NO COLLAR AT DINNER

Dominion, Volume 16, Issue 154, 17 March 1923, Page 15

NO COLLAR AT DINNER

“ENTICING” A WIFE AWAYP A remarkable case in which a Keighley man alleged that his mother-in-law enticed his wife away from him and persuaded her to go back to South Africa was opened, before Mr. Justice Darling (states the “Daily Mail”). The husband was Mr. Charles Sanderson, a cashier. The mother-in-law was Mrs. Hannah Hudson, a widow, of Port Elizabeth, South Africa. Sergeant Sullivan, K.C., for Mr Sanderson, said that the claim was for the alleged enticing away of Mrs. Sanderson, and for harbouring her against the will of the husband, The wife is no party to the proceedings. The defence, apart from a denial of the statement of claim, set out grounds for the wife leaving her husband. Mr. Sanderson, said Sergeant Sullivan, married his wife, who came from South Africa, at a Wesleyan Chapel in Morecambe in October, 1920. In July, 1921, Mrs. Hudson and Mrs. Sanderson's sister arrived from South Africa on a holiday. Subsequently the husband noticed a change in tlie'.att’tude of his wife. One day, counsel proceeded, when plaintiff was in the. kitchen, his Wife summoned him into the dining-room, where he found his mother-in-law, his wife, and her sister. His. wife announced that she was ceasing to be Ills wife except, in name and in the eyes of the law. When he demanded the reason ho was told that: He did not accompany the wife beyond the chapel door when she went to church He smoked In the dining-room without the mother’s permission. ■ He had not been respectful in his attitude towards her mother. Ho frequently got up when he had finished dinner without asking the mother’s 'permission. He had on two occasions eat down at meals without a collar on. “Mothers-in-law are proverbially sensitive as to the social requirements of sons-in-law sitting down to dinner ' without buttoning their collars,” said Sergeant Sullivan, amid laughter.. Mr. Justice Darling: Within limits, that is quite right. Counsel: I have seen the greatest financiers in America sitting down to dinner without collars on and with open shirt front on hot days. That was in a community where such things ate excused better than they are at Keighley. (Laughter.) Mr. Justice Darling: Do the financiers of Keighley genezally wear collars? (Laughter.) Defendant and her daughters, said counsel, left plaintiff’s house next merning before six o’clock. Mr. Charles Sanderson, the plaintiff, said that when his mother-in-law complained that he did not wear a collar nt dinner, if was in the hot summer of 1921. “1 said I could not wear a collar,” he added. “They were dressed in blouses half-way down front and back, and I had to wear a collar. (Laughter.) I continued to appear without a collar.” (Laughter.) The hearing was adjourned, and by the time the case was resumed the English mail had left.