Patsy Silmon seeks alimony from her estranged husband, Fielding Silmon, whom she married in March of 1821. Patsy explains that she only lived with Fielding for six months before he began "beating, abusing and otherwise maltreating" her and then finally "threw her out of doors." Patsy sought shelter at her father's house, taking with her an infant child and the slaves, whom her father had given the couple as a marriage gift. Calling herself her father's "worse than widowed daughter," Patsy laments how her "fond dreams of earthly felicity were so early obliterated, by the said Fielding, to whom she had plighted all that was ennobling in woman and all that was dear to man, to wit, Her love!" Fielding, who obtained a judgment against Patsy's father for one of the slaves, has refused Patsy's "proffer" to return to him "in order to secure that maintenance, which she derived from the munificence of her father" and urges the collection of the judgment. She asks for an award of alimony and an order compelling Fielding to give security "to keep the peace towards" her.
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Repository: South Carolina Department of Archives and History, Columbia, South Carolina
