Savings Bank v. Causey

Sloan, J., delivered the- opinion of the Court. Maurice D. Causey filed a bill against the Savings Bank of Nanticoke, praying a decree to compel the bank to assign to him a mortgage for $200 given to it by Mrs. Edith M. Toadvine, his mother-in-law, and, from a decree in his favor, the defendant bank appeals. There was other relief prayed but, as it was abandoned by the plaintiff, it need not be discussed here. The Salisbury National Bank, trustee under the will ■of Walter B. Miller, held a mortgage from Edith M. Toadvine for $1100 on a parcel of land containing four and one-half acres, at Nanticoke, on which she, with her aged father, resided.

It had been conveyed to her by her father, Ware C. Walter, February 14th, 1898. The mortgage to Walter B. Miller was dated January 27th, 1914. June 4th, 1935, the Salisbury National Bank assigned the mortgage to Carroll E. Bounds and William W. Travers for the purpose of foreclosure, who advertised the property for sale on June 29th, 1935. Adjoining the four and one-half acre parcel was a one acre lot, conveyed to Mrs. Toadvine by Mary P. Crosley, April 1st, 1905, and from that time on the two parcels of land were occupied by Mrs. Toadvine and her father, the improvements being on the larger parcel.

On February 14th, ⁶⁷⁵ 1921, the Nanticoke Bank took a mortgage on the one acre parcel from Mrs. Toadvine to secure the payment of $200. On June 29th, 1935, the Nanticoke Bank held three judgments, which were general liens on all of the mortgaged real esetate, the balances on which then amounted to $1007.01. Two of the judgments, amounting to 8850, were also against Mrs. Toadvine’s father, Ware C. Walter. The day the Miller mortgage had been advertised for foreclosure, the plaintiff, Causey, whose home was in Baltimore, went to the Nanticoke Bank, and inquired of Wilbur F. Turner, then president of the bank, what it 'would require to stop the mortgagee’s sale and take up the liens on the property, and was advised that the liens amounted to 82250.

He then told Turner that if Mrs. Toadvine would convey her property, which he thought was all in one parcel, to him and his wife, they would give a mortgage to the bank for not more than 82300 on the Toadvine property, and on his own property, located nearby, on which the Nanticoke Bank already had a first mortgage, in consideration of the assignment to him of the bank’s liens, it having arranged, for its protection, to take over the Miller mortgage. Causey then went to see Mrs. Toadvine, who promptly consented to the proposed arrangement; whereupon, the same day, the following agreement, typewritten by Mr. Turner, was entered into between him, acting for the bank, and Mr.