December 21, 1893
WILY WILEY RILEY
He Takes Mr. Kennady's Wife and Runs Away With Her
They were Both Members of the Same Church and Stood Well
[Princeton Banner]
The neighborhood of New Bethel church is very much torn up over a sensation involving two families who have heretofore stood well with all who knew them, at least until a very few weeks ago.
Wiley Riley, a farmer, and a member of the church named, lived close to another farmer named Kennedy. A short time since Riley's wife discovered evidence of her husband's unfaithfulness, and charged him with it, making Mrs. Kennady a sharer in his sin. Riley at first denied it but gave in when proof was shown him. She threatened to sue for a divorce, but Riley persuaded her not to make a fuss, promising that he would mend his ways and be true to her. About this time the matter reached the ears of some of the members of the church, and they took steps in the matter by following out the directions laid down in Matthew V. A brother went to him and remonstrated with him, and then a committee, headed by the pastor, waited on him. They took his acknowledgment and affected a permanent reconciliation between him and his wife, on the ground of a solemn pledge to discontinue his relations with Mrs. Kennady. The latter was also a member of the church and it was proposed to discipline her, but she did not give them time, for as soon as she could see Riley they made a plan to run away together. This was successfully accomplished a few nights ago and Mr. Riley and Mrs. Kennady are now sojourning in a strange land.
Mrs. Kennady was living with her third husband, although she is a comparatively young woman. There was more or less mystery attached to the death of her first two lords, and there was much gossip about their dissolution, though no one ever openly announced the cause of death of the two men, and is probable that the gossip was wrong, resting as it did on Mrs. Kennady's reputation for gayety. She had children by at least two of her husbands and she took one or two of them with her. Riley left a wife behind.
Source: Crittenden Press. Marion, Kentucky, December 21, 1893, page 3, Chronicling America – Library of Congress.
