Wife selling at Hiring Fairs
hugh.w...@gmail.com
some but it was a topic which turned up on the Devon-L rootsweb list
the two second "marriages" taking place in Australia and England
an article from the North-China Herald, September 1909.
Since we emerged from the Middle Ages, divorce has been accepted in
principle by both Houses of Parliament and there were many private Acts
passed up to the year 1858. Originally if a person wished to obtain a
divorce in England, three suits had to be brought - ecclesiastical,
civil and parliamentary. In such circumstances divorce became a remedy
for the rich; the poor, we are told, were driven to bigamy.
A Commission was appointed in 1850 with a view to the adoption of
remedial measures, and the recommendations made included the
establishment of a regular Court for divorce. Bills constructed on the
principles laid down by the Commission were introduced into Parliament
and successively abandoned or lost, until in 1857 the Ministry of the
day, by great exertions, carried the Bill which is now the Act of
twenty and twenty-one Victoria c. eighty-five. Notwithstanding the
hostility it excited, the Bill proposed little more than a
consolidation of jurisdictions; and proceedings in the Divorce Court
have now, with few exceptions, the same object and result as the former
proceedings in Parliament and in the civil and ecclesiastical Courts.
Full divorce is granted on the principles usually recognized by the
House of Lords; and the other remedies are such as might formerly have
been granted by the ecclesiastical Court.
This Act, however, has not made it possible for the poorer classes to
obtain divorce. In an undefended case the costs amount from £40 to
£60, while in other cases they may amount to hundreds of pounds. The
argument is sometimes advanced that the process of in forma pauperis
should be followed where the petitioner is unable to pay, but in such a
case only the Court fees, from £6 to £8, would be saved. Moreover
members of the artisan and labouring classes are unable to give the
time necessary to travel to London, even if they can find sufficient
money to institute proceedings. Bigamy and other outrages against
society have been the result of this defect in procedure only too
often; consequently, for years it has been felt in many quarters that
it was due to society that there should be some amelioration of the
conditions appertaining to the process of divorce. But a champion of
the poorer classes has been lacking.
Lord Gorell, who as President of the Divorce Court, has had long
experience of the subject, has at last been impelled, by years of
watching this class of case, to come to a conclusion about it which he
felt it to be his duty to lay before the House of Lords. He has,
therefore, brought the matter prominently before the nation by moving
the following motion: "That it is expedient that jurisdiction to a
limited extent in divorce and matrimonial cases should be conferred
upon County Courts, in order that the poorer classes may have their
cases of that nature heard and determined in such Courts."
more
http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~mossvalley/mv/journals/nch/mv_divorce.html
my own three divorces wiped out my capital but made for an interesting
life
regards to all
Hugh W
just 70 years and 22 days