Missouri Pac. Ry. Co. v. Maffit

• Decision Date: 16 January 1888
• Citation: 6 S.W. 600,94 Mo. 56
• Parties: The Missouri Pacific Railway Company v. Maffitt, Plaintiff in Error
• Court: Missouri Supreme Court

6 S.W. 600

94 Mo. 56

The Missouri Pacific Railway Company v. Maffitt, Plaintiff in Error

Supreme Court of Missouri

January 16, 1888

Error to Johnson Circuit Court. -- Hon. N. M. Givan Judge.

Affirmed.

Cockrell & Suddath for plaintiff in error.

(1) Error was committed in admitting in evidence the deeds to Baker, and from the latter to plaintiff, because they did not describe or undertake to convey the lands in controversy. (2) The court erred in not finding defendant to have been in adverse possession ten years. (3) The equitable defence should have been sustained. (a) It set up such a mistake of law as a court of equity will relieve from, it being a mistake as to the operation and legal effect of an instrument. 1 Story's Eq. Jur., sec. 124, et seq.; Harvey v. Charles, 45 Mo. 157; Hunt v Rousmaniere, 8 Wheat. 174; 1 Peters, 1; Bank v Daniel, 12 Peters, 55; Broadwell v. Broadwell, 6 Ill. 599; Evarts v. Strode, 11 Ohio 480; Summers v. Coleman, 80 Mo. 488. (b) A voluntary grantor is entitled to reform a deed if he can show a mistake in the legal effect or estate supposed to be conveyed by it. Mitchell v. Mitchell, 40 Ga. 11; Day v. Day, 84 N.C 408.

T. J. Portis for defendant in error.

Ray, J. Sherwood, J., absent.

OPINION

Ray, J.

This is an action of ejectment, the petition being in the usual form. In 1869, Samuel Graham and wife and Elhanan Roop and wife executed and acknowledged, and filed for record with the recorder of deeds for Johnson county, Missouri, a plat of the town of Centreview, in which occurred the language following, to-wit: "The land being one hundred feet wide on the south side and one hundred and fifty feet on the north side of the railroad tract (or track) being hereby given and donated to the railroad." The answer and reply show, and it was also admitted and stipulated at the trial, that the small parcel in controversy and described in the petition is included in the above-mentioned strip so given and donated to the railroad company. The plat aforesaid or copy thereof, and a deed from the said railroad company, to-wit, the Pacific Railroad of Missouri, by Seymour D. Thompson, Master in Chancery, to James Baker, and a deed from said Baker to plaintiffs, constituted the chain of title offered and read in evidence by plaintiff.

The defendant, Maffitt, at date of suit, was in possession under a lease from said Elhanan Roop, one of the said makers of said town plat and former owner of this portion of said tract. His answer is (1) a general denial of the petition, except as to the allegations of possession of the premises by defendant and the incorporation of plaintiff, which are admitted; (2) a plea of the statute of limitations of ten years, and (3) an equitable defence, in substance, that, at the time said Roop and Graham were preparing said plat, one Powell, land commissioner and assistant engineer of the railroad company, informed him that it was probable the company would wish in a short time to locate engine-houses and necessary side tracks therefor at said places, and requested said Roop to reserve land suitably situated for that purpose, and that said Roop being willing to give the land for that purpose, and desiring to express such intention, inserted the language we have quoted in said plat, believing that it would still be necessary to execute a formal deed before any title would vest in the railroad company, and that said language was used through ignorance and mistake, under said belief that it amounted to no more than a declaration of said intention. The answer further charges that the plaintiff acquired all the pretended rights of the said railroad company with full knowledge and notice of the foregoing facts, and asks that the language so employed in said map and plat be so reformed as to express the intention of the parties executing the same.

The reply admitted the said execution, acknowledgment, and filing for record, etc., of the said plat, and that the language set out heretofore was employed therein, but denied all other allegations set up by the answer. Upon trial of the cause, which was had before the court without a jury, no declarations of law were asked on plaintiff's behalf, whilst three were asked by the defendant, of which the first was refused and the other two were given, and which said declarations of law are as follows, to-wit:

"1. The court declares the law to be that the conveyances offered in evidence by plaintiff to show title in itself, do not vest in it any legal title to the premises in controversy."

"2. The court declares the law to be that, unless the plaintiff, its predecessor, grantor, or other person under whom it claims, has been in possession of the premises in controversy within ten years next preceding the institution of this action, the finding must be for the defendant."

"3. If the evidence shows...