Drucilla V. Rook asks the court to compel her estranged husband, Benjamin Rook, "to settle upon your oratrix and her children, a certain proportion of his estate, for their support and maintenance." She informs the court that she "submitted" to Benjamin's "abuse for years, with all due humility and submission," until she was recently "compelled to leave his house, and take refuge, at the house of her parents with her children." Calling Benjamin "indifferent" to the welfare of his family, she reveals that he sold "the whole of his negro slaves, including the slaves, which your Oratrixes father gave to her, on her marriage" to Osmund Woodward Jr. for "about" $8166, a price she believes is "below their real value." She asserts that the sale was made with the intent of "driving her from his house, as he well knew, it was impossible for her, who had been raised tenderly and indulgently, and from her low state of health, to attend to all the domestic duties required about a house, and take care of her infant children." Fearing that Benjamin is about to leave the state, she seeks an injunction to prevent him from removing his property and from negotiating the promissory notes given to him by Woodward. She finally asks the court to protect her in "living separate and apart" from him and that their children "may be placed under the care of some fit and proper person."
Result: Partially granted; dissolved.
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Repository: South Carolina Department of Archives and History, Columbia, South Carolina
