Rank v. Hanna

• Decision Date: 13 December 1854
• Citation: 6 Ind. 17
• Parties: Rank v. Hanna and Another
• Court: Indiana Supreme Court

6 Ind. 17

Rank v. Hanna and Another

Supreme Court of Indiana

December 13, 1854

From the Tippecanoe Court of Common Pleas.

The judgment is reversed with costs. Cause remanded.

D Newell and E. A. Greenlee, for appellant.

R. C Gregory, R. Jones and S.W. Telford, for appellees.

OPINION

Hovey J.

On the 8th day of March, 1853, Elizabeth Rank brought an action, in the Court of Common Pleas of Tippecanoe county, for dower. Hanna and Reynolds, the defendants, answered, admitting that William E. Rank, the husband of the petitioner, was seized of one undivided eighth part of the tract of land described in the petition, and averring that they were seized in fee simple of six-eighths, and one Clark Williams of the remaining eighth part of said land. That William E. Rank, on the 19th day of September, 1844, conveyed his part in said land to one Lyman Beeman, and that Beeman, Williams, and the defendants agreed that the whole tract should be platted as an addition to the town of Lafayette, and that the respective owners should hold their shares in the lots in severalty; and that to carry this agreement into effect, Williams and Beeman, with their wives, on the third day of November, 1844 conveyed their interest to the defendants, who platted the same, and recorded their plat embracing the tract, as Hanna and Reynold's addition to Lafayette. That on the next day, the defendants conveyed to Beeman seven and one-half of the lots in the addition, being one-eighth of the whole number in value. That William E. Rank died long after all these transactions, and that no part of the lots conveyed by Beeman are embraced in the complaint.

To this answer the plaintiff demurred, alleging as a cause that the answer does not contain sufficient facts to bar the plaintiff of her action, &c. Joinder in demurrer, demurrer overruled, and judgment in favor of the defendants.

The defendants insist that Beeman, by the conveyance from the plaintiff's husband, became vested with his title, and during his life could exercise all the control and power over that title that the husband could, had it remained in him. And that had this title remained in the husband, he could have made partition with his co-tenants, and the dower right of the plaintiff would have attached only to the part set off to the husband in severalty.

We will not stop to inquire what the husband might have done had he lived, nor what the consequences might...