A Legal Battle Over Abandonment and Affection
A Tacoma woman sues her husband's companion for $10,000, claiming the woman used 'wiles and arts' to alienate him from his family.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
TACOMA, Feb. 20.—Mrs. Jessie B. Hollands today sued Miss Susan L. Edwards for $10,000 damages, charging her with stealing the affections of her husband, Edward Hollands, and occupying the place of the complainant in his home, thereby compelling her to work in a kitchen in this city in order to support herself and provide for her two children, aged 16 months and 5 years, respectively, which Hollands left with her. He took the two older children to live with him and Miss Edwards in section 15, township 16, in this county. Mrs. Hollands does not want her unfaithful husband to return, but asks, on account of the grief and shame that she has suffered, to receive some compensation. In 1882 she married Hollands at Brooklyn, N. Y. Last July, after coming here, she says Miss Edwards, by wiles, arts and blandishments, made a slave of Hollands, who had previously been a loving spouse. Subsequently, Hollands is charged with living with the Edwards woman as man and wife. In September they went into the country to live. Hollands owns a store and a house and other property here. The two children left with the mother are at the Children's Home.
“Mrs. Hollands does not want her unfaithful husband to return, but asks, on account of the grief and shame that she has suffered, to receive some compensation.”
This 1892 'alienation of affections' suit highlights how legal systems historically treated a spouse's desertion as a tangible property loss, mirroring modern debates about how we assign value to domestic labor and emotional stability in the wake of family instability.
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