Walbridge v. Day

• Decision Date: 30 April 1863
• Parties: ALONZO WALBRIDGEv.FREDERICK S. DAY, AND ISAAC C. DAY.
• Court: Illinois Supreme Court

31 Ill. 379

1863 WL 3120 (Ill.)

83 Am.Dec. 227

ALONZO WALBRIDGE

v.FREDERICK S. DAY, AND ISAAC C. DAY.

Supreme Court of Illinois.

April Term, 1863.

OPINION TEXT STARTS HERE

WRIT OF ERROR to the Circuit Court of the county of La Salle; the Hon. MADISON E. HOLLISTER, Judge, presiding.

In the year 1834, Edward Keys was the owner in fee simple of lot number eight, in block number fifteen, in the town of Peru, in La Salle county. Soon after, Keys died intestate, seized of the premises, leaving a widow and children. In 1837, George W. Howe became administrator of the estate, and in that capacity, on the 1st of September, 1837, he received from one Spaulding a mortgage upon these same premises, to secure the sum of $530. What title or claim Spaulding had to the lot, does not appear. Subsequently, Howe, the administrator of Keys, instituted proceedings by scire facias, to foreclose the mortgage, and in February, 1840, obtained a judgment of foreclosure, and execution was issued, by virtue of which the premises were sold on the 16th day of May following, to Jesse Williams, for the sum of $300. Williams assigned his certificate of purchase to Crosier, to whom the sheriff made a deed, on the 17th of May, 1842. Crosier afterwards conveyed the lot to Frederick S. Day and Isaac C. Day, the defendants in error; they conveyed to William F. Day, on the 2nd of November, 1846, this lot and another, for $1,500. On the 22nd of July, 1851, William F. Day re-conveyed the lot in question to the defendants in error, for the consideration of $600, by deed with special warranty. In November, 1851, Willis instituted an action of ejectment in the Circuit Court of La Salle county, against the Days, and recovered the premises.

Willis, the plaintiff in the action of ejectment, derived his title in the following manner: Keys, being the owner of the lot, died intestate, leaving his widow and several children; afterwards one of the children died. In 1840, Howe, the administrator of Keys, died, and Walbridge, the plaintiff in error, who had married the widow of Keys, became administrator de bonis non of the estate, and after that, purchased from the surviving children and heirs at law of Keys, their interest in the lot; and thus all the title which the heirs of Keys held in the premises, became vested in Walbridge and his wife. On the 4th of May, 1850, Walbridge and wife conveyed to Willis, for the sum of $100. Under the title thus derived, Willis succeeded in the ejectment suit against the Days, who held under the sale on foreclosure of the mortgage, as already mentioned.

It appears, that at the May term, 1837, of the Circuit Court of La Salle county, Howe, as administrator of Keys, obtained an order for the sale of this lot to pay the debts of the estate, but there was nothing to show that a sale had ever been made under that order.

After Willis recovered the premises from the Days, to wit, on the 9th of July, 1852, he and his wife conveyed the premises to the Chicago and Rock Island Railroad Company, for the consideration of $1,600. And in the December following, the defendants in error, Frederick S. and Isaac C. Day, and their wives, conveyed the same premises, by quit-claim deed, to the railroad company, for the consideration expressed in the deed, of $100.

It seems, that prior to the institution of the action of ejectment, before mentioned, by Willis against the Days, the latter had compromised the question of title between them by paying to Willis the sum of eight hundred dollars; and by the sale subsequently made to the railroad company, the Days received one-half the purchase money for their interest in the lot.

Upon this state of facts, Frederick S. and Isaac C. Day, in September, 1855, exhibited their bill in chancery in the court below, against Walbridge, alleging that when he purchased from the heirs of Keys, and when he afterwards conveyed to Willis, he knew of the complainant's claim of title to the premises, and of the just and equitable grounds of the same, and that it was unjust and unconscionable on the part of Walbridge to convey the lot to Willis, and thereby defeat the rights of the complainants.

It was further claimed in the bill, that inasmuch as the estate of Keys had received a full consideration for the lot upon the sale to Williams on the foreclosure of the mortgage mentioned, the entire title to the premises should have passed by that sale; and that the purchase by Walbridge from the heirs of Keys, and his sale to Willis, was a gross fraud upon the complainants. They therefore prayed, that Walbridge might be compelled to reimburse them in their losses by reason of their title being thus defeated, at least to the extent of the purchase...