Williams v. Lee

Miller, J., delivered the opinion of the Court. Under proceedings in equity which need not be stated at length, the real estate of Priscilla Stump, deceased, was sold for the purpose of distribution amongst her heirs-at-law. After the sale two papers were offered for probate in the Orphans’ Court purporting to be her will, and a codicil thereto. A supplemental bill was then filed in the equity cause, alleging the discovery of these papers, denying their validity for want of testamentary capacity, but bringing in and making defendants all parties who could claim as devisees or legatees thereunder.

The parties thus brought in answered and averred that the deceased at the time she executed these papers, was fully competent to execute the same, and they were therefore valid testamentary dispositions of her property. On this question of capacity a mass of testimony was taken, upon which the Court below decreed the papers to be null and void, and directed the proceeds of sale to be distributed to the heirs-at-law ; the appellant is the only party in interest vrho has taken an appeal from this decree, and he claims under the alleged codicil to the will-. By that paper the deceased devised the “Stafford Mills” and land thereto attached, to her brother Herman Stump for life, and after his death, to her nephew, the appellant, in fee. The record shows that no exception was taken by the appellant, a defendant in the Circuit Court, to the jurisdiction of a Court of equity to determine the question of testamentary capacity, and in that case the Code, (Art. 5, sec. 2T,) forbids any such objection to be made in this Court.

Our decision in this case cannot therefore be construed as decisive of this jurisdictional question. What we are called upon to decide by this appeal is, was the Court below right in deciding upon the evidence before it, that the deceased had not testamentary capacity at the date of this codicil ? To that end we have examined and considered the testimony in the record. ³²⁵ From this it appears that in July, 1847, Miss Stump was, under proper proceedings instituted for the purpose, found to be a lunatic, and her person and property placed in charge of a committee consisting of Judge John H. Price and Henry W. Archer, and so remained until her death in July, 1865. The inquisition states she was a lunatic without lucid intervals, incapable of managing her property and had been in the same state from 1845, and for how much longer the jurors know not, neither do they know how she became so unless by the visitation of God.

The testimony discloses her mental condition for a long period prior as well as subsequent to this finding. The alleged will was executed in February, 1838, and the codicil in April, 1843, the former having been written by Dr. Worthington, the family physician, and the latter by Judge Price. These papers were left in the custody of Judge Price, who seems to have forgotten their existence and did not discover them until nearly a year after her death. There were three subscribing witnesses to each paper, and of these but two, Mr. Wiles, a witness to the will and afterwards a Judge of the Orphans’ Court, and Judge Price, a witness to the codicil, survive and have testified in the case.

Each of them without hesitation and with emphasis swears that on the respective dates of these papers she was, in his opinion, incompetent to execute a will. Their testimony is important and entitled to great weight. As attesting witnesses they were entitled to give their opinions unaccompanied by any statement of facts or circumstances upon which they were founded. But added to this, one of them, Judge Price, had a long and intimate acquaintance with the deceased.

He knew her well from 1828 to the time of her death. He was closely connected by marriage with her and her family, and his position as one of her committee for eighteen years afforded him ample opportunity to know her mental condition. The fact that these gentlemen attested these papers, ³²⁶ whilst it affords prima facie evidence that they then considered her sane, does not prevent them from testifying as to