Wilson v. Crook
Wilson v. Crook
Opinion of the Court
The si'sters and brother of Samuel' F. Clawson, deceased, and the husbands of the sisters, are the complainants. The bill was filed in 1843, more than eighteen months after the grant of administration. The administration was granted by the Orphans’ Court of Benton county, on the 4th day of December 1840, to the defendants, John M. Crook and Harriet Clawson, then the widow of the intestate, and now the wife of the defendant, Hiram Mitchell. It appears that the complainants, who are the sisters and brother of the intestate, are his heirs at law and distributees, he having died without will or issue. It appears also, by the bill, that the intestate left considerable real and personal estate, and that the representatives had not made a full return of the latter to the Orphans’ Court. It appears by the bill that a discovery of the personal, estate, not repoited to the Orphans’ Court, is necessary; and it appears by the answer of the defendant Crook, that a portion^ of the personal estate was not reported to the Orphans’ Court. As to this, the answer, however, gives excuses which, if true, are very satisfactory; and we are not at all disposed to question, their truth. But the fact is, notwithstanding, that the personal estate was not fully returned to the Orphans’ Court. The case,, therefore, was a proper one for a discovery, and the chancellor having a right to the jurisdiction of it for that purpose, should have gone on to close the administration, which appears to have been the object of the bill. — Hunley v. Hunley, 15 Ala.R. 91.
Let the decree be reversed and thé cause remanded.
Reference
- Full Case Name
- WILSON & WIFEs. v. CROOK, Adm'rs
- Cited By
- 9 cases
- Status
- Published
- Syllabus
- 1. A court of chancery will entertain a bill filed for the discovery of assets, which an administrator has failed to return in his inventory, and having jurisdiction for that purpose, should go on and close the administration. 2. Where in closing an administration in chancery, it is found necessary to sell the real estate for the payment of debts, the chancellor can order them to be sold, as near as may be, in the manner prescribed by statute for sales in similar cases under an order of the Orphans’ Court.