Unlucky Marital Ventures

Southland Times, Issue 19034, 30 April 1903, Page 2

Unlucky Marital Ventures

Vev IJnUed Press AssociationBy Electric Telegraph— Copyright..

LONDON, April ; 27,

Further developments have occurred in relation to an extraordinary marriage case recently brought to light. Ihd bogus Trince who, in December last, marriert at a registrar's office in- Portsmouth Miss Mabel- Scott, formerly" Couiiless Russell, hus been committed for trial on a charge of making a ialso statutory statement before the registrar. His real name is William Brown, and he is th« son of a coactonaiu Brown;-represent-. cd himself to the •x-Countess us. Prince Enthrobald Stuart of Modena, a natural

son of the Emperor of Austria, and "on. the strength of this statement she married him. In J anuary lastj, BroWtt -deserted his wife on the Continent .and fl»d to New York. ■ ' *

(The relations of tho ex-Countess and her husband, Eurl Hussell, givye rise to several scandals. The lady, who was* daughter of Sir Claude E. Scott. was . married to the Earl i n 1890, and in tho following year she sued hiiu .unsuccessfully, in the Divorce Court, a subsequent ■ second trial proving equally abortive. But in 1900 he formed an acquaintance with a man-fed woman nuaned Marioni or Mollie Soniervllle. (neo Cook), and Ift I America they each obtaiue<l a divorco i from their reapectivo wife and husband, anrl then went through tho Coruv ol a. nmriiuge. according to tho laws of Nc» vada. On returning to England they were divorced from thoir older ties toy the more binding process of British law, the Earl agreeing to "pay Jtl.VJi) damages • to Mr Koniervillu. In .July of 1901 he was arraigned before the llousa of Lords for bigamy. and sentenced to Uiri-c months impriKoninent. which term he underwent, amf WftS re-married soon nfter liberation. Tho - Lord Chancellor, who prwsided as Lord .0. Steward of the Court of Peers, white . clear that some punishment had necessarily to he inflicted, made the following.- , remark : "f think he (Earl Russell) was undoubtedly suffering under almost intolerable provocation, the cjreuntfftanccs of hi* domestic life being such M s might lead him to do aIuHJSt anything to got rid of the person who had poisoned tho whole atmosphere j u which h<? U v e<l.'4

The Earl brought a libel action against his mother-in-law. Lady Scott, in consequence of that lady charging him in the courts . with having committed certain abominable offences, and sh© was convicted and sentenced to a term of imprisonment.)