Salisbury couple 'shocked' after proposal photos go viral in social media hunt
A couple from Salisbury have described their “shock” after photos of their proposal went viral as a social media hunt ensued to find them.
A woman who saw the proposal take place snapped a few photos of Mac Sullivan proposing to his now-fiancee Alicia Rockall, on Saturday afternoon at Bourton-on-the-Water.
She wasn't able to catch the couple at the time so in a bid to send the photos to the duo, she shared one of the images online that same day.
The post garnered over 4.2 million views since and the mystery pair were found within 24 hours.
Jen, who lives in Gloucester, said: "It’s all been a bit of a whirlwind,”
Speaking about capturing the now-viral moment, she said “My husband and I sat by the big Christmas tree in Bourton-on-the-Water and sat there people watching for a while and I looked to the left, where the little bridge is, where the actual photo was taken.
"There were lots of people walking across it and then I saw a couple walk onto the bridge and for some reason, I was quite captured by them and I could see that the man was sort of positioning himself and I said to my husband, ‘I think he’s going to propose’, so I thought I’d take some photos.”
She said she aimed to share the photos with the couple but lost sight of them, so turned online to track them down.
By Saturday evening, one of the couple’s friends, Callum Haley, whom Ms Rockall met at school in Sixth Form, reached out to Jen and by Sunday, Ms Rockall contacted Jen.
“She was really lovely,” Jen said about Ms Rockall. A further post from Jen on X on December 17 announcing the couple had been found garnered close to 100k views.
Ms Rockall, an account manager at a marketing agency, said she and her fiance were “shocked” to discover and see the post go viral.
She added they were both “just enjoying the moment” and had no idea that it was going viral online.“
I think we probably had about 25 of our friends message us who had seen the post.
"I got a message from Callum and it said, ‘This is really random and a bit awkward if it’s not you, but is this you and Mac on Twitter?' followed by a link to Jen’s post on X.
“Immediately, I just went ‘oh my God’. I had a look, indeed it was us, and at that point, it had about 5,000 likes.
“Both of us were just shocked". Alicia said Jen was absolutely lovely and said she would probably send her a photo when the wedding does roll around.
Ms Rockall added that not only had her fiance created “this moment of happiness for the two of us” but he had “created joy for a lot of other people” on social media, which she said was “really beautiful" in itself.
“People in the comments were reminiscing about their own engagements and their grandparents’ engagements, and that’s really lovely,”
Ms Rockall said: "Social media can be a dark place but I’m glad this story is wholesome and warms some people’s hearts which is brilliant to be a part of.
”The couple were on a trip to the area at the time, with Ms Rockall saying it was a place the pair had discovered early on in their relationship,
She added: “I was completely shocked, in the best way, I never thought he would do it in public and so to have a little bit of a crowd around us was really lovely.”