A ROMANTIC AFFAIR.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume XIII, Issue 4112, 13 May 1892, Page 3

A ROMANTIC AFFAIR.

Search For aHusbad

J PRESS ASSOCIATION.]

iNVEROABajix, May 12,

Quite a romance came before Mr Eawson, R.M., this afternoon, when a woman laid a complaint that James Brov/nj horsedealer, her'husband, had deserted her at Wallacetown and left her destitute. The man denied all knowledge of the complaint. He had never seen her till she came to the hotel where he boarded; last month and claimed him as her husband. The woman's story was that lier name was Mary Quiely, and she was a native of County' Clare, that she and, defendant bail grown up together from childhood, and in 1889 when she was Jfi -they, were married, Being unable to keep house, they continued, to live with their .parents, and :ffio*rtly afterwards Brown migrated to this colony. Several years passed during which she never heard from him, but rumours occasionally reaching, her of his whereabouts she came to New Zealand in 1889. As Ler-buflband had the marriage certi-

fioate, she ■ brought an. acknowledge mentfrom tho pries who bad married them, She settled ih Hokiiilrn, where she had a half brother mid. a sister; and worked for her living, all 1 the time making enquiries - about her husband, .Hearing that he was , living in Inyercargill, and seeing his name attached to a horse hient, she gave up her situation and came hero, and now identified the defendant as the man to whom she married, although he denied that lie knew her.

Cross examined: She said that Miss Kelly, of Weslport, and Martin Clohesy, of Reefton, knew both her and her husband. They were in the village when they were married, and although : not present: knew. that the oeremony took: place. Although she had been an atten» durit in a lunatic asylum ber association with the patients had not affected her mind, She had never claimed any other man as her husband, and had always gone by the name of Mrs Brown. Defendant's counsel said this was the stcond woman iu New Zealand who had claimed him as her husband. ' His Worship refused'to make the order. If that were done on such evidence no man would be safe. ',

Complainant's solicitor asked that defendant should go into the witness box, but the other side declined, and were upheld by the Bench on the ground that so far, there was no case lo answer, defendant's assertion that he did not know the woman being sufficient until further proof of identity was brought., His counsel said Brown would do his duty by the woman when.he was satisfied she was his wife.