Kerby v. Charlestown

99 A. 835, 78 N.H. 301, 1916 N.H. LEXIS 60
CourtSupreme Court of New Hampshire
DecidedNovember 8, 1916
StatusPublished
Cited by9 cases

This text of 99 A. 835 (Kerby v. Charlestown) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of New Hampshire primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Kerby v. Charlestown, 99 A. 835, 78 N.H. 301, 1916 N.H. LEXIS 60 (N.H. 1916).

Opinion

Young, J.

Whether the plaintiffs should be permitted to file a. copy of Mrs. Paris’ will depends on where she resided at the time of her death. P. S., c. 187, s. 13. The court has found that she resided in New York; consequently the only question raised by the state’s exception is whether the evidence warrants that finding. The plaintiffs rely on the fact that Mrs. Paris went to New York in the fall of 1913 to acquire a domicile in that city and after consulting an attorney as to what she must do to effectuate her purpose, registered at the Manhattan Hotel as of New York City, hired a room by the year, changed the address on her trunk from Charlestown, N. H., to New York City, removed her securities from Manchester, N. H., to New York, made a will in which she set herself up as of New York City and from that time on claimed to be a resident of that city. This evidence sustains the court’s finding that Mrs. Paris honestly believed she was a resident of New York; but it will be necessary to consider it in connection with the other findings to-determine whether it is sufficient to sustain the finding that she was such a resident on either April 1 or May 2, 1914. A person does not acquire a new residence by merely going to another town with the intention of making it his domicile. He must not only go there with that intention but also with the intention of residing there for a more or less definite time and making it his home. Leach v. Pillsbury, 15 N. H. 137, 138; Hart v. Lindsey, 17 N. H. 235, 243; Concord v. Rumney, 45 N. H. 423, 427; Foss v. Foss, 58 N. H. 283; Bartlett v. New Boston, 77 N. H. 476. By home as that word is used in the law of domicile is intended what every one lias in mind when he thinks of home, — his principal residence, the place to which he always intends to return, or the one place he thinks of as home. Hart v. Lindsey, supra. While it is common knowledge, as the plaintiffs contend, that many persons reside in different places parts of each *304 .year, that is not this case, for in so far as actual residence is concerned the evidence shows that Mrs. Paris actually resided in•Charlestown for the last thirty or forty years of her life. In other ■words the evidence shows.that the only house, or for that matter, .room, Mrs. Paris actually occupied for more than a few weeks at a 'time during the last years of her life was in Charlestown. The •question, therefore, is not which of two places in which' she actually resided parts of the year was her home but whether it can be found that she intended when she went to New York in the fall of 1913 to reside in that city and make it her home. Consequently the evidence as to what she said and did while she was in New York in the ■fall of 1913 must be considered in connection with the evidence as to how and where she in fact resided both before and after that visit ;to New York. The question, therefore, of whether it can be found that Mrs. Paris was a resident of New York in 1914 resolves itself into one of whether it can be found that when she went to New York in 1913 she intended actually to reside there and make that city her home within the meaning of home as that term is used in the law of domicile.

The fact she hired a habitable room at the Manhattan Hotel would have some tendency to sustain the court’s conclusion if it were not for the further finding that she never intended to occupy it; for the right to occupy this room carried with it all the rights incident to living in a first class hotel, — that is rights in the parlors, ■toilet rooms, dining rooms and elevators and to the services of the -employees of the hotel. The inference favorable to the plaintiffs that might be drawn from the finding that the room fylrs. Paris .hired was in every way habitable is, however, negatived by the .findings that she never occupied this room, never even saw it, that it was not such a room as she ever had occupied or ever intended to occupy, that it was located in a part of the hotel usually occupied by men, and that “she knew that she could always have other and more elaborately furnished and more conveniently located rooms for herself and companion when stopping in the Manhattan Hotel.” ‘These findings not only negative any inference favorable to the plaintiffs that can be drawn from the fact Mrs. Paris hired a habitable room, but also their contention that she hired this room in •order to be sure of a place in which to stay if she returned to the -city when all the rooms in the hotel were occupied. The only infer-ence that can fairly be drawn from the finding in respect to Mrs. Paris’ knowledge is that it never occurred to her when she hired *305 this room that there would ever be a time when it would be necessary for her to occupy it, for the court finds in terms that she knew when she hired it that she could always have other and better rooms when she wished to stop at the hotel.

The only legitimate conclusion, therefore, that can be drawn from these findings as a whole is that Mrs. Paris hired the room at the hotel because she was advised that she must have some place in New York that she could call her home if she wished to acquire a New York domicile, and not because she had any thought of actually residing either in this room or in the Manhattan Hotel and making the hotel her home. Most of the other facts on which the plaintiffs rely to sustain the court’s findings are colorless in and of themselves in so far as the question of Mrs. Paris’ intention to reside in New York City and make it her home is concerned. In fact most of them tend rather to the conclusion that she thought the doing of the things she is shown to have done was all that was necessary to acquire a New York domicile, or, that if she did these things, she could live just as she had been living for the last thirty years, than to the one that she went to New York in the fall of 1913 with the intention of actually residing in that city and making it her home; for if that had been her intention, — that is if she had intended actually to remain in that city, — it is incredible that her attorney would have advised her to hire a room she never intended to occupy or to change her will for the purpose of setting herself up as of New York or to go back to the hotel and change her registration from Charlestown, N. H., to New York City; for the only possible reason there could be for doing any of these things was to .give notice to everyone that she was a citizen of New York, and it is obvious that if she had intended to reside in that city, giving that notice was an idle ceremony. These facts therefore tend to the conclusion that she had no intention of actually residing in New York. The fact she changed her address on her trunk also tends to the conclusion that she did the things she is shown to have done because she was advised that they were the things to do and not because she thought of actually residing in New York and making it her home; for the purpose that ordinarily induces a person to put his name and address on his trunk is to enable the transportation companies to forward it to him if it goes astray. It is obvious however that that could not have been Mrs. Paris’ purpose in making this change for the evidence all tends to the conclusion that she intended to reside in Charlestown even though her domicile was in New York.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
99 A. 835, 78 N.H. 301, 1916 N.H. LEXIS 60, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/kerby-v-charlestown-nh-1916.