Case ID: nc_9/html/0435-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "Taylor, Chief-Justice.", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

Doe on demise of Pritchard, et al. v. Turner.
    From Pasquotank.
    When those who chum the mherih'noe, are of equal degree, and none of them can claim a preference by representing the acquiring line, ail are equally entitled, although some of them may be of the half blood.
    
      Sprd.al verdiel in ejecivient. it was found by the Jury, that Tiiomas Symons was seised and possessed in fee* of the lands mentioned in the Plaintiff's declaration ; that the said Thomas died intestate in the year 1790, leaving a widow, Ann, and leaving, as his heir at law, an only child, Sarah; that Sarah intermarried with Joseph Jordan, and died intestate the 2d of March, 1308, leaving, as her heir at. law, an only child, Thomas ; that Thomas died an infant, intestate, and without issue, on the 12th of June, 1808 ; that Joseph Jordan, the father of Thomas, is also dead, and that the lessors of the Plaintiff are brothers and sisters, of the whole blood, to Joseph. Jordan ; that Ann Symons, the widow of Thomas Sy-mons, after his death, intermarried with Abraham Boswell, and died, leaving issue by this last marriage, an only daughter, Mary, who was living at the death of Thomas Jordan, the infant; that the Defendant claims title under the said Mary, who intermarried with Benjamin Pike, and that the Defendant was in possession.
    The, Court, on this finding, rendered judgment for the .Defendant, and the Plaintiff appealed.
   Taylor, Chief-Justice.

The controversy, in this case, arises between the paternal uncles on one side, and. a maternal aunt, of the half blood, on the other side» The land descended to Thomas Jordan, from his maternal grandfather, no portion of whose blood flows in the veins, either of the lessors of the Plaintiff, or the Defendant» The parties on both sides, are in the same degree of consanguinity to the intestate; and hence, it ap-Peai's ^ie principle governing the decision, has been virtually settled in Ballard v. Hill, (3 Murph. 416.)

jn that case> the half blood of the maternal line were preferred to a more distant collateral, of the paternal line, although the land descended therefrom; and this construction seemed unavoidable under the several enactments of 1784, which admit the half blood of both lines equally into the inheritance, and declare a priority, only where the contest is between those of the acquiring, and those of the non-acquiring line. It is also declared, that the same rules of descent shall be observed, whore the collaterals shall be further removed than brothers and sisters’children ; .consequently, where those who claim the inheritance, are of equal degree, and none of them can claim a preference by representing the acquiring line, all are equally entitled, although some of them may be of the half-blood. An uncle of the whole blood, where he represented the acquiring ancestor, would exclude an aunt of the half blood, who did not, upon the principle of the case cited, as well as that of Pipkin v. Coor, (1 L. Rep. 103;) but to prefer him where he did not so represent the acquiring ancestor, would virtually repeal the law entitling the half blood to inherit.

Ham and Henderson, Judges, concurred.