The Brattleboro daily reformer. (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1913-1955, 1915-08-25
HOratiO Says Personal Prop
erty Was Promised Him
for Services
SEPARATE ACCOUNTS
NEVER SUGGESTED
Says He Has offered Other Heirs More
than Farm is Worth to Avoid Con
troversy = Cared for Mother, Who
Had Cancer 10 years.

An answer has been filed in the county
clerks office by the defendants in the
chancery suit of Knapp against Knapp, "a
suit IN which two brothers and two sisters
seeks to force an accounting by two other
brothers, who, it is claimed, are in posses
sion of the Knapp homestead in Dunn
merston without right thereto
Ambrose and Chaunccy l. Knapp of
Brattleboro and Ida c. Knapp of North
Iampton and Martha E. Hancock of Spring
field, Mass, are the orators and the de
PENDANTS are Horatio and Ora Knapp OF
Dummerston. The orators charge that
the defendants have converted the farm
and personal property to their own use,
Irefusing an accounting to the other heirs,
have cut timber and sold it and that the
orators have been driven from the prop
Ierty by threats when seeking to go
| there.
The defendants deny the charge that
there were % head of cattle on the farm,
a pair of oxen and two horses at the death
OF their father William NJ Knapp, in
1884, but assert that there were only
eight or 10 head of cattle, one pair of oxen
land one horse.
Ora Knapp, the reply states. has moth
ing to do with the property, but has had
from it such support as he desired when
he has made his home there
1t IS set forth in the answer that Hora-
ito carried on the farm for several years
before the death of his father and that
Horatio was 81 years old at the time of
the death Of William NJ Knapp. At the
! lrequest Of his mother, the answer SAYS.
he stayed on the farm and conducted it,
! having the personal property then on the
place in return for his management of the
!. farm and the care of his mother The
) other heirs, it is asserted, came and went
: as they pleased. No suggestion was ever
made to. him, he says, to keep separate
; taccounts. He employed the necessary Ia
Dor for the conduct of the farm and paif
all the expenses for the support of the
mother, who suffered with a cancer for II
: years before her death in 1896
= Horatio, it is claimed, paid all of til,
r doctor bills and the burial expenses ant
: what timber he cut was cut at the reques
: Iof his mother to help towards paying tn,
I bills Of the physician, but the timber Gu
|. was to the value of not more than S4ot
= or 500 and did not meet the total ex
J. Ipenses OF his mothers Illness, the answe
asserts This method of procedure wa
s. approved by the others. it Is asserted i
- the reply. 1t is asserted that no CLAIM
was ever made by the other heirs unit
the death of their sister, Rose, in 1911
and that there was a tacit understandin
among the heirs that he should carry O
the farm and that no charge would h
made against him for the use If it, pre-
vided he cared for their mother.
His fathers personal estate, he say
amounted to no more than $500 at tn
= time of his death. The assessed valuatio
D Of the farm then was $1,000. and now
d is $500. He asserts that he has offere
y the other heirs more than the property
worth to avoid controversy and pleat
the statute Of limitations to all claims q
cept those Of the heirs as to their shar,
r >of the real estate, which he asks shall !
- ipartitioned and apportioned