Watts v. Alco Oil & Gas Corp.

540 S.W.2d 557, 1976 Tex. App. LEXIS 3045
CourtCourt of Appeals of Texas
DecidedAugust 4, 1976
DocketNo. 6432
StatusPublished
Cited by3 cases

This text of 540 S.W.2d 557 (Watts v. Alco Oil & Gas Corp.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Texas primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Watts v. Alco Oil & Gas Corp., 540 S.W.2d 557, 1976 Tex. App. LEXIS 3045 (Tex. Ct. App. 1976).

Opinion

OPINION

WARD, Justice.

This is a vacancy case brought pursuant to Article 5421c, Tex.Rev.Civ.Stat.Ann., involving land in Pecos County. The tract contains 309.05 acres of land, is rectangular in shape, and is alleged to be between the East lines of Surveys 3, 5, and 6 of Block OW and the West line of Survey 1, Block 203¾⅛, at its Northern end. The tract has its North and South boundary lines 272.1 varas and 224.1 varas in length, respectively, and its East and West boundary lines are some 7,032 varas in length. Trial was before a jury which, in answer to two special issues, determined that certain adjoin-der calls made by O. W. Williams referable to the East line of Block OW and to the West line of Survey 1, Block 203½, were not mistaken calls. The trial Court then entered judgment for the defendants, decreeing no vacancy, and with the claimed vacancy being within Survey 1, Block 203½. This result was achieved in the judgment by disregarding the jury finding to Special Issue No. 1, and by accepting the jury finding to Special Issue No. 2, and honoring the call for adjoinder in Williams’ corrected field notes of Survey 1, Block 203½, dated July 20, 1887, to the East line of Sections 3, 5, and 6, Block OW. The questions presented on appeal are whether adjoinder calls in the corrected field notes of Survey 1, Block 203½, are to be honored over calls for course and distance, and whether the original field notes of Survey 1, Block 203½, could be cancelled and changed by the corrected field notes of 0. W. Williams, dated July 20, 1887. We hold that the adjoinder calls in the corrected field notes of Survey 1, Block 203½, are to be honored over calls for course and distance, that the original field notes of Survey 1, Block 203½, were validly changed and corrected by O. W. Williams, and we affirm the judgment of the trial Court.

Suit was instituted by Ed E. Watts after his vacancy application was denied by the Commissioner of the General Land Office. Frieda Watts was substituted as party plaintiff for Ed E. Watts, who had died. The Attorney General intervened for the State on behalf of the Permanent Free School Fund by a trespass to try title suit for title and possession of the 309.05 acres. The defendants, Marjorie Price Crawford and Mildred Price Simmons, are the owners of the North 1425 acres of Survey 1, Block 203½, and they claim under a 1906 award of Survey 1 to E. Gomez. Survey 1, Block 203½, had been awarded under a “mineral” classification, with the result that the State is the owner of the mineral estate subject to outstanding oil and gas leases, unitization agreements, and the rights of the owners of the soil under the Relinquishment Act. These defendants are known as the Survey 1, Block 203½, defendants. Aleo Oil & Gas Corporation, et al., are a separate group of defendants, and hold interest in Surveys 3, 5, and 6, Block OW, which were patented without mineral reservation by the State. They will be referred to herein as the Block OW defendants.

In the Appellate Court, the State of Texas appears both as Appellant and as Appel-lee, as the judgment decrees no vacancy, but places the 309.05 acre tract within Survey 1, Block 203½. Survey 1, Block 203V2, was classified as mineral land by the Com[559]*559missioner of the General Land Office before it was awarded to E. Gomez in 1906. Because of the later Relinquishment Act, the awardee or his assigns became the agent of the State of Texas for the execution of ordinary oil and gas leases. As the land is now under an oil and gas lease as a part of Survey 1, Block 203½, the State is receiving a royalty of 3/32nds. The owners of the soil are receiving a like royalty of 3/s2nds. To protect that interest, the State is Appellee, but a very weak one at best. If the 309.05 acre tract of land is vacant land, and is land which the State of Texas is entitled to recover from the Appellees, subject only to the rights of the Appellant Watts as an applicant under Article 5421c, Sec. 6, and the rights of any possible good faith claimants under said Act, the land would then be subject to sale and for lease under the provisions of Article 5421c, Sec. 6, whereby, since the land is within five miles of a producing oil and gas well, the State of Texas would retain a ⅛⅛ or 4/s2nds free royalty in the mineral estate of the tract. The awardee or his assigns, if a good faith claimant, would acquire 13/i6ths of the mineral estate under the tract, as well as the surface estate, by paying the State for the value of the surface estate only, without taking into consideration the value of the mineral estate, or without taking into consideration the value of improvements upon the land. (Article 5421c, Sec. 6(g)). To gain that advantage, the State is Appellant. If the tract in question is determined to be a part of Sections 3, 5, and 6 of Block OW, the State would have absolutely no interest, as those sections were sold by the State without a reservation of any minerals. To defend from that event, the State is again Appellee, and, obviously, a strong one.

Block OW defendants likewise have doubts as to their ultimate appellate position. The Block OW defendants and the Survey 1, Block 203½, defendants entered a written stipulation of record and approved by the trial Judge that since none of the defendants were asserting claims among themselves, and were jointly asserting that there was no vacancy as claimed by the plaintiff and the intervenor State, that as to these two groups of defendants any answers made by the jury to the two special issues submitted, and any judgment thereafter rendered, would be without prejudice to the claim or title of any defendant as against any other defendant.

Special Issue No. 1 inquired if Surveyor O. W. Williams was mistaken in his calls for adjoinder of Block OW and Survey 1, Block 203½, when he wrote his corrected field notes of Block OW on January 11, 1887. The jury answered he was not mistaken. Special Issue No. 2 inquired if Surveyor O. W. Williams was mistaken in his calls for adjoinder of Survey 1, Block 203V2, and Block OW when he wrote his corrected field notes of Survey 1, Block 203½, in July, 1887, and to this issue the jury also answered that he was not mistaken. The trial Court ignored the jury finding on Issue No. 1 on the basis that the matter was settled by the case of Frost v. Socony Mobil Oil Company, 433 S.W.2d 387 (Tex.1968). There, it was held that a vacancy did exist between Surveys 49 and 50 located at the Northern end of the tier of Block OW and the senior L. W. Durrell Surveys to the East. It held that calls for course and distance of the junior OW Surveys prevailed over adjoinder calls where Williams’, the junior surveyor, corrected field notes were based on office surveys and adjoinder calls were the result of his mistake in locating the West line of the senior survey of L. W. Durrell. Because the same tier of OW Surveys was again involved, the jury finding to Special Issue No. 1 was disregarded, and the East line of Sections 3, 5, and 6, Block OW, was held to distance calls of 1618 varas East of the monumented West line of Williams’ East tier of Block OW. That was the same result as was ordered by the Frost judgment. While the Block OW defendants are not contesting the position taken by the Survey 1, Block 203½, defendants, the Block OW defendants do attack the District Court judgment in favor of the State as being erroneous. They do this in two ways: first, that the 309.05 acre tract is a part of Block OW which would result in the State having no interest in the miner[560]*560als.

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Bluebook (online)
540 S.W.2d 557, 1976 Tex. App. LEXIS 3045, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/watts-v-alco-oil-gas-corp-texapp-1976.