DOCTORS COURTSHIP.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLII, Issue 12818, 18 March 1905, Page 2 (Supplement)

DOCTORS COURTSHIP.

£300 AWARDED FOR BREACH OF PROMISE.

The extraordinary broach of promise action brought by Miss Frances Hanrahan, a barmaid, against Dr. William Harrop Parry, of Llanwrst, Denbighshire, ended in a Dublin jury awarding her £500 damages.

The courtship, which began on a steamer while Miss Hanrahan was journeying from Holyhead to Dublin, was brought to a close with the discovery that Dr. Parry was a married man. This was after, according to M'iss Hanrahan, ho had become engaged to her, and had placed a ring on her finger out of several rings he produced. On behalf of Dr. Parry, Mr. O'Shaughnessy submitted that there was no corroboration of the alleged promise, and consequently no case to go to the jury; but the Chief Justice refused to nonsuit.

Mr. O'Shaughnessy then said the whole thing was the result of a drunken freak. Unfortunately, Dr. Parry had taken to drink within the last eighteen months, and had mined his practice. One of the difficulties his advisers had experienced since the opening of the case was to keep him sober, and they had not succeeded. The rings he brought with him to Miss Hanrahan were his wife's rings, and a blow which blackened his wife's eye was struck by him while he was steeped in drink. Dr. Parry, in his evidence, stated that when he me't Miss Hanrahan on the boat he thought she was ill, and he got her " a brandy and soda," and told Thomas Jones, a plasterer who accompanied him, to hold up her head until ho had got " a brandy and soda" for himself. (Laughter.) Some amusement was caused by Dr. Parry describing his efforts, to get drink in Dublin before the public-houses opened. On one occasion he and Jones, who was with him, were followed by a strange man, and when they asked him what he was looking for he said, " Just -what you are looking for yourselves." (Laughter.) The rings referred to by Miss Hanrahan were, Dr. Parry said, his wife's, and he brought them with him, lest his money should run short. He showed them to Miss Hanrahan at the refreshment bar, and she put one of them on her finger. He never promised to marry her. Thomas Jones said that he told Miss Hanrahan on board the boat coming from Holyhead that Dr. Parry was a doctor and a married man; but, in answer to the Chief Justice, Miss Hanrahan replied that this statement was incorrect. Mrs. Parry, the wife, gave evidence, and explained that it was she, and not her husband, who wrote suggesting that Miss Hanrahan's letters should bo addressed to " Mr. Jackson," her object being to intercept the correspondence. Her husband, she added, did not deny that she was his wife in the presence of M'iss Hanrahan. When the jury returned the verdict in favour of Miss Hanrahan there was applause in Court.