Gates v. Union Naval Stores Company

• Decision Date: 30 March 1908
• Citation: 92 Miss. 227,45 So. 979
• Court: Mississippi Supreme Court
• Parties: CHARLES B. GATES ET AL. v. UNION NAVAL STORES COMPANY

45 So. 979

92 Miss. 227

CHARLES B. GATES ET AL. v. UNION NAVAL STORES COMPANY

Supreme Court of Mississippi

March 30, 1908

March 1908

FROM the chancery court of Harrison county, HON. J. O. S. SANDERS Special Chancellor.

The Union Naval Stores Company, a corporation, appellee, was the complainant in the court below, and Gates and another appellants were defendants there. From a decree in complainant's favor defendants appealed to the supreme court.

The Union Naval Stores Company charged that Preston Bond in 1894 acquired from the United States the title to the land upon which lots one and two of block four of the town of Bond were subsequently platted; that Bond and one W. J. Evans were for several years in partnership in business and occupied Bond's store building situated upon the lots; that Bond sold out to Evans in 1898, and, with intent to convey to Evans the title to the said lots, executed to Evans a deed which by mistake described the two lots as being situated in block one instead of in block four, the deed being executed in 1898 and filed for record in November, 1900; that Bond owned no property in block one, this block being situated off the land patented to him by the government; and that both Bond and Evans intended that the conveyance should be of the property whereon was located the store building. The bill further charged that Evans in December, 1900, borrowed $ 9,000 from the Union Naval Stores Company, the complainant executing in its favor a deed of trust upon the lots so purchased from Bond and on other property, describing the lots as they were described in the deed from Bond to Evans the parties intending to convey by the deed of trust the two lots whereon was situated the store-building; that the deed of trust, containing such erroneous description, was foreclosed by suit and the two lots were purchased by complainant in April, 1903, at a commissioner's sale, for $ 1,600; that, pending the foreclosure suit a receiver was appointed by the chancery court to take charge of the business and assets of Evans, and that when the receiver took charge thereof Evans pointed out to him the store building and lots one and two of block four as being his property, and that at that thee defendant, Mrs. Whyte, was occupying a part of the store-building, she being post-mistress and sister of Evans, leasing a post-office room from him. The bill further set forth that, in March, 1903, shortly before the foreclosure sale, Bond fraudulently made conveyance of lots one and two of block four to the defendant, Gates, for the sum of $ 500, less than one-third the actual value of the property, and that at the thee both Bond and Gates knew that Bond had no real title to the lots described. The bill prayed that complainant's title should be adjudged superior to the claims of the defendants, and that their claims should be cancelled as a cloud upon the title Neither Bond nor Evans were made parties to the suit.

Reversed and remanded.

T. A. Wood, T. M. Evans, and Alexander & Alexander, for appellants.

Without reformation, and that by a bill to which Bond and Evans are necessary parties, this suit cannot be maintained. A decree of reformation...