Some UK divorce cases from 1901 which involved soldiers and a sailor who saw active service in South Africa, from reports printed in various British newspapers. Additional information on any of the servicemen named is welcome, especially the names of the two officers in the first snippet!
A correspondent of the "Sun" understands that a sensational divorce case is to be withdrawn, terms of settlement having been arrived at by the parties. The petitioner in this case was an officer serving in South Africa. His wife had accompanied him, and it is alleged that the misconduct took place in South Africa with a rich young officer of position. It is said that £30,000 damages were to be asked. It was not intended to offer any defence, and it had been arranged that the suit should not come on for hearing until after the marriage of the co-respondent, who is engaged to a charming young lady. Another arrangement has now been arrived at (says the correspondent), whereby the husband has consented to a separation without going into court, and is to receive a very large sum as compensation.
Cardiff Evening Express, Thursday 17th January 1901
____________
14 March 1901 - Major George Robert Brown Patten, formerly of the 18th Hussars, and now an Army pay officer, residing at Shrewsbury, was granted a decree nisi on the ground of his wife's adultery with Captain William Patrick Newbigging. No defence, and parties agreed damages of £1000. In 1899, Major Patten, his wife, and their two children went to Gibraltar, where they made the co-respondent's acquaintance. After the birth of the third child, Captain Newbigging went to South Africa, and after being wounded was sent home to England. In August 1900, Mrs Patten went to visit Mrs Newbigging, but evidence showed that she stayed at a hotel in Merionethshire with Captain Newbigging. She then confessed to her husband that he was not the father of the third child. Major Patten was awarded custody of the two eldest children.
____________
20 March 1901 - Thomas Gerald Walker was granted a decree nisi against his wife, Ada Mary, on the ground of her adultery with Mr John A. Miller, an owner of racing stables at Newmarket. Miller was to pay £5000 damages to Walker. At the end of 1899, Mr Walker had volunteered to go out to join the Rhodesian Horse, and was appointed lieutenant and adjutant. During the time he was away he had received affectionate letters from his wife, until in November 1900, he received the following, from "The Larches," Newmarket, dated October 25th: - "I have not written to you for some weeks. I could not. Before you get this I shall have gone away, and shall never see you again. I was not true to you for a long time before you went away, and I could not go on living the life I then did again. I cannot ask you to forgive me. Tom, I hope some day you will try to forget that I ever came into your life at all. I could not let you come back, not knowing I had gone. It is all my fault. I only wish I had told you before. I hope that some day you will be happy, and forget me. - Ada."
Walker at once returned home and made inquiries, and intended to return to SA to rejoin his regiment after the case had ended. He had found that, as Mr Miller had a Scottish domicile, she had got a divorce in Scotland, and had since re-married. The affair had begun as soon as Walker went out to South Africa in January 1900.
____________
28 March 1901 - Mr Arthur Hepburn Hastie, a London solicitor, obtained a decree nisi by reason of the adultery of his wife with a Major Rankin, said to be an officer in the Australian contingent who served in South Africa. "Last December the petitioner went to Wales to shoot, and was not expected home for a week. Having received a telegram from one of his clients, he unexpectedly returned home, arriving there between three and four o'clock on the morning of January 1st. He found the door of his room locked, but after a time his wife opened it, and the co-respondent, insufficiently clad, rushed downstairs into the street."
____________
19 April 1901 - James Peters, a sergeant in the Royal Artillery, sued for a dissolution of his marriage with the respondent, Sarah Emily Peters, on the ground of her adultery with Luther Davis, an artificer at Portsmouth Dockyard. In February 1900, Peters went out to South Africa, and was wounded near Pretoria; he returned to England in October that year. When he went to South Africa he had sent his wife to live at his brother's house at Landport, Portsmouth, allowing her 7s 6d out of his pay. On his return he found that his wife had had improper relations with the co-respondent. A decree nisi was granted.
____________
24 April 1901 - Mrs Jane M'ewan Story petitioned for a dissolution of her marriage (granted with costs) with Mr Robert Douglas Story, a war correspondent for the London "Daily Mail," on the ground of his adultery with Mrs Freda Ford. No defence was offered.
Before the war, defendant at one point had put Mrs Story, in delicate health," fully clothed into a bath of cold water. In Dec 1899 he went to South Africa, and on his return, in July 1900, Mrs Story met him at Southampton; he was accompanied by Mrs Ford, and the three of them travelled to the Story's home in London. He paid very little attention to his wife, and later took Mrs Ford to Ostend, Blackpool, Manchester, Glasgow, and Edinburgh, while lecturing on the war. After several acts of violence, petitioner left the respondent, who had then set up house with Mrs Ford.
____________
29 April 1901 - Mrs Gwendoline Liza Beech sued for a divorce from Herbert James Goddard Beech, alleging desertion and misconduct. The suit was undefended. They had lived together until 1897, but the wife then obtained a decree for restitution of conjugal rights, which was not obeyed. In the meantime, Beech had gone out to South Africa with the Yeomanry, returning in December 1900. Evidence was given that Beech had stayed with another woman at a London hotel. A decree nisi was granted, with costs and the custody of the only child.
____________
April-May 1901 - Mr W. H. Walpole, of Ipswich, petitioned for a divorce from his wife, Minnie, on the ground of her adultery with Mr George Chamberlain, late of the Imperial Yeomanry, who had died in South Africa. The affair had been going on since at least the summer of 1897. Mrs Walpole, having left her husband, then shared a flat with a Mrs Cooke, and that lady gave evidence that she once saw Mr Chamberlain in the bedroom, lacing Mrs Walpole's bodice. Mrs Walpole was alleged to have called Chamberlain her "dumpling," and said that she was very fond of him. He had given her presents, and she had a photograph of him in her bedroom. The case lasted for some weeks, Mrs Walpole having also made allegations against Mr Walpole and Mrs Cooke; on May 22nd the petition was dismissed.
____________
"I've forgiven him for his drunkenness, I've forgiven him for his faithlessness, and I've forgiven him for his cruelty - but at last I really thought I should have to go for a divorce. And I did."
That is how Mrs. Jane Trend - a pretty woman with red roses in her hat - explained her position in the Divorce Court yesterday. Her husband, who was (she said) a drunken, cruel, and unfaithful shipping clerk, is now fighting the Boers in South Africa. Before he 'listed he twice threatened his wife with his (Volunteer) bayonet, and on those fearsome occasions she stayed out on the doorstep all night.
Then one day he wrote her a confession of his unfaithfulness.
151, Manor-road, Brockley.
"I, John W. Trend, do hereby acknowledge...…..&c."
On another day his wife followed him out of curiosity to Vauxhall, where the attractions of a lady and a coffee shop in the Vauxhall-bridge-road beguiled him.
To-day Mr. Trend is hunting De Wet a single man once more; for Sir Francis Jeune has separated him from his wife after hearing her tale of woe.
Cardiff Evening Express, Wednesday 5th June 1901
____________
17 June 1901 - Captain Francis Pulsford Latham, 3rd Welsh Regiment, was granted a decree nisi because of the adultery of his wife, Gertrude Helen, with a band conductor in Bournemouth. In February 1900 Captain Latham went to South Africa on active service, leaving his wife and three children living in Bournemouth. During his absence it was said, by a private inquiry agent, that his wife had been visited by the band conductor, who would stay the night. Latham was in South Africa during the court case, but had been permitted to give evidence on affidavit. Captain Latham was given custody of the children.
____________
3 July 1901 - Herbert Senior, a miner, of Hoyland, Barnsley, was granted a decree nisi, because of the adultery of his wife, Eliza. During his absence in South Africa, as a private in the York and Lancaster Regiment, she had been visited by a John Smith.
____________
26 July 1901 - Colonel Robert Vesey Ash, formerly Army Medical Staff, sued for a divorce from his wife, Eliza, on the grounds of her alleged adultery with Major Edward James Tickell, stated to have been in the Rhodesian Field Force. Suit was undefended, and petitioner had agreed to accept damages of £1750 from co-respondent. The Ashes lived in Brighton. Major Tickell had an accident at a gymkhana there, and Colonel and Mrs Ash cared for him until he recovered. Mrs Ash later went to stay with Tickell's friends, and was much colder to her husband when she returned. Some time before the divorce case, she confessed to her husband that she'd been Tickell's mistress for some years.
____________
25 October 1901 George Thomas Ross petitioned for the dissolution of his marriage on the ground of his wife's adultery with a man unknown. They were married in May 1897, at Portsea, and there were no children. In November 1897, he joined HMS Fearless, and went to the Mediterranean, then proceeding to active service in South Africa. He returned to England in October 1900. His wife had written to him from Frederick Street, Portsea, saying that she had given birth to a child in August 1898, but it was discovered that it had actually been born in August 1899. She also wrote to him that she had a secret to tell him, and that the child belonged to "Harry," but "Harry" could not be traced. The landlady at Frederick Street gave witness that Mrs Ross had received several men there during her husband's absence. The Court granted a decree nisi.
____________
Proof was led before Lord Kyllachy in the Court of Session to-day, in an action of divorce by James Hogg, colour-sergeant, permanent staff, 4th Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders, Paisley Barracks, against his wife, Julia M'Gale or Hogg, residing at 41 Mar Place, Alloa. The pursuer (42) said he was married to the defender in Jan., 1884, and they remained at Paisley until September, 1899, when he proceeded to Dublin, and thence to South Africa with his battalion. His marriage was happy until then. In 1886 he discovered that the defender was taking drink. While in South Africa he received a letter informing him that his wife had been put off the strength of the regiment owing to her conduct. He returned from the front in August last, when he received information which led him to raise the present action. From the regimental reports he saw that Sergeant Love had been court-martialled and reduced for drunkenness and irregular conduct with a married woman in the barracks one night in February, 1900. The reports also showed that Mrs. Hogg, on 19th February, was struck off the married strength of the battalion. In cross-examination, witness denied that while in South Africa he received a letter from his wife denying that she was the woman who had been connected with the Love incident. He admitted that the name of Mrs. Hogg was not mentioned in the regimental report relating to the barrack-room incident. Sergeant-Instructor Peasland stated that on a night in February, 1900, he placed Sergeant Love under arrest for drunkenness, and ordered Mrs. Hogg, who was with him, out of the barrack room. He was afterwards told that they were together again. Subsequently Love was discharged from the service as medically unfit, and he could not now be traced. Mrs. Hogg, examined, said she was with her husband when he left for South Africa. A week later she proceeded to Paisley Barracks. She had never seen Love until she went there, and she had only casual conversations with him in the presence of others. She heard him complain to the doctor of cold, and on the night of 14t February she was told to make a hot drink fore him. She did so, and took it to the guard-room, but she was out before lights were out. It was not true that she returned and misconducted herself with Love that night. After the court-martial she was turned out of barracks on 24 hours' notice, and she wrote to her husband defending herself. Lord Kyllachy gave decree, and awarded the defender five guineas expenses.
Edinburgh Evening News, Saturday 30th November 1901
____________
20 December 1901 - Mrs Mabel Barlow was granted a decree nisi on account of the cruelty and adultery of her husband, Captain Harry Barlow, late of the South Staffordshire Regiment, and also of the Imperial Yeomanry. They were married in 1887, and the respondent became an excessive drinker and was very violent towards her. He went out to South Africa with the Yeomanry, and returned home invalided in 1901. While looking through his things, his wife found letters from, and a photograph of, Miss Ada Branson, an actress, whom he afterwards visited.
barlowscayman.blogspot.com/2014/12/cousi...nd-branson-girl.html
____________
20 December 1901 - Mrs. Kate Stewart or Haldane sued her husband, Captain James Aylmer Haldane, Gordon Highlanders, for divorce (granted with costs). After meeting at Belfast, in 1888, they had married at Greenock; the marriage was kept secret, and she retained her maiden name - this was done at her husband's request, as he didn't want his family and brother officers to know of the marriage. They had never lived together as man and wife, and the last letter she had received from him was in 1893, when he sent her £4. Evidence was given "in which a lady's maid and a nursery governess figured in incidents at Belfast."
