Gantt v. Trott

Schmucker, J., delivered the opinion of the Court. This appeal brings up for review by us the distribution made by the Orphans’ Court of- Calvert County of a net balance of proceeds of sale of a farm owned by Charles F. Gantt in his lifetime and sold after his death for the payment of' his debts. The power of the Orphans’ Court to direct the sale of the land, which had been appraised at less than $2,500, and the regularity of the sale are both.conceded. The only controversy is whether the net fund amounting to $208.12 is to go to the appellants who are the heirs at law of the deceased on his father’s side or to the’appellee who is his heir at law on his mother’s side.

It appears from the record that Charles F. Gantt died in February, 1906, intestate, unmarried and without issue, at the age of about sixty-one years, seized and possessed of a farm' of forty acres in Calvert County on which he had resided all of his life. The destruction of the Calvert County Court House by fire in 1882 had obliterated the record evidence, if any such existed, of the source of his title to the farm and he had never attempted to re-establish on the records any evi ³²⁷ dence of the ownership of his lands, as those persons, whose muniments of title had been destroyed by the fire, were authorized to do by chap. 116 of the Acts of 1886. The uncontradicted testimony in the record shows that Gantt was the only child of his parents, and that his father died and his mother afterwards married a Mr. Whittington prior to 1876, and that she died shortly thereafter without having had any other children. Samuel Turner aged sixty-one years who had lived adjoining the farm or within a mile of it all of his life, testified that Gantt and his mother had lived on the farm from his early childhood until her death which occurred about thirty years ago and that Gantt had continued to live there until his death in 1906.

He also testified that he had often heard the mother say that she had received the farm from her father, Thomas Hunt, and had often heard the son say that the property belonged to his mother and that he got it from her at her death. He further testified that such was the prevalent opinion in the neighborhood as to the nature of Gantt’s title to the farm. Substantially the same testimony was given by Charles T. Chaney who had been acquainted with Gantt for forty years prior to his death, and by the appellee, Richard H. Trott, who is the only direct descendant of Thomas Hunt now living. It was also proved that in 1876 the farm was assessed for taxes to Mrs. Whittington and that it had stood in her name on the tax books ever since then.

No attempt was made to contradict this testimony but the portion of it which consisted of proof of statements made to the witnesses by Gantt and his mother as to the character of their title to and possession of the farm were excepted to as being hearsay, and all of it was excepted to because the testimony of the respective witnesses was not read to them before signing in accordance with the