Case ID: nc_72/html/0176-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "Reade, J.", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

CHAS. R. BREWER and wife HETTIE v. THOMAS A. HARVY.
    To make a gift valid to pass title, there must be a delivery, either actual or symbolical.
    Therefore, where a father pointed out a colt to his daughter, at the same time saying to her, “that is your property; I give it to you,” hut retains the possession, no title passed to the daughter.
    This was a Civil Action, to recover the possession of a certain horse and for damages, tried before Seymour, </., at Fall Term, 1874, of the Superior Court of Chaven county.
    On the trial below, it appeared that one White, who was the father of the feme plaintiff, during his lifetime, gave to her the horse in controversy. That at the time of this gift, the feme plaintiff was only twelve years old, and the horse itself nothing but a colt. The manner of the gift seemed to be this: The father, White, standing in the piazza of his honse, in company with the feme plaintiff and her mother, pointed out the colt, at the time standing with its mother near by, and told her that it was her property: “ I give it to yon.”" That the colt was ever afterwards known as her property, by the family and by the neighbors. When her father died, the colt was one or two years old, and had never been out of her father’s actual possession. That she, th a feme plaintifl, lived with her father until his death, and with her mother and one Adams, whom her mother subsequently married, at the same place, till Adams carried the said horse away. That her father while he' lived, and her mother afterwards, took care of the-horse for her and as her property, until it was sold in A ugnst, 1873, by said Adams and wife to the defendant Harvy, while the feme plaintiff was away in November. '
    
    There has been no administration on White’s estate, and the property belonging thereto, remains in charge of her mother, upon the place her father died. She, th % feme plaintiff, has since intermarried with the other plain tiff, and is nineteen years old.
    "Upon this statement of facts, the Court intimating the opinion, that the plaintiffs could not recover, on the ground, that there had been no sufficient delivery in law, and plaintiffs could not maintain this action for want of title, plaintiffs submitted to a non-suit and appealed.
    
      N. R. Bryan, for appellants.
    
      Ciarle <& Roberts and Fair cloth (& Granger, contra.
   Reade, J.

A gift is, of course, without valuable consideration ; and to make it valid to pass title, there must be a delivery, either actual or symbolical.

In this case, the owner pointed out a colt, and said to his daughter, ” that is your property ; I give it to you.” There was no change of possession. The title did not pass to the daughter.

There is no error.

Peb Cueiam. Judgment affirmed-»