the 1840s, there were three main railway companies building lines around Gretna and this resulted in three railway stations named "Gretna". The first station called "Gretna" was opened by the Glasgow, Dumfries and Carlisle Railway on 23 August 1843, this station was renamed Gretna Green railway station in April 1852. It closed on 6 December 1965, but a new station was opened by British Rail nearby on 20 September 1993, the station is served by Glasgow South Western Line. This station had a new