Case ID: va_16/html/0556-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

Holladay and Wife v. Littlepage.
    Saturday, November 2d, 1811.
    I. Detinue — Declaration—Defects Cured by Verdict.— In detinue, if a negro woman, by name, and her “issue” (without naming them) be demanded in the declaration, and the jury And the names of the issue, the defect (if any) is cured, and judgment should be entered according to the verdict. See Royall v. Eppes. ante, 479, pi. 7.
    a. Same — Same—Same.—The failing to lay a separate value, as to each slave demanded, is an error which would be fatal on demurrer, but is cured by a verdict severing the values.
    3. Same — General Damages. — It is not error that the jury And general damages for detaining several slaves; but the alternative value of each slave ought to be separately found.
    In an action of detinue, in the district court of Richmond, the declaration demanded “a negro woman slave Amy, and her issue, of the value of 1,000 dollars, and Rachel, a negro woman slave, and her issue, of the value of 1,000 dollars.” Pleas, non detinet, and the act of limitations, and issue. The verdict was, “that the defendant doth detain the negro woman slaves in the declaration mentioned, to wit, Amy and Rachel, and the issue of the said Amy named Maria, and the issue of the said Rachel named Dixon, in manner and form, &c. ; that the said Amy is of the price of 1001. the said Rachel of the price of 1001. the said Maria of the price of 501. and the said Dixon of the price of 501. and that the action of the plaintiff did accrue within five years next before the suing out the original writ,” &c. and damages were assessed to forty shillings.
    
      A motion was made in arrest of judgment, on the ground that the declaration was vague and uncertain, in demanding ’the issue of the two negro women therein mentioned; that the jury erred in finding for the plaintiff the two negroes Maria and Dixon, whose names were not mentioned in the declaration: and that the jury found general damages, which applied, •as well to the detention of the negroes not .named in the declaration, as of those who were named therein.
    The district court was of opinion that the said errors *'were sufficient in law to arrest the judgment. It was therefore considered, “that the plaintiff take nothing by his bill, &c. and that the defendant go thereof without day, and recover his costs,” &c.
    From which judgment the plaintiff appealed.
    Botts, for the appellant.
    The names of ■the slaves are not indispensably necessary in the declaration. If the reverse of this position were established, a child not yet named could not be recovered: and it is not certain that the issue in this case (being infants) had named at the time the declaration was filed.
    Reasonable certainty is all that the law requires in an action of detinue. The not naming a horse is no defect in the declaration, notwithstanding he has a name of notoriety. If a negro has a common name, (such as John or Tom,) the description is by no means certain. The words “issue of a mother,” who is named, describes the individual more positively.
    2. If this declaration be defective, it is cured by the act of jeofails, according to which judgment is not to be arrested “for omitting the averment of any matter, without proving which the jury ought not to have given such verdict.” Besides, two negroes were well named, and well found. Judgment ought to have been entered for those two, at any rate. Yet the court arrested it altogether. The only objection is, that general damages were assessed for all four. This, then, was error in the verdict; not in the pleadings; and, at utmost, a venire de novo should have been awarded, 
    
    3. Costs were improperly given against Ihe plaintiff; the rule being, that “where judgment is arrested, each party pays his own costs.”
    
    *The Attorney General, contra,
    relied chiefly on the doctrine that, in detinue, a greater degree of certainty is required than in ordinary actions.'
    
    
      
       See monograpliicwoieon “Detinue and Replevin” appended to Hunt v. Martin, 8 G-ratt. 578. The principal case is cited In note to Laughlin v. Flood, 3 Munf. 259.
    
    
      
       Higgenbotham v. Rucker, 2 Call, 313.
    
    
      
       Cameron v. Reynolds, Cowp. 407, Impey’s Pr. 354.(1)
      (1) Note. This is not law in Virginia. In 1 Rev. Code, p. no, c. 76, s. 17, ad finem, it is enacted, that, "in all cases where judgment shall be given for the defendant, he shall recover his costs.” And (p. 8,1. •c. 66, s. 44,) “it shall be lawful for the district courts, in any cause originating there, where the verdict dr judgment shall be given for the defendant, to award costs to the party in whose favour such judg-ement shall be given.” — Note in Original Edition.
    
    
      
      Buffer’s N. P. 50;3 Tucker’s Bl. 152.
    
   Tuesday, November 5th, ■ the president pronounced the following opinion of the court.

“This court (not admitting that the omission to state the names of the issue of the female slaves in the declaration mentioned was important, and being of opinion that the declaration, not laying a separate value as to all the negroes demanded thereby, might have been held erroneous upon demurrer) is yet of opinion that the judgment of the district court is, in this case, erroneous; the latter defect being cured by the verdict, which has severed the value aforesaid; and the former being, at most, only a fact imperfectly stated, and, consequently, cured by the verdict, which finds the names of the issue of the female slaves in the declaration mentioned. It is therefore adjudged that the judgment aforesaid be reversed, with costs, and entered for the appellant, pursuant to the verdict.” 
      
       Note. See Fulgham v. Lightfoot, 2 Call, 257. “See monographic note on “Appeal and Error” appended to Hill v. Salem, etc., Turnpike Co., 1 Rob. 263.