Morrison v. Neff
Morrison v. Neff
Opinion of the Court
This -is an action of ejectment brought by the plaintiff against the'defendant to recover the possession of “about fifty rods in width off of the east side across the north-east quarter of section 30, township 2 north,' range 6 east, in Gage county.” The defendant is the owner of the northwest quarter of the north-west quarter of section 29, township 2 north, range 6 east (lot 2). The question involved is the location of the section line between sections 29 and 30. An opinion was filed in this case in 1884, the judgment being reversed, and is reported in 20 N. W. R., 254.
A rehearing was granted, and the cause is again submitted.
The land in controversy is situated on what was formerly the Otoe reservation, and was surveyed in the year 1873. A stone purporting to be the corner stone at the north-east corner of section 30, is 52 rods east of the true line between sections 29 and 30, as shown by the section corner on the south line of said section 30, and by the section line on the north, so that the section line from the corner contended for by the plaintiff runs nearly south-west to the south line of the section. No witness swears to the location of the corner by the government surveyors at the point indicated, nor did any witness testify to seeing the stone there prior to 1876 or 1877. The court below found the issues in favor of the defendant, and rendered a decree
The field notes also may be considered where a government corner is destroyed or its existence is in dispute; so with plats of the government survey. All these are fingerboards, as it were, which point in the direction of the original corner as located by the surveyors. The court will then weigh carefully all the evidence presented, and determine the fact. In this case we think that the court below was fully justified from the evidence in finding, as it must have done, that the stone 52 rods east of the true line was not placed there by the government surveyors, and in proceeding thereupon to determine from the evidence the true location.
There are strong equities in favor of the defendant, and
Judgment affirmed.
Note. — This opinion was withheld from publication in the regular series of Reports by direction of its writer. — Rbp.
Reference
- Full Case Name
- Phœbe J. Morrison, in error v. Jonathan Neff, in error
- Status
- Published