Bradley v. Johnson

• Decision Date: 31 July 1873
• Parties: EMMA BRADLEY, plaintiff in err0r. v. JOHN JOHNSON, administrator, defendant in error.
• Court: Georgia Supreme Court

49 Ga. 421

EMMA BRADLEY, plaintiff in err0r. v. JOHN JOHNSON, administrator, defendant in error.

Supreme Court of the State of Georgia

(Atlanta, July Term, 1873.)

[49 Ga. 413]

Judgments. Estoppel. Before Judge Johnson. Mus: ogee Superior Court. October Term, 1872.

For the facts of this case, see the decision.

Henry L. Benning; G. E. Thomas, for plaintiff in error.

Peabody & Brannon, for defendant.

WARNER, Chief Justice.

This was a bill filed by the complainant as the widow and heir-at-law of Bradley against the defendant, as the administrator of Bradley, for an account and distribution of Bradley's estate, with a prayer for an injunction. The defendant denies that the complainant is the widow and heir-at-law of Bradley. On the trial of the case the defendant offered and read in evidence an exemplification of the record from the Court of Ordinary of Muscogee county, in which it appears that Johnson made application to that Court for letters of administration on Bradley's estate, to which the complainant, *entered a caveat, claiming that she was entitled to the administration as the widow of Bradley. The Ordinary granted the administration to her. Johnson entered an appeal to the Superior Court from the decision of the Ordinary, and on the trial of the appeal the jury found the following verdict: "We, the jury, find that John Johnson, applicant, is entitled to administration on the estate of Thaddeus W. Bradley, deceased." Judgment was entered on this verdict, in exact accordance with the terms thereof, and certified to the Ordinary, and made the judgment of that Court, and Johnson was appointed by the Ordinary administrator on Bradley's estate. The Court charged the jury, "that if the question whether the plaintiff was the widow of deceased was made and adjudicated between the parties to this cause in the proceedings had before the Ordinary and on appeal, and it was therein and thereby adjudged that the plaintiff was not the widow of deceased, such adjudication was conclusive of the fact in this case, and she would be thereby barred of her right to maintain her present suit." To which charge of the Court the complainant excepted, and the question is, whether the judgment of the Court of Ordinary granting the letters of administration on the estate of Bradley to Johnson, as the same appears in the record, was conclusive evidence that the complainant was not the widow of Bradley, so as to conclude her from showing that she was his widow on the trial of the equity cause, and was a bar of her right to maintain that suit.

1. The rule as to the conclusiveness of judgments, as stated by Lord Chief Justice DeGrey, in the Duchess of Kingstone's case (20 Howell's State trials, cited by...