DESERTED

NZ Truth, Issue 1212, 21 February 1929, Page 8

DESERTED

Christian Did Not Act Like One

HER ONLY COURSE «

(From "N.Z. Truth's" Hastings Rep.) About seven years ago, an advertisement from a Maraekakaho Station, near Hastings, called for applicants to take over the Job Of married couple on the. station. In answer to that "ad." went "Mr. and Mrs." William Charlton Christian, and as a respeotablo "married couple" they held the job down. , . TN fact, half way through their term they were regarded as well married, for a child was born. Until about last Christinas they carried on, and then came a move Into Hastings. After a few days there, Christian remembered/ that he had to go back to the station to sell up some of the gear he had left behind, and that was the last that Ethel Mary Morris (for they were not a married couple), saw of William Charlton Christian. Inquiries at the station showed that he had not been back. He was traced to Gisborne, and from there he wrote admitting that he was father- of the born child -and that he was prepared to pay for its maintenance, but he wasn't, agreeable to paying anything to the "woman who had been my housekeeper for about eight years." As for the child yet to be born, this was not mentioned m his letter. The deserted mother had only one course left, and she took it. She applied at the Hastings Magistrate's Court last week to have William Charlton Christian adjudged the father of both her born and unborn children, and a sympathetic magistrate made the order m both cases. He also ordered William to pay 15/---per week for the born child, £5 past maintenance and £2/2/- costs. In regard to the other, the question of making an order was left over pending the birth of the second child. iiiiHimiiiiiiiiiiiiiiniiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii "' HiiiiiiimiiiiimiHiiiiun,