One subject in the history of crime in Britain is particularly remarkable for how we register changing moral attitudes in family life: wife-beating. Scanning local newspapers and social history reference works reinforces the view that a century ago, in many communities, brutality against members of the family was not always punished, and was sometimes indeed ignored. There are even cases of families starving children in order to buy alcohol.
George Parker and his wife Sarah definitely liked a drink. They had a long history of violence towards each other, but at the beginning of this particular day in which Parker when so far that he committed a very serious assault on his wife, there were all the right circumstances for an explosive event in their home.
This took place in Market Street, Gainsborough, where they lived, he working as a paperhanger and she at home. There is a shadowy presence over the following brutal events, though. This is a certain character called R Walter Forrest who may well have been Sarah’s lover and the cause of at least some of the trouble. The poor woman clearly needed someone to care for her: her husband wanted her dead. They had been married for eleven years and none of them appear to have been happy ones.
On the March morning that began this awful attack, George emerged from his bed fully clothed and yelled for Sarah to fetch in some beer. She did this, and he took the beer upstairs. This made his condition much worse. When he came down he was ready to kill. Luckily, Sarah had a woman-friend sitting with her downstairs, so there was a witness from the very start. This was Ada Shorthouse, who swore that she had heard Parker say, when he came down again, ‘I’ll kill you, you bitch!’ Parker took Sarah upstairs and there was a row. Shorthouse must have kept out of the way and been frightened for her life as well as her friend’s. Sarah was at first kicked and beaten about the face. When Ada knew that Parker was totally out of control and was trying to throttle his wife, she ran for a police officer.