Case ID: va_27/html/0714-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "The PRESIDENT", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

*Thomas M. Cowling, v. The Justices of Nansemond County.
    May, 1828.
    Judgments — Finality—Appeal.—Though a Judgment of a Superior Court of Law, reversing a Judgment of a County Court, and directing other pleadings in the cause, be interlocutory in its character, yet the finality of the Judgment in the County Court imparts its character to the Judgment of the Superior Court, so as to authorise an appeal to the Court of Appeals.
    Executors-Official Bond — Haterial Defects, — The official bond of an Executor, in the penalty of which the names of the obligees are not inserted, and in the condition of which the name of the Executor, and of the Court to which he was to return the . account of his transactions are blank, is materially defective, and no Judgment can be rendered on it at Law.
    An imperfect bond, purporting to be an executor’s bond, was executed by the Appellant and other obligors, in Nansemond County Court on the 10th October, 1S03. The following is a copy of the instrument so executed: “Know all men by these presents, that we, William Coflield, Thomas M. Cowling, and Willis Coffield, are held and firmly bound unto Gentlemen, Justices of the Court of County, now sitting, in the sum of four thousand dollars, payment whereof well and truly to be made to the said Justices, and their successors, we bind ourselves, and each of us, our and each of our heirs, Executors, and Administrators, jointly and severally firmly by these presents. Sealed with our seals this 10th day of October, Anno. Dom. one thousand eight hundred, and three, & in the year of the Commonwealth.
    “The Condition of this obligation is, that if the said William Coffield executor of the last Will and Testament Willis Coffield deceased, do make a true and perfect inventory of all and singular the goods, ■ chattels, and credits of the said deceased which have or shall come to the hands, possession, or knowledge of the said or into the hands, or possession of any other person or persons for and the same so made do exhibit *into the Court, at such time as shall be thereto required by the said Court, and the same goods, chattels and credits do well and truly administer according to Law, and do make a just and true account of acting and doings therein when thereunto required by the said Court, and further do well and truly pay and deliver all the legacies contained, and specified in the said Will, as far as the said goods, chattels, and credits will extend according to the value thereof, and as the Law shall charge; then this obligation to be void, else to remain in full force.
    William Coffield, (L. S.)
    Thomas M. Cowling, (L. S.)
    Willis Coffield, (L. S.)
    “Sealed and delivered in the presence of,”
    Debt was brought on this bond in the name of Jeremiah Godwin, surviving obligee of Robert M. Riddick, William Summer, and Fisher Dashiell, Justices of the Peace of the Court of Nansemond County aforesaid, at the relation of Samuel Carrol, Administrator de bonis non, with the Will annexed of Willis Coffield deceased, against the above mentioned obligor, Cowling, to recover the sum of $1,169, found due from the said executor to the estate of his Testator, by the Commissioners appointed to settle his accounts.
    The Declaration recited the bond as being made to the “said obligees;” that is, the persons before named as Justices of Nansemond County, and recited the condition as importing an obligation on the part of the Executor to make a just, and true account of his actings and doings, when required by the said Court of Nansemond County. It further averred, however, “that although the obligation ■ aforesaid does not show the names Of the obligees, or persons to whom the same was executed, yet the obligees aforesaid are those to whom, and in whose favor the said obligation was made and executed, as by the rec-ordsand proceedings remaining in the Clerk’s Office of the said *'County of Nansemond, (besides other evidence) will manifestly appear.”
    The Defendant Cowling, craved oyer of the writing obligatory, and also of the condition thereof, and demurred to the Declaration, for the following causes: 1st. Because there are no obligees actually named in the penalty of the said writing obligatory; 2dly. Because in the condition, the name of the Executor, as well as the name of the Court into which he would have been bound to exhibit an account of his Executorial transactions, are omitted to be inserted: 3dly. Because the condition omits to designate and point out who shall render an account of his actings and doings as Executor as aforesaid when thereunto required. 4thly. Because there is a variance between the Bond and Declaration. There was a joinder in demurrer, and the County Court gave Judgment for the Defendant.
    The Plaintiff obtained a Supersedeas, and the Superior Court of Law reversed the Judgment of the County Cou"t, and ordered all the proceedings subsequent to the Writ of Enquiry to be set aside, and proceeding to give such Judgment as the Countj’ Court ought to have given, overruled the demurrer, directed that the Defendant below should answer over, and remanded the cause to the County Court for further proceedings to be had therein, and gave Judgment for the Plaintiffs costs in the Superior Court.
    To that Judgment, the Defendant obtained a Supersedeas from a Judge of this Court.
    
      Chapman Johnson, for the Plaintiff in Error, was stopped by the Court.
    Scott, for the Defendant in Error.
    
      
      See monographic note on “Judgments” appended to Smith v. Charlton, 7 Gratt. 425: monographic note on “Appeal and Error” appended to Hill v. Salem, etc... Turnpike Co., 1 Rob. 263.
      The principal case is cited in Janey v. Blake, 8 Leigh 91; Morgan v. Ohio River R. R. Co., 39 W. Va. 23, 19 S. E. Rep. 590.
    
   May 3.

The PRESIDENT

delivered his opinion, in which the other Judges concurred.

*Upon the preliminary question, whether the Supersedeas was properly awarded to the Judgment of the Superior Court, I think there can be no doubt; for, though that Judgment, reversing the Judgment of the County Court, and directing other pleadings in the cause, was interlocutory in its character, (though final there,) the Judgment of the County Court, being final as regards the jurisdiction of this Court, it imparted that character to the Judgment of the Superior Court, and an appeal will lay from it to this Court.

On the merits, I think there is as little doubt. A Relator in a suit on an official bond, ought to set out in the pleadings, his interest in, and claim to, relief upon it; which he has totally omitted in this case. On the demurrer to the Declaration, by oyer taken of the bond and condition, they became a part of it, and might be demurred to for any defect apparent on their face; and that is the ground of the special demurrer in this case. The two first points relate to defects m the bond and condition; as first, because there are no obligees named in the bond. Secondly, because in the condition, the name of the Executor, and of the Court into which he was to return the account of his transactions, are blank. In fact, the bond is only a copy of the blank bond to be found in the Act, except that the names of the obligors are inserted in the penal part of it. It is materially defective. Parties ought to be held to a reasonable strictness, or great injustice may be done. There can be no bond without an obligee; and it ought to be made to the sitting Justices at the time it is executed.

On all these grounds, not noticing some minor objections, I think that the Judgment of the Superior Court ought to be reversed, and that of the County Court affirmed. 
      
      .Ttjdgk Co alter, absent.