Phelps v. Edwards
| Decision Date | 09 January 1880 |
| Citation | 52 Tex. 371 |
| Parties | W. W. PHELPS v. JAMES D. EDWARDS. |
| Court | Texas Supreme Court |
APPEAL from Brazoria. Tried below before the Hon. William H. Burkhart.
Suit was brought March 30, 1878, by James D. Edwards against A. Ward and E. C. Dewey for a balance of $2,257, with eight per cent. interest per annum from August 10, 1877, due for certain machinery, known as a steam train, sold by plaintiff Edwards to Ward & Dewey on June 27, 1877, and placed in the sugar-house on the Lake Jackson plantation, in Brazoria county, Texas, operated by Ward & Dewey.
Plaintiff alleged that he had done what was requisite under the law to fix his mechanic's lien on the sugar-house and machinery therein on the Lake Jackson plantation and fifty acres of the adjacent land; that James A. Baker, W. B. Botts, Ira H. Evans, Galusha A. Grow, and William Walter Phelps claimed some interest in the Lake Jackson plantation, and made them defendants. Plaintiff prayed for judgment against Ward & Dewey for his debt and interest, and for foreclosure of the mechanic's lien claimed in the petition, and an order for sale of the property on which the lien was claimed.
Baker, Botts, Evans, and Grow filed answers disclaiming any interest in the suit or plantation. Ward & Dewey made default.
The defendant, William Walter Phelps, filed a general demurrer to plaintiff's petition, and answered, denying all allegations in the plaintiff's petition, except as specially admitted in the answer.
He alleged that on the 29th of December, 1873, he owned the Lake Jackson plantation, and on that day sold it to defendants, Ward & Dewey; that they still owed him on the purchase-money four notes for $7,000 each, less a credit on one of the notes of $4,207.22, each note bearing eight per cent. interest per annum from May 10, 1877, up to which time the interest had been paid; that the notes were secured by deed of trust, executed by Ward & Dewey, on the plantation and improvements thereon, on December 29, 1873, which deed of trust was placed on record in the record of deeds and mortgages for Brazoria county long before the 27th of June, 1877, and that plaintiff had notice thereof when he sold the machinery to Ward & Dewey.
Defendant Phelps further alleged that if the plaintiff had ever sold and furnished to Ward & Dewey the machinery as alleged by plaintiff, the same was now a fixture on the Lake Jackson plantation; that the machinery was sold, if at all, by plaintiff to Ward & Dewey, and placed and erected by them on the Lake Jackson plantation, as fixtures, without the consent or knowledge of defendant.
The defendant Phelps prayed that in the event that the machinery, sugar-house, and fifty acres of land should be decreed to be sold to pay plaintiff's claim, that the sale be directed to be made subject to Phelps' deed of trust for the purchase-money.
On the trial in the court below, a jury was waived, and the court, after hearing the pleadings and evidence, dismissed the defendants who had disclaimed, and rendered judgment for plaintiff against Ward & Dewey for the amount of his debt and interest against all the defendants, and foreclosed the lien claimed by plaintiff on the steam train, and directed the same to...
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Morrison v. State Trust Co.
...equities were all with the mechanic's lienor as to the improvements, although there was a prior vendor's lien upon the land. In Phelps v. Edwards, 52 Tex. 371, Judge Bonner "To hold, in such a case as this [that] the lien of one who furnishes machinery to another necessary to make available......