RIGHTS SIGNED AWAY

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22616, 2 January 1937, Page 6

RIGHTS SIGNED AWAY

AMAZINti DOCUMENT CLAIM BY WIFE SUCCEEDS [from our own correspondent] LONDON, Dec. 9 What counsel described as the "most remarkable document ever produced in a British Court"-was held by the Windsor magistrates to be void and worthless. It was an agreement signed by a man and a woman, relieving them of all responsibility to one another after marriage. Trooper Christopher James Cooper, 21, of the Royal Horse Guards, produced the document when his wife, Beatrice Maud Cooper, ' 31, of Windsor, applied for a maintenance order. Mrs. Cooper said that three before they were due to be married she signed the agreement in a London station waiting room. She read it through, but did not realise that it meant that she was renouncing all claim upon her husband. She said that sho Avould have signed anything, even her death warrant, to have a name for the baby sho was expecting. The marriage took place at Caxton Hall register office, London, in J una, and the child was born in July. They had never lived together or met smca the wedding ceremony. . , Cooper declared that he the agreement, for which he paid i-o, to his wife. All she wanted was a nanio for the baby. He gave her his name, keeping his part of the bargain. For the wife, Mr. Hezlett. of. Windsor, said that in his opinion the agreement, although it was drawn up by jj solicitor, stamped and signed oy botn parties, was bad from start to nn'sn. It aimed to defeat everything that marriage meant and it was against public policv. Mr. Donald Macintyre, for Trooper Cooper, maintained that the document might he a most remarkable one, but it was good in law. The Bench ordered Cooper to pay 1{ 8 6d a week for the maintenance of bis wife and child.