The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1922-08-14
SHE DIDN'T LIKE HIS ROOMS
And He Says She Asked Him
Continually for Money.
Memories of First Wife
Swallowed Home, Is Charge.

Swallowed Home, Is Charge.
The suit for divorce, of Patrick H.
Coney, local attorney, against his wife,
Mrs. Mabelle L. Coney, came to trial
today in the Shawnee county district
court before Judge George H. Whit
comb.
The case will probably drag its
length thru this afternoon and part of
tomorrow. Arguments and the pre-
sentation of evidence, which included
the reading of letters from both
parties, took up the time of the court
today.
In his petition, Coney alleges gross
neglect of duty. in that his wife had
left the home which he provided for
her, and that in addition, she was
continually asking him for money,
when he had previously informed her
that he was a poor man. and had no
money. His petition asserted that she
repeatedly demanded that he build a
new house for her, when he had made
90 plain that it was out of the question.
Didn't Like His Rooms.
In the answer and counter petition
filed before the trial by the defend
ants attorneys, the statement was
made that the quarters to which
Coney took his bride after their mar
riage in Chicago September 10, 1921,
an apartment over a business building
at 316 Kansas avenue, were cherries
to make any changes or improvements
in the place, or to permit his wife
to make any such changes.
Counsel for Mrs Coney, who is the
widow of Fennimore P. Cochran,
former Kansas attorney, Of Cotton
wood Falls, followed the same line of
argument in the hearing today which
had been set forth in the counter
petition
The shadow of the first Mrs. Coney.
deceased some years ago. stood over
the household from the day the second
wife entered it, the defendants attor-
neys declared today. Things which
had been tolerated by his first wife,
Captain Coney declined to alter or bet
ter at the request of his second wife,
the attorneys declared in court.
Hang Paintings in Kitchen.
The walls of the flat in which the
chromos and prints of Civil war he
roes. battle scenes, and army comrades
of the captain. The counter petition
asserts that when the second Mrs.
them for oil paintings and other OBJ
jets d art in her possession, the cap
tain peremptCrily refused that per
mission and advised her to hang her
OH paintings in the kitchen
No single thing could be changed
about the house, to the taste of the
second wife, and the first wife was
eternally held up to the second as
model of housewifely industry and af-
lection, according to the argument of
lthescounsei for the defense
/. The attorneys charged that Cap
tain Coney has been Grabbed, irrita-
bic, parsimonious and unreasonable"
On the other hand, the case brought
out charges that Mrs. Coney-then
Mrs Cochran, being homeless and
nearly penniless-had "entrapped by
the articles of love-" the captain into
matrinony full well knowing his fl
.faI nd T1e T.
lions with which he surrounded him
self.
DisorderIy Flat Near.
The charge was made that immedi-
ately adjoining the Coney apartment,
and separated from the stairway to
the Coney apartments only by a thin
wall. was an apartment which served
as a resort for disorderly persons
and to which they frequently re-
sorted for the purpose of drinking
liquor and other illegal and immoral
practices.
The counter petition asserted that
such persons frequently became con-
fused, and going into the Coney apart
sence of Captain Coney. would de-
nand to be served with liquor.
The counter petition declares that
Captain Coney. instead of being so fl
nancialIy embarrassed as he has
claimed to his wife, is really worth
some 100000, part of it in Benton
county. Mo, farm land. and the rest
in real estate and town lots, in places
unknown to his wife.
Had Secret Agreement.
A secret pre-nuptial agreement,
signed by Mrs. Coney and renouncing
all her title to any portion of her hus-
bands possessions, played a large part
in. the case. She was persuaded to
sign this agreement without under
standing it. and under false pretences
made nv her husband her ATTORNEYS
declared.
An incident heavily stressed by the
attorneys for the defense is that i'm
mediately after the marriage of the
pair. they took a trip to a national
encampment of the G. A. r., and that
Mrs. Coney was compelled, according
to her statement, to travel there upon
the unused portion of a railroad ticket
issued to a California woman, widow
of a Civil War soldier. and to forge
the name of the other woman to the
ticket in order that it might be vail
dated for the return trip.