Case Name: Gilpin, Judge of the Orphans' Court, for the use of Faxon, v. Crandell's Administratrix
Court: United States Circuit Court of the District of Columbia
Jurisdiction: United States
Decision Date: 1812-11
Citations: 2 Cranch 57
Docket Number: 
Parties: Gilpin, Judge of the Orphans’ Court, for the use of Faxon, v. Crandell’s Administratrix.
Judges: 
Reporter: Reports of cases argued and determined in the Supreme Court of the District of Columbia (District of Columbia - reported by Mackey)
Volume: 2
Pages: 57–58

Head Matter:
Gilpin, Judge of the Orphans’ Court, for the use of Faxon, v. Crandell’s Administratrix.
An action cannot he maintained, under the laws of Virginia, upon an administration bond, until a devastavit shall have been established in a suit against the administrator. ,
Debt on the administration bond of Crandell, who was a surety in Dyson’s administration bond, for the non-payment of a debt due from Dyson, the intestate, and for which a judgment had been recovered by Faxon against Dyson’s administratrix. The defendant pleaded that Dyson’s administratrix had performed the conditions of the administration bond. The plaintiff replied that she had not, in this: that Faxon had recovered judgment against her de bonis intestatoris, for $59, upon which a fieri facias was returned nulla bona, and that she had assets, but wasted them; to which ther.e was a general replication and issue.
Mr. E. J. Lee, for the defendant,
contended that he had a right to prove a devastavit in this case, in the same manner as if the plea had been pleaded by Dyson’s administratrix herself in a suit against her.

Opinion:
But
the Court,
(nem con.) was of opinion, under the decisions in Virginia, that this suit was not maintainable ; as no devastavit had been established in a suit against Dyson's administratrix.