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Carter v. Elk Coal Co.

191 S.W. 294, 173 Ky. 378, 1917 Ky. LEXIS 486
CourtCourt of Appeals of Kentucky
DecidedJanuary 23, 1917
StatusPublished
Cited by16 cases

This text of 191 S.W. 294 (Carter v. Elk Coal Co.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Kentucky primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Carter v. Elk Coal Co., 191 S.W. 294, 173 Ky. 378, 1917 Ky. LEXIS 486 (Ky. Ct. App. 1917).

Opinion

Opinion of the Court by

Judge Carroll

Affirming.

This suit was brought by the appellants to recover from the appellees $6,600, the value of the coal alleged to have been wrongfully taken by the appellees from land claimed by the appellants. The title of the appellants to the land from which the coal was taken was put in issue by the appellees, who themselves set up ownership of the land, and on a trial before a jury, after the evidence for the appellants was all in, the trial judge directed a verdict for the appellees.

The appellants claim the land under a patent issued to Benjamin Goodin in 1853. The Goodin patent purports to contain one hundred acres, and the survey shows that the boundaries are marked by seven lines, but it is agreed by both parties that the only line in dispute is the fifth line beginning “at a sugar tree at the head of Dean’s branch; thence S. 85 E. 350 poles [380]*380down the spur between. Goodin’s and Dean’s branch to a sourwood.” On the correct location of this line depend the rights of the parties. If this line should be run as claimed by the appellants, the record before us shows that the land from which the coal in question was taken lies within the boundary of the Goodin patent, but if this fifth line should be located according to- the contention of appellees, which was upheld by the trial court, the land 'from which the coal in question was taken lies outside, of the Goodin patent as .shown by the evidence in this record.

There is no dispute between the parties that the sugar tree and the sourwood are well established comers in the Goodin patent. The controversy between them grows out of the fact that the appellants insist that the line between the sugar tree and the sourwood should follow with its meanders the top or crest of the spur that extends from the sugar tree to the sourwood, and that lies between Goodin’s branch and Dean’s branch, running in a southeasterly direction from the sugar tree to the sourwood; while the appellees contend that a straight line should be ran from the sugar tree to the sourwood. The accompanying map shows the location of the objects named and the spur, together with the straight line between the sugar tree and sourwood, and illustrates the difference that would result in running the line between these two points with the spur and on a straight line.

Before, however, taking up the discussion of this question, which is the real, and we might say the only, material question, in .the case, we may stop to notice the other contention raised by counsel for appellants that a line running with the top or crest of the spur and following its meanders between the sugar tree and sour-wood should be treated as the fifth line in the Goodin patent, because the appellants and those under whom they hold, claim to the top of the spur with its meanders between these points and have been in the adverse possession of the land in controversy which lies between the straight line and the top of the spur for such a length of time as to invest them with title, although it should be held that the fifth line of this survey should be ran as a straight line from the sugar tree to the sour-wood. But an examination of the evidence satisfies us that this claim of adverse possession of the land that [382]*382• lies between this straight line and the top of the spnr, if the straight line be the correct line, is not based on facts sufficient to satisfy the requirements of the law' in reference to holding land by adverse possession.

[381]

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Bluebook (online)
191 S.W. 294, 173 Ky. 378, 1917 Ky. LEXIS 486, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/carter-v-elk-coal-co-kyctapp-1917.