Whitehead v. Whitehead

• Decision Date: 22 March 1911
• Citation: Whitehead v. Whitehead, 84 Vt. 321, 79 A. 516 (Vt. 1911)
• Parties: WHITEHEAD v. WHITEHEAD.
• Court: Vermont Supreme Court

79 A. 516

84 Vt. 321

WHITEHEAD

v. WHITEHEAD.

Supreme Court of Vermont. Franklin.

March 22, 1911.

Exceptions from Franklin County Court; Willard W. Miles, Judge.

Action by Orrin R. Whitehead against Clara G. Whitehead. Judgment of dismissal, and petitioner excepts. Affirmed.

Argued before ROWELL, C. J., and MUNSON, WATSON, HASELTON, and POWERS, JJ.

W. B. Locklin, for petitioner.

POWERS, J. The law of this case is all to be found in Mathewson v. Mathewson, 81 Vt. 173, 69 Atl. 646, 18 L. R. A. (N. S.) 300. It is there held that intolerable severity may be established in divorce proceedings by proof of any line of misconduct persisted in by the offending party to such an extent as to cause or threaten injury to the life, limb, or health of the other, and that it is not necessary that such injury, actual or threatened, should be the direct result of such misconduct, but that it is sufficient if it is produced by grief, worry, or mental distress occasioned thereby. It is also there held that, when the facts and circumstances are so decisive of actual or apprehended bodily harm resulting from mental suffering that there can be no difference of opinion about it, the court may take judicial notice thereof; otherwise, such essential fact must be found in order to warrant a decree of divorce.

All this the petitioner admits, and he insists that he has brought his case within the rules thus established. He says that when a wife drifts into a life of adultery, and knowledge thereof is brought home to the husband, but one result can follow. His home life is thereby rendered intolerable, and sufficient mental suffering caused to injure, or at least threaten, his health, and that this result is so inevitable that we should, if necessary, take judicial notice of it. We cannot adopt this view. The only finding here is that the petitioner's knowledge of his wife's...