DIVORCED.

Waikato Times, Volume 103, Issue 17411, 25 May 1928, Page 7

DIVORCED.

EX-MEMBER OF CABINET. MR F. M. B. FISHER. MUTUAL SEPARATION. (By Telegraph—Press Association.) CHRISTCHURCH, Friday. In the Supreme Court Francis Marion Rates Fisher, former New Zealand Cabinet Minister, petitioned for divorce from his wife, Esther Alice Fisher, on the ground of mutual agreement to separate. . Mrs Fisher cross-petitioned on the same ground and obtained a decree nisi, to be made absolute after three months, the husband lo pay the wife's costs on the highest scale. The payment of the costs of hearing lengthy evidence before a commission in England was left In agreement between the parties. The husband did not. proceed on his petition, and his counsel offered no objection to the cross-petition. Mr Donnelly, for the wife, said Mr Fisher .was now a financial adventurer without any definite profession or occupation. He was at one stage the youngest Cabinet Minister in New Zealand. He was apparently peeved at his defeat in the 1914 election. lie then went to England and performed valuable service during the war period. Mrs Fisher was always unwilling to let her husband divorce her and eventually decided to take proceedings herself.

Counsel stressed however, that he did not use the term “ financial adventurer,” in any offensive sense except to mean that Fisher was willing to go anywhere where there was a field for his talent. Mr Fisher, who was a son of the well-known Wellington Parliamentarian Mr George Fisher, represented Wellington in Parliament from 1905 to 1914, and during the last thro£ years of his term was Minister of Trade and Customs. He is. well known also as a tennis player, having three times won the New Zealand Championship and figured prominently in International matches.