Sixty-five-year-old Jane Hughes petitions for a divorce from her husband, Edward Hughes. Jane cites that she married Edward "many years ago in Ireland ... & then emigrated to Virginia." She confesses that the said Edward "has been negligent, excessively intemperate & drunken & intolerably abusive & violent to your Oratrix, often beating & otherwise so cruelly using her that to protect her person from violence & to save her life she has been compelled to fly from her residence." She asserts that her husband owns 230 acres of land, "a negro boy worth $1000," as well as "other property worth some $1700 or $1800." Jane reports "that her said husband declares that he will sell all of his property & return to Ireland ... & will never give your Oratrix or any of her children any thing at all & that he is even now selling his estate to prevent her from getting any part of it." Fearing that he "will spend all of the property in dissipation even if he should not go away so that your oratrix & her children will be reduced to absolute want of the necessaries of life," the petitioner prays "that a divorce may be granted ... & a proper alimony allowed her, that her husband may be injoined & restrained from disposing of his property so as to defeat any decree that your Honor may make in this suit."
Result: Settled between parties.
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Repository: Circuit Court Building, Rustburg, Virginia
