The Anaconda standard. [volume] (Anaconda, Mont.) 1889-1970, 1899-11-04
FIGHTING FOR A WOMAN
r. w. Gillespie Still Claims Mrs.
Lucas Is His Wife.
HE WANTS A NEW TRIAL
Lucas Conmon-Law Marriage Case
Again in Court-Gillespie Claims He
Has New Evidence and That
& the Court Erred,

Once more the now famous Lucas COM
mon-law marriage case has come into the
courts. although the district court has
decided that the common law marriage
existing between Mr.. and Mrs. Lucas is
binding and legal and that the subsequent
marriage Mrs. Lucas entered into with
Richard William Gillespie solemnized at
Lethbridge. N. w. T., by a Church of
England clergyman, is void. Gillespie is
still fighting for the woman and is seek
ing a new trial.
Oct. %, previously having secured from
the9court 80 days in which to file a state
ment on a motion for new trial, Giles
pie, by his attorneys Duffy & Casey, filed
that statement In it he claimed that he,
although he had been admitted into the
caseeas a defendant. had received no no.
tice of the trial of Sept. Is and hence was
unable to get his witnesses present. He
held to be error the fact that the court
had refused his motion for continuance
and that the evidence was not taken by
stenographer Also he claimed that the
plaintiff. Lucas, in his testimony admitted
he and Mrs. Lucas had never been mar
ried; that no ceremony had taken place
and that they never pledged themselves
to each other in the presence of wit
nesses
In the statement Gillespie also swore
that at the trial he testified that in July.
1898, the plaintiff had told him he Iucas)
had never married Mrs Lucas and that
they were not husband and wife. The
statement further set out that June A.
1898 he (Gillespie) ard Mrs. Lucas under
the name of Lydia Adeline Maitland. her
maiden name, were married at Leth-
bridge, N. w. T., by Rev. w. Ridley Beal,
Further Gillespie, in the statement said
he had witnesses in the persons of Henry
Evans, Frederick Abbey, w. C. Powell,
Fred Widman, Alexander Young and j.
w. Robinson and others by whom he
could prove that Lucas had said he never
had married Mrs. Lucas and desired to
have the marriage declared before the
court only for the sake of the two chill
dren.
The motion for a new trial was based
on the following points: Irregularity in
the proceedings of the court: newly dis
covered and material evidence: abuse of
the discretion of the court in refusing to
allow a continuance: insufficiency of the
evidence to justify the decree, and the
fact that the decree is against the laO;.
In the specifications as to wherein the
evidence was insufficient Gillespie claim
ed that no evidence had been introduced
to show that a marriage had been SOL
emniZed, and that no evidence was intro
duced to show that the laws of Illinois, in
which state the common law marriage
was contracted, permitted or sanctioned
such a marriage.
Yesterday Attorney ]. M. Simpson, rep
resentng Lucas. filed a motion to strike
Gillespie's motion from the records, which
motion will be argued Nov II. In the mo-
ton an objection is made to the court
settling or signing Gilespie's statement
1t is moved further that the order made
Sept. %, permitting Gillespie to have 80
day in which to prepare a statement on
motion for new trial, be revoked as
the time had elapsed, it not appearing on
the records that the statement had been
filed in the required so days.