Reese v. Bruce

206 S.W. 658, 136 Ark. 378, 1918 Ark. LEXIS 335
Supreme Court of Arkansas·Decided November 11, 1918·Published·Cited by 3 cases

Opinion

Humphreys, J.

W. W. Tate died intestate on the 29th day of May, 1899, leaving him surviving Amanda Tate, who was his third wife, and twelve children, four by each marriage. On the 23d day of January, 1917, three children by his first marriage, Mrs. Lillie Reese, Henry H. Tate and Mrs. Alma Dorsey, and one grandchild by said marriage, Mrs. Vera‘Chessir, joined with the four children by the second marriage, Mrs. Mattie Bruce, Mrs. Dora Nixon, Mrs. Mary Wilson and James Tate, in a suit for the partition of 209 acres of land near Russellville, in Pope County, against the surviving widow, Mrs. Amanda Tate, and the surviving children of W. W. Tate and Amanda Tate, in the Pope Chancery Court. It was alleged that W. W. Tate was the owner in fee of said tract of land when he died; that on the date of his death he resided with his wife and minor children on said real estate, or a part thereof, as his homestead; that, thereafter, until 1904, appellees resided on said real estate, at which time, they abandoned the land as a homestead, but that the surviving widow, .Amanda Tate,- continued to control the property and to collect the rents therefrom;, that the minor children were entitled to share in the rents and profits until each attained the age of twenty-one years; that the widow had used for her own benefit all the rents and profits and had failed to account for one-half thereof to the children entitled thereto until the year 1904, and had failed to account for.all the rents and profits to the children entitled thereto after 1904, and until this suit was instituted. Appellees answered separately, denying the abandonment of the homestead or that the surviving widow, Amanda Tate, was indebted on account of rents and profits to any of the petitioners or to her own children.

Appellants, Mrs. Lillie Reese, Henry H. Tate, and Mrs. Alma Dorsey, who were children by the first marriage, and Mrs. Vera Chessir, daughter of Mrs. Lula Chessir, who was a child of the first marriage, then filed an intervention, denying that W. W. Tate was the owner of said real estate in fee when he died, and in which intervention they alleged that W. "W. Tate, their father, was appointed guardian for them in Howard County; that he applied for and obtained an order to sell their lands in Howard County for reinvestment in Pope County lands; that, pursuant to the order, he sold said lands for $1,200 and invested the amount a short time after the sale on November 20, 1880, in Pope County lands and took the deed therefor in his own name; that said lands were chargeable with a resulting trust in their favor for said amount, with six per cent, interest thereon from the date of the purchase. The interveners filed the guardianship proceedings of the sale of their interest in the Howard County lands as exhibits to their complaint, which exhibits disclosed, in substance, that their mother and grandmother, Martha E. Tate, widow of William Clardy, and W. W. Tate, their father, married on the 2nd day of July, 1865; that at the time of the marriage their mother had two children, Sarah E. Clardy and James W. Clardy; that at the time she owned 100 acres of land as legatee under her father’s will and an interest in 160 acres as widow of her former husband, William Clardy; that in a partition suit between their mother and the Clardy children, through oversight, the lands were put in hotch-potch and divided by the commissioners, 120 acres to their mother and 70 acres, each, to the Clardy children; that deeds were never made by the commissioners to their mother and the Clardy children, but simply set off and designated so that each might know his part; that these interveners, born subsequent to the partition of the Howard County lands between their mother and the Clardy children, had an undetermined interest in said lands, and that to the end that said uncertain and undetermined interest might be definitely ascertained and reduced to possession, their guardian procured an order and. sold said lands on November 20, 1880.

" Appellees demurred to the intervention on the ' ground that the interveners had been guilty of laches. The demurrer was sustained and the interveners refused to plead further. Thereupon, the chancellor entered a final decree dismissing the intervention for the want of equity, from which an appeal has been prosecuted to this court.

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Reese v. Bruce, 206 S.W. 658, 136 Ark. 378, 1918 Ark. LEXIS 335 (Ark. 1918).

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