Pyle v. Gross

Fowler, J., delivered the opinion of the Court: John Gross owned a large tract of land in Harford County, and in October, 1872, together with his wife, Margaret Gross, conveyed it by way of mortgage as follows, namely, to secure the respective sums of $3,500 and $3,000 to Susan B. Han-way and Jas. K. Hamilton. These mortgages were duly assigned to D. Meredith Reese, trustee, and Robert M. Chatterton, who on default being made, filed their bill in the Circuit Court for said county and sold the mortgaged premises, with the exception of sixteen acres thereof, which had been conveyed in fee by Gross and his wife to one D. Preston Wysong, subsequent to the execution of said mortgages. By the deed just mentioned the property thereby conveyed was ¹³³ warranted generally to Wysong, his heirs and assigns, by the joint covenant of the grantor and his wife, Margaret Gross, and by mesne conveyances became vested in the plaintiff, Elisha R. Pyle, on the 29th December, 1891.

The mortgages not having been satisfied by the sale already mentioned, the sixteen acres so conveyed to the plaintiff were also sold, and he was compelled to purchase the same at the mortgage sale or submit to an ouster. The sale to the plaintiff, under the mortgage, having been duly ratified, after due notice and demand, he brought this suit against the defendant, Mrs. Gross, to recover damages for the violation of the joint covenant of general warranty of her husband and herself. The defendant demurred to the declaration, and the only question intended to be presented by the demurrer is whether she, being a married woman, was liable, prior to the Act of 1898, ch. 457, to the plaintiff (he being the assignee of the husband’s grantee) on a covenant in a deed conveying her husband’s land in which she joined for the purpose of releasing her inchoate right of dower. The learned Judge below sustained the demurrer and the plaintiff has appealed.

The solution of the question thus presented depends,