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

ASSIZE INTELLIGENCE.

HOME ClRCUlT.—Gumnronn, AUG. G.
(Before Mr. Baron Bramwell and a Common Jury.)

HAY V. VANSITTART.

This was an action to recover £5B 17s. for board asd
lodging, and necessaries supplied by the plaintiff to the rife
of the defendant.
Mr. E. James, Q.C., Mr. Gordon Allan, and Mr. Win-
grove Cook were for the plaintiff; Mr. M.Chembers' Q.C.,
Mr. Archibald, and Mr. Phillips were counsel for the de-
fendant.
Mr. E. James, in opening the case for the plaintiff, said
that, although the action was brcught nominally merely
far the recovery of a sum of money for board and lodging
and other necessaries supplied to the wife of the defendant,
yet the ca,e undoubtedly involved questions of considerable
interest affecting the parties in the suit, and it would be
necessary for him to enter into particulars of a private and
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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 her into
the world without the means of providing for herself.
Tne defendant, Mr. Charles Vansittart, was a clergy-
man, very well connected, the nephew of the late
Lord Bexley, and in 1845 be married the lady
wheae 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 £5,000 was settled by the defendant
upon his wife, and also £l,OOO in securities ; and after
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 fur her
own use £l5O a-year. The income of the defendant at this
time was about £l,lOO or £1,200 a-year, and be had the
living of White Waltham, in Berkshire, to which he was
presented by his uncle, and he lived at that place with his
wife and three boys and one girl were the result of their
union. The defendant and Isis 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 lie could not help
expressing his regret that the defendant should bare been
advised to resist the present action, and that lie should be
compelled to detail facts cf the most painful character,
and to draw the veil from the privacy of domes is life,
and show that the defendant had been guilty of the most
heartless cruelly and the gro'sest possible misconduct
towards his wife. She would not herself be able to give
evidence, on account, as he was instructed, of her suffer-
ingthe iroin
defendanta ainjury tuwaitd,i herhatwa:
butthe
he should result of
pr)
the violence
otherlenceof
testimony, which, it appeared to ltitr, would abundantly
make out whet he had stated. Mrs. Vansivart was a mast
amiable and accomp'ished lady, and he would slim, by a
letter written by the defendant himself, that he had at one
time stated that she was really too gnol f.a. him ; but it
would appear that fiery soon after their marriage he treated
her o.ith the utmost cruelty ; that he repeatedly stated that
he wished she and her eidldien were dead ; and that at
length it became evident that they could no longer live
with any prospect of happiness, and arrangements
made for their separation, anti an agreement was
wtoegreeth
drawn up and executed by which the defendant undertook
to make his wife a certain allowance. Instead of carrying
out that agreement, however, the defendant left England
and proceeded to Geneva • but before he went he obtained
s
Y
r that might be almost in a mance
termed kidnapping, and
possession of the persons of two of his children, two bays,
anti I't
was
from that time to the preset he had not contributed a
single farthing towards his wife's support,