Griffith v. Watkins

• Decision Date: 13 January 1926
• Docket Number: (No. 2579.)
• Citation: 279 S.W. 489
• Parties: GRIFFITH et al. v. WATKINS et al.
• Court: Texas Court of Appeals

279 S.W. 489

GRIFFITH et al. v. WATKINS et al.

(No. 2579.)

Court of Civil Appeals of Texas. Amarillo.

January 13, 1926.

Appeal from District Court, Dallam County; Reese Tatum, Judge.

Suit by E. H. Griffith and others against L. B. Watkins and Lula E. Watkins. L. B. Watkins died, and suit was continued against defendant Lula E. Watkins. Judgment for defendant, and plaintiffs appeal. Affirmed.

Bailey & Richards, of Dalhart, for appellants.

R. E. Stalcup, of Dalhart, for appellee.

RANDOLPH, J.

This suit was filed by appellants seeking the reformation of a deed, and the petition also contains allegations necessary to constitute it an action of trespass to try title. The original defendants were L. B. Watkins and his wife, Lula E. Watkins. L. B. Watkins died after the filing of the suit, and such suit was continued against the widow. On trial of the case judgment was rendered in favor of the surviving defendant, and from such judgment appeal has been duly taken to this court.

It appears from the pleading of plaintiffs, and from the evidence introduced by them, that Mrs. Watkins was the owner in her separate right of four lots numbered 4, 5, 6, and 7, in block 46 in the town of Dalhart; that the plaintiffs made a trade with the husband, L. B. Watkins, to purchase said four lots for the Jenkins Memorial Baptist Church; that a written contract was drawn and signed by L. B. Watkins. This contract was lost. Beyond the testimony of the witness Griffith that such written contract, setting up the terms of sale, properly executed, was executed by Watkins, there is no evidence establishing the contents of the lost contract. A deed was thereafter signed and acknowledged by Watkins and wife conveying lots 4, 5, and 6 to appellants as trustees for said church, but lot No. 7 was not included in this deed. Appellants allege, and tender evidence to prove, that lot No. 7 was left out of the deed by mistake.

The only questions that we shall discuss are those involving the right of the plaintiffs to a reformation of the deed, as the solution of those questions are decisive of the case.

The trial court filed no findings of fact and conclusions of law, and none were requested to be filed, and every ground upon which the judgment could be supported by the evidence will be presumed to have been found by the trial court.

Pretermitting any discussion of the admissibility of such testimony, the evidence introduced by plaintiffs shows that the trade, as made by the plaintiffs with L. B. Watkins, included lot No. 7, but they do not anywhere show that Mrs. Watkins knew the terms of such trade, or what property was to be included, and do not show that she ever intended to convey lot No. 7; the only intention she is shown to have had was to convey the property designated and described in the deed that she executed. On the contrary, she testified that she never knew that her husband had made any trade whereby lot No. 7 was to be included, and that she signed and executed the deed intending only to convey the lots described in the deed.

The appellants call attention to a circumstance tending to bear out their contention that lot No. 7 was intended to be conveyed — the circumstance of the whole of the lien debt on the four lots...