In re Buck's Estate

• Decision Date: 06 April 1920
• Docket Number: No. 16601.,16601.
• Parties: ST. LOUIS UNION TRUST CO. v. BUCK.
• Court: Missouri Court of Appeals

220 S.W. 716

204 Mo. App. 1

ST. LOUIS UNION TRUST CO. v. BUCK.

No. 16601.

St. Louis Court of Appeals. Missouri.

April 6, 1920.

Appeal from St. Louis Circuit Court; Wilson A. Taylor, Judge.

In the matter of the estate of Ralph S. Buck, deceased. The order of the probate court allowing the application of Marie V. Buck, administratrix of the estate of Ralph B. Buck, for an order requiring the St. Louis Union Trust Company, as executor, to pay the legacy, given by the will to her intestate, to her, was affirmed by the circuit court on appeal, and the executor appeals. Affirmed.

Charles M. Polk, of St. Louis, for appellant. W. B. & Ford W. Thompson, of St. Louis, for respondent.

BIGGS, C.

This cause originated in the probate court of the city of St. Louis, and arises out of an application of Marie V. Buck, administratrix of Ralph B. Buck, addressed to that court, asking that the St. Louis Union Trust Company, executor of Ralph S. Buck, be ordered to distribute to her as such administratrix a certain legacy bequeathed to Ralph B. Buck by the will of Ralph S. Buck as follows:

"I give and bequeath to my nephew and namesake Ralph B. Buck the sum of two thousand dollars, which I desire my executors shall pay over to the St. Louis Union Trust Company to be invested, managed and controlled by said company during the minority of my said nephew, and during his said minority the net income of profits arising from said principal sum of two thousand dollars shall be added to the principal, and the whole amount of principal and accumulated income shall be paid over to my said nephew by said trust company when he reaches the age of twenty-one years, to be his absolutely."

The probate court and, on appeal, the circuit court (a jury being waived) sustained the application, and ordered the trust company, as executor aforesaid, to pay the legacy to Marie V. Buck as such administratrix. From this order and judgment the trust company as such executor has appealed here, contending that the evidence is insufficient to warrant the trial court in finding: (1) That Ralph B. Buck is dead; and (2) that, if dead, he died subsequently to the date of the death of his uncle Ralph S. Buck, for unless Ralph B. Buck survived his uncle the legacy lapsed, and the administratrix of his estate could not lay claim to same.

Ralph S. Buck, the uncle, died November 11, 1910. Ralph B. Buck, the nephew, was born November 14, 1892, and disappeared August 20, 1909, when about 17 years old, and has never been heard from since.

After waiting a period of more than 7 years, the boy's mother, Marie V. Buck, applied to the probate court, and was granted letters of administration on his estate. Appellant admits that Marie V. Buck is the duly appointed, qualified, and acting administratrix of the estate of Ralph B. Buck.

The only testimony submitted by either party was that of Marie V. Buck, the mother, and that is as follows:

"I am Marie V. Buck, the widow of Stephen B. Buck and the mother of Ralph B. Buck. was married to Stephen B. Buck February 17, 1892, at Wheaton, Ill. My son, Ralph B. Buck, was born November 14, 1892. 1 was living in Denver, Colorado, at the time my son disappeared. He disappeared August 20, 1999. He went to his work in the morning, and I never saw him afterwards. He was then 16½ years old, and was working as a bell boy in a boarding house, getting no a month. He had only worked there a couple of weeks. Before that he had worked for a paper concern of the name of Heckel's Paper Company. He had only worked all together seven or eight weeks. He had been at school before that, and he had been with me and my husband until that time. He had always wanted to run away. He had always talked about—of course, his father wanted

to control him, and he was uncontrollable. I think perhaps he wanted to go to sea; he used to read a book Newdy Newman, the Boy that Went to Sea, and used to read that book continually over and over, and I think perhaps he wanted to do something like that. Perhaps the book encouraged him in some way.

"Once he started to go away with a boy by the name of Charles McSwain, who worked down on the ranch for us. He only got a couple of miles and then came back. We didn't know anything about it at the time, but Ralph told me afterwards.

"Once he ran away and stayed overnight because he swore at his father, and his father whipped him with a buggy whip, and he stayed away that night and came back the next morning; that was out on the ranch. He didn't go to any one's house. He just went down to what we call the irrigation ditch, and he came to the kitchen door and knocked and asked where father was, and I told him I had fixed it up with his father; that his father wouldn't punish him, and he should come in; and his father didn't punish him.

"He had called his father a very severe name, and his father had whipped him with a buggy whip, and I took the buggy Whip away from his father. This was about a year or nine months before Ralph disappeared. After that Ralph did not want to go to the military school; didn't want to go to any school, and his father was determined; and of course I tried to take Ralph's part. I shouldn't have done it, but I did.

"Just before Ralph disappeared the last time, his father told him he was going to Kansas City, and go in business, and if he wouldn't go to school he would put him in the factory— he expected to go in the stove business, something of that kind—and he would put him through right from the floor on up, and he would have to do that or do something; that he had his mind made up. And he told me he wouldn't work for his father or his uncle; they both made him nervous, and he was going to run away, and I asked him, I said, `Would you leave me?' and he said, `No, I wouldn't.' I didn't believe he would.

"There had not been any trouble with his father for about a week before he disappeared: He didn't want his father to control him. He thought he was a man. He was a large boy for his age, and was very bright. He had never done anything bad, but was just wild. He thought he knew as much as his father did, like all American boys. I have never heard anything from him since he disappeared. The earth seemed to open up and swallow him. I have never received any letters, and not to my knowledge has any other member of the family heard from him."

As heretofore stated, the parties herein waived a jury, and submitted the questions of fact involved to the court. No complaint is made against the declarations of law given by the court, and, if there is evidence in the record sufficient to warrant the finding on the questions of fact, that finding, like the verdict of a jury, will not be disturbed.

The lower court necessarily found...