The Sun.
London, England, 1858-08-07 00:00:00

ASSIZE INTELLIGENCE,

HOME CIRCUIT.—GUILDFORD, AUG. 6.
(Before Mr. Baron Bramwell and a Common Jury.)

HAY Y. VANSITTART.

This was an action to recover £5B 17a. for board :Lad
lodging, and necessaries supplied by the plaintiff to the wife
of the defendant.

- -
Mr. E. James, Q.C., Mr. Gordon Allan, and Mr. Win-
grove Cook were for the plaintiff; Mr. M. Chambers Q.C.,
Mr. Archibald, and Mr. Phillips were counsel for the de-
kndau t.
Mr. E. James, in opening the case for the plaintiff, said
that, although the action was brought nominally merely
far the recovery of a sum of money for board and lodging
and other necessaries supplied to the wife of tie defendant,
yet the ca=e undoubtedly involved questions of considerable.
interest affecting the parties in the suit,
rs andolia private
p it
r.iwotuehal
and
necessary for him to enter into particulars
domestic nature, which it was always very unpleasant to be
compelled to do, and he should not enter into thoe particu-
lars to any greater extent than Le considered abso-
lutely necessary in. the conduct of the case. The pro-
ceedings of the defendant appeared to have been of the most
extraordinary character, and he should be compelled to state
certain acts of a most painful nature, because before a claim
of this kind could be supported it was necessary to establish
that it was utterly impossible for a wife to remain under the
same roof with her husband, or that he had driven hi er nto
the iibrld without the. means of providing for herself.
The defendant, Mr. Charles Vausittart, was a clergy-
man, very well connec'ed, the nephew of the late
Lord Bexley, and in 1845 I,e married the lady
whose name would be alluded to in the present inquiry,
and who was the daughter of Mr. Busk, a merchant of
eminence in the City of London. At the time of the mar-
riage a sum of X 5,000 was settled by the defendant
upon his wife, and also £1,600 in securities ; and after j
his death his wife would have been entitled to those
amounts ; and Mr. Busk, his wife's father, also settled
£5,000 upon her, and likewise agreed to give her for her
own use £l5O a-year. The income of the defendant at this
time was ahont g,1,100 or £1,200 a-year, and he had the
living of White Waltham, in Berkshire, 'to which be was
presented by his uncle, and be lived at that place with his
wife and three boys and one girl were the result of their
union. The defendant and his wife continued to reside at
White 'Waltham until the year 1857, when the circum-
stances occurred to which he should have to direct their
-attention ; and at this stage of the case he could not help
expressing hie regret that the defendant should have been
advised to resist the present action, and that he should he
compelled to detail facts of the most painful character,
and to draw the veil from the privacy of domesic life,
and show that the defendant had been guilty of the most
heartless cruelty and the grossest possible misconduct
towards his wife: She would not hirself he aide to elve
evidence, on account, as he was instructed, of her suffer-
ing from an injury that was the result of the violence of
the defendant towatils her ; but I.e should prAnce other
testimony, which, it appeared to hirr, would abundantly
make cut what lie had stated. Mrs. Vausittart was a most
amiable and accomplished lady, and he would show, by a
letter written by the defendant himself, that he had at one
time stated that she was really too good for him ; but it
would appear that very soon after their marriage he treated
her with the utmost cruelty ; that be repeatedly stated that
be wished she and her children were dead ; and that at
length it became evident that they could no longer live
together with any prospect of happines., and arrangements
were made for their separation, and an agreement was
drawn up and executed by which the defendant undertook
to make his wife a certain allowance. Instead of carrying
however, the defendant left England
cut
thatp proceeded eaegdreeinnt
detoeGeleva; but before he went he obtained
possession of the persons of two of his children, two b)ys,
in a manner that might be alinoshtetehramdeduktidcnoanptpriibnugteadnda
from that time to the present
single farthing towards big wlfv's support, And it was