Case ID: va_2/html/0776-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

Young v. Skipwith.
    October Term, 1796.
    Decree — Pinal—Case at Bar. — A decree.directing the surveyor to make partition of a tract of land, and to make report, is not final, and cannot be appealed from.
    This was an appeal from a decree of the High Court of Chancery, wherein the ap-pellee was plaintiff. The suit was brought for a specific execution of an agreement, *whereby the defendant was to purchase a tract of land on the joint account of himself and the plaintiff; the prayer of the bill was for a partition of the land according to certain boundaries agreed upon by the parties, and for a conveyance. The court of chancery decreed in favor of the plaintiff, and directed the surveyor of the county to run a line of division, and to report the quantity 'of land on each side thereof.
    
      
      Decree — Fmal.—A decree is not final, unless the cause itself has been thereby terminated in the court below. The principal case is c.ited, in support of this rule, in Cocke v. Gilpin, 1 Rob. 35; State v. Hays, 30 W. Va. 119, 3 S. E. Rep. 181; Ryan v. McLeod, 32 Gratt. 378; Templeman v. Steptoe, 1 Munf. 368; Alexander v. Coleman, 6 Munf. 340; Thorntons v. Fitzhugh, 4 Leigh 213.
      In this connection, the principal case is further cited with approval in Royall v. Johnson, 1 Rand. 427; Grymes v.Pendleton, 1 Call 54; Manion v. Fahy, 11 W. Va. 493.
      See foot-notes to Grymes v. Pendleton, 1 Call 54; Fleming v. Bolling, 8 Gratt. 292; Vanmeter v. Van-meters, 8 Gratt. 148, and notes referred to therein.
    
   After a very lengthy argument in this court upon the merits of the case, the court dismissed the appeal, as being prematurely prayed before the final decree and remanded the cause to the court of chancery.