The evening star and Newark advertiser. [volume] (Newark, N.J.) 1907-1908, 1908-01-09
Being Slapped in the Face
Got to Be an Old Story,
Mrs. ~SOmmerkOrn Says.
TELLS TALE OF CRUELTY
Seeking Divorce, Describes Ex'
citing Alleged Domestic Occur.
rences.-M Law Very
Nice to Her Face, Yes, but
My!the Things She Said.


skirt cut to pieces figured in the pro-
ceedings of the suit for divorce and
maintenance brought by Mrs. Esther
Sommerkorn, of 224 South Ninth street,
against Ferdinand Sommerkorn, before
Vice. Chancellor Stevens in Chancery
Court this morning.
Mrs. Sommerkorn said the garments
husband, and shortly after, while UNI
der the influence, her husband tool a
butchers knife and cut the garments
to tatters. She also said that on an
other occasion he took the wedding
certificate from the wall and threw it
at her, with the remark hat he was
tired of her and she could go home to
her people.
The wife was the only witness on
the stand this morning. She said that
they were married October IA, 1904. and
that one child was born to them.
When married her husband was con-
Quoting a grocery store at 200 Jefferson
street; that the stock in the store
gradually dwindled way owing to her
husbands refusal to attend to the
business. There was no trouble be-
tween them until the following spring.
q He came into the store one day under
the influence of liquor, she alleged, and
compelled her to stand in a corner,
her sister in another and her brother
in another, and threatened to shoot
the three. He was to finish them off,
she said, with a butcher knife.
Trouble continued, and the witness
said thai it was all because her mother
called on her and he ordered her to
keep the mother-in-law way. Witness
said that she inc her husband had
often little fights between ourselves"
She attributed a great part of the
trouble between them to her husbands
continual drinking. On one occasion
he ordered her to go home, saying, the
witness averred, that "if it was not
I, for you ! could get some money from
my mother
She said that she was compelled to
leave him because of his cruelty and
20 home to her father, but that she
was taken back to her husband on
every occasion. Y 1tsa
Many nights I have been compelled
to sleep on an ironing board, because
Freddie would put me out of bed" the
witness said, in referring to some CT
their domestic troubles.
Freddie beat me upon the slightest
provocation," she continued, "and made
me suffer very, very often.
1--WE were living at his mother s house,
176 Jefferson street, for several weeks,
and he would beat me then. His
mother would often say Freddie, don't
beat that girl any more; if o get mao
strike the floor, but don't hit her any
more This treatment was because |
would not say good morning to his
mother" explained the witness.
On other occasions she was beaten,
she said, because she refused to put
wooden leggins on the baby, a
she considered the weather was not cold
enough. AT another time she was read
ing a book entitled 1.-THE Two Orphans"
and the husband hurled the book into a
corner and slapped her face. She had
often ~eenslapped in the face when she
had her baby N her arms.
She got angry one morning, she AYERS,
after trouble with the husband. and hit
him across the face with a red-hot
Shaker and burned him.
Mrs. Sommerkorn was bitter in her
reference to the mother of her husband.
"She would be very nice to me and
tell me her son was not treating me
right, and then she would tell her son
Twas no good and then she would take
his part against me-"
On June 2, Sommerkorn brought home
asbottle of champagne and beat her be-
cause she refused to drink it with him
was another statement the wife made.
In April, Of last year, she said, the
grocery store was sold to his mother
for 1000 and he gave her 800 to buy
clothing. 1t was from this money that
the two suits and skirt that were cut
up were purchased.
"He ordered me to leave him three
times since we were married, but NY
father and mother always went back
with him and tried to make peace.
HE slept one night" said the wit
ness, with a revolver under the pillow,
and he told me several times that he
would not kill me at that time, but to
be careful. The day he cut up my
clothes he told me if 1 had him ar
rested he would swing for me-
Under cross examination by Mr. Nc
Dermott, counsel for defendant, every
effort was made to show hat many Of
the statements of the witness were ex-
ageerated, but she withstood the Ere
of a scathing cross examination.
Ferdinand Sommerkorn was relea sed
from the county Jail in November last,
where he had been imprisoned on a writ
of attachment sworn out by his wife for
falling to pay her IS a month alimony
pending the disposition of the divorce pro-
ceedings. Already the case has cost him
nearly $1,000. He was released from the
county jail on an order Of the Vice-Chan-
cellor, on a petition that he had no money
and could not pay his wife. He promised
to paw her in weekly payments. He has
paid to date $1S.
ro-,,vr1c cATr WrrrYNc