Memoir, This Actually Happened To Me
#17 — Dad was a Bigamist: He Married Mum & Another Girl
He drove a lorry and looked like a young Mel Gibson…
My dad, the bigamist.
Isn't it funny, you don't hear the word bigamy much nowadays. Is it because people have turned away from marriage? It does seem to be a tradition that has gone out of fashion.
Or perhaps couples are trying out polyamory?
Of course, there is always the problem of being found out online too. Such a vast amount of data exists about Tom, Dick and Harry! Not to mention Anne, Jane and Diane.
What is Bigamy?
The act of entering into a marriage with one person while still legally married to another. Merriam webster.
Bigamy is a criminal offence in the UK under section 57 of the Offences Against Person Act 1861. If a marriage takes place in the UK and one of the parties are already legally married to another person then they are committing bigamy, and the marriage will be considered void. KJSmith.
My dad — was a bigamist in the 70s. He was a few other things too, but that is not a theme I want to address here.
As well as all of this, he looked like a young Mel Gibson. I mean, he was extremely handsome, but looking like the actor doesn't make bigamy OK. Does it? No… of course not. And let's remember, many people think the once golden Mel is a bad person… I am not sure why, but I heard something about it on the grape vine. Perhaps he committed bigamy too. I know he was a catholic, unlike my dad who refused to go to church with the rest of the family. Too busy doing things he shouldn’t!
Regarding the Mel Gibson slur, personally, I don’t subscribe to the news on TV. As a very wise 80-year-old woman once told me —
“It is just there to scaremonger.”
Dads
He was not my real dad. I was adopted by him and my mum when I was 6 months old. Although at the point this story takes place, he was the only father I had ever known.
My real dad — my birth dad — was a sailor. Sailed the seven seas. I never met him… But maybe I did.
The world of dads for me has never really worked out. My stepdad was a bit of an arse, so I wished an uncle of mine had been my father. But I managed along the way.
My adopted mum was amazing and her mum — my gran — a true individual. I was lucky to have them.
But every so often I remember… my dad was a bigamist.
My dad the bigamist
So how did it happen? Well, he did what it says on the tin. Married someone else while he was still wed to my mum.
Mind you, she got a divorce pretty sharpish when she found out. Well, you would, wouldn’t you? Sorry if I sound flippant about such a serious topic but it happened oh… so many years ago.
I was only about seven or eight when I heard a dreadful argument between him and my mum downstairs. My brother and I were meant to be in bed but sat on the top of the stairs listening while clasping our knees. Bless us!
Anyway, the most I can remember from the conversation was my mum shouting —
“Well, I’m keeping the children.”
Like he wanted us in the first place! He never liked us…
Sorry — I am just stepping into my Rocky Horror memories there…
THEY DIDN’T LIKE ME! THEY NEVER LIKED ME… Riff Raff
Then all of a sudden he was gone. Left… I think it must have been nearly winter, as I remember getting a Christmas present in the post. Then a present for my birthday in March. But I never… ever saw him again.
I was curious about what had happened, why he had left, and of course initially I missed him. He had been very strict whereas my mum was far more easy going, so the structure of the way I was being brought up changed dramatically.
My friend from round the corner was a bit older and said the big D word to me.
D I V O R C E.
She was right. But after I had searched under my mum’s bed and delved into her brown leather suitcase, I learned a new word…
B I G A M Y.
The dirty rascal had married a woman down on the south coast and already had a couple of babies with her. Of course, the young me, immediately thought that as I was not his flesh and blood, he would naturally want some proper mini-hims. Not small people like my brother and me, who were just acting the part. Be it not very well!
I didn’t really wonder how he had met someone so far away. He was a long distance lorry driver. Plenty of opportunity to meet and marry several women without being found out. And I suspect he would have remained living with two families if his illegal wife had not got pregnant with a second child.
Oh the tangled web we weave when first we practice to deceive. Sir Walter Scott.
As far as I know, my father was never tried for the crime he’d committed.
Anyhow, all of this marriage and cheating stuff must have taken a toll on him, as within a few years he’d had a heart attack and died at forty. You can read about that bit below, as something very… very strange happened the day he died:
At this point, my brother and I were used to being without him, so his death didn’t really affect us, but I wondered about his new family. How they coped. None of my business, really.
Whatever my father was, he remained the love of my mum’s life until she died at 83.
Another Bigamist
A woman named Emily Horne — an interesting surname for a bigamist— committed bigamy, apparently six times in relatively recent years. Making my dad look like a pussycat!
She married her first and legal husband in 1996 and must have liked it because she married again in 1999.
Further ceremonies took place — two in 2002, another in 2007 and 2011. Her final marriage was to a guy she met online a few months later.
In between all the weddings, she was tried and sentenced a few times, but it didn’t deter her. I suppose we should admire her persistence!
Bigamy is having one wife too many. Monogamy is the same. Oscar Wilde
Here is one of my better semi-erotic fiction stories. The anti-hero in the tale is loosely based on my father.
So dear reader — have you ever met a bigamist and if so what was their story?
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May More is Editor: Tantalizing Tales & Redemption Magazine. Passionate about transgressive fiction. Top Writer Fiction/Short Stories/This Happened to Me. Twitter @more_matters. Likes individuals, food, Italian wine and chickens.
