POSED AS A MAN

Taranaki Central Press, Volume IV, Issue 390, 23 March 1937, Page 5

POSED AS A MAN

WOMAN’S MASQUERADE. STORY OF HER "MARRIAGE” Amazing London Court Revelations. Press Association—Copyright. Received 12.15 p.m. London, March 22. An amazing story of a woman’s masquerade as a male since 1923 was told in the Marlborough Street Court to-day, when Valerie Arkell-Smith, aged 42, was fined £1 for theft of £5 from a woman employer while she was undetectedly acting as a “man servant'” The evidence showed that ArkellSmith served as a V.A.D. during wartime, after which she married an Australian Lieutenant Arkell-Smith, but they separated after six months. She lived later with an Australian soldier, Ernest Crouch, and there -were two children by this marriage.

After parting from Crouch, she began the masquerade. She “married” a woman the same year. After that she posed as a baronet and obtained various responsible positions. She left her “wife” in 1926, and was engaged in various jobs, as a man, until her conviction at the Old Bailey in 1929, ona charge of making a false statement in a marriage registry, which revealed the masquerade. After that she resumed male attire and lived with several women as “man and wife.” Finally representing herself as a widower, she secured a position as a manservant, which led to the present charge. ' . The solicitor representing her said she had reason for wearing male attire, which at . present he was not desirous of disclosing.