Bride-To-Be Was Married – Denaby Woman In Court

July 1946

South Yorkshire Times, July 13th, 1946

Bride-To-Be Was Married.
Denaby Woman In Court.

How plans for a Mexborough wedding had to be called off at the eleventh hour, because it was discovered that the woman was already married, was disclosed in a case at the Doncaster West Riding Court on Tuesday when Dorothea M. Smith (25), machinist, of Warmsworth Street, Denaby, was fined £5 for an offence under the Perjury Act, making a false statement relating to marriage.

Prosecuting, Mr. N. C. Smith said defendant was formerly Miss Dorothea Hall. On January 22nd, 1943, when she was 22, she married a widower named Harry Smith, aged 42. This wedding did not last very long, because the couple went to Blackpool for honeymoon and only stayed together one night. Afterwards they went to Mr. Smith’s home at Mexborough for one night, then she packed up her belongings and returned to her mother’s home.

These two had not lived together since that time.

In September, 1945, went on Mr. N. C. Smith, Mrs. Smith made the acquaintance of Stanley Hambleton, for whom one could have the deepest sympathy because they courted and, having heard certain rumours, he asked her whether she was married. Several times she denied it. That being so, he offered marriage and she accepted. Everything was arranged, even to the extent of getting permits for furniture. She said she would arrange for the catering. Everything was for the wedding.

She and Hambleton went to see the Vicar of Mexborough and saw a lady there, a church worker, at the vicarage. They signed an application to be filled in for the publication of banns. ‘Dorothea Marjorie Hall’ was described as a spinster and she signed the application.

The banns were read, but just before the ceremony Hambleton went again to this woman and taxed her again, and he must have done it with greater emphasis than before, for she then admitted that she was already married.

Mrs. Smith had made a voluntary statement in which she said she had married Smith and left after a few days and went back to her home at Denaby. She admitted the arrangements for marrying Hambleton at Mexborough Parish Church. She understood that Smith had consulted a solicitors about getting a divorce. She thought she could get that through and marry Stanley Hambleton without his knowing anything about it.
Defendant told the magistrates that she was sorry. She knew she had done wrong. She only lived with Smith a few days and left him because she was never happy with him.