Jeems Bayou Hunting & Fishing Club v. United States

• Decision Date: 10 June 1921
• Docket Number: 3522.
• Citation: 274 F. 18
• Parties: JEEMS BAYOU HUNTING & FISHING CLUB et al. v. UNITED STATES.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Fifth Circuit

274 F. 18

JEEMS BAYOU HUNTING & FISHING CLUB et al. v. UNITED STATES.

No. 3522.

United States Court of Appeals, Fifth Circuit.

June 10, 1921

N.C Blanchard, of Shreveport, La. (Hampden Story, H. C. Walker Jr., and Elias Goldstein, all of Shreveport, La., on the brief), for appellants and cross-appellees.

Robert A. Hunter, Sp. Asst. Atty. Gen., of Shreveport, La., for the United States.

Before WALKER, BRYAN, and KING, Circuit Judges.

WALKER Circuit Judge.

By the bill in equity in this case the United States, claiming to be the owner of land now known and described as lots 8, 9, and 10, in township 20 north, of range 16 west, situated in the parish of Caddo, La., containing 85.22 acres, as shown by a plat of survey approved March 28, 1917, by the Commissioner of the General Land Office, sought relief which included the following: An adjudication that the above-described land is the property of the plaintiff, free and clear of all claims of the defendants to the suit, and that the possession of said land be restored to the plaintiff; that the defendants be enjoined from setting up any claim to said land, or to any oil, gas, or other minerals on or under the same; an accounting by the defendants for oil and gas removed or extracted from said land, and for all moneys derived from the sale or disposition of the same, and for all rents royalties, and proceeds arising from the sale or lease of the same; and for the recovery from the defendants of all such sums so received by them. The defendants were three corporations, namely, the Jeems Bayou Fishing & Hunting Club the Producers' Oil Company, and the Texas Company.

The bill contained averments to the effect that the Producers' Oil Company, acting under a pretended lease made to it by the Jeems Bayou Fishing & Hunting Club, wrongfully entered upon said land and took therefrom a large quantity of oil and gas, which it sold to the Texas Company, and that it paid as a royalty part of the value of such oil and gas to the Jeems Bayou Fishing & Hunting Club. The plaintiff's assertion of right to the relief sought was resisted on the ground that title to said land was acquired by Stephen D. Pitts by a patent issued to him on October 1, 1860, for the 'southwest fractional quarter of section 10, in township 20, of range 16 west, in the district of lands subject to sale at Natchitoches, La., containing 23 acres, according to the official plat of the survey of the said lands, returned to the General Land Office by the Surveyor General,' and that that title thereafter was duly acquired by the Jeems Bayou Fishing & Hunting Club, which leased said land to the Producers' Oil Company.

By the court's decree the first above-mentioned land was adjudged to be the property of the plaintiff; the Producers' Oil Company and the Texas Company were adjudged in solido to pay to the plaintiff the ascertained value of oil taken from said land, less the ascertained cost of producing it, and less the amount paid as royalty to the Jeems Bayou Fishing & Hunting Club; the three defendants were adjudged in solido to pay the ascertained amount paid as royalty to the Jeems Bayou Fishing & Hunting Club; and interest from the date of the Master's report, which was confirmed, was allowed on the amounts adjudged to be paid to the plaintiff. The defendants appealed from the decree, and complain of it so far as it was adverse to them. The plaintiff sued out a cross-appeal, and complains of the part of the decree which credited the defendants, or any of them, with the amount of the cost of producing oil from the land. The respective parties are referred to herein as plaintiff and defendants.

The official plat of survey which was referred to in the above-mentioned patent issued to Stephen D. Pitts was one of the township mentioned made in 1839 by A. W. Warren, deputy surveyor, which was filed in the General Land Office after being approved in writing on August 31, 1839, by H. T. Williams, Surveyor General. A large part of the space included within the exterior lines of said township 20 is covered by a body of water which was designated on the Warren plat as 'Ferry Lake.' According to that plat the only land in the southwest part of section 10 of that township is a narrow peninsula, bounded on most of its eastern side and on all of its southeastern, southern, southwestern, and western sides by Ferry Lake; the plat also showing that the shore line of the land in the township north of the southwest fractional quarter of section 10 is an irregular one, running generally a little west of north from the point at which the east and west line running through the center of section 10 ends at at the lake shore a short distance west of the center of that section. That plat does not indicate even approximately the actual location of Ferry Lake with reference to the land included within the traverse line, being the broken line of different courses and distances, shown by Warren's survey to have been run by him around the land designated on his survey and plat as the southwest fractional quarter of section 10.

Evidence adduced proved that there is a compact body of high land, comprising 528.99 acres, lying between the actual shore line of Ferry Lake and the line which Warren's plat indicates is the shore line of lands in sections 10 and 3; that omitted land being south, southwest, and west of Warren's traverse line extending northwardly from its southernmost point in fractional southwest quarter of section 10 to the northern boundary of the township. Southeast, south, and southwest of the land included within the traverse line run by Warren around the tract in the southwest fractional quarter of section 10 surveyed by him is a considerable body of high land, part of which by a proper survey would have been included in that fractional subdivision, and the remainder of which lies south of the line between sections 10 and 15, which line, in consequence of Warren's error as to the location of the margin of Ferry Lake, was not run by him at all. The average distance in a westerly direction of Ferry Lake, or James or Jeems Bayou, as that part of the body of water in the township is now called, from Warren's traverse line along the western side of the above-mentioned peninsular-shaped tract surveyed by him is considerably more than 2,500 feet; the distance from a number of points on that line being over 3,000 feet.

Portions of the above-mentioned lands, which were omitted from the survey made by Warren, were surveyed prior to 1913 under orders of the Commissioner of the General Land Office. In September, 1913, that official directed Arthur D. Kidder, supervisor of surveys, to make a resurvey of the township for the purpose of determining whether Ferry Lake was a navigable body of water in 1812, when Louisiana was admitted as a state, and whether Warren's survey correctly meandered the lake as it existed at the time of Louisiana's admission. That resurvey was completed in May, 1914, and the result was shown by hydrographic and topographic plats and by a resurvey map, accompanied by field notes, all of which were approved by the Commissioner of the General Land Office. The resurvey plat mentioned showed land, including that involved in this suit, lying between Warren's traverse lines and the mean high-water mark of Ferry Lake as it existed in 1812 and 1839. On December 1, 1916, the Commissioner of the General Land Office ordered Mr. Kidder to survey the uplands which the above-mentioned resurvey disclosed as existing between Warren's traverse lines and the mean high-water line of the lake. The survey was made as ordered, and is represented by an official plat approved by the Commissioner of the General Land Office on March 28, 1917.

The last-mentioned survey included the lands involved in this suit; the three ...