Case Name: Joseph Brazer, Appellant, versus Jesse S. Dean and Another, Administrators, &c.
Court: Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court
Jurisdiction: Massachusetts
Decision Date: 1818-06
Citations: 14 Tyng 183
Docket Number: 
Parties: Joseph Brazer, Appellant, versus Jesse S. Dean and Another, Administrators, &c.
Judges: 
Reporter: Massachusetts Reports
Volume: 15
Pages: 171–172

Head Matter:
Joseph Brazer, Appellant, versus Jesse S. Dean and Another, Administrators, &c.
The judge of probate may allow to the widow of an intestate the wno.e of the personal estate, unless the amount be so great as to make the allowance extravagant
And, m such case, the charges of administration may be deducted from the proceeds of the real estate sold, by order of court, for the payment of the intestate’s debts.
The appellant was a creditor of the estate of Nathaniel Myrick, deceased, the respondents’ intestate, and appealed from a decree oí the judge of probate for the county of Penobscot, allowing the administration account of the respondents.* The estate was insolvent; the real estate, had been sold by virtue of a license for that purpose ; and the personal estate, amounting, by the inventory, to 146 dollars, had been allowed to the widow of the intestate for her use. That sum constituted one article in the account in question ; and, in consequence, the charges of the respondents for the expenses of administration were deducted from the proceeds of the sale of the real estate.
*One reason of appeal was, that the judge had allowed to the administrators the expenses and charges of settling the estate out of the said proceeds, which had been sold, by order of court, for the payment of the just debts which the deceased 3wed at the time of his death, with incidental charges; the estate so sold not having been taken by the said administrators on execution, or on a mortgage, in payment of a personal demand.
Vide Stat. 1788, c. 51.

Opinion:
Per Curiam.
This objection cannot prevail; because, the estate being regularly sold for the payment of debts, the proceeds are not distinguishable from the other personal estate, but the whole forms one common fund for the payment of debts and the expenses of administration. It is true that all the personal estate, in the present case, having been given to the widow, the expenses of the adminis tration are, eventually, taken out of the proceeds of the real estate But there can be no valid objection to this, the estate being regularly sold; and it would have been necessary to sell it, if there had been no expenses of administration.
Another reason of appeal was the said allowance, to the widow, of the whole personal estate of the deceased.
But the Court saw nothing improper in such a course, unless the amount of such personal estate was so great as to make the allowance extravagant, which they did not consider to he the case, here.
Decree affirmed.
Vide Stat. 1816, c. 95.