A wedding!

1967, the so-called Summer Of Love year, turned out to be a very tough year for the Rolling Stones. In February both Mick Jagger and Keith Richards were arrested for the possession of illegal drugs. Recording sessions for a new studio album at Olympic Sound Studios, London, were rudely interrupted. In May, Brian Jones also was arrested for possession of drugs.

For Ian Stewart, who never got involved into the 'drug thing', 1967 started in a much more promising fashion, since he married Cynthia Dillane, Andrew Oldham's personal assistant for about five years. In his autobiography Stone Alone Bill Wyman recalls the wedding day: "Stu, our trusty road manager, pianist and, above all, mate from the earliest days, was married on 2 January 1967 to Cynthia, Andrew Oldham's secretary. After the service which some of the Stones attended at St Andrew's Church, Cheam, Surrey, there was a wedding breakfast for twenty-six guests.

At the reception in the evening, Cynthia recalls her father, a professor at paediatrics, walking past of the Stones and Marianne Faithfull who were sitting on a long sofa smoking pot. 'Someone's got a bonfire', he said innocently. 'It was a bitterly cold January day and nobody could possibly have had a bonfire, but he identified this "strong odour, a garden fragrance", Cynthia remembers".

Not so very much is publicized about Stu and Cynthia's marriage. The couple got one son (Giles, born 1971) and got divorced in some later year. Of course it's interesting to have a closer look at the 'triangle' relationship between Stu, the silent and stubborn Scotsman, and the wordly Andrew (who kicked him out of the Stones in the first place) and Cynthia. More on this topic to come in the near future, I hope.

Adapted from the following source: Bill Wyman, Stone Alone, Penguin Books, 1991.
Suggested further reading: Andrew Loog Oldham, 2Stoned, Vintage, 2003.