Ellington v. Ellis & Dorsett

2 La. App. 715, 1925 La. App. LEXIS 244
CourtLouisiana Court of Appeal
DecidedMay 9, 1925
DocketNo. 2228
StatusPublished
Cited by4 cases

This text of 2 La. App. 715 (Ellington v. Ellis & Dorsett) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Louisiana Court of Appeal primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Ellington v. Ellis & Dorsett, 2 La. App. 715, 1925 La. App. LEXIS 244 (La. Ct. App. 1925).

Opinion

CARVER, J.

This suit was brought id 1911 by J. T. Ellington against C. J. ElliS, E. N. Dorsett, Tensas Delta Land Company^ Limited, J. W. Kesterson and Fred. Buskin.

Its main purpose was the partition of 280 acres .of land in which the plaintiff claimed an undivided one-third interest and Buskin, Ellis and Dorsett the other two thirds, and incidentally to have decreed null as to plaintiff’s interest the, claims of Tensas Delta Land Company, Limited^ [717]*717and Kesterson who, plaintiff alleged, claimed the whole of some of the land.

The Tensas Delta Land Company, Limited, filed a general denial, and the record does not show that it ever owned or claimed any of the land. It is thus eliminated from the suit.

Subsequently plaintiff filed an amended petition alleging that the Tensas Basin Levee Board claimed some interests in the land; but the Levee Board thereafter executed a quitclaim -deed to the successors of plaintiff and his co-claimants; thus eliminating- the Levee • Board also from the suit.

Pending the suit, Kesterson, who- claimed 80 acres, executed a deed in favor of the West Virginia Timber Company, conveying it to that company. Thereupon plaintiff filed a supplemental petition making the West Virginia Timber Company a party. That . company answered, setting up its title under its purchase from Kesterson and alleging that it obtained from Kesterson subrogation to his rights of warranty against his vendors and that said vendors, Vincent and Hayne, had warranted the title, wherefore it called them -in warranty.

Hayne and the representatives of Vincent who had died, filed exceptions as follows:

1. Improper joinder of defendants.

2. Improper cumulation of demands.

3. Vagueness.

4. No cause or right of action.

These exceptions were apparently overruled, whereupon Vincent and Hayne answered denying that they had warranted Kesterson’s title or that he had subrogated the West Virginia Timber Company to his rights of warranty. They also set up their chain of title as follows;

Document 48. Tax Collector to J. M. Dresser in the year 1900 for taxes of 1899 assessed . to Levis Brothers.

Dresser to North Louisiana Land Csompany; July 10, 1903.

North Louisiana Land Company to Blair Bierson; December 16, 1906.

Blair Bierson to .Simon Goldman; October 7, 1,907.

.Simon Goldman to Wesley Halliburton; July 6,' 1909.

Wesley Halliburton to Vincent and Hayne; February 3, 1910.

They also asked that their vendor, Halliburton, an absentee, be called in warranty and cited through a curator ad hoc.

This, was ordered by the Judge. E. B. Moóre, an attorney, was' appointed curator and served. We find no answer either -by the'curator or any one else for Halliburton.

On March 2, 1917, Fred. S. Boughton filed a petition alleging that he had acquired the interest- of Ellington, Ellis and Dorsett, and asking to be made a party.

On July 6, 1920, Dan Buie filed a petition alleging that he had acquired the interests of, all. the original parties to the suit except those claiming 80 acres of the land adversely to him and his authors.

This -80 acres -in N% of NEÜ of Sec. 18 Tp. - 16 ■ N. R. 8 -E. and the adverse claimants are the West Virginia Timber Company and its warrantors.

Buie further alleged that he and his authors had been in possession of all the land for over 'thirty years, wherefore hé pleads the prescription of 10- and 20; probably meaning 30; years. ■’

Thus the contest narrows down now to one between Buie on the one side and the West -Virginia • Timber Company and its warrantors on the other.

Bui-e's-title traces to the heirs of D. C. Henderson-who died in 1869 owning all of the 280 acres, having acquired it as follows :

■January 10, 1859; E% of NW% of Section 17, with Other lands from the State.

[718]*718December 15, 1859; SE% of SW% of Section 8, with other lands from the State.

The W% of NW% of Section 17 in 1858 from the Succession of Mary Burns.

The N% of NE1/^ of Section 18 from A. W. Best and Lucinda Best his wife on December 3, 1860.

A. W. Best acquired the N% of NE% of Section 18, and other land, from the State in 1857.

The land lies in one body but Big Creek runs between the 80 acres described as N% of NE% of Section 18 and the rest of the land, though there is, according to Scott, a surveyor, a bare possibility that some small portion of this 80 acres lies east of the creek.

The creek is the boundary line between Franklin and Richland parishes, Franklin parish lying east of the creek and Richland parish west of it.

The deeds forming the West Virginia Timber Company’s chain of titles were as alleged in the answer of Vincent and Hayne, but further deeds were introduced carrying that chain further back as follows:

No. 46. Tax Collector to Patrick Mathis in 1881 under Act No.-of 1880 providing for the sale of property formerly forfeited or adjudicated to the State. The deed recited that the property had previously been forfeited to the State for unpaid taxes due by Lucinda Best, though for what years is not stated.

No. 47. Patrick Mathis, by the sheriff, to Levis Brothers in 1884.

The deed adjudicating the property to the State does not appear to have been introduced in evidence.

The plea of prescription filed by Buie was set down for trial separately and judgment .was rendered sustaining the plea and rejecting the demands “of all parties claiming any part of the real estate in controversy which are adverse to the claims of ownership as set up in the original petition”.

The demand in warranty was not passed op, but the costs were taxed against the warrantors.

The West Virginia Timber Company alone appealed but Hayne and the representatives of Vincent file a motion insisting on the exception filed by them. This motion, though, cannot be considered, as the judgment cannot be amended as between appellees.

See Louisiana Digest, volume 1, pages 579-580.

Their counsel say that the court should on its own motion dismiss the suit for lack of jurisdiction in the court a quo because the suit was brought in Franklin parish and the 80 acres now in contest is situated in Richland parish.

Code of Practice, 163, provides:

“In actions of revendication of real property * * * the defendant may be cited * * * either within the jurisdiction where the property revendicated * * * is situated, though he has b-is domicile or residence out of that jurisdiction, or in that where the defendant has his domicile, as the plaintiff chooses.”

In Williams vs. Zengel, 117 La. 610, 42 South. 153, the Supreme Court says:

“The action of slander of title is a form of the possessory action. Dalton vs. Wickliffe, supra; Cross on Pleading, No. 262. In all its forms the possessory action is an action of revendication, for it has for its object the assertion of rights to real estate. It involves real estate.”

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Bluebook (online)
2 La. App. 715, 1925 La. App. LEXIS 244, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/ellington-v-ellis-dorsett-lactapp-1925.