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About Omaha daily bee. (Omaha [Neb.]) 187?-1922 | View Entire Issue (April 8, 1906)
torn oaita' daily bee: Sunday, april 8, iooa ROMANCE K REAL ESTATE Btrarn'e Etory of Title to Taroel of l&nd Located in Boston. TRUTH THAT MUCH EXCEEDS FICTION Creed el HeArs for Lccmer Start Straae Clroalt ( Law gaits that Bveataallr BJt the Vni( tn presenting fhta interesting- account of the wandering of fee slmpls title from one claimant to another w feel that a word la necessary from the donor lest the reader mar feal that we are placing too much confidence In the credulity of our friend. We cannot teatlfy aa to the facta of Mr. Crocker's remarkable etory, but Mr. Crocker, now deceased, was a well known attorney and trustee In Boscon and his atandlnf aa a lawyer a well as the author ities cited In the storjTj are sufficient evl denoe of Ita veracity. We are Indebted to Mr. Crocker brother, Hon. Qeo. O. Crocker, the transit com missioner of Boston, for the original copy aa It was published by the Massachusetts Title Insurance company and the American Law Review In October, 1ST!. History at a fltl. Of the locality of the parcel ef real es tate, the history of the UUe of which It Is proposed to relate. It may be sufficient to say that It lie In Boston within the limit of the territory ravaged by the great fire of November and 10, 1873. In I860 thla par cel of land was In the undisturbed pos session of Mr. Will am Ingalla, who referred his title to It to the will of hla father, Mr. Thomas Ingalla, who died In 1830. Mr. In galla, the elder, had been a very wealthy ciUsen of Boston; and when he made hla Will, a few years before his death, he owned this bne parcel of real estate, worth about SOO,000 and possessed In addition, personal property to the amount of between 1200,000 and MA0OO. By his will he specifically devised this parcel of land to his wife, for life and upon her death to Ms only child, the William In galls before mentioned. In fee, to whom, after directing his executor to pay to two nephews, William and Arthur Jones, the urn of $36,000 each, he gave also the large residue of bis property. After the date of his will, however, Mr. Thomas Ingalls engaged In some unfortunate speculatlona and upon the settlement of his estate the personal property proved to be barely suf ficient for the payment of his debts and the nephew got no portion of their lega cies, The real estate, however, afforded to the widpw a comfortable Income, which enabled her during her life to support her self In a respectable manner. Upon her death in 1346 the son entered Into possession of the estate, which had gradually In creased In value; and he had been enjoying for fifteen years a handsome Income de rived therefrom, when he was one day sur prised to hear that the two cousins, whom his father had benevolently remembered In his will, had advanced a claim that this real estate should be sold by his father's executor and the proceeds applied .to the payment of their legacies. Sarprlse to the Holders. This claim, now first made thirty years after the death of his father, was of course a great surprise to Mr. Ingalls. He had entertained the popular Idea that twenty years' possession effectually cut off all claim. Here, however, were parties, after thirty years undisputed possession by hi mother and himself, setting up in 1860 a claim arising out of the will of his father, that will having been proved In ' 1830. Nor had Mr. Ingalla ever dreamed that the legacies given to his cousins could In any way have precedence over the specific devise of the parcel of real estate to himself. It wns, as a matter of common sense, so clear that his father had Intended by his first will to provide for hla wife and son and then to make a generous gift out of the residue of his es tate to his nephews, that during the thirty years that had elapsed since hla death It had never occurred to any one to suggest any other disposal of the property than that which had actually been made. Upon consulting with counsel, however, Mr. Ingalls learned that although the time within which most actions might be brought was limited to a specified number of years, there was no such limitation af fecting the bringing of an action to recover a legacy, See Mass. Gen. St. o. 97. 12; Kent against Dunham, 106 Mass. 686, 891; Brooks against Lynde, 7 Allen, 84, 66. He also learned that as his father's wilt gave him after his mother's death the same estate that he would have taken by Inheritance had there been no will, the law looked upon the devise to him aa void and deemed him to have taken the estate by descent. Whiit he had supposed to bo a specific devise of the estate to him then was a void devise, or no devise at all; and his parcel of real' state, being In the eye of the law simply a part of an undevised residue, was of course liable to be sold for the payment Of the leracle contained In hi father' will. It was asset which the exeoutor was bound to apply to that purpose. This exact point bad been determined In the then re cent ease of Ellis against Page, 7 Cu.nh, Kl; and Mr. Ingalls wa finally compelled to aee the estate, the undisputed posses sion of which be had enjoyed for so many year, sold at auction by the executor of bis father will for $136,000, not quite enough to pay the legacies to hla cousins, which legacies, with Interest from the ex piration of, one year after the testator's death, amounted at the time of the sale in 18C2 to $143,000. The Messrs. Jone them selves purchased the estate at the sale, deeming the purchase a good Investment of the amount of their legacies and Mr. Ingall Instituted a system of stricter economy In hi domestic expense and pon dered much on the uncertainty of the law and the mutability of human affair. Another Claimant la Slant. By one of those curious coincidence which so often occur, Messrs. William and Arthur Jones had scarcely begun to en Joy the Increased supply of pocket money afforded them by the rent of their newly acquired property, when they each re ceived one morning a summon to appear before Justices of the superior court, "to answer unto John Rogers In a writ of entry," the premise described In the writ being their newly acquired estate. The Messrs. Jone were at first rather startled by this unexpected proceeding; but as they had, when they received their deed from Mr. Ingalls executor, taken the precaution to have the title to their estate examined by a conveyancer, who had re ported that he had carried hi examina tion as far back as the beginning of the century and had found the .title perfectly clear and correct, they took courage and waited for further developments. It was not long, however, before the fact upon which the writ of entry had been founded were made known. It appeared that for some time prior to 1730 the estate had be longed to one John Buttolph, who died In that year, leaving a will In which he de vised the estate "to my brother William' Thomas Buttolph had held the estate until 177$, when he died, leaving an only daughter, Mary, at that time the wife of Timothy Rogers. Mr. Rog ers held the estate until 1790, when she died, leaving two sons and a daughter. This estate she devised to her daughter, who subsequently. In 1800, conveyed It to Mr. Thomas Ingalls, before mentioned. Peter Rogers, the eldest son of Mrs. Rogers was' a non-compos, but lived until the year 1SS4, when he died at the age of 75. He left no children, having never been mar ried. John Rogers, the demandant in the writ of entry, wa the oldest son of John Rogers, the second son of Mrs. Mary Rogers, and the -basis of the title set up by him was substantially aa follows: Descent of Estate Tall. He claimed that under the decision in Hay ward against Howe, 12 Gray 49, the will of John Buttolph had given to Thomas But tolph an estate tall, the law construing the intention of the testator to have been that the estate should belong to Thomas But tolph and to his Issue as long as such Issue should exist, but that upon the failure of such Issue, whenever such failure might occur, whether at the death of Thomas or at any subsequent time, the estate should go to William Buttolph. It had also been decided in Corbln vs. Healy, 20 Pick, 614. EJS, that an estate tail doe not desoend tn Massachusetts, like other real estate, to all the children of the deceased owner, In equal shares, but according to the old English rule, exclusively to the oldest son. If any, and to the daughter only in default of any son, and it had been further decided In Hall v. Priest, Gray. 18, 24, that an es tato tall cannot be devised or In any way sfTocted by the will of a tenant In tall. Mr. John Roger claimed then' that the estate tall given by the will of John But tolph to Thomas Buttolph had descended at the dee.th of Thomas to his only child1, Mary Rogers; that at her death, Instead of passing, aa had been supposed" at the time, by virtue of her will, to her daughter, that will had been wholly without effect upon the estate, which had, in fact, descended to her oldest son, Peter Rogers. Peter Roger had Indeed been disseised In 1800, if not before by the acts of his sister In tak ing possession of and conveying away the estate; but as he was a non-compos during the whole of his long life, the statute of limitations did not begin to run against him ahd his heir In tall, namely John Rogers, the, oldest son of his then de ceased brother, John, was allowed by Mass. Gen. st. c. 145, par. 6, ten years after his uncle Peter's death, within which to bring his action. As these ten years did not ex pire until WA, this action, brought in 1863, was seasonably commended, and It was prosecuted with success, Judgment In his favor having been recovered by John Rog ers in 1S65. Work of a Bright Lawyer. The case of Rogers v. Jones was nat urally a subject of remark among the legal profession; and It happened to occur to one of the younavr member of that pro fession that It would be well to Improve some of Mj Idle moments by studying np the farts of this rase tn the Ruffolk Regis tries of Iwds and of Probate. Curiosity prompted this gentleman to extend his In vestigation beyond the facts directly Ih volved In the case and to trace the" title of Mr. John Buttolph back to an earlier date. He found that Mr. Buttolph had purchased the estate In 1730 of one Hosea Johnson, to whom It had been conveyed In 1710 by Benjamin Parsons.- The deed from Parsons to Johnson, however, conveyed the land to Johnson simply, without any mention of his "heir; and th young lawyer, having recently read t,n case of Buffum v. Hutch inson, 1 Allen, W, perceived that Johnson took under this deed only a life estate In the granted premises and that at his death the premises reverted to Parson or his heirs. The young lawyer, being of an en terprising spirit, thought It would be well to follow out the Investigation suggested by his discovery. He found, to hi sur prise, that Hosea Johnson did not die un til 17P6, the estate having In fact been pur chased by him for a residence when he wa twenty-one year of age and about to be married. He had lived upon It for twenty year, but had then moved hi residence to another part of the city and sold the estate, as we have seen to Mr. Buttolph. When Mr. Johnson died In 1786 at the age of ninety-seven. It chanced that the sole party entitled to the revision a heir of Benjamin Parson, was a young woman, hi granddaughter, aged eighteen, and Just married. This young lady and her husband lived, a sometime happens, to celebrate their diamond wedding In 1861, but died during that year. A she had been under the legal disability of coverture from the time when her right of entry upon the estate a heir of Benjamin Parsons, first accrued, at the termination of Johnson's life estate, the provision of the statute of limitations, before cited, gave her heir ten years after her death, within which to bring their action. Parsons' Heir Como la. These heirs proved to be three or four people of small means residing tn remote parts of the United States. What arrange menta the young lawyer made with these parties and also with a Mr. John Smith, a speculating moneyed man of Boston,- who was supposed to have furnished certain necessary funds, he was wise enough to keep carefully to himself.. Suffice It to say that In 1869 an action was brought by the heir of Benjamin Parson to recover from Rogers the land which he had Just re covered from Willlnm and Arthur Jones. In this action the plaintiffs were success ful, and they had no sooner been put tn formal possession of the estate than they conveyed It, now worth a couple of hundred thousand dollar, to the aforesaid Mr. John Smith, who was popularly sup posed to have obtained In this case, as he usually did In all financial operations In which he was concerned, the lion's share of the plunder. The Parsons heirs probably realised very little from the results of the suit; but the young lawyer obtained suf ficient to establish him s a 'brilliant spec ulator In suburban lands, second mort gages and patent rights. Mr. Smith had but a short time been In possession of his new estate when the gTeat fire of Novem ber, 1872, swept over It. He was, however, a most energetic cltlxen and the ruins were not cold before he wa at work rebuilding. He bought an adjoining lot In order to Increase the else of hla estate, the whole of which wa soon covered by an elegant block, oonsplcuous on the front of which may be seen bis Initial "J. 8." cut In the atone. Ingalls Again , Active. While the estate " which had once be longed to Mr. Ingalls wa passing from lone person to another In the bewildering manner we have endeavored to describe, Mr. Ingalls had himself,, for a time, looked on in amazement. It finally occurred to him, however, that he would go to the root' of this matter of the title. He employed a skillful conveyancer to trace that title back, if possible to the Book of Posses sion. The result of this Investigation was tht the. parce which he had himself owned, together with the additional parcel bought and added , to It by Smith, had tn 1643 or .1644, when the .Book of Possessions wa compiled, constituted one parcel, which was then the "possession of one "Madid Engle," who subsequently In 1660, under the name of "Mauditt Knglcs," ; conveyed it to John Vergoose, on the express condi tion that no building should ever be erected on a certain portion of the rear of the premises conveyed. ' Now, It had so hap pened that this portion of these premises had never been built upon before the great fire, but Mr. Brglth's new buildings had covered the Whole of the forbidden ground. It wa evident, then, that the condition had occurred so recently that the right to enforce a forfeiture was not barred by the statute and could not be deemed to have been waived by any neglect or delay, and that consequently, under the decision In Gray against Blanchard, 8 Pick. 284, a for- SIDEWALK AND DUILDING BRICK FIRE DRICK AND CLAY ra X 683 EMU c. t hull co OTUCCO, HARD WALL PLAQTCR Ai:D PINION Laa y 20th and IZARD OT. TELKPHONS 429 X Four Wire OAND' CLIPPINGO, CONCRETE. GTONE feltur of the estate for breach of thla con dition could now be enforced If the true parties entitled by descent and by residuary devise under the original "Engle" or "En gle" could only be found. It occurred to Mr. Ingalla, however, that this name "En gle" bore a certain similarity In sound to his own, and as he had heard that during the early year after the settlement of this country great change In the spelling of names had been brought about, he Insti tuted an Inquiry Into his own genealogy, the result of which was. In brief, that he found be could prove himself to be the Identical person entitled, as heir of Madid Engle, to enforce, for breach of the con dition In the old deed of laso, the forfeiture of the estate now In the possession of John Smith. Smith Loaea Heart and Property. When Mr. Smith heard of these facts he felt that a retributive Nemises was pursu ing him. He lostMhe usual pluck and bull dog determination with which he had been accustomed to fight at the law all claims against him, whether Just or unjust. He consulted the spirit, and they rapped out the answer that he must make the best settlement he could with Mr. Ingalls or ho would Infallibly lose all his fine estate not only that part which Mr. Ingalla had orig inally held and which he had obtained for almost nothing from the heir of Benjamin Parsons but also the adjoining parcel for which he had paid Its full value, together with the elegant building which he had erected at a cost exceeding the whole value of the land. Mr. Smith believed In the spirits; they had made a lucky guess once tn answering an Inquiry from him; he was getting old; he had worked like a steam engine during a long and busy life, but now his health and hla digestion were giving out, and when the news of Mr. Ingalls' claim reached hi ear he became In a word demoralised.. He Instructed his law yer to make the best settlement of the matter that he could and a settlement wa soon effected by which the whole of Mr. Smith' parcel of land In the burnt dis trict was conveyed to Mr. Ingalla. who gave back to Mr. Smith a mortgage for the whole amount which the latter had ex pended in the erection of hie building, to gether with what" he had paid for the parcel added by him to the original lot. Mr. Smith, not liking to have anything to remind him of hla one unfortunate specula tion, soon sold and assigned this mortgage to the Massachusetts Hospital Life Insur ance company, and as the well known counsel of thai institution ha now exam ined and passed the title, we may presume that there are In It no more flaws remain ing to be discovered. fna-alls New View of Law. In conclusion w may say that Mr. William Ingalls, after having been for some teh years a revller of the law, espe cially of that portion ofVlt which relates to the title to real estate, Is now Inclined to look more complacently upon It, being again In undisturbed and undisputed pos session of his old estate, now worth much more than before, and tn the receipt there from of an ample Income which will enable him to pass the remainder of his days In comfort. If not In luxury. But though Mr. Ingalls 1 -content with the final result of the history of his title, those lawyers who are known as "conveyancers" are by no mean happy when they contemplate that history, for it ha tended to Impress upon them how full of pitfall is the ground upon which they are accustomed to tread, and how extensive Is the knowledge and how great the care required of all who travel over It, and they now look more dis gusted than ever, when, a so often hap pen, they are requested to "Just step over" to the registry and 'look down" a title, and are Informed that the title la a very simple one and will only take a few minute, and that So-and-so, "a very care ful man,' did It In less than half an hour last year, and found It all right, and that hla charge waa $S. Moral. It would be presumptlous on our part to suggest the moral of this tale even to the simplest mind. It' I far better to merely Impress It upon you. In Omaha today many titles to real estate are changing hands and the abstract and Ita examination are hot given the attention It deserve by the buyer and seller. With them It Is a question of economy and they even fre quently feel that it Is an expensive and al most unnecessary detail of the transaction. The parcel of real estate In Mr. Crocker story Increased In value during the story from $50,000 to over $250,000. With such possibilities Is It not worth while to exer cise the greatest care In selecting the ab stracter who la to make the abstract of title and to see that It la examined care fully? The time 1 fast approaching when owner of real estate will rely not only upon a careful examination of the titles, but will have their title Insured, as Is the custom in the east. DIAMOND RINGSTILL HELD Valuable. Article Whleh garvlves Stag Art Await Owner, Who Denies It. A fine dlntnond ring 1 waiting It owner In the Orpheum theater box office, and meanwhile Manager Relter I wondering how large a damage suit a certain woman will bring - against hi company. Relter thinks the ring 1 worth not more than $150, but he know bow value expand In court The management ha done It beat to induce the woman to take possession of her property but she won't. She parted with It Friday night during the performance in response to a request from Hermann, the sllght-of-hand man, for three rings from the audience. The woman sat In the second row. Hermann took the rings, apparently pounded them to piece In a pestle, loaded a gun with the piece and fired them Into a box from which he extracted the three ring a good a when taken from the audience. But the woman in the aecond row didn't think so. She insisted It waa not her ling and wouldn't take It No amount of per suasion would Induce her to do so. Rather than stop the performance Hermann had to keep the ring and turn it over to the house management Tfje woman did not give her name or make any other explana tion of her conduct WOMAN IS CALLED A WITCH Party to Welchhorhood Wranal Cast Strang; Spell Over Her Adversary. "X am afraid of that woman. She 1 a witch. Bh throw poison over the fence to -my chicken and ha said she Would burn the bouse down." This emphetlo declaration waa mad on the witness stand In county court Saturday by Mrs. John Craig in the case in which Mrs. Hannah Baker sought to secure a peace warrant against Mr. Calg. Mrs. Craig was testifying for ber husband and he declared she believed Mrs. Baker had supernatural power and she did not want anything to do with her. The trouble started Sunday, April 1, when Mr. Baker says Craig threw a lot of brick at her. The Cralgs came back with counter charges against Mrs. Baker, and the testimony on both sides wa very emphatic. It developed the Craig have built a high board fence between their place and Mrs. Baker since the trouble. Mr. Baker is a small, wrinkled German woman, and I Craig' next door neighbor at Tenth and Paul streets. Judge Ieelie Olsoharged toe Sslsadaab nnn n n. EVERY WEEK TO USERS OF PllL8BUnY'S,'BESr BREAKFAST FOOD to M U IX U UL (TRADE MARK) One of these reliable time piece will be (riven to n reader of thi paper, who will end in a correct solution of the VITUS PICTURE I'UZZLli, the first on of which appears below. Remember these, are good time, keepers, open face, nicVl finish, item wind and stem set, and the movements are all accompanied by the manu facturers guarantee to keep accurate time .for year, and will be repaired and re placed free of charge any time within 12 months. With ordinary cars the will keep good time for many yean. Vifos PcjzzIo Picture -Ho. I Soho if Gorrccily end get a Watch f - Mi i- , ! 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Your solution .n.ro-.w,atcl1 ma,t be 2orrect in every particular sod must be accompanied by the top from two-pound package of PILLSBURY'3 "VITOS," and also by the descriptive sentence as set forth above frr .t, wriie your name ana address plainly on your solution. If sent by a school child give age and name of school. The standing of the Pillsbury-Washburn Flour Mills Co., the manufacturers of this breakfast Cereal, the largest flour and cereal concern in the world, is a guaranty of the quality of these watches, and an absolute assurance that they will be distributed in good faith, exactly s advertised. The portraits of these Presidents can be found in almost any U.S. History or Cyclopedia, and school children can get their teachers to give them the names after tbev have pasted up the pictures. There is no catch in the puzzle and it is comparatively easy of solution. Every correct solution gets a watch. A watch given to one member of family only, About PILLSBjJRrS "Be.t" Breakfast Food "VITOS" flfifif DdllcifilB M J0 taYe eating the common, ready UWIIUiyUJ tQ genre breakfast food, break away and try the delicious creamy flavor of tbia one incomparable breakfast cereal. Mist I Every package of Vitos is made from the white heart of the wheat grain. It contains the real nutritive essentials, and when easily and simply prepared makes 12 pounds of delicious, strength civinsr food. So that it costs I9SS than H as much as the ordinary ready to serve kinds. In addition to this, Vitos takes very much less cream or milk than the dry kinds of food, and this means economy too. , Cheap ness Is not all to be considered in foods; but when you get so much better food at such a saving is it not worthy of consideration f 15 cents for a full 3-pound package. LETTEMHEAU) S MACHINERY G&EMDGTJE OTIS JB G U "T. $ LIVE STOCK GENEBAL , VIEWS; UILDING IB ill tfwf ireioiAififr