Not just as newspaper report!

[Phoenix]

Idly Googling, I found a reference to a newspaper report concerning murder in a Marylebone lodging house, run by best mate's ancestor. Not only did this clearly come from a different newpapers than the three or four other reports I have read, but it was quoted verbatim by an American, in London with his slave, who had witnessed the arrest of the murderer and attended the court case and was describing his reactions to a cousin back in America.

Thank you, Google! (And whoever posted the letter!)

[SueinKent]

What a good find.

[Phoenix]

The husband was demonstrably drunken, & traced his wife to the lodging house, where he stabbed her with a sharpened chisel. He was found guilty, not of murder, but of manslaughter.

Friend's family moved very shortly afterwards, suggesting their behaviour (allowing this drunk into the house & then sending him upstairs after his wife) was not approved by the neighbourhood.

It is very difficult to get a handle on the facts, but while the letter writer was shocked by the violence towards a wife, his slave was sorry for the husband as the daughter was a prostitute & the son slept above a beershop.

The drunk was accompanied by a lad (who could not give evidence on the first hearing as he did not understand the significance of swearing on the bible) who was carrying boxes out of the room all the time the woman was being attacked. The lad assumed she was being thumped, rather than stabbed & said she deserved it.

What is so hard to understand is the way that nobody went to this poor woman's aid until it was too late. Or why the chisel had been sharpened.

[Little Nell]

In some parts of London drunkenness and violence were regarded as everyday life and best not interfered with.

Perhaps if there had been a history of quarrelling between the couple, neighbours may have not thought anything more significant was happening.

Wife beating - domestic violence in general - used not to be regarded in the same way we see it, just as drink-driving was regarded as amusing, rather than dangerous.

[Christine in Herts]

There are still people who think that there are legitimate reasons why someone could attack/abuse a spouse/partner - usually (but not always) male violence against female.

Christine