On the 1st marriage he was a 2nd Corporal, many soldiers married unofficially but the wife had no rights to reside in camp/barracks or to accompany the regiment. She had to live in lodgings in Plymouth paid for out of their own pockets.
On the second he was now a Staff Sergeant, Royal Engineers, entitlement likely meant married quarter accomodation by 1897 in somewhere as large as Plymouth plus paid travel and rations for wife & children if the regiment moved or was posted abroad.
This article quotes "Grierson (1899): "Marriage is allowed to all the staff-sergeants, to 50% of the other sergeants, 4% of the corporals and privates in the cavalry, artillery and engineers, and 3% in the infantry."
https://dressuniformhire.co.uk/pages/a-military-wedding-history-traditionhttps://dressuniformhire.co.uk/blogs/history/asking-permission-to-marry-in-the-militaryA Soldier is not to marry without a written sanction, obtained from his Commanding Officer. Should he marry without this sanction, his Wife will not be allowed in Barracks, nor to follow the Regiment, nor will she participate in the indulgences granted to the Wives of other Soldiers."Whilst such a union was not something the army could disturb despite army regulations, it meant that such a married soldier would normally have to sleep in his barracks and his wife elsewhere. At some later date a soldier’s wife might be given permission to ‘go on the strength’ of her husband’s regiment."
https://wightonfamily.ca/genealogy/essays/armywives.htmlhttps://blog.forceswarrecords.com/service-in-the-british-armya valid certificate of marriage from the officiating priest had to be presented to the Adjutant before the marriage could be entered into the Regimental Marriage Book
The snip indicates a GRO cert was proof, and was to be transcribed into the Regimental Register. The officiating minister held the only copies of the marriage register ledgers on the day of marriage and immediately afterwards, so issued any required GRO certs. An additional copy became available once the priest had forwarded his quarterly return to London. Once books were full one duplicate ledger was deposited with the GRO District, the other retained by the church, hence the FindMyPast images. One sometimes sees annotation "cert seen" in service records next to details of wife & children / NOK, even the odd English GRO marriage or birth cert in Boer/WW1 era records.
