Mowry v. Latham

• Decision Date: 01 August 1891
• Citation: 17 R.I. 480,23 A. 13
• Parties: MOWRY v. LATHAM.
• Court: Rhode Island Supreme Court

23 A. 13

17 R.I. 480

MOWRY

v. LATHAM.

Supreme Court Of Rhode Island.

Aug. 1, 1891.

Appeal from probate court.

Marquis D. L. Mo wry, pro se.

Stephen A. Cooke, Jr., and Louis L. Angell, for appellee.

MATTESON, C. J. This is an appeal from a decree of the court of probate of Smithfield, by which the appellee, Daniel W. Latham, was appointed administrator on the estate of Van Buren Mowry, deceased. The grounds of appeal are—First, that the court had no jurisdiction to make the appointment, because the deceased was not a domiciled inhabitant of the town of Smithfield; and, second, that the appellee was not a person entitled to the appointment. On the part of the appellant, testimony was submitted that the domicile of the father and grandfather of the deceased, and the original domicile of the deceased, were in that part of the town of Smithfield embraced within the present town of North Smithfield; that the deceased was a bachelor, and the owner at his death of his homestead estate, being the farm which had belonged to his father in his life-time, in that town, in the house upon which he had always retained a room for his own use, and as a place of abode, when not away at work; that he was in the habit of visiting and occupying this room from time to time; that a considerable number of years prior to his death, and while unquestionably he was a domiciled resident of North Smithfield, or of that part of Smithfield now constituting that town, he had been placed under guardianship as a person non compos mentis; and that such guardianship had never been dissolved or annulled by decree of court. The appellant contends that upon these facts the deceased should have been regarded as a domiciled inhabitant of North Smithfield, and not of Smithfield. The testimony, however, on the part of the appellee shows that for nearly eight years next preceding his death the deceased had actually lived in Smithfield in the family of the appellee; that he frequently spoke of his residence with the appellee as his home; that for several years next prior to his death he had at his own request been taxed, and had paid taxes, upon his personal estate in that town; that the room reserved by him in the house upon his homestead estate was used by him, not so much as a place of abode as for the storage of the furniture which had belonged to his mother in her life-time, and other articles which he did not wish to or could not conveniently keep with him while working out by the month as a farm hand; and that for several years next preceding his death he had spent but little time at this room, visiting it only on Sundays for a few hours at a time and on a few occasions, at considerable intervals, passing a night there. The place where a person lives is presumptively his domicile, (Anderson v. Watts, 138 U. S. 694, 706, 11 Sup. Ct. Rep. 449; Mitchell v. U. S., 21 Wall. 350, 352; Desmare v. U. S., 93 U. S....