A DIVORCE CASE.

Waikato Argus, Volume III, Issue 184, 16 September 1897, Page 2

A DIVORCE CASE.

(J!Y TKLEGIUPH —OWN CORRESPONDENT) Auckland, Lust Night. At the Supremo Court to-day His Honor Mr Justice Connolly sat under li The Divorce aril Matrimonial Causes Act, 1807," the petitioner being Alice Mayhew, now ot Taupiri, and the respondent Samuel Frederick Mayhew, at one time a school teacher in Auckland. The petitioner prayed that the marriage he dissolved on the grounds of adultery and desertion without reasonable excuse for two years and upwards. In the. petition, which was read by Mr Cooper, the petitioner stated that on the 10th September, 187b', she was lawfully married to the respondent, then a bachelor, at the residence of her father, Dr. Joseph Elms'y, Otahuhu, by the Rev. John .Macky, a Minister of the Presbyterian Church. She cohabited with her husband at Northeote and at Avondale. There was no issue of the marriage ; on or about the 20th October, !SS'2, the respondent deserted the petitioner and proceeded to New South Wales, where he his, the petitioner is informed, since resided. The petitioner alleged that the respondent had committed adultery with women unknown to her, and had been living with a woman as his wife in Albion-street, Surrey If ills, Sydney ; further, that he had lived and cohabited with another woman at Liver pool-street, Sydney. The petitioner, a woman of middle age, in tier evidence said that after the marriage she lived with her husband, first at Northcote for two years, and then at Avondale for about a similar period. He was a school teacher at Avondale, and the Board of Education gave hiin the option of resigning owing to a scandal, lie resigned, and left the district. This was in the year ISS'J, and respondent lett her about a fortnight later, and witness had never seen or received a letter from him since. In further evidence, the petitioner deposed to having supported herself by teaching under the Board of Education, and since February, 1893, she had been housekeeper at Woodlands Station, Taupiri, and governess to the children. Witness said she sent a special agent to Sydney to trace her husband, but her solicitors had conducted the rest of the business. Witness lias identified her husband s photograph, taken before he left Auckland. Witness said she had had no communication with her hunband whatever for fifteen vears, when he intimated to her that he intended to leave her altogether. . , .. Mr Cooper then put in the evidence taken on commission in Sydney, which was read by the registrar. The respondent had stated before a solicitor's articled clerk that he had not any intention of contesting the suit, and admilted the desertion. His Honor granted a decree nisi for the dissolution of the marriage.