The detective who chased his wife with a carving knife
Rose Woodger was scared of her private detective husband - was his insistence that he was a good husband who made his wife bacon breakfasts a plain-faced lie?
Not all private detectives were nice men. This, you might have assumed already, given that some private detectives appeared in the press charged with assaults, frauds, threatening behaviour, and other types of dodgy behaviour. But it also means that some of them were also rather unpleasant at home, too.
This appears to have been the case with George Edwin Woodger, a Kent-born private detective who, by 1926, was living in West Kensington with his young wife Rose. Rose Katherine Woodger, nee Lester, was from a humble background, being one of 11 children born to horsekeeper Robert Lester and his wife. In 1911, the 11 surviving members of the Lester family were crammed into a three roomed property at 30 Garvan Road, Fulham (the three rooms including a kitchen) - a property that they would live in for years.
In fact, by 1926, Rose had returned to live there. She had only been married four and a half years, and 18 months of that had been spent living in her family home, together with her husband. Things should have been made a bit easier for her once she and George had moved into rented accommodation at May Street in West Kensington, but once there, George's behaviour had become cruel. She took him to court to get a legal separation, arguing that on more than one occasion, George had chased her with a carving knife. George insisted he had been at his detective office in Holborn at the time, but unfortunately for him, his actions had been witnessed by two other women who lived in the same building.
George claimed that the breakfasts he made for Rose were a sign of his love for her
(photo by Joadl on Wikimedia Commons)
George, in turn, argued that Rose neglected him, and that he had to do the housework. This was a surprise to Rose, who insisted that she made the beds, did the cooking, and 'emptied the slops'. Although the court felt that housework amounted to little more than that apart from 'flicking' at ornaments with 'a little brush', George said that he scrubbed the floors and cleaned the grates as he felt this was 'man's work'. He also said he was a loving husband because the day she had left him, he had made Rose a breakfast of bacon and tomatoes. All he wanted, he pleaded to the court, was for his wife and young child to return home to him.
George's testimony sounded like that of a heartbroken man just wanting his family life to resume. He was a man who did his fair share of chores, who tried to make his wife's life easier, and who made her breakfasts in the morning to demonstrate his love for her. But he was a good actor. Rose made clear that she was frightened of him, and did not want to return. Although their evidence contradicted each other, the court believed that Rose's testimony was more convincing than George's. Many a private detective had previously been an actor, and even when not, they had to be good at acting to carry out their jobs. George may have thought he was a good actor, but the court disagreed.
Rose, still only in her mid 20s, was given her legal separation, and she and her son Kenneth were awarded regular maintenance. She returned home to Garvan Road, where she was still living in 1939; she and George divorced, and in the early 1950s, she finally remarried - hopefully, this time, to someone who genuinely treated her well.