| Sumario: | This article describes the divorce trial of Hannah and George Webb, who appeared in Sydney's Divorce Court in late 1901 before Judge George Bowen Simpson without a jury. Over nine days, Hannah Webb provided a harrowing account of her husband's ongoing abuse, while George Webb described his wife's adulterous affair, fondness for beer, and slovenly housekeeping. Drawing on Court Reporting Office transcriptions, divorce records, and press reports, my discussion considers what the legal approach to marital cruelty reveals about gender ideals and gendered power in late nineteenth-century Australia. Ample witness confirmation and widespread community knowledge of George Webb's violence render curious the judge's pronouncement that Hannah's allegations of cruelty were 'unfounded and unsubstantiated.' Webb v Webb shows how the law could silence women by discounting their testimony, with the cards often stacked against women who appeared in court. Newly established cruelty provisions were open to individual judicial interpretation and the belief persisted that wives could avoid violence by modifying their behaviour. At a time of social change, uneducated and unskilled women like Hannah Webb remained disempowered and dependent while a male breadwinner held the balance of marital power.
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