Case Name: Hezekiah Reeves against James Middleton
Court: General Court of Maryland
Jurisdiction: Maryland
Decision Date: 1790-05
Citations: 2 Md. 414
Docket Number: 
Parties: Hezekiah Reeves against James Middleton.
Judges: 
Reporter: Maryland reports, being a series of the most important law cases argued and determined in the Provincial Court and Court of Appeals of the then province of Maryland, from the year 1700 [i.e. 1658] down to the [end of 1799]
Volume: 2
Pages: 414–415

Head Matter:
GENERAL COURT,
MAY TERM, 1790.
Hezekiah Reeves against James Middleton.
THIS was an appeal from Charles County Court. It was an action of trespass quare clausum fregit for entering the close of the plaintiff, called Middleton?s and Askom?s Progress, tying in Charles County.
By the bill of exceptions taken in this cause in the County Court, 2XSeptember term, 1787, it appears that in this cause a plot was returned, upon which, by order of the plaintiff, a tract of land called Jourdan was laid down agreeably to a plot taken in a cause between' Walter Smith against Smith, Sarah, Ignatius, and James Middleton, formerly depending in the Provincial Court, which last-mentioned James Middleton is the defendant in this action; that the plaintiff in ttys action offered to read and shew to the Jury the said plot, taken in the cause aforesaid, of Walter Smith against Smith, Sarah, Ignatius and James Middleton, signed and sealed by the Sheriff and Surveyor of Charles County, and returned to the Provincial Court, to shew the admission of the defendant as to the running of the lines of the said tract of land called Jourdan, without producing any other evidence of the admission aforesaid. The defendant ob * jected to this evidence, and The Court were of opinion the same should be, and it was accordingly rejected. The plaintiff excepted to the opinion of the Court, and appealed to the General Court.
Key and IV. H. Dorsey, for the appellant.
Cooke and M. J. Stone, for the appellee.
Cooke, for the appellee.
A verdict, to be admitted in evidence, must be between the same parties. If the plot is evidence, it can be so only because it is part of the proceedings, and a part cannot be evidence unless the whole record is produced. 1 Stra. 162. Vin. Evid. 122. Comb. 337. The minutes of the Court are not evidence. Holt, 347. O. L. E. 287. 6 Mod. 149.
If the whole of the proceedings had been produced, it might have appeared that the decision of the Court and Jury were in that cause against the defendant’s location, and corresponding with his claim on this occasion. Bull. 230. But whether it was so or not, it ought not to be evidence. The defendant must give some location on the plots returned in the cause, or admit the plaintiff’s location; and the defendant often makes a location in order to oblige the plaintiff to prove his location, without any regard to the true situation of the land. See 1 Raym. 734.

Opinion:
The General Court reversed the judgment of the County Court, and remitted the cause to the County Court for a new trial.