WOMEN QUARREL.

Press, Volume LX, Issue 18151, 14 August 1924, Page 3

WOMEN QUARREL.

SEQUEL IN COURT. At about dusk on the evening of the first Monday in this month, in a house in Nursery road,' Limvood, a verbal battle' wcs waged between two raarried women. The sharpness of tho. words spoken by one of tho twa<n caused tho other to s'ap htT.opponent's face and then, during .the struggle which ensued, an rxo -was wielded and descended upon , the pate of one of the struggles. Tho affray had a sequel in the Magistrate's Court yesterday, when the cause of it was ..told, to Mr Wyvcrn Wilson, S.M. Lillian Reedj a widow, appeared on remand, on a- charge th.'it, having had the intent to do grievous bodily Jiarm to Flora Beatrice Bartlett, a married woman, , ehe did actual bodily harm to :h«;f at .Linwood. Mr E. Twyneham appealed for the. accused, who'pleaded not■ guilty.-'- .."•.. Acting Senior-Sergeant A. ,G..Q ; artennsin, who conducted the case for the' police, said tho two women ivcre distant r relatione 'ancLl lived in the samo house, but on August 4th they quarrelled, and a struggle ensued. During the.feht Mrs lieei wa-j alleged to have struci. Mrs BaytJelf .on' the heaid with an axe, irflxtinga wound which had necessitattd medical - attention. ' • - ' ' Dr. T. B. L'avii said that at about o p.m. on August 4th he was-summoned to attend Mrs Bartlett,. at the ho: se of Mrs Kced. When ho arrived Mrs Bart'ett was seated in a chair, and there was a wound an inch and a quarter long and about a quarter to half an inch deep in ber he-_d, and it' was bleeding profusely; The victim of the blow was couscous. _ He dressed the wound, which ww, now quite right, ' ■ Cross-examined by Actinx Sen o-Sergeant Quartermain, the doctor said that the wound might have been caused by the back or the side'Vf an axe. 'Whatever the weapon was it must have been blunt; . ■ ' Flora Beatrice Bartlett said, she rented rooms from Mrs Seed; who. was a cousin of witness's husband and who ..owned the house.' On Sunday evening, August 3rd, witness's husband was mending a pair of. her shoes in their room, when the children of the. accused camo" and kicked on the door and .. demanded to know what they were doing. Tho following day witness looked all day for -ft house, because she had been worried by Mrs Reed that she would have to get out, ae she wanted the room for the children. When she returned the accused told her that she would have to get out of the house," and said that if witness would not leave she would smash the grate in the room they rented. W tntss suggested to Mrs Kced that she did not want the room for her children at all, but for two "gentlemen" boarders, whom she alleged that Mrs 'Heed usid to have at her place every week-end. Mrsi Reed thereupon slapped witness's face and told her that she would "smash up the grate now! .and she ran to the washhouse for the purpos. of selecting something with wh.ch to do tho work. Within a very few ni.nutes a or uttering her threat, tho accused came running towards the room occupied by wi.neM with an aze over her shoulder.. Witness met he" at the door and told- hor do anything Billy. She put. up her hands to £2rd her h/ad, but the accusedbroke through her guard and struck her on tho head with the axe. .. - .'■ After hearing the evidence of the last witness, tho Magistrate. Mid tliat in hw opinion there wa* no intent to do actual bodilv harm, and be cons.dered that trn. charge should be reduced to one of common tlireatencd to break up a grate in a room occwied by Mrs Bartlett, and that ma j stSe that ensued between the two women . xr » g VMTtlett had been struck with an axe. The fecu-ed had Probably resented the suggestion ffi aho wanted the room for men assault but il««« Bnd tv€n j n . the with .MJ.JJ. Si tSffiS upheld. THe case was dism.ssed.