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Would You Trade Your Wife for a Dog?- One 19th Century English Farmer Did
Wife selling was a not uncommon practice for many years in England
For those of us who married well, we wouldn’t exchange our significant other for anything in the world. Unfortunately, not everyone always feels that way. In fact, it used to be a practice in some areas to sell your wife as an alternative to divorce. That’s what happened nearly 200 years ago when an English farmer traded his wife for a few bucks and a dog.
In 1832, a livestock farmer named Joseph Thomson from Carlisle, England was fed up with his wife Mary Anne. At the time, divorce was practically impossible due to the religious barriers in place, but he knew the relationship couldn’t continue. He turned to the most practical option available to him, which was selling her.
Wife selling had no legal basis in England but persisted as an intermittent practice from the late 17th century until the early 1900s. Although appalling, a husband would display the wife he was looking to rid himself of publicly by walking around with her on a halter or rope, soliciting the highest bid. Some were prosecuted for making these sales but the authorities were largely lackadaisical in enforcing such matters.
