Woolfolk v. Woolfolk

• Decision Date: 21 February 1895
• Parties: WOOLFOLK v. WOOLFOLK (two cases).
• Court: Kentucky Court of Appeals

29 S.W. 742

96 Ky. 657

WOOLFOLK v. WOOLFOLK (two cases).

Court of Appeals of Kentucky.

February 21, 1895

Appeals from circuit court, Jefferson county.

"To be officially reported."

Action by Nellie Woolfolk against Frank Woolfolk for divorce. From a judgment, both parties appeal. That portion of the judgment denying absolute divorce affirmed; that portion granting her alimony reversed.

C. B Seymour, for plaintiff.

Lane &amp Burnett, for defendant.

HAZELRIGG J.

The chancellor adjudged that the wife, Nellie Woolfolk, was not entitled to an absolute divorce, for which she had applied and she has appealed from that judgment. He granted her however, a separation from bed and board, with an allowance of $10 per month for five years, and from that judgment the husband appealed to the superior court; and, his appeal not having been disposed of in that court, both appeals are before us for determination. The grounds alleged by the wife are that, without fault on her part, the husband abandoned for her for a year before the institution of the action, and that for more than six months he behaved towards her habitually in such cruel and inhuman manner as to destroy her peace and happiness, and to indicate a settled aversion to her. The proof sustains neither ground. After living together some eight or ten years, at the home of the husband's father, in Oldham county, and on his farm, the parties moved to the house of the wife's mother, in Shelbyville, where the husband kept a butcher's shop. After living there some two years or more, the mother-in-law ordered the husband away, but allowed the wife to remain; and she, in August 1890, moved to Louisville, to live with her sister. When a year expired, she brought this suit. The proof, however, shows that she visited her husband on his farm in Oldham county in the summer and fall of 1890, spending the night with him. In November, also, of that year, she went with her husband to visit Fox and wife, and spent the night there together. Here they appeared to be living happily together as husband and wife. They also stayed together at the St. Cloud Hotel in Louisville, on the night of December 26, 1890. These occurrences were from eight to ten months only before the institution of the action. They evince anything else than an "abandonment" such as the statute contemplates. A single instance only is testified to as showing cruel treatment, and that consisted in what is termed by the witness a threat by the husband to kill his wife. No quarrels are shown to have occurred, and it is manifest that the so-called "threat" was nothing serious. Moreover, the visits of the wife to her husband and their cohabitation occurred afterwards. The mother of...