A CURIOUS CASE.

Akaroa Mail and Banks Peninsula Advertiser, Volume I, Issue 79, 20 April 1877, Page 2

A CURIOUS CASE.

(From the Dunedin Stai*)

In the Supreme Court at Auckland, John Pyke, telegraphist, was charged with stealing from a house belonging to R. M { Donald, a sewing machine, a portmanteau, and other articles valued at £17 10s. The prosecutor married Emily Rodgers in Sydney, in 1873. In 1874 he came to Auckland, went from Auckland to Napier by himself, where his wife joined him for a few days. Witness went into the country to look at a hotel, leaving his wife at Napier, and when he returned from the country to Napier his wife had left him, talcing his money. On October 26,1876, she came to him begged him to forgive her, and asked him to take her back, which he consented to do. They lived together for two or three days at Paori, and he

told her he had no place to keep her at Waitekauri, but that she should go to Grahamstown, get some furniture, take a house, and make herself comfortable. He gave her £7 10s and authority to get furniture. He went back to Waitekauri and again came to Grahamstown on the 25th December, when he found his house locked, that the bed had been stripped, and a number of household articles taken away, among other things a leather portmanteau and a sewing machine, which was bought shortly before leaving him at Napier. Witness further deposed to seeing the sewing [machine and portmanteau in a house in Chapel street, Auckland, where his wife and the prisoner had been lodging. M,Donald, through prisoner's solicitor, Mr. Rees, made strange disclosures. He confessed that he was married on the 16th of August, 1873, in Sydney by Dr. Lang, when he described himself as a widower, although he had not been married before. He described himaelfthus because he had lived in Scotland with a woman named Sarah Elizabeth Draper. That was the only stain upon his character. If not dead, she was certainly dead to him. He knew Sarah Elizabeth Daverness ; she passed as Mrs M'Donald. His wife left him first in Auckland, but he did not know the reason. She left a third time in June, 1874 and was away twentytwo days, He did not tell Mrs M'Donald that he had another wife living and that he had sent for her from Scotland. He was not aware that his wife was married to Pyke. He knew that she was living with a person and that she went to Poverty Bay in a great rage and there married Pyke, as she showed him "the marriage license. He was astounded, as he was her lawful husband.— Emily Rodgers, alias M'Donald, was called and deposed that her name was Emily P}ke. —Mr. Rees objected to her being examined, as she was the wife of the prisoner and could not give evidence.— Mr. Hesketh said the marriage must be proved.—Mr. Rees put in the marriage certificate.—His Honor said if she were examined it would be his duty to warn her of the possible consequence. He must leave the matter to the judgment of counsel. It seemed the only way of getting the prisoner out of his difficulty, but he should caution her that in answering any question she hould not criminate herself. In answers to Mr. Hesketh, she said her name was M'Donald and her maiden name Rodgers, but not Pyke. She was married to M'Donald in Sydney, and the prisoner, who was charged with stealing a sewingmachine. She sawM'Donaldin October, 1877. He gave her L 2. She went to reside at Shortland, and got goods there from one Cook, paying him L son account with Pyke's money.—The letter produced in the course of the trial were very amusing, and set the Court smiling. They showed how foolish the man in years may become in connection with a young giddy wife. In one part he expatiated on his " Dolly's charms, and hoped to live for ever in her arms." Another, passage referred to "the prospect of a baby when the sewing-machine would make way for a baby's cot—an extra tie to the connubial knot." The case occupied about six hours, when his Honor intimated to the jury that the evidence was insufficient to found a conviction on, and the jury at once returned a verdict of not guilty. The prisoner was at once discharged, and immediately left the Court with Mrs. Pyke arm in arm in triumph.