THIS was an appeal from the Circuit Court of the United States for the district of Michigan.
It was a bill filed on the equity side of the court, by John Baptiste Beaubien and twenty-one others, aliens and residents of Canada, against Antoine Beaubien and one hundred and twenty-seven others, thirteen of whom were citizens of Michigan and residents of Detroit. The rest of the defendants were admitted to be parties by order of the court.
The complainants began the history of their title as early as 1745, when the Governor and Intendant of the Territory gave to their ancestor, Beaubien, a concession of land of three arpens in front on Lake Erie, by forty arpens in depth; and afterwards, in 1747, the same persons granted to one Barois a concession of two arpens in front by forty arpens in depth adjoining the above. They then traced the title down, as stated in the opinion of the court.
Some of the defendants demurred to the bill, and the rest pleaded that they were bona fide purchasers, without notice.
In 1857, the court passed the following decree:
'This cause having been brought on to be heard on the demurrer of the above defendants and others, to the amended bill of complaint, and the plea of the Right Reverend Peter Paul Le Fevre and Theodore Williams, claiming to be bona fide purchasers for a valuable consideration, without notice, of the lands and premises owned and claimed by them on the Antoine Beaubien and Lambert Beaubien farms, described in the bill of complaint and in said plea, and the said demurrer and plea having been argued by G. T. Sheldon, solicitor and counsel, and W. H. Emmons, counsel for said defendants, and Messrs. Burt and Maynard, counsel for the complainants, and the arguments of counsel having been duly considered, i is ordered, adjudged, and decreed, that the demurrer hereto fore filed of the above defendants, Theodore Williams and the Right Reverend Peter Paul Le Fevre and others, claiming a portion of the lands and premises in the bill of complaint mentioned, as heirs, donees, or otherwise, without valuable consideration, be, and is hereby, sustained; and the said plea of the said defendants, Right Reverend Peter Paul Le Fevre and Theodore Williams, claiming other portions of said lands and premises in their said plea mentioned, as bona fide purchasers for a valuable consideration, without notice, having been argued by the respective counsel, and the arguments of counsel having been duly considered, it is ordered, adjudged, and decreed, that the said plea of the said defendants, Peter Paul Le Fevre and Theodore Williams, be, and is hereby, sustained; and that the said bill of complaint of the complainants, as to all said land and premises described and set forth in said plea, be, and is hereby, dismissed.'
From this decree, the complainants appealed to this court.
It was submitted on printed arguments by Mr. Platt Smith for the appellants, and Mr. Carlisle for the appellees, upon a brief filed by himself, Mr. Emmons, and Mr. Russell.
After Mr. Smith had argued that the bill set forth a complete title, and that the facts charged were admitted by the pleadings, he proceeded to notice the question of the lapse of time.
Lapse of time is not made a question by the pleadings; the court will not presume for the defendants what they do not claim for themselves.
Anthony Bledsoe was killed by the Indians, 20th July, 1788; he made a will, devising 'my estate to be equally divided amongst my children; to each of my daughters a small tract of land.' He left five sons and six daughters. There were 6,280 acres of land in Tennessee; the executors assigned 320 acres to each of the girls, and made deeds. Polly, the eighth child, in 1799, being then a minor, married Weatherhead, she and her husband took possession of the 320 acres that had been assigned to her. In 1801, the residue of the lands was divided among the sons. In 1818, Polly Weatherhead and her husband sold the 320 acres that had been assigned to her, and they removed to Mississippi. In 1843, Mr. Weatherhead died. In 1846, Polly Weatherhead brought suit for her portion of the whole tract. The boys and their grantees had made valuable improvements, built brick houses, &c. The suit was brought fifty-eight years after the death of the ancestor, fifty-three years after the partition among the girls, forty-five years after that among the boys. She maintained her suit.
Weatherhead's Lessee v. Baskerville et al., 11 Howard, 329, 359, 360.
In Stackpole v. Davoren, an account of rents and profits of an estate was decreed, after an adverse possession of fifty years.
1 Bro. P. C., 9, referred to in Hill on Trustees, 265.