126 Va. 245 | Va. | 1919
delivered the opinion of the court.
This is an appeal from a decree refusing' Mrs. Maude Grim an absolute divorce from her husband, William Grim, on the ground of willful desertion and abandonment.
The parties were married in Maryland, May 6, 1899. They were both residents of Stanleytown, Page county, Virginia, and after the marriage continued to reside there and at other points in Virginia until about 1906, when they went to Washington, D. C. They lived together there until 1912, when the separation took place. The defendant remained in Washington for two years, and then returned to Stanleytown, Virginia, where he has ever since resided.
Process was duly served and the bill was filed at the first November rules, 1918. The defendant did not answer, and offered no evidence. The complainant took a number of depositions, including her own, which seem to us to sufficiently show that she was a good and faithful wife, and gave her husband no just cause for desertion; that he was neglectful, cross and disagreable in the home, and was a man of intemperate and dissolute habits; that at the time of the separation he stated to her that he “was gone for good and would never returnthat he subsequently stated to third persons that he would never live with her again; and that when his wife went to see him in Virginia for the purpose of effecting a reconciliation, which she did as soon as she was satisfied that he would not voluntarily return, he refused to listen to her appeals.
In the instant case there was no witness present at the final separation, and apparently none when Mrs. Grim sought a reconciliation with her husband in Virginia, but her statements in these particulars seem to us frank and full; and as to her own exemption from fault, his mistreatment and neglect of her, the efforts on her part to bring about an adjustment of their differences, and his rejection of her overtures, she is strongly corroborated by the testimony of apparently disinterested third persons who were well acquainted with the parties and their surroundings.
£2] It might have been conducive to a fuller development of the facts if the court had required, as it might have done under the provisions of the act of March 13, 1914 (Acts 1914. p. 154). that the testimony, or at least the more important parts of it, be given ore terms in open court. Be this as it may, complainant, in our opinion, has established a case entitling her to a divorce from the bonds of matrimony.
Reversed.