'Divorce À Vinculo', 1861. Mrs Carolina, a representative of the slave-owning south of America, holding a cat o' nine tails and declaring her right to beat her own property, represented by a child slave pleading with the representative of the Northern States for protection. During the first half of 1861, a number of states in the slave-owning south of America left the Union following the election of Abraham Lincoln as President in 1860. Jefferson Davies was elected president of a new Confederacy but the Northern States refused to recognise the right to secession. The year 1861 was to see the beginning of the American Civil War. By definition a divorce à vinculo dissolves and totally severs the marriage tie. From Punch, or the London Charivari, January 19, 1861.
