Wells v. Brewster
Wells v. Brewster
Opinion of the Court
delivered the opinion of the Court. Judge Farrand did not give an opinion, having been of counsel in the case.
This case must be decided upon the special verdict, which is very briefly drawn up. The general questions are — 1. Is there a sufficient finding to support the judgment rendered for the plaintiff in the Court below ? — 2. Upon this finding ought the judgment to have been rendered for the defendant? — 3. Is the verdict so defective that there ought to have been a venire de novo ? The verdict first finds a title in the intestate, Charles Brewster, to one hundred acres of land in the township of Georgia, and then states the manner in which the claim of the plaintiff below, administratrix, is made out through the intestate, to the Lot in question, by virtue of that title and a division of lands in Georgia by the proprietors.
The Court are of opinion that there is a sufficient finding to warrant a judgment for the plaintiff'below, if the division be found valid, for the defendants, if it be invalid. The Court are also of opinion that a sufficiently valid division is found; certainly against all who are strangers, having no proprietary interest in the town; and even against every proprietor whose rights have not been violated in the very matter in contest.
Samuel and Orange Wells, the two other defendants below, were not strangers, destitute of interest in the division ¿ for it is expressly found by the verdict, that they were the owners of two rights or shares in Georgia, in the right of their father. It is not slated how they became owners, or how they acquired their father’s title, or whether the father was living or dead. But to make any good sense of it, we must understand that they were owners of the rights by a title derived from or through their father — whether by descent or purchase is immaterial. It is further found, that in the proprietary division, Samuel and Grange Wells, the sons, refused to have any lands voted to them in lieu of their drafts, on their rights. This, could they have claimed a right to such vote for this Lot, was clearly an abandonment of such claim. But it does not appear that they had derived from their father any title or claim to the possession or improvements made by Stiles. And it is found that they, in the division of the town, received other lands to the full amount of their two rights or shares. They have therefore, according to the principle laid down, no right in this case to contest the legality of the division, or to contend that the Lot in question was not well severed to Charles Brewster, the intestate-
Reference
- Full Case Name
- Wells and others v. Brewster
- Status
- Published