WIFE'S TRIALS

Evening Post, Volume CXII, Issue 122, 19 November 1931, Page 14

WIFE'S TRIALS

HUSBAND'S BEHAVIOUR ASTONISHING EVIDENCE AN ESTATE OE £29,000 Astonishing evidence of the trials and tribulations of herself and family as a result of tho behaviour of her husband was given in the Supreme Court yesterday afternoon by Catherine Louisa Westlake at the hearing of the application by the Public Trustee for probate in solemn form of law of the last will and codicil of her late husband, John Brown Westlake, settler, of Pahiatua. Tho application is opposed by Mrs. AVestlake and others on tho ground that when the will and codicil were purported to have been executed tho testator was of unsound mind, memory, and understanding. As stated in yesterday's "Post," Westlake lost his life with several others in a tragedy, which has remained a mystery, on a farm property at Himatangi, near Foxton. His estate was estimated to be worth £29,000. TESTATOR'S ALLEGATIONS. In concluding his opening address, senior counsel for the defence said the medical evidence would show that it was not a case of merely a mean man, but of a man suffering from delusions as to the character of his wife and children. He had an obsession amounting to a delusion, first that his wife was a hateful person of no use to him and that somehow or other she had deprived him of the dowry he had expected from her people, and, secondly, that his children wero of no use to him; that the son Arthur was disobedient and that the daughter Grace was not merely disobedient and wanting in affection toward him, but was immoral, allegations, counsel said, which were utterly and entirely without foundation. The medical witnesses would say that all the facts, especially the testator's suspicious nature, were in their opinion the result of a mental defect called chronic delusional insanity or paranoia. Tho malady was the gradual development of a lasting system of delusions. "I thiuk we shall satisfy the Court," added counsel, "that there was absolutely nothing in the conduct of his wife and family which gave him any cause for grievance, and that the testator's hatred of them proceeded from his own defects and not from any fault of theirs." WIFE'S EVIDENCE. Poignant details of her married life with the testator were given by his widow, Catherine Louisa Westlake, who said that she was married to Westlake in 1889. After their marriage they lived in a small house out of Akaroa, Westlake going in each day to Akaroa, where he had a saddlery business. Westlake would not buy sufficient food, and often there was only dry bread to eat. She was also denied proper maternity attention. When they lived in Masterton they had boxes for chairs, beds made of boards, and the blankets were horse-hair lined. Her husband used to chastise the children for no reason other than to "put his temper out on them." Later her husband took a boarding-house. They had 17 permanent boarders, and over the week-ends there were as many as 50 in the house. She and the children, with the assistance of one waitress, had to do all the work. At that time the oldest child, Arthur, was twelve. All Westlake did was to provide the food and take the money. The board-ing-house was a successful business, her husband clearing £900 in the thirteen months they were there. NO MONEY AND FEW CLOTHES. Then they went to Pahiatua, continued Mrs.' AVestlake. AVestlake gave them no money; they had very few clothes, aud had no pleasure. On one occasion when she bought her daughter Grace a pair of boots there was a terrible row. AVestlake said he would murder the lot of them and set fire to the house. AVhen his temper was roused her husband behaved as though. ho was not right in his mind, but he always took care to be very nice m front of strangers. He used to use filthy language toward her and the children, throw food on the floor and stamp in it, and throw meat at the walls when they were at meals. Neither she nor the children provoked these acts. LETTERS SEIZED. Mrs Westlake said that her husband bought an 18-aero farm at Mangataiiioka for £29 an. acre, which he subsequently sold for £52 an acre. She, Arthur, and Grace had to milk 36 cows, at first by hand and later by machinery. They went back to Pahiatua to live in 1910. Mrs. AVestlake said her husband used to wait for the postman, open their letters, and tear them up Apart from his coarse habits, her husband when in the house was suspicious, and used to sneak about the place watching them. _ Senior counsel for the plaintiff had not concluded his cross-examination ot Mrs. AVestlake when the Court atliourned until this morning. This morning Mrs. AVestlake was submitted to a lengthy cross-examination by senior counsel for the plaintiff. SON LEAVES HOME. Mrs. Westlake was asked if it was nor really her son Arthur's leaving home and going to live with her relatives that annoyed AVestlake and made him bitter towards the son. Witness denied the suggestion. "What do you say was his reason for his annoyance and bitterness towards your soul "—"I don't know what his reason was." - Mrs. AVestlake said she told Arthur to leave home because of his father's treatment of him. Sho did not remember her son having written to his father telling him that he had feathered his nest and that he (the son) was <r o ing to try and feather his. . ° "Dealing with his treatment of your daughter Grace, what do you say was his objection to her?"—"l don't know." "Why, then, did Grace leave home?" "Because he told her to go." Witness added later that she thought that Westlake acted in that manner to show his nasty temper. "You had him arrested in May, 1928, ou information given you by your brother?"—" Yes." Witness said that when her husband was brought to Pahiatua the proceedings were withdrawn. "Did you realise that you had acted wrongly in having him arrested?" — "No." "Did you give any proof at all, other than this statement of your brother, that he was leaving New Zealand?"—" No." Mrs. AVestlake said she know that her husband considered he had been very unjustly treated by being arrested. AGAINST CATHOLIC FAITH. Witness said that Westlake had tried to get the children to renounce the Catholic faith, and had brought homo a book against the Catholic religion and said the children had to read it, but witness refused to allow the children to read the book. The daughter Grace, now the wife of A. C. Judd, drover, of Pahiatua, corroborated the evidence given by her mother as to AVostlake's harsh treatment of the family. AVitness, with tears in her eyes, said she only roniernbered her father giving her money once. That was one Christmas, when

he gavo her brother and herself 6d each. Mrs. Judd said that her father had threatened 1o cut their throats and murder them. She, her brother, and sister never received any toys or presents, and wero not allowed to' have any pleasure and go out anywhere. Westlake showed no fatherly interest in them, and for years did not speak to witness. She had given her father no cause for offence or mental worry. "TERRIFIED OF FATHER." Continuing, witness paid they were always terrified of their father. She referred to an occasion when, as a result of her father threatening to murder her, she went to the police constable's house. AVhcn she was living at home she locked her bedroom door every night on the advice of her mother. Witness said her sister was in a very bad stale of health, which she attributed to her father's ill-treatment. Arthur John Westlake, the son, gave evidence of a similar nature to that of his sister in regard to the conduct of the testator toward the family. (Proceeding.)