NO WONDER ROMANCE DIED

NZ Truth, Issue 1209, 31 January 1929, Page 7

NO WONDER ROMANCE DIED

Disillusioned Wife Declares That She Has Worked Daring Most of Her Married Life; Been Sworn At, and 111-treated

HER PETITION FOR SEPARATION SUCCESSFUL

(From "N.Z. Truth's" Special Wellington Representative)

Usually when matrimonial disputes come before a magistrate for settlement, mutual recriminations are inevitable. But rarely is so much bitterness of feeling displayed between a man and wife as that witnessed m the Wellington Court a few days ago. „,_,*■■. -v v v v __ > A wife petitioning for separation and guardianship of. her six children described her husband m no uncertain terms as nothing better than an animal, while he charged her with unchastity of a gross character.

THE petitioner, a woman m middle life, married Samuel Francis Aitken m January, 1912. Iri January, seven years later, she was granted a separation on the grounds of cruelty. Apparently, romance for her was then not quite dead, for about two months later she agreed to take her husband back again. 'Under his ill-treatment of her, however, according to her story, what was left of her illusions vanished, until- at last, sixteen years after her marriage, she has made a final parting from the man she took for better or for worse. Magistrate McNeil, who heard her application, based as before on the ground of cruelty, believed her story and granted her application. Lawyer F. 0. B. Loughnan handled Mrs. Aitken's brief, while Lawyer Percy Jackson conducted the husband s case. ■ Mrs. Aitken told the court her husband was always fighting with her and accusing her of going out with other men. She had worked nearly all the period of her married life, , and at one time she had taken two of the children to work with her. Only on rare occasions had her husband maintained her. Bad language seemed to be a habit with Aitken, according to his wife, who said he often swore at her and struck her. On several occasions she had been forced to call m the police. On December 5 last, she said, he had called her some vile names, and told her to go down to the registry office, where she would find out that she wasn't married. ' _ She had a teapot m her hand, and when her husband attempted to strike her she held it up,, to protect herself with. He knocked her against the \yall and caught her by the throat and the hair. ■■■'"'_ . ■ i On January 6 he attacked her again, so she sent for the police and showed them the bruises on her arms. Aitken, she said, had tutored the boy Sam to call her a vile name. ■ The home was of her own making, as she kept boarders, and, she paid the rent. Aitken didn't pay anything towards it, so she turned him out. Lawyer Jackson: You turned him out and won't let him come back? . . Mrs. Aitken: No, certainly no,t. „. And I suppose he; is- /entirely wrong when he says you. were "oh" with men when he was m hospital?— Yes. When a woman is working from 4 o'clock m the morning till 7. o'clock at night, and then has to go home to do her own 'work, she can't be on with other men. Mrs. Aitken said that her husband had cleared out and left her penniless, with other men m the house. — ■ ■——. ■ Vile Names Lawyer Jackson questioned Mrs. Aitken aboiit a man named Constantine, who is now a boarder m her house. She denied emphatically that he had taken Aitken's place m the home. . When Lawyer Jackson further questioned petitioner about her moral conduct, Mrs. Aitken replied w.ith some heat: "He ought to talk! Aitken lived with another woman and emptied her into the street. He is not a man; he's an animal."-' Lawyer Jackson: Did you give the boy a. thrashing a few days ago? — Certainly I • did, for what he called me. For what his father told him to say. The witness (declared that Aitken called her a vile name, and told .her that if she, didn't get a separation he would, and then a divorce. "Now he comes here and defends it," she said. Counsel: Didn't you throw a teapot at him? — No. Did you know he had to consult a doctor because his arm was hurt?— He would go to anyone to make an excuse. Haven't you called Aitken a nasty name? — Never.

Did you have parties at your house when your husband was m hospital? There is a gramophone, and we had a little evening till 11 o'clock. Did you ever flirt?— -What do you mean? Do you think a married woman with six children wants to flirt. Have you ever kissed Constantine? — Certainly not. Your son Sam says so? — It is what his father has put him \up to. If I I wanted to do a thing like that I would not do it m front of the children.

Weren't you m a room once with Constantine, and the door was barricaded with a couch? — I haven't a couch.

A GREAT deal of arm waving, plenty of self-eulogy and a flow of words

that put the proverbial brook to shame, got William nowhere. His frequently repeated statement that he had a good home for his wife to go to did not weigh heavily with the. S.M., for Gertrude told of another occasion when her husband offered her the .hospitality of his home. She said she could ijot trust him, for "he always broke his promises."

William is a circus proprietor, and his' wife, whom he married thirteen years ago, used to display her tightclad limbs on the trapeze -wherever he pitched hia tent.

Those care-free days of wandering from town to town with the travelling show are over, and the sawdust ring no more sees husband and wife working m harmony.

This was not the first time the husband and wife had faced each other across the courtroom floor.

Twice previously Gertrude had endeavored to obtain some finality, but without success.

Her petition for "a divorce was not granted some time ago, and Magistrate Hunt told her to go home to her husband when she applied for a maintenance order.

aer. \ , "It's been a circus all the time," remarked Lawyer Schramm, when William's counsel, Lawyer Matthews, stated that complainant was once a performing artist m her husband's show. -"My husband has never provided me with a home," stated Gertrude when she entered the witness-box. "I have sometimes obtained money to keep his show going." Since May, 1926, they had been apart, she said, and when she went to see her Husband m "Whangarei with a view to a reconciliation 'he agreed to live with her. They actually lived together, but for a fortnight only, for Gertrude became suspicious that there was another woman m the case. Gertrude took steps to obtain a maintenance 1 order, but her husband then told the court that he had a home waiting for her at Claudelands, near Hamilton, and she took the Magistrate's advice to return to him. According to her story, friend hus-

Djdn't the boy see you? — He's a wicked, wilful liar, and I hope to God he drops dead for putting that lie into the boy's head. Further questioned on this point, Mrs. Aitken remarked, "He's the man who is guilty. Didn't I catch him with a girl I had m Levin while I was out nursing?" You have your boarders and don t want him? — No, not when he stops till two m the morning arguing. Concerning her husband's charges against her, Mrs. Aitken said there had always been a man m the case, according to Aitken. "That's his rotten, jealous mind," she added.

band left it at that, and she spent a whole day looking for. the house, and when she found it she received another shock, for the "circus woman" met her on the door step.

The stories of husband and wife as to the manner of approach of complainant on the day she went to claim the home promised her differed some; what, but it could be gathered that it was not a happy home coming.

"Would you go back if he promised to take you home again?" asked her counsel.

"No. I can't trust him. H e never keeps his promises," replied Gertrude. Lawyer Schramm: You have taken at least three proceedings against him?— Yes. And they have all been unsuccessful? — Yes, but they shouldn't have been. I suppose that since the unsuccessful divorce proceedings you are prejudiced against your husband? — Nothing of the kind. When the wife stated that she had been married before she entered into partnership with the defendant, and that there had been no children of the marriage with William, Lawyer Schramm asked if it were true that she was at present maintaining a child.

Gertrude admitted that there was a little child staying with her, and she asked the S.M. if she had to reply to questions on that point. Magistrate Cutten thought that the question was not relevant, and ruled that she need not answer if she did not wish to. , . Complainant then left the box to be replaced by her husband, a red faced, broad shouldered, voluble man, who sang his own praises without a blush of modesty. - \. Lawyer Matthews frequently lost patience with him when he wandered from the v point of questions under cross-examination. Speaking of the day his wife called at his house at Claudelands, defendant stated that he acted as peacemaker between her and the other occupants of the house. "Knowing her temper, I told her to keep quiet," he" said. "I* had to tell the man to be quiet, too, for I wouldn't let ' anyone say anything against the wife. "I've been a good husband to her, and she's been a good wife to me, but she won't leave the city. She wouldn't live m the best house I could get m the country, and I must live out of town because of the horses." Before she took .proceedings against him for divorce, said William, she had "cleared out to Australia." # He had come home one day to find the house shut and ascertained that Gertrude had left for Sydney. Then William stated what he thought was the cause of the trouble between them. "She told her sister that she had only loyed one man m her life. That's the whole trouble. I. don't know where that man is," he said,, '. "I like my wife, and I think a lot'of her. She likes me, too," went on defendan, but Lawyer Matthews cut him short. , "3?Vell, -to close it up," said counsel,

She only asked the court for a separation, and didn't look for maintenance from him m any shape or form. The man, Henry Constantine, whom Aitken alleged had taken his place m the home, gave evidence that he had known Mrs. Aitken only about three months, and had been boarding at her house for. a fortnight. He remembered the row on December 5, when the husband grabbed Mrs. Aitken by the hair and neck, and dragged her across the room. Mrs. Aitken went for the police. Aitken had hot treated her as a wife should be treated. He had called her filthy names. Lawyer Jackson: You carried on a flirtation with Mrs. Aitken? Constantine: Yotir information is quite wrong. Do you ever kiss her? — Certainly I do not. Questioned concerning the use of bad language, Constantine said it had been used by both parties to the dispute. Any of the trouble m the house was not of his making. Constantine said it was Aitken who suggested that he should stay m the house. On the night of the row with a man named Morris, Aitken passed some "funny" remarks and witness asked him if they applied to him. Aitken replied: "No, Harry, old chap. You are quite welcome to stay here any time you like." Florence Aitken" told the court that she had often seen her father strike her mother, and quoted some of the names she said Aitken had used towards his wife. Samuel Francis Aitken, a small man, when telling the court his side of the story, said he was not strong enough to strike his -wife. His wife attacked him because he did not leave the house. Aitken repeated the names he said that she had called him. The girl's story, said Aitken, -tfras a fabrication. She had been tutored up to it by her mother. Regarding the teapot incident, Ait-' ken's version was that she struck him with the pot and then, while Constantine held him, threw it at him frpim the kitchen. Aitken said he could not say why his wife thrashed the boy. The lad did not call his mother a bad name. He had never suggested such a thing to the boy. „..-., "I have never struck my wife m my life," said Aitken. "It has always been the other way about." Lawyer Loughiian: The court made the order for separation m 1919 on the grounds of cruelty. How do you account for that? — Aitken: I made no defence. I thought better of it. You say all this story is a conspiracy between Constantine, your wife and your daughter? — Yes. Boy Sobbed Aitken said he had never used bad language toward his wife. He could not understand why she once went for the police. Counsel: Have you stood your trial for perjury? Aitken: Yes, but it was not proven. When was that?— ln 1913. The boy Sam said he had seen his mother kiss Constantine. "Mother called me a gaolbird," said the lad. "and a criminal," but he could not say why. He had received a thrashing because his mother wouldn't let him have a bath. .-, ' Without commenting on the evidence, Magistrate McNiel said he must make an order for separation. The guardianship of the two children would also be given to the mother. Solicitor's costs, two guineas, were debited against Aitken. So ended another little human drama, but there was a poignant epilogue. In the corridor of the courthouse the boy Sam clung to his father and sobbed bitterly when he learned that he had to live with his mother!. *