Wallace v. Ashland Oil & Transp. Co.

• Decision Date: 21 June 1957
• Citation: 305 S.W.2d 541
• Parties: Lena WALLACE et al., Appellants, v. ASHLAND OIL & TRANSPORTATION COMPANY, Inc., et al., Appellees.
• Court: Supreme Court of Kentucky

Page 541

305 S.W.2d 541

Lena WALLACE et al., Appellants, v. ASHLAND OIL & TRANSPORTATION COMPANY, Inc., et al Appellees.

Court of Appeals of Kentucky.

June 21, 1957.

As Modified on Denial of Rehearing Oct. 25, 1957.

Shumate & Shumate, John W. Walker, Irvine, Louis Cox Frankfort, for appellants.

McDonald & McDonald, Alvin B. Trigg, John Palumbo, Elwood Rosenbaum, Charles Landrum, Jr., Elmer Drake, Lexington, and E. B. Rose, Beattyville, for appellees.

SIMS, Judge.

This is an appeal from the judgment of the Fayette Circuit Court holding that the successors in title of William Townsend are the owners of the oil and gas in 204 acres of land located in Powell County described in the judgment, and that the successors in title of J. B. White have no title or interest in the oil and gas therein. The successors in title of Townsend have conflicting claims in the oil and gas in this land, which claims were not adjudicated and were reserved for further hearings by the trial court.

This record is quite voluminous as to pleadings, exhibits and proof, and there were seven briefs filed on behalf of the claimants. It is patent we cannot discuss in detail the pleadings, the evidence and the many points raised in briefs but must content ourselves with only briefly giving our conclusions, otherwise this opinion would be extended beyond reasonable length.

In 1937, the Federal Government condemned the surfact of certain lands, including the 204 acres in controversy here, for the purpose of a national forest, but did not acquire the oil and gas rights which remained in the former owners of the fee. The Ashland Oil & Transportation Company is holding about $18,000 representing oil it has purchased from this lease. it makes no claim to the money but is merely a stakeholder and brought this action against all claimants to the fund for the court's determination as to whom it should pay the proceeds of the oil it purchased.

The successors in title to White filed their pleadings and set up title to the oil and gas in this 204 acre tract, as did the successors in title to Townsend. E. H. Fuller, who claims under Townsend, in his answer to the cross-petition of Lena Wallace, a claimant under White, pleaded that a judgment entered in the Powell Circuit Court in 1918 in certain consolidated actions of White v. Townsend involved the title to this same 204 acres and it was there held that Townsend and not White had title thereto, and that the 1918 judgment was res judicata in the present action. It is practically admitted in briefs that the question now for determination is whether or not this 1918 judgment determined the controversy to the same land which contains the oil and gas rights presently in dispute between the privies to the parties to that action.

The 1918 judgment determined White was the owner of certain lands east of a line running N. 9 W., known as the old Samuel Young line, which was established in 1784 in a patent covering 30,000 acres issued to Young by the Commonwealth of Virginia, and that Townsend was the owner of certain lands to the west of that line. The pleadings and proof, as well as the judgment in the consolidated actions of White v. Townsend, are filed as exhibits in the present action. An examination of the pleadings, the proof and the judgment shows the controversy in 1918 was over the same 204 acres of land now in dispute. The answer of Townsend in that action relative to a description of his land avers:

'That the eastern boundary of same which is the boundary line between the plaintiff's land and the defendant's is a very old, well marked and defined line, known as the Samuel Young N 9 W. Line, and extends from a large pine on a branch known as Tight Hollow a water of the Graining Block Fork and runs thence North 9 West crossing White's Branch near its forks, and that said line is well established and well known, and has been so established and known for a period of one hundred years and that said line cuts off the tract described in plaintiff's petition about two hundred acres lying on the Western side of same, to which portion so cur off the plaintiff has no title whatever nor has he ever had any peaceable possession of same, nor did those under whom he claims ever have any title or any possession to said boundary on the Western side of said Samuel Young line, or did they ever at any time pretend or claim to own same.'

This pleading designates the Samuel Young line with particularity and describes how and where it runs on the ground.

The pertinent part of the judgment in the consolidated actions, from which no appeal was prosecuted, reads:

'These causes having been consolidated and submitted and the Court being advised considers that the plaintiff, J. B. White, has no title to the land claimed by the defendants lying West of the Samuel Young N 9 W line, on the waters of White's Branch in Powell County, Kentucky.

'And it is further considered by the Court that the defendants, Townsend and others, have not trespassed on the plaintiff's lands...