Case ID: wright_1/html/0226-02.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "LANE, J.", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

BOAL’S LESSEE v. KING, PRICE, ET AL.
    Early records — execution—seal—sheriff’s deed — levy—sale—defective deed— adverse possession.
    Summary records of the courts in the early settlement of the country, are admissible and held good, until reversed on error.
    An execution without the seal of the court is void.
    A sheriff’s deed conveys no title without a levy and sale.
    An actual possession of wild lands must be proved, to enable the plaintiff to recover upon possession alone.
    A sheriff’s deed in 1802 is not good, unless acknowledged in open court. _
    _ A deed, defective as a conveyance, is admissible, to show an adverse possession.
    Ejectment. The plaintiffs claimed under a judgment of the general Court of the Territory northwest of the Ohio. He offered the minutes of the court, viz.: 11 J. JR. Millsv. J. C. Symmes, March term, 1800/ verdict $1,300; judgment upon the verdict; costs $44.46;” and proved that there was no other record.
    The plaintiff then offered an execution in evidence.
    
      Caswell for the defendant, objected, such entry was no record.
    
      Caswell objected, that it had no seal of the court.
    
    
      Hammond, contra, thought the only question was, whether the execution was void. He looked upon it as only voidable, and that the objection to it should have been made on its return.
    
      Caswell objected.
    
      Caswell moved for a non suit, because, as this /was vacant land, the plaintiff has not shown actual possession.
    
      Starr then offered a deed, acknowledged before a judge of the Court of Common Pleas, in 1802, not in open court.
    
      JN[ Wright objected,
    that the acknowledgment was not made in court, and cited Rhodes v. Symmes, 1 O. 315.
   LANE, J.

The evidence must go to the jury. It is the only record of those early times. However informal, it is good until reversed.

LANE, J. It is inadmissible; the paper is not an execution without seal; it is only prepared for the seal. It has no more validity than *a deed written out, seal prepared for execution, but [224 never executed by the grantors, would have.

The plaintiff then offered the sheriff’s deed, for the property sold on the execution, and to prove possession under it in 1807.

LANE, J. The deed is inoperative to convey title, without an execution and sale; but it is admissible to show the plaintiff’s entry and possession adverse.

The levy, as returned, was upon three hundred and seventy-three acres, as stated in the deed and sale, and conveyance for only a part of the levy. The possession was sought to be proved by showing a former suit, and the payment of taxes. The plaintiff then rested.

LANE, J. Actual possession is necessary. But if Mills was on the land, claiming to be the owner, he actually held, according to the deed under which he claimed. The motion is overruled.

THE COURT excluded the deed; the law expressly requires such deed to be acknowledged in open court.

A verdict was rendered for the defendants.

A motion for a new trial, because the court erred in rejecting the execution for want of a seal, was reserved to the Court in Be nk, and there overruled; 6 O. 11.