Hmm.
Seems that a "missing wife" is more than just a missing woman.
Yeah, yeah, WE all know that but it seems the penny has just dropped for some law people in Australia; if Teacher's Pet has taught us anything it's that WE SHOULDN'T JUST RELY ON THE HUSBAND.
Just a small, slight consideration that hasn't jumped up and slapped a whole gender in the face, apparently.
I digress.
Pottering amidst the glories of archived news at Trove, I've often come across "missing wife" or "missing wife and children" headlines and sometimes I go looking to see if the wife and/or kids turned up in the births/deaths/marriages.
Most times, there's a further trace of them.
But sometimes there's not a speck.
One of the "missing wife and children" was one of those that never, ever showed a sign of life: hubby didn't report the disappearance for at least 4 weeks, and no follow-up news reports.
Likewise with searching "Missing girls" in the Sydney area during the early days of The Great Depression; I was following a hunch regarding a certain serial killer I'd been researching and, worryingly, I was unable to trace a good number of the reported "missing girls" - any number over zero is too fucking many.
But few police or news follow-ups, while casual trawling through the NSW Birth/Deaths/Marriages found gaps.
How many family trees have sudden stops on people's lives..."born 1922 disappeared 1945" ...
And the odd thing I've noticed is -
when a bloke goes missing in the news archives he usually turns up again, whereas women don't.
