Case ID: mass_25/html/0337-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "\n      Per Curiam.\n    ", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

Frederick Church versus Sally Burghardt.
    Evidence of acts done and declarations made by the claimants of land, after a possession by one of them for thirty years, is admissible to show that such possession was not adverse.
    Trespass qu. el. fr. A verdict was found in favor of the-plaintiff.
    The parties were in possession of two adjoining lots of land, under different titles. The dividing line', which was first laid out in 1734, was a straight line. A crooked fence was erected more than fifty-eight years before the trial, and included on the Burghardt side a part of the other lot; but the owners oí" the two lots occupied respectively up to this fence for more than thirty years. The plaintiff recently erected a fence on the straight line, which the defendant tore down.
    The question was, whether evidence of acts and declarations of the parties since the expiration of the thirty years, was admissible to show that the old fence was built for mutual accommodation, without any view to title, and that the occupation was not adverse.
    
      Barnard and Hall, for the plaintiff,
    cited Burrell v. Burrell, 11 Mass. R. 298; Stearns, 38, 43, 67; Smith v. Burtis, 9 Joins. R. 174; Brandt v. Ogden, 1 Johns. R. 158; Kincaird v. Scott, 12 Johns. R. 368; Co. Lit. 374 a.
    
    
      Whiting and C. A. Dewey, for the defendant.
    
      Sept, 9th
    
    
      
      Sept. 12th..
    
   Per Curiam.

It is urged that a complete possessory title was obtained, up to the line of the old fence ; and that all evidence of acts or declarations, which took place afterward, are, irrelevant-and inadmissible to prove the character of the previous possession. If the premises are well founded, the argument is sound and the conclusion logical. But the very question was, as to the nature and character of that antecedent possession ; and the acts and declarations of the parties owning the estates, made after thirty years, which had a tendency to show their motives and views during the thirty years, were proper to show the nature of the occupancy, and rebut the inference which would otherwise follow from the fact of possession. Surely, if a written agreement had been produced, showing that Burghardt was allowed to maintain a crooked fence, until Church should choose to have one back upon the true divisional line, it would defeat all claims to the land in dispute on account of the thirty years’ possession. Confessions of the party in possession claiming under that title, his acts and declarations having a tendency to show such arrangement and ■ understanding, are equally competent evidence.

Judgment according to verdict.