Court Opinion

ID: 9830437
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-01 20:12:52.629906+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:43:22.464646
License: Public Domain

On Rehearing.
As appears from our opinion, we held the testimony of the witness Austell concerning the declarations of appellee relating to his wife’s health at the date of their marriage inadmissible on the ground that it appeared from the application for insurance that she: had been married five years, and that the state of her health at that time would not be proof of the state of her health five years later. Appellant now calls our attention for the first time to the fact that appellee testified on trial that he and the insured had been married but a year when she died. With such conflict in the evidence we would hold the error reversible, but for the fact that an examination of the record discloses that the court finally did, after appellee had rested, admit such proof, as is shown by the following excerpt taken from the statement of facts:
“Mrs. Cleona Austell, recalled by the defendant, testified as follows: ‘While I was living in the house with Mr. and Mrs. Shepherd, in the fall of 1917,1 heard Mr. Frank Shepherd, in the presence of his wife, state that he married her when she was nearly dead with consumption and that he had doctored her up.’ ”
Cross-examination by Mr. Thomas for the plaintiff:
“There is nothing else I want to tell against this man Shepherd. I have not told any of my friends or neighbors that I was willing to swear anything on this trial to hurt old Shepherd. I did not say any such thing as that.”
The motion for rehearing is overruled.