Vance v. Vance

• Citation: 216 Miss. 816,63 So.2d 214
• Decision Date: 09 March 1953
• Docket Number: No. 38698,38698
• Parties: VANCE v. VANCE.
• Court: United States State Supreme Court of Mississippi

Page 214

63 So.2d 214

216 Miss. 816

VANCE v. VANCE.

No. 38698.

Supreme Court of Mississippi.

March 9, 1953.

Gover C. Doggette, Laurel, for appellant.

A. S. Scott, Laurel, for appellee.

KYLE, Justice.

The appellant, Edward Vance, as complainant, filed his bill of complaint in the chancery court of Jones County against the appellee, Talma Vance, as defendant, asking for the cancellation of the appellee's claim of title to a 15-acre tract of land described as the South Half of the Northwest Quarter of the Southwest Quarter of Section 20, Township 9 North, Range 11 West, less give acres in the southwest corner thereof, and two other small parcels of land lying immediately north of the above mentioned 15-acre tract. The appellant also asked for a mandatory injunction requiring the appellee to remove fences erected by the appellee along the southern boundary lines of the last mentioned parcels of land, and for other relief. The appellant in his bill deraigned his title to the 15-acre tract of land, and alleged that he had acquired title to the other two parcels of land by adverse possession for a period of more than ten years.

The appellee in his answer did not controvert the appellant's title to the 15-acre tract, but the appellee in his answer denied that the appellant was the owner of or had acquired title to the two small parcels of land lying immediately north of the 15-acre tract.

The record shows that the appellant and the appellee are brothers. Their father, J. W. Vance, was at one time the owner of all of the 40-acre tract of land described as the Northwest Quarter of the Southwest Quarter of the above mentioned Section 20, except five acres in the southwest corner and one acre in the northwest corner of the 40-acre tract. J. W. Vance, on January 18, 1924, conveyed to the appellant the South Half of the 40-acre tract, less the five acres in the southwest corner which was owned by other parties, and on January 24, 1924, J. W. Vance conveyed to the appellee the North Half of the 40-acre tract, less the one acre in the northwest corner which was owned by other parties. A short time after the execution and delivery of the above mentioned deeds the appellant conveyed his 15-acre tract of land to his mother, but on April 3, 1928, his mother and father reconveyed the 15-acre tract to the appellant, and on April 25, 1938, after the death of his wife, J. W. Vance, executed another deed of conveyance of the 15-acre tract to the appellant. In each of these deeds the land was described as the South Half of the Northwest Quarter of the Southwest Quarter of said Section 20, less five acres in the southwest corner.

Prior to the conveyance of the two parcels of land to the appellant and the appellee in 1924 J. W. Vance had built a terrace acoss a part of the 40-acre tract. The terrace pursued a zigzag course beginning at a point about 400 feet west of the east boundary line of the 40-acre tract and running thence in a northwesterly and westerly direction approximately 500 feet, thence southwardly approximately 53 feet to the south boundary line of the North Half of the 40-acre tract, and thence in a westerly and northwesterly direction to the point of intersection with the Laurel-Sharon road. The terrace divided the J. W. Vance portion of the 40-acre tract into two approximately equal parts. The appellant claimed that the terrace marked the boundary line between his land and the appellee's land. But the appellee denied that he had ever agreed to recognize the terrace as a boundary line between the two parcels of land. The terrace marked the north boundary lines of the two small parcels of land to which the appellant claimed title by adverse possession.

The case was tried at the February 1952 term of the court. At the beginning of the hearing the appellant's attorney offered in evidence a surveyor's plat which the parties agreed was a true representation of the 40-acre tract, and which showed the location of the terrace and the dividing line between the North Half and the South Half of the 40-acre tract. And the appellant's attorney stated that the part of the land lying north of the South Half of the 40-acre tract and designated on the plat as parcels 1, 2 and 3 was the land in controversy. The appellant's attorney also requested that the record show that 'It is further admitted by the defendant that he is not claiming any land lying within the South Half of the Northwest Quarter of the Southwest Quarter of Section 20 Township 9...