While some men resorted to selling their unwanted wives, as reported in previous Mercuriosities posts, one man turned to a somewhat more gruesome, if unsuccessful, method of separation.
“SCOTLAND
Edinburgh, Sept. 2. In a town at some distance from this city a few days ago, a man who had been many years married, it should appear, had conceived some dislike at his wife, and had planned the design of getting rid of her. The method he took was uncommon : While asleep, he put a noose over her neck, and pulled her up to the ceiling, where he kept her hanging for a long time, that he made no doubt of her death. He then put her into the bed where she had been before, left her, and went to alarm the neighbourhood with the story of his wife’s being in a fit, and expiring. The neighbours immediately came to his assistance ; but to his amazement and mortification, in place of finding his wife dead, he found her alive, and able to tell distinctly, to all around, the story of his wickedness. The man was committed to prison.”
Stamford Mercury, 12th September 1765.