Case ID: mass_12/html/0438-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "Parker, C. J.,", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

Jonathan Crouch, and Elizabeth, his Wife, versus Daniel Eveleth.
    The statute of 1783, c. 32, § 1, which authorizes the courts to grant licenses to executors and administrators to sell the lands of their testators or intestates for the payment of their debts, gives no authority to appoint a stranger to execute " that duty ; and a sale by a stranger so licensed, conveys no title to the purchaser.
    This was a writ of entry sur disseizin, brought by the demandants in right of the said Elizabeth, to recover two parcels of land situate in Stow, in this county ; and they counted upon their own seizin within thirty years in her right, and alleged a disseizin by the tenant.
    The action was tried here on the general issue before Jackson, J., "November term, 1813, and a verdict taken for the demandants, subject to the opinion of the Court upon the following case.
    In 1775, one Joseph Skinner was seized in fee of the demanded premises, and died so seized on the 22d of September, in that year. •The said Elizabeth was his only child and heir, and she, with her said husband, were seized of the premises until the conveyance thereof hereafter mentioned.
    The tenant claims to hold the premises under a conveyance thereof, made in 1785, pursuant to an order of the Court of Common 'Pleas, for the payment of the debts of the said Joseph Skin ner.
    
    [*504] * At this Court of Common Pleas for this county, November term, 1784, Martha Skinner, the widow- of said Joseph, and administratrix of his goods and estate, petitioned for license to sell the whole of his real estate for the payment of his debts. The said Court theréupon ordered that one Jonathan Wood should be empowered and licensed to sell the said estate for the pur poses mentioned in the said petition ; and the said J. Wood accordingly made and executed his deed on the 19th of March, 1785, purporting to convey to the said Eveleth in fee the premises now demanded. "
    On the 8th of April, 1785, the said Emeleth, by his deed of that date, conveyed the same to the said Martha Skinner. Both these deeds were registered on the 21st of April, 1786. On the 29th of January, 1791, the said Martha, by her deed of that date, conveyed an undivided moiety of the premises to the said Eveleth, and, on- the 2d of July, 1796, by another deed, she conveyed to him the other moiety thereof. The two last-mentioned deeds were both registered on the 20th of July, 1796.
    If the Court should be of opinion that the demandants were not entitled to recover, the verdict was to be set aside, and a verdict entered for the tenant; otherwise, judgment was to be rendered upon the verdict as returned.
    
      J. Prescott, for the demandants.
    
      Bigelow, for the tenant.
   Parker, C. J.,

delivered the opinion of the Court. The tenant defends under a conveyance from one Jonathan Wood, who claimed to act under a license from the Court of Common Pleas, granted in March, 1785, upon an application made to that Court by the administratrix of the estate of Joseph Skinner.

The statute of 1783, c. 32, which authorizes the Courts to grant licenses to executors and administrators to sell the estates of deceased debtors, gives no authority to appoint any stranger to execute that duty. The title set up by the tenant is a statute title, and must be acquired pursuant to the * statute. The [*505] heir at law can be divested only in the mode prescribed by the statute.

The title of the tenant, therefore, fails ; and judgment must be entered for the demandants according to the verdict.