Dodge v. Briggs

• Citation: 27 F. 160
• Parties: DODGE v. BRIGGS and others.
• Decision Date: 22 March 1886
• Court: U.S. District Court — Southern District of Georgia

27 F. 160

DODGE v. BRIGGS and others.

United States Circuit Court, S.D. Georgia, Western Division.

March 22, 1886

Lanier & Anderson and R. K. Hines, for complainant.

Luther A. Hall and Hill & Harris, for defendants.

SPEER J.

There is involved in this controversy the title to 300,000 acres of land. The lands are heavily timbered with yellow pine, and derive their chief value from that fact. They are of the alleged value of $150,000, but this is probably a very low estimate of their value. They lie in the counties of Telfair Dodge, Pulaski, and Laurens. The cause came on for a final hearing in November last, and the arguments of counsel exhibited great ability and research, ample preparation, and unusual force and precision of statement. Because of the importance and difficulty of the issues involved, and the multitude of questions arising in the consideration of the record, I have, until now, been unable to reach a satisfactory conclusion; and while regretting this delay, I have deemed it proper to take the time, and carefully to test, in the light of principle and authority, the results of my examination.

The bill is filed by George C. Dodge, a citizen of the state of New York, against Luther A. Hall, Oliver H. Briggs, and H. G Sleeper, who are alleged to be operating under the firm name of Sleeper, Hall & Briggs, in Dodge county, and against many other parties in this district, who are alleged to be trespassers on various parcels of the land. The respondents are citizens of Georgia, and of the several counties in which the land is situated, save the heirs of Colby, Chase, and Crocker, to whom more explicit reference will be made,-- these are non-residents.

The complainant alleges that he is the owner of the lands in controversy; that his title is traceable through a period of half a century, and originates in grants from the state of Georgia. The taxes have been uniformly paid. There are 1,500 separate lots. The lands belong to that class termed 'wild lands.' Being unoccupied and uncultivated, and widely dispersed in five counties, it is impossible, without extraordinary expense, to protect them from depredation. From this cause complainant states that he has already suffered heavily. Complainant further avers that about a year previous to the filing of the bill the respondents Oliver H. Briggs Luther A. Hall, and H. G. Sleeper concocted a plan to deprive him of the use and enjoyment of his lands. They surreptitiously ascertained the fact that one of his deeds, viz., a deed from Stephen Chase, Abraham Colby, and Samual C. Crocker had been defectively executed, as they suppose; that Briggs, Hall & Sleeper quietly went to work and procured powers of attorney from the heirs at law of Colby, Chase, and Crocker, who are named in the bill, under which power of attorney the three alleged conspirators have assumed the right to sell and lease the said lands, and to dispose of the timber; that Luther A. Hall, one of the alleged conspirators, is an attorney at law, but that he has combined and conspired with the others for the use and benefit of the three, and their compensation depends upon the success of their project; that Briggs, Hall & Sleeper are actively engaged in promoting and encouraging trespassers on these lands; that they sell to ignorant and innocent persons lots of the land, and sell the timber, and lease tracts of timbered land for turpentine farms; they represent that complainant has no title to the land. These wrongs have seriously injured the complainant. Moreover, the alleged conspirators, by interviews and publications in the newspapers, and by their sedulous activity in slandering the title of the complainant, have deprived him of the ability to sell these lands; that these damages are irreparable on account of the insolvency of Briggs, Hall & Sleeper, and their confederates. All of the other alleged trespassers, with one or two exceptions, are likewise insolvent, or beyond the jurisdiction of the courts.

The remaining allegations of the bill are, substantially, as follows: In the year 1833 a number of persons in the state of Maine, conceiving it a profitable enterprise, organized a stock company known as the Georgia Lumber Company. Their object was to purchase tracks of heavily-timbered pine lands in Georgia; to send down the skillful lumbermen from the pine forests of Maine to build saw-mills; and to develop, at that early day, what has since proven to be a valuable and lucrative resource of the state,-- its timber interest. Before incorporation it was called the Georgia Land Company; afterwards the Georgia Lumber Company. Stephen Chase, Abraham Colby, and Samuel E. Crocker were commissioned as its agents to go to Georgia, and to make purchases of lands for the company. The agents performed this service, and purchased the lands, in the year 1834, from Peter J. Williams, of Baldwin county. The charter of the Georgia Lumber Company was procured in Georgia in 1834 by Stephen Chase; that Colby, Chase, and Crocker acted in the state of Georgia as the agents of the company, and uniformly represented themselves as such, and never set up any claim to these lands in their own right. Afterwards, 18,000 acres of the land was purchased in the same manner, and by the same agents, from Josiah Flournoy. Colby, Chase, and Crocker are all dead, and for many years. Their heirs never claimed the lands until they were induced to make the power of attorney to Briggs, Hall & Sleeper; and but for the fraudulent representation of these alleged conspirators, for their own selfish purposes, no such claim would ever have been interposed. The deed from Peter J. Williams to Stephen Chase, Abraham Colby, and Samuel E. Crocker was by mistake made to them in their individual names, but not as agents of the Georgia Land or Lumber Company. Complainant further charges that Briggs, Hall & Sleeper are proceeding to make a number of contracts for lots of land lying in different counties, and with a large number of persons, which will involve him in multiplicity of suits to protect his interest; that Briggs, Hall & Sleeper are not recording these contracts, but are concealing them from complainant; and that the parties with whom they are contracting are building shanties and cutting timber on his lands, to his great and irreparable injury. Complainant alleges that he has no adequate remedy at law; and prays that the defendants, all discovery being waived, shall be held to account for the rents and profits of the lands which they have appropriated to their own use, and for all damages; that the contracts, leases, powers of attorney, and other instruments of writing may be delivered up and canceled, in order to remove the cloud from the title of complainant; that Briggs, Hall & Sleeper, and their agents, be enjoined from further interfering with the lands, and from making sales, leases, and contracts of any description thereto; and that the alleged heirs at law of Colby, Chase, and Crocker be likewise enjoined; and that the numerous trespassers be enjoined from further trespassing on or using said lands for their own purposes, in any manner.

On the nineteenth of January, 1885, an amendment to the bill was filed, locating the residence of the several heirs at law of Colby, Chase, and Crocker, and praying that they be made parties. It charges, further, that since the filing of the original bill these alleged heirs, with full knowledge of his title, made conveyance of all of said lands to one Silas P. Butler, a resident of the state of Massachusetts; these are quitclaim deeds, but there was no record of these deeds, or any attempt to record them, until after the bill was filed; that these conveyances were part of the scheme to defraud the complainant; that while purporting to be in consideration of the sum of $300,000, that no such consideration passed; that Silas P. Butler is a person of no responsibility, but is an employe of John L. Colby, one of the heirs at law. It is prayed that Butler, and all of said heirs, be perpetually enjoined from claiming or setting up any title to the lands in controversy.

Briggs, Hall & Sleeper file a joint answer. They deny all combination. They say that the complainant never was the legal owner of said lands, and that no legal title has ever passed to him. They say that the deed purporting to have been made by Colby, Chase, and Crocker to the Georgia Lumber Company conveyed no title; that the charter of the Georgia Lumber Company is unconstitutional. They say, further, that the conveyance made by the corporation to the state of Indiana, and the deed of the state of Indiana to Martin R. Green, are void. They admit that under powers of attorney from the heirs of Colby, Chase, and Crocker they have sold and leased many of the lots of land mentioned in complainant's bill, but their action is fair, honest, and legal. They say, in November, 1883, the entire interest of the heirs whom they represent was sold to Silas P. Butler, of the state of Massachusetts, and that they now represent Butler as his agents and his attorneys at law. They deny their insolvency. They say that they have reason to believe that Stephen Chase, Abraham Colby, and Samuel E. Crocker own said land individually, as they purchased the same for their individual benefit, and in their individual names, and not as agents and trustees for any one. They deny that Colby, Chase, and Crocker represented themselves to be agents of the Georgia Lumber Company. They deny all manner of fraud or concealment.

Silas P. Butler, by plea, sets up the same facts as were set up in the answer by Briggs, Hall & Sleeper. He also files an answer, averring that Colby, Chase, and Crocker had title to these lands, and that he bought in good faith from their heirs. He...