CRAIG DIVORCE CASE.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LV, Issue 307, 20 May 1913, Page 6

CRAIG DIVORCE CASE.

JURY UNABLE TO AGREE. CO-RESPONDENT SEVERELY CROSSEXAMINED. AN EXTRAORDINARY CORRESPONDENCE, i Auckland, May IG. The jury lias been unable to agree in the Craig divorce case. The co-respond-ent, Henry Hargreaves, to-day underwent a severe cross-examination, and further extracts were read from the correspondonce which passed between him an'd Mrs. Craig. The petition, as stated yesterday, is that of Thomas John Craig, merchant, of Auckland, against Zillah Aurora Craig, with Hargreaves, who is a Sydnev bank clerk, joined as co-respondent. Dr. Bamford asked Hargreaves: When her husband was ill you laughed at him. You say, "It will only repay him for the misery he has caused Vou." Did you write tha,t?—Witness: Yes; I wrote that. There was nothing in it. Dr. Bamford: And you assume a proprietary interest in Mrs. Craig? Here is what you have written: "So they think your return will work wonders, d n them." "Don't sit up with him and make yourself ill. I absolutely forbid it, Zillah." "Let the crawler die, and be d dto him." "Have you heard from G , dear? Only write a formal answer. I want you all to myself." "I am sorry, to hear 'it is improving.'" ,'T ani'relieved to hear that you are ■sleeping by yourself." Are there'any other married .women you write to in this strain? Witness: No. Dr. Bamford: What does "that night at 25" lefer to?— Witness: I told Mrs. Craig I cared for her that night. Dr. Bamford: You did not tell heir you care for the nurse or anybody else?— Witness: No; I don't think so. Dr. Bamford: That was before you came to New Zealand and lived at Beach road?— Witness: Yes. His Honor: Do you remember writing to this woman, asking if she allowed her husband to kiss her?— Witness: Yes. His Honor: Do you make a habit of putting that question to married women? ] —Witness was understood to intimate that he didn't. His Honor: Because if you did the' consequences to yourself would probably ' be more drastic than divorce, proceedings. The addresses by counsel were practically only summaries of the evidence. In summing up the evidence for the jury, his Honor pointed out that they had to consider whether the. letters' that had been written were, as Mr.Prendergast had put it, compatible with innocence. Could an honest man have writen such letters, an honest man infatuated with a woman, as honest men had been, and would be again? Could an honest married woman keep and reply to such letters as these? Could a man who honestly loved a woman write to her forbidding her to kiss her husband,, and stating that he wanted her all to 'him T self? What did he mean by th'sit abominable language? He expressed..the,wish that her husband may suffer tortures before he dies. Was that the" love of" a man whose love 'was no less than his respect ? The jury nitfst' consider ' the whole of the circumstances, Jhe persistent communication and the ""constant meetings. On the last; time the. lady left for Auckland, she theii; aLall event's, knew that her .husbajid -most/ jdeoidedly, objected to her relations with.ihis man, and even after that there was a long, unfinished letter written by, ,the, wife. In this there were answers to,questions that should never have been asked, .The jury, however, must be as, satisfied as to her guilt before returning..a..verdict to that effect, as if : the, offence,.were punishable by fine or imprisonment, ..and they were trying it in 'the Court below. That any decent person could wJite such letters seemed to his Honor to'.be'lnconceivable, but he pointed out -that 'that did not affect the respondent' Except in' so far as she kept the letters and 1 did' not reprove them. Regardilig'^hb''Second issue, there was no evidence! on which the jury could act. There no evidence of any wrong except'the'wrong of drunkenness, and in'that respect .there was not only the evidence of but of several other' witnesses that Craig drank to excess. • But there-was,no evidence of cruelty apart from the fact, that he unquestionably took too nrjich liquor. The question for the jury yas,'whether a wife who was treated with.Reasonable kindness, who did not want.for : ,.anything, could be said to be driven. to adultery because her husband drank, too. much,, There were other steps she.could have taken. 'Tf his drunkenness wasisuch.as, she described she could in the first place, have taken out a prohibition 'order against him. ' One .could- not help, sym-: pathising with a woman who'had to live' with a man who drank- to excess, but there was no reason in law 1 "why- she should be driven to adultery." Thenlication of the law lay with his Honor. The jury could consider this- aspect of the question as men of feeling. -'"'" '•'' As stated above, the jury announced that they were unable to agree, and that the required three-fourths majority could not be obtained either way on the issues submitted.