Women accused of being man-haters

In April of 1925, real estate insurance agent Charles Oliver Latham of Edgewood took the stand at the Superior Court of Rhode Island to argue against his wife’s petition for divorce.

Charles had married Hilda Catherine Barr on May 22, 1917 and they had one child together, a 7-year-old daughter. Hilda was now accusing Charles of treating her with extreme cruelty and wanted the marriage ended. Alleging that she was the victim of persistent and malicious speech and behavior, Hilda claimed she suffered mental anguish and impaired health as a result. Several of her friends testified before the jury.     

Charles referred to the charges against him as a “frame-up”, created by Hilda and her female counterparts. He denied that he had ever hit her but admitted to admonishing her at times by shaking his index finger at her. As for the names he was accused of calling her, he swore that he had never uttered those words and that he instead “boosted her all the time”.

Charles did not try to hide the fact that he and Hilda argued, explaining that arguments often began when she spoke negatively of his parents. Other times, angry disagreements came about after he went to the homes of his friends to play “penny-ante” when she refused to allow the games to be held in their own home.

The attorney representing Charles explained that his client was simply an “overgrown boy” and that the party who was actually guilty of extreme cruelty was Hilda. He told the court that while Charles was setting up the family Christmas tree on Dec. 24, 1924, Hilda traipsed out of the house to file a petition for divorce. The attorney referred to Hilda and her friends as “man-haters”, each of the friends being either unmarried or presently living apart from their husbands.

More than a year later, the arguments in court continued. Hilda charged that Charles was too affectionate with her and that his vulgar and coarse conduct in front of her friends was having a negative effect on her nervous system and causing her to have indigestion, not so severe that she had to seek medical attention however.

Other times, she charged, he was not affectionate at all, instead threatening to kill her on several occasions, pinched her cheeks often, locked her out of their house sometimes, and refused to go for a doctor as she lay sick with typhoid fever for four days.

It was finally determined that, although Charles’s behavior might be bothersome to Hilda, it did not constitute extreme cruelty. While it was obvious to the court that Charles had often made crude attempts to be witty and had complimented his wife’s attractiveness more often than “well-bred” people normally do, the comments were not made to hurt or embarrass her and there had been no “willful desire to annoy.”

In addition, the court did not feel that Hilda’s witnesses corroborated her story about her husband’s “constant malicious vulgarity”. It was felt that, while Charles did have certain aspects of vulgarity in his speech and behavior, Hilda was simply “supersensitive.”

The judge explained that it did not appear as if Hilda had done anything to help Charles improve his behavior or to reduce the friction in their relationship. He believed the real problem was simple incompatibility, which had been present since shortly after marriage. As evidence of Charles being vulgar in speech and conduct was not weighty enough to constitute extreme cruelty, and not so frequent that it could be considered continual, and not perpetrated out of malice toward her, Hilda’s divorce petition was denied.

The words Hilda and her witnesses had used to describe Charles were not applicable to the actual facts, according to the judge. As it was determined that she did not have acceptable grounds for ending the marriage, the judge urged them to make the marriage work for the sake of their daughter.

The unhappy couple remained legally married and, a short time later, on June 28, 1928, 48-year-old Charles died suddenly at their Edgewood home of a brain hemorrhage and heart disease. He was buried in Cranston. The widowed Hilda remained in Cranston, supporting herself and her daughter by working as an agent for a fire insurance company. She lived to be 98 years old.

Kelly Sullivan is a Rhode Island columnist, lecturer and author.