109 Mo. App. 19 | Mo. Ct. App. | 1904
In this, a divorce proceeding by the husband against the wife, wherein the latter by cross-bill asked counter relief, and before the issues had been joined and the case prepared for trial of the merits, the court heard defendant’s motion for suit money and maintenance pendente lite and allowed $500 for counsel fees and $75 for her support. The testimony was confused, but from defendant’s reluctant admissions, and her pass book with the bank with which she kept an account, it is sufficiently established that she was owner of considerable separate estate, consisting of a dwelling, her place of residence, worth $7,500, and other improved realty in the city of St. Louis, producing about $700 gross income annually; that she was holder of $22,500 of notes secured by deeds of trust, also of $6,000 in bonds, producing an income of six per cent per annum, all the foregoing realty and personalty being unencxxmbered, and that she was also intex-ested to extent of one-half in a mortgage indebtedness of $15,-000 which, however, was hypothecated to secure a loan of $6,000. Originally at common law allowances pendente lite were made in favor of the wife in divorce proceedings on the ground, that as the husband acquired by vix'tue of his marital rights, complete control over the property owned by the wife at the time of marriage or acquired by her during coverture, unless the court required the husband to furnish her with the means of prosecuting her own action or defend against an action brought by him in such proceedings, she would be defenceless and destitute. But as the law respecting the dominion and interest of the husband in the wife’s property and her control of her own estate became modified and, indeed, revolutionized, the reason-for the common- law rule no longer continued, and the absolute right of the wife to an allowance pendente lite in
The bill of exceptions indicated that within three days after order and judgment on a day in April, 1904, not specified, plaintiff filed motion for a new trial, and concluding the bill set forth as its date the twelfth day of May, 1904; the complete transcript before this court shows that the order awarding alimony was made on the fifth of April, 1904, the motion for new trial filed on the sixth of April, 1904, and the bill of exceptions was presented, signed and filed on the twelfth of May,
The judgment is reversed and the cause remanded with direction to deny and overrule the application.