COME HOME WITH ME NOW

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXV, Issue 50, 2 March 1915, Page 2

COME HOME WITH ME NOW

FORGIVING AUCKLAND HUSBAND SEEKS WIFE IN PRISON. REMARKABLE DIVORCE CASE, Of a forgiving nature was a petitioner who appeared in the Auckland Supreme Court before Mr Justice Stringer on Friday to ask for a divorce. The decree-seeker was Charles Albert Richmond, a porter, who, in September. 1904, married the respondent, Minnie Adeline. The petitioner was a petty officer on a ship, and for a time they lived in Sydney, and subsequently removed to New Zealand. Returning to Auckland from one of his voyages he made inquiries after his wife, and found that she was in the. hands of the police at Wellington on a charge of vagrancy. Witness was asked by the police if he would take her back again. He replied that he was willing to do so, but she never returned to him. Afterwards witness again learned that she was in prison, this time serving a term Of six months at Wellington. Petitioner obtained a permit, visited her in gaol, and in front of the warders, asked her if she would return to him when she came out oi prison. She replied that she had done with him for ever. In March, 1908, he met her in Queen Street, and again invited her to come home. On this occasion she consented, and three weeks later he sent her away for a month’s holiday to Sydney. At the end of the month she came back, stayed with witness for a fortnight, and then off she went again. The circumstances of her last flight were that she stayed out until about idnight, and happened to come in just as the petitioner was bemoaning his lot to the landlady of the house at which they were staying. The wife announced that she had heard all that had been said about her, and that she was now off for good. She flounced nut of the house, and had never returned. On that occasion she had had a “tew spots.” Mrs Irene Welsh, of (Jrey Lynn, gave corroborative evidence with regard to the petitioner’s final departure, and stated that prior to the midnight incident she had had to remonstrate with the respondent for staying out late at night, and for going down to a boat to visit a gentleman friend. Other evidence was called as to the respondent’s conduct after the final separation, and a decree nisi was granted.