PATHETIC CASE

Southland Times, Issue 19966, 4 September 1926, Page 8

PATHETIC CASE

DIVORCE ACTION WIFE ACCUSED OF DRUNKENNESS. DECREE NISI GRANTED (Per United Press Association.) Auckland, September 2. A pathetic divorce action based on habitual drunkenness on the part of the wife came before Air Justice Herdman in the Supreme Court to-day when Joseph Buckley, an elderly man afflicted with deafness, asked for a dissolution of a marriage that was contracted nearly 40 years go. Respondent, Catherine Buckley although she was in another room did not appear in Court. Her counsel Mr Sullivan obtained leave to withdAw the answers to the petition making it an undefended action. The petitioner was a sorrowful figure in the witness box and his story was drawn out more by the questions of his counsel, Mr Singer, than by his monosyllabic answers. Petitioner said that almost from the time the marriage was contracted on November 7, 1888 drink had obsessed his wife although there were six children of the marriage. The home was the scene of continuous outbursts of violence. His wife would break the furniture and tear the blankets and only a few yeans ago smashed a door with an axe. Respondent was arrested for drunkenness on different occasions and once disappeared from home and when traced with great difficulty was found to be living under an assumed name. Mr Sullivan said respondent admitted having taken to drink following a shock four years ago. She had not been drinking all through her married life. Mr Singer said Buckley had brought the petition because he was “tired of the whole business.” Mr Sullivan: “The petition is not defended but it is right and proper I should mention that the wife has not been drinking for eight months past, ever since the petition was served.” A decree nisi was granted.