W. T. Carter & Bro. v. Brown
W. T. Carter & Bro. v. Brown
Opinion of the Court
This suit was filed by appellants, as plaintiffs below, in the district court of Tyler county on February 25, 1919, against the appellee, Yernie B. Brown, as defendant, and other parties came into the case, but no further! mention of them is necessary to the disposition here. The suit was in the ordinary form of trespass to try title to a tract of 322% acres of the Jane Taylor league of land in Tyler county. The appellee, Brown, answered, claiming title to an undivided 160 acres of the tract sued for, based upon the 10-year statute of limitation. The trial was had with a jury, and but one issue was submitted, which was answered in favor of the appellee, this issue being whether appellee had had and held peaceable and adverse possession of the 160 acres of land claimed by him for the full period of 10 years before appellants filed this suit.
It was admitted upon the trial that appellants were the owners of the 322%-acre tract sued for, and were entitled to recover the whole of same, unless defeated as to 160 acres thereof by the plea of limitation interposed by appellee. After its motion for new trial had been overruled, appellants brought the case to this court by appeal, and the main attack upon the verdict and judgment, as shown by the second, third and fourth assignments of error, is upon the ground that the evidence was wholly insufficient to warrant a finding by the jury that appellee’s possession, use, etc., of the land claimed by him was of such nature as to constitute adverse and peaceable possession of the same for a full period of 10 years prior to the filing of the suit. We will treat these several assignments as one, and dispose of them together. The evidence adduced upon the trial in favor of appellee, if given credence by the jury, was sufficient to show the following facts:
In the case of Houston Oil Co. of Texas v. Griffin, 166 S. W. 902, the Court of Civil Appeals for the First District affirmed a judgment in favor of a limitation claimant upon facts which, in our opinion, were not as strong in favor of the limitation claim as are the facts in this case, and in that case the Supreme Court of this state denied a writ of error. In the Griffin Case the Court of Civil Appeals, among other things, said:
*891 “Appellant, under appropriate assignments of error, contends, as it did upon tlie former appeal, that the trial court should have instructed the jury to return a verdict in its favor on the ground that the evidence is insufficient to raise the issue of the adverse possession of appellee of the 160 acres of land claimed by him for 10 years prior to the institution of this suit. This contention is based upon the proposition that the cultivation and use by appellee of the small field of 1 acre on the land in controversy during his minority and while he was living with his father was not a sufficient actual and visible appropriation of the land to put the owner upon notice of appellee’s claim to said 160 acres. As said in our former opinion, it cannot be held as a matter of law that the inclosure and cultivation of a field of 1 acre on a large tract of land is not sufficient possession and use to put the owner of the land upon notice that the person so using and occupying his land is claiming some right or title thereto. The ease is not one of encroachment. From the distance the 1-acre field was located from the land owned by appellee’s father, where appellee lived with his father, the owner of the land on which the field was situated could not reasonably have supposed that said field was placed on his land by mistake on the part of his neighbor as to the location of his lines, and the rule announced in Bracken v. Jones, 63 Texas, 184; Titel v. Garland, 99 Texas, 201, 87 S. W. 1152, and Bender v. Brooks, 103 Texas, 329, 127 S. W. 168, Ann. Cas. 1913A, 559, does not apply.”
It might be said here that the encroachment doctrine has no application to this case, and we think that it will be found, upon consideration of the opinion of the Galveston court, in the case just quoted from, and in which writ of error was denied by the Supreme Court, that the facts there in favor of the limitation claimant were not as strong as are the facts in favor of the claim in this ease. We, therefore, overrule all assignments questioning the sufficiency of the evidence to support the verdict.
It follows from what we have said above that it is the opinion of this court that the judgment in this case should be affirmed; and it will be so ordered.
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