A RESPONDENT’S CREDENTIALS.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXIII, Issue 5255, 26 January 1878, Page 3

A RESPONDENT’S CREDENTIALS.

A remarkable suit for nullity of marriage was heard before Sir Kobert Phillimore without a jury on November 17. The petitioner and respondent were married in 1873, at the registry office at Greenwich, in the names of Pool and Franklin, and lived together for two years. The petitioner’s father was a retired solicitor, who had amassed a large property, and the respondent described himself as the son of a plantation holder in Jamaica. He resided ! with the petitioner occasionally, when endeavoring to obtain money from her father. The respondeat explained his absence by saying that he was a member of a secret society, and not master of his time or his actions, and obliged to travel from place to place when required to do so by the society, which bo afterwards confessed was that of the Jesuits. In 1875 this course of conduct aroused the plaintiff’s suspicions, and she caused advertisements to ho inserted-in the London papers, based upon the defendant’s account of himself, to ascertain the name of the lady to whom she inferred he had been previously married. She then) learnt that he had been married in the name of Thornton to a widow, who was still living. On being pressed for his credentials by the petitioner’s father before marriage he objected to his word being doubted. The reply to the advertisement disclosed the following facts : “ Real name Constable. Committed forgery in 1836-7. Escaped by entering as private iu Bengal Artillery ; deserted iu 1843. In London. 1844-5, passed as Capt. Constable, son of Sir O. Constable. Swindled a score of ;West-end trades-, men, among others Howell and James. Was ia Lancaster Gaol for debt, has passed, under twenty aliases ; has been in prison three times on the Continent for card-sharping ; obtained commission in Northern .army of United States in 1863, on pretence of being a British officer ; embezzled regimental funds, made his escape while heavily ironed, and injured one ancle ; passed in New York as Franklin ; is “ wanted ” by police of Chicago, New York, and Buffalo, for felony, &c.” The necessary facts for the petitioner having been proved, the Court pronounced a decree nisi, with costs.