A PUB landlord tried to strangle his wife with a piece of rope as their marriage crumbled, Worcester Crown Court was told.

Alan Clarke became emotionally distressed when he learned of her divorce plan.

After drinking alcohol, he returned to the Live and Let Live pub on Bringsty Common, near Bromyard, which they were renovating, and wrapped the rope around his wife Susan's neck.

"She thought he was going to kill her," said Abigail Nixon, prosecuting. "She was screaming as the rope got tighter."

But her 17-year-old son intervened, grabbing the rope and pulling it off. Clarke asked for it back, vowing he would hang himself.

Clarke, aged 62, now of Church Street, Ledbury, was jailed for 12 months. He pleaded guilty to assault causing actual bodily harm and making a threat to kill.

Judge Andrew Geddes told him: "This must have been a terrifying attack. Thanks to the intervention of one of your children, you didn't take it further."

The court heard that the couple had been to another pub nearby on September 4 last year but Clarke carried on drinking in a caravan next to their home.

He told police he became drunk but never intended to hurt his wife, a mother-of-two. A divorce was now going through.

Nicolas Cartwright, defending, said Clarke was a man of previous impeccable behaviour. He had given the court 26 character references.

Clarke had been suffering from stress ever since his wife announced she was going to divorce him. He had seen a doctor three days before the violence.

Mr Cartwright said the defendant's words had been: "I love her so much, it hurts me." He added: "The rejection was too much. After drinking he snapped. This is a one-off incident late in life."