"A decent looking woman, named Charlotte Clark, was charged at the Guildhall, on Monday, with intermarrying with Joseph Bryant; her husband, William Clark, being still alive. Both marriages were clearly proved, the first to have taken place at St. George's Church in Dec. 1835, the second at St. Mary Major's in August last year
"It seemed that Clark had been living away from his wife for between two and three years, working on the railroad, where he had lost an arm, and now on coming back, finding she had married another was resolved to prosecute her.
"Bryant, the second husband who is a blind man living in St. Thomas, said he had been informed by a man that Clark was dead, and that there was not a worthier woman than the prisoner in the City of Exeter.
"She was committed for trial."
*
What a tragedy is here! - what a plot for George Eliot or Thomas Hardy! - and what a lot of questions! These were poor, ignorant people but Charlotte was a decent looking woman than whom her blind second husband thought there was no worthier woman in the city of Exeter and William Clark had been working on the railroad and had lost his arm and his wife. Had she believed William to be dead? Did he not communicate with his wife?
The City Assize Court, two weeks later, showed little mercy. Charlotte was sentenced to six weeks imprisonment with hard labour. By now she was looking sickly and the governor of the prison was asked to employ her in the kitchens. In a sense she was lucky, - not to have been transported.
To which husband did Charlotte return after prison, to the one-armed man who had prosecuted her or to the blind man who, it seems, truly loved her?
Sources: The Western Times, 5th March & 19th March, 1842. ( I have to add that The Exeter Flying Post of 3rd March gives a differing report in which Charlotte appears somewhat less worthy, )
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