Case Name: Bell vs. Gamble and Montgomery, admr's
Court: Tennessee Supreme Court
Jurisdiction: Tennessee
Decision Date: 1848-09
Citations: 9 Hum. 117
Docket Number: 
Parties: Bell vs. Gamble and Montgomery, admr’s.
Judges: 
Reporter: Tennessee Reports
Volume: 28
Pages: 117–119

Head Matter:
Bell vs. Gamble and Montgomery, admr’s.
Where a note was signed and delivered, with an understanding that it should not be enforced, a Court of Chancery will not permit its enforcement.
Hewet executed a note to Thompson, and Thompson brought the note to Bell and requested him to sign it. Bell signed it, with an understanding that he was not to be held responsible thereon. Hewet was the father-in-law of Bell, and the administrator of the estate of Bell’s father. Beil signed the note, with the purpose of enabling him successfully to urge on Hewet the payment of it. Thompson died, and Gamble and Montgomery administered on his estate. They sued Bell, and during the pendency of the suit, Bell filed this bill in the Chancery Court at Knoxville, praying an injunction against the further prosecution of the proceeding at law. At the hearing on the proof, the presiding Chancellor (Williams) granted a perpetual injunction, in conformity with the prayer of the bill.
The defendants filed a transcript of the record in the office of the Clerk of the Supreme Court, and assigned errors for the reversal of the decree in the Chancery Court.
T. Lyon, for complainant.
E. Maynard, for the defendants.

Opinion:
GRbbn, J.
delivered the opinion of the court.
The bill alledges that Nathaniel Hewet, the step-father of the complainant, was indebted to one Jesse Thompson, in the sum of three hundred and thirty-seven dollars and eighty-eight cents, for which, said Thompson took Hewet's note; — that after said note was taken, Thompson applied to the complainant, then a young man, about twenty years old, to sign the note also — which the complainant declined to do. Thompson then told complainant, that he did not wish to hold him responsible, but that he was apprehensive Hewet was mis-managing his affairs, and that he was afraid of the loss of the debt, and wished the signature of the complainant, only for the purpose of engaging him to give the debt some attention, and to urge Hewet to pay it. Upon these assurances, complainant, confiding in said Thompson, agreed to sign, and did execute said note. Thompson has died, and the defendants are his administrators, and have sued on the note. Complainant declines relying on and pleading his infancy at the time the note was executed. «
The allegations of the bill are substantially proved, and we think constitute a good ground for enjoining the enforcement of this note against the complainant.
If Thompson was living, and was to attempt to enforce an obligation thus procured, it would be a gross fraud. And although these administrators are not chargeable with any intentional wrong, yet this note on the complainant, so executed, can have no more obligatory effect on him, in their hands, than it would have had in the hands of their intestate.
Affirm the decree.