Tram Lumber Co. v. Hancock

• Decision Date: 20 March 1888
• Citation: Tram Lumber Co. v. Hancock, 7 S.W. 724, 70 Tex. 312 (Tex. 1888)
• Parties: TRAM LUMBER CO. <I>et al.</I> v. HANCOCK <I>et al.</I>
• Court: Texas Supreme Court

7 S.W. 724

TRAM LUMBER CO. et al. v. HANCOCK et al.

Supreme Court of Texas.

March 20, 1888.

Commissioners' decision. Appeal from district court, Jasper county; W. H. FORD, Judge.

Trespass to try title to land, brought by Electra C. Hancock and husband, W. J. Hancock, H. H. Allen, Jr., Emmet B. Allen, and Myrtle Hancock and husband, James W. Hancock, against the Tram Lumber Company, James Masterson, and A. M. Vaughn. Judgment for plaintiffs, and defendants appeal.

T. W. Ford, for appellants. W. W. Blake, for appellees.

ACKER, J.

Appellant the Tram Lumber Company claimed the land in controversy under a deed from the collector of taxes, purporting to have been executed in pursuance of a sale of the land made for non-payment of taxes assessed against it. This deed, when offered in evidence, was excluded on objection of appellees, and this is assigned as error. The land attempted to be conveyed thereby is described as 3,788 acres of the Martin Flores league. As has been repeatedly decided by this court, such a deed is void for uncertainty and insufficiency of description of the land. The court did not err in excluding it.

One of the defenses interposed by appellants, James Masterson and Henry Fox, was that they purchased the land in good faith, paying a valuable consideration therefore, without notice of the title, or claim of appellees. Both parties deraign title under A. C. Allen, — Masterson and Fox through a deed from the heirs of A. C. Allen to the heirs of David Files, dated March 5, 1878, and filed for record in Jasper county on the 18th day of May, 1878; appellees through conveyance from A. C. Allen to their immediate ancestor, Harvey H. Allen, dated March 18, 1840, but never filed for record in Jasper county, where the land is situated, until the 23d day of May, 1882. The heirs of David Files conveyed the land to Masterson and Fox by special warranty deeds. The deed from the heirs of A. C. Allen to the heirs of David Files contains these recitations: "Whereas, we, Charlotte M. Allen, Eliza Converse, (sole surviving child of said Allen,) and James Converse, husband of said Eliza, are fully satisfied and convinced that one David Files had a good and valid deed to the land hereinafter described from and through the late A. C. Allen, and that the said original deed to said Files has been lost, and that the record thereof in the county of Jasper was burned." The recited consideration is "For and in consideration of preventing a suit, and the payment of ten dollars by the heirs of David Files, we bargain, sell, remise, release, and quitclaim all our right, title, interest, estate, claim, and demand in and to" the land in controversy. There was evidence given tending to sustain the defense of innocent...