GRAVESIDE SENSATION

Evening Star, Issue 17542, 23 December 1920, Page 2

GRAVESIDE SENSATION

DEMONSTRATION AGAINST HUSBAND. Extraordinary allegations were made in the course of the hearing at Leeds of a case in which Arthur William Ralph, an ex-Lecds policeman, of Third avenue, New Worthy, summoned his next-door neighbor, Mrs Howe, for alleged abusive language under singular circumstances. The trouble arose out of a disgraceful scene at the funeral of Mrs Ralph at New Worthy Cemetery, Leeds, on September 30. The case was listened to with great interest by a large number of neighbors, who occasionally showed their feelings during the hearing. When the magistrates gave their decision dismissing the plaint, and the result was communicated to those who had been unable to obtain admission to the court, there were loud cries of “ Hurrah!” Complainant aliened that defendant had caused trouble between himself and his wife, and that in consequence he had had on one occasion to ask her to leave his house. Mrs Ralph died on September 25. On Ralph following the coffin out of his house it was alleged that defendant shouted after him, and that when he was alighting at the cemetery she exclaimed: “I am here, you .” After the service in the church she cried out; “ Where’s your fancy woman?” and at the graveside she tore his card o2 a wreath, rubbed dirt on it, and threw it down. As he was leaving the graveside she commenced to “boo.” Mr Masser (for defendant) declared that Mrs Howe denied using the language complained of, though she admitted that she was among a crowd of about 500 people who demonstrated at the funeral. She had acted, he urged, without malice to complainant, but simply out of the love and affection she held for his deceased wife, who had confided in her, and whom she regarded almost as a daughter. Mrs Howe had appealed to complainant to give up another woman and to live happily with his wife. She had, perhaps naturally, some feelings of resentment towards him when she heard that his wife was dead and that she, the next-door neighbor, had not been called in to see her.

In her evidence Mrs Howe deposed that from time to time deceased came to her in great trouble about her husband. She had appealed to complainant, as stated. Witness was not asked to see deceased, though another woman saw her just before the end. The crowd, she proceeded, were enraged that Mrs Ralph should be interred without an inquiry being held into the cause of her.death, for she had been working on the day before her death. Mr Maud (for complainant): Do you suggest that Mr Ralph killed his wife'?— No, sir. Well, how high will you put it?— Well, I think he knows how she died. I don’t think the doctor was rightly acquainted with the case. Had Mrs Ralph bad health?—No, sir. Witness added that on one occasion deceased had taken salts of lemon because she was unhappy. Mr Maud: Do you suggest she took the poison herself or that her husband gave it to her?—l should not like to say. After a pause, she added “ No, certainly not.” Witness went on to say that she-had told Ralph that if anything happened to his wife she would make him suffer. She had a presentiment that something would happen, . Mr Maud: Then you were convinced that, if complainant had the power, he would put his wife away? Have you anticipated this? —No, we have jnot been anticipating; we have been expecting it—(ap-plause)—-and it has come to pass.' Mrs Howe intimated that she did not go to the cemetery with the funeral party, but with others, to see “what was going on.” She admitted asking complainant where his “fancy woman” was, but thought she was justified, adding: “ I used to tell Mrs Ralph that if it was in my power to show him up I would do it. I did not do, as much as hundreds of other women at the cemetery.” In dismissing the case Alderman Pickersgill remarked that the Bench felt it was the only course they could adopt; but they hoped the parties would go home, let the matter drop, and live peaceably.