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living in sin
for support to explain her actions. Her first husband, Henry, ‘had … been
imprisoned for neglecting to support her and her children.’ Her second
husband stayed only a short time, since he lost his job. Her third, James
Foggart, final y proved to be a provider. Henry prosecuted her, but Justice
Denman gave her only five days; apparently, he agreed that she needed a
breadwinner.34 The emphasis on providing was so great that some men
continued to support their children, even if their wives had ‘misbehaved’.35
Working-class marriage, then, could be a strife-torn experience, as
many historians have found.36 Youthful choices often proved disastrous,
and some people could not find a congenial partner even with second and
third choices. Although most couples stayed together, a minority refused
to continue in poisoned relationships. Historians of nineteenth-century
working-class marriage have justifiably concentrated on the majority of
couples who continued to live together, despite violent conflicts. But the
evidence of bigamy cases partial y revises the argument that working-class
people expected little more than dogged companionship in marriage.37
Obviously, several modes of behaviour wrecked working-class marriages.
Poor husbands and wives accepted more sexual infidelity and violence than
middle-class couples, but they had limits. Unhappy spouses divorced with
their feet for drunkenness, adultery, violence, and even incompatibility.
These ‘self-divorces’ did not show a contempt for matrimony. On
the contrary, bigamies were strong evidence of people’s attachment to
marriage. Despite miserable experiences, many risked prison to create
new ties. Often, the illegal unions were more successful. For neighbours,
bigamous unions had advantages as wel , because they provided stable
families in the place of those with constant bickering. Examples of happy
second unions abound in the records; in fact, second wives sometimes
refused to prosecute, forcing the magistrates or police to do so.38 Some
people needed a first mistake to find a congenial mate, but the law did not
allow for such experimentation. As Justice Lawrance remarked, ‘He could
never countenance the doctrine that if a man could not live happily with
his wife he was entitled to … commit bigamy. At that rate, a great many
men would be leaving their wives and marrying some one [sic] else.’39 The
judge’s discomfort was palpable; when an illegal union was more successful
than a legal one, judges had to deal with the consequences.
Wider kin and community
The attitude of family members towards bigamous unions varied by
Copyright © 2008. Manchester University Press. All rights reserved.
circumstances. The relatives of wronged spouses were usual y hostile,
either to defend a deserted spouse or to protect a second one. As stated
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bigamy and cohabitation
above, families of either the first or second wives instigated many cases.
Even when they did not start the prosecution, they testified for their
relatives.40 A father, in particular, would take any chance to punish a man
who had ‘ruined’ his daughter, as many examples attest.41 Though parents
predominated, siblings were also important. Anna Campbel ’s brother
prosecuted her bigamous husband; Mary Greene’s sister was the main force
in the prosecution of William Sheen.42
Nevertheless, some family members actively supported bigamous
unions, depending, again, on circumstances. Edward Jones’s daughter
defended her father’s decision to remarry illegal y, since her mother had
refused to return to him despite his appeals. Some family members even
participated in fooling second spouses. Robert Green, a carman, was
married when he courted Alice Gabbetie. Alice heard that Robert was
already married shortly before the wedding, so she went to Green’s mother’s
house to find out the truth. Green denied it, and his mother told her ‘he
was single, and could, therefore, do as he liked.’ When Annie discovered
the truth, she was so angry that she prosecuted both Greens, though the
authorities dropped the charges against the mother.43
The most difficult and conflicted situation for families were bigamies
within the family fold. These cases could lead to bitter divisions with
extended kin, showing the limitations of family forbearance. Joseph
Moran, an engineer, married his sixteen-year-old cousin in 1854, though
he was already married to Rebecca Bridger. ‘After the second wife’s relatives
found out that prisoner had a wife then alive, and spoke to him about it, he
said they might do their worst – they could only give him three months.’
This response made a private settlement impossible, so the case went to
court, and Moran received nine more months than he expected. John
Curgenwen married his first cousin in 1852. They lived together only a year
before she returned to her father’s house, and Curgenwen shipped out to
the Crimea in 1854. She did not see him for the next ten years; clearly,
the family members had little desire to meet again. Curgenwen remarried
in 1862. When he was posted to Cornwal , his extended kin discovered
his marriage and prosecuted him. Despite the long passage of time, the
bitterness remained.44
Stil , the case of Benjamin Toombs of Surrey shows that marriages
within the same families did not always lead to predictable divisions.
Toombs married Letitia Rudge in 1814 after lodging in her parents’ house
for some time. Benjamin apparently became attached to many of the
members of Letitia’s family, including wider kin, during his marriage.
Copyright © 2008. Manchester University Press. All rights reserved.
He soon left Rudge (apparently for sexual misconduct). In May 1830, he
married Mary Ann, Letitia’s first cousin. Obviously, Mary Ann knew that
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Frost, Ginger S.. Living in Sin : Cohabiting as Husband and Wife in Nineteenth-Century England,
Manchester University Press, 2008. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/nscc-ebooks/detail.action?docID=1069613.
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living in sin
Benjamin was already married, yet she did not hesitate, nor did her father
protest. Only her brother objected, which was why Benjamin ended up
in court.45 This kind of support was unusual, but it does indicate that
families disagreed about how best to deal with failed relationships. Mary
Ann’s father preferred to keep Benjamin, an in-law, in the family, over
Letitia, a blood relative, whom he forbade Mary Ann to see. Letitia’s ‘base’
behaviour made her a less desirable family member than her estranged
husband, and, indee
d, Letitia did not object to the new arrangement, since
Benjamin continued to support her. These tangled family alliances made
for a difficult court case.
As with families, neighbours and friends considered the reasons
for the separation before they condemned bigamy. ‘Misbehaviour’ of the
first spouse was crucial, and neighbours expected the man to provide
for the first spouse as well as his new family, as many of the above cases
indicated.46 Also, the bigamist must be honest about her or his past. In
fact, if the bigamist did not volunteer the information, someone else often
did. In Leeds, Elizabeth Gil son’s neighbours told her that her fiancé, Alfred
Windsor, a labourer, was a married man, though she married him anyway.
In Dalton, John Jessop, a hay dealer, married Kate Boucher, even though
his wife was alive. At the trial, Kate claimed she knew nothing of his first
wife when they married, but two witnesses testified that they had told her
the truth, with the warning that ‘she would be a fool to marry him’. Even in
the arguably more anonymous realms of London, neighbours intervened,
if in indirect ways. Jane Willis received an unsigned letter after her wedding
to Samuel Potling, warning her that he was already wed.47 On this issue, in
fact, community standards were stricter than the letter of the law; one case
in 1838 led to a near riot by outraged female neighbours after the dishonest
male defendant got off the bigamy charge.48
In short, notions of ‘right’ behaviour did not follow those of the
legal system. In some cases a legal y innocent defendant was distinctly
unpopular. Far more often, a guilty defendant earned public sympathy. Put
another way, popular definitions of marriage and divorce were wider than
the law allowed. Similarly to affinal marriages, many people did not see
any harm in bigamy as long as all the parties were informed about and
satisfied with their relationships. Annie Waterton told neighbours in Leeds
that it did not matter that her fiancé, Charles Scoltock, was already married
because ‘there would be no bother about it as she had asked the first wife’s
permission.’ This reasoning was particularly popular when both spouses
remarried; Scoltock argued that since his first wife had a new spouse, he
Copyright © 2008. Manchester University Press. All rights reserved.
assumed he could do the same. James Young had a similar defence in
London in 1907; both of his previous wives had remarried by the time he
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Manchester University Press, 2008. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/nscc-ebooks/detail.action?docID=1069613.
Created from nscc-ebooks on 2019-06-18 23:44:10.
bigamy and cohabitation
was arrested. The magistrate, unimpressed, insisted ‘Bigamy by both parties
will not improve his position.’49 But often such mutual partings did make a
difference to neighbours and kin.
Defining marriage and divorce
Most of these couples thought of themselves ‘as husband and wife’, and even
the newspaper records called multiple spouses ‘the first wife’ or ‘the second
wife’. Judges, witnesses, prosecutors, and defendants did the same.50 These
couples resisted legal definitions of marriage and divorce, a phenomenon
that many historians have explored, though most have argued that the age
of marital nonconformity was the first half of the century.51 Bigamy cases
prove that many people had their own definitions of marriage and divorce
until at least the twentieth century. Nevertheless, Victorian bigamists
combined a challenge to the marriage laws with a desire for the ritual.
Couples, especial y women, wanted a wedding to validate their unions,
echoing affinal and consanguineous couples. Paradoxical y, they defined
‘marriage’ loosely, defying the authorities, yet at the same time, they
craved the formality of marriage, thereby seeking the approval of those
authorities. Especial y to women, marriage was still ‘better’, conferring
status and security.52
Examples abound of women who insisted on going through the
ceremony even though they knew it was invalid. Rhoda Byrne married
Joseph Courtney, a gardener, in 1900, though she knew he was married.
She explained, ‘it was better to marry than merely to live with him, and
therefore he consented.’ John Calvert testified that he told Hannah Metcalfe
that he was already married, but they had a wedding ‘in order to satisfy her
scruples’. Women’s insistence on a ceremony showed up in other sources as
wel . Sir William Cobbett told the Royal Commission on Divorce in 1912
that the limited nature of divorce led to bigamies because women would
not live with men without a wedding. Cobbett knew of two men who ‘took
the risk’ so they could live with the women they loved.53
Sometimes men initiated the second weddings themselves. William
Weaver was a former comedian who had reformed into a travelling preacher.
His first wife was unfaithful, and Weaver lived with Mary Drinkwater until
his conversion. At that point, he was reluctant to continue cohabiting and
so married bigamously. In other words, to him, committing a felony was
less sinful than cohabitation; ironical y, his religious scruples justified his
law-breaking. Nor was Weaver unique. William Goode was a clerk in holy
Copyright © 2008. Manchester University Press. All rights reserved.
orders who had married first in 1860 and then married Isabel a Vickery in
1876. Isabel a found out in 1878 that he was married; when she confronted
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living in sin
him, he replied, ‘what he had done might appear wrong in the sight of
man, but it was right in the sight of God.’ The two had lived together for
two years before they wed, and even a felonious marriage was superior to
living ‘in sin’.54
Part of the preference for marriage came from families, especial y if
the woman was expecting a child. James Garden, a surgeon’s assistant from
Bromley, married Caroline Smith because her father insisted on it when
Caroline became pregnant. In the same way, the married John Arthur
Rogerson, from Stafford, committed bigamy with a Miss Shekell to ‘save
her from shame.’55 In short, to avoid one legal stigma, the couple incurred
another. Nothing could legitimate their children, but the couples did not
always know this and, even if they did, they still wanted the ceremony,
since it conferred public validity. As Elizabeth Hutton explained in 1884,
she married an already wed man ‘because I loved him and to save my name
with my friends; I did not want to live with him without being married.’56
Bigamy cases also indicate that self-divorce persisted beyond the
>
first half of the nineteenth century.57 The simple act of desertion could be
enough for some men and women; the fact that they lived apart for several
years, they insisted, invalidated their ties. This belief persisted in the face
of repeated official denials, because of the confusion over the seven-year
rule; people mixed up the idea that they could not be convicted of bigamy
with the idea that they could remarry legal y. In addition to the trials, other
sources hint at this confusion; Guy Aldred’s mother believed she could
remarry legal y because her second marriage took place more than seven
years after her husband’s desertion; she clung to this belief despite her son’s
exasperated denials.58
A number of factors constituted a self-divorce. At times, a long
separation was accompanied by the permission of the first husband or
wife. Annie Birkhead and Michael Jessop consulted her husband before
they married, ‘and he told her she was at liberty to get married again’. She
was apparently telling the truth, since both of her husbands stood bail
for her. Other times, the couples assumed that if their first spouse had
remarried, they could do so as wel .59 Such couples were most unwilling
to accept that these remarriages were not valid. Thomas Bevan, a plasterer,
married Catherine Wilson in 1848, though his wife was still alive. Catherine
defended Thomas at his trial and said she would live with him again when
he was free. The judge protested, ‘“he don’t belong to you, he belongs to his
first wife.” The witness shook her head, seeming very much to doubt his
Lordship’s authority as to her right and title.’60 Similarly, Alice Mary Currey
Copyright © 2008. Manchester University Press. All rights reserved.
told the judge in Albert Durrant’s trial that ‘he has been a most kind and
loving husband to me … after this is all settled I am going to live with him
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Manchester University Press, 2008. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/nscc-ebooks/detail.action?docID=1069613.
Created from nscc-ebooks on 2019-06-18 23:44:10.
bigamy and cohabitation
again’.61For many bigamists self-divorce involved quasi-legal sanctions.
Living in Sin Page 17
