Liggett v. Morgan

• Decision Date: 23 March 1889
• Citation: 11 S.W. 241,98 Mo. 39
• Parties: Liggett, Plaintiff in Error, v. Morgan et al
• Court: Missouri Supreme Court

11 S.W. 241

98 Mo. 39

Liggett, Plaintiff in Error, v. Morgan et al

Supreme Court of Missouri

March 23, 1889

Error to De Kalb Circuit Court. -- Hon. B. J. Casteel, Special Judge.

Reversed and remanded.

S. G Loring for plaintiff in error.

(1) The court erred in the admission of evidence. (2) The court erred in the giving of instructions, especially the third. There was no evidence that Henry Houk promised the defendant Catharine Morgan, that if she and her husband would settle upon the land, they or either of them might have it for their own.

Ramey & Brown for defendants in error.

Brace J. Sherwood, J., absent.

OPINION

Brace, J.

This is an action in ejectment for a tract of land in DeKalb county described in the petition by metes and bounds. The defense was ten years adverse possession.

The plaintiff derived title to the premises by warranty deed, dated September 24, 1881, from Henry Houk, the patentee. This suit was begun in March, 1882. The defendant Catharine Morgan is the daughter of the said Henry Houk. She and her husband went into the actual possession of the premises about fifteen years before this suit was brought, and have been continuously in the possession thereof during all that time. The only question in the case is: Was this possession held adversely to her father's title?

The evidence for the defendants tended to show that the premises was a small tract of brush land situate about a half a mile from Henry Houk's home; that his daughter, Mrs. Morgan, was living elsewhere with her husband; that her mother having died, and a sister who was living at home with her father being about to marry, in January prior to the defendant's going upon the land, her father through her brother proposed to her that if she would move on the land and help take care of his younger children he would give her the land; that she accepted the proposal and in pursuance of such agreement the defendants went upon the land, built a house upon it, cleared up and fenced about three-fourths of it, and ever since have lived upon the premises claiming it as the property of Mrs. Morgan.

The evidence for the plaintiff tended to disprove any such agreement, and to prove that in January before defendants went upon the land Henry Houk, the father of Mrs. Morgan, and Smith Morgan, her husband, entered into a parol agreement by which the said Houk agreed to sell the land to said Morgan for the sum of four hundred dollars to be paid in four equal annual installments of one hundred dollars each, in one, two, three and four years from the day of sale, a bond for a deed to be executed when the first installment was paid, and a deed made when the last installment was paid; that this was the only agreement that the said Houk ever made with the defendant or either of them about the land; that they went upon the land; that the said Morgan never paid any part of the purchase money therefor or any taxes upon the land; that they remained there about fourteen years when Houk gave Morgan notice to get off, and afterwards conveyed the land to plaintiff; that neither of the defendants ever claimed to own the land, nor did said Houk ever hear of such claim until after the sale was made to plaintiff. The jury returned a verdict for the defendants and the plaintiff brings the case here by writ of error.

I. It does not appear by the record that the attention of the trial court was called by specific objection to any evidence complained of as...