Case ID: h-j_1/html/0751-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "Chase, Ch. J.", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

GENERAL COURT,
    OCTOBER TERM, 1805.
    Heath’s Lessee vs. Eden’s Guardian.
    Where the acknowledgment of ft deed by a /e-me covei't grantor was held to be defective because it did not substantially pursue the inud<* prescribed by the act of assembly whereby femes covert may convey* their interest ia
    Ejectment for a tract of land called The Wolf Holes, and another tract called Cole’s Jldventure, lying in Saint-Mary’s county.
    By a statement of facts agreed on by the counsel in (lie. cause, the question submitted to the chief judge of this court was, whether or not the acknowledgment of Mary, the wife of Daniel C. Heath, made to the deed executed on the 23d of August 1776 by them to Townshend Eden, for the tract of land called Wolf Holes, was sufficient to pass the estate which, she. claimed, therein under a devise from her father, Bichard W. Key. Which acknowledgment, made before two justices of the peace, is in the following words, viz. “St. Mary’s County, sc. August 23d, 1776. Then came Daniel Charles Heath and Mary his wife, parties to the within deed, and acknowledged the same to he their act and deed according to the true intent and meaning of the same. And at the same time came Mary Heath, who being by us privately examined out of the hearing of her husband, acknowledged her right of dower to the within land and premises, and declared she did the freely and voluntarily, without threats or fear of her said husband .displeasure.”
    
      
      ICey, Harper anti Buchanan, for the Plaintiff.
    
      Shaaff, for the Defendant.
   Chase, Ch. J.

I am of opinion the deed from Daniel Charles Heath, and Mary Heath, to Townshend Eden, executed on the 23d of August 1776, for Wolf Holes, cannot operate to transfer the estate and interest which Mary Heath had and held in the said land to Townshend Eden; her acknowledgment of that deed being defective in not substantially pursuing the mode prescribed by the act of assembly whereby femes covert may convey their interest in lands. And I do accordingly direct judgment to be entered for the plaintiff.