Fickes's Estate

Citations

• 59 Pa. Super. 535
• 1915 Pa. Super. LEXIS 116

Syllabus

<p>Will — Trusts and trustees — Oral evidence to establish trust — Limitation on absolute gift.</p> <p>1. Where a testator makes a devise or bequest absolute in form but upon a private understanding with the devisee or legatee that he will apply the estate to objects named by the testator, a trust arises which a court of equity will enforce and this whether the trust arises through the expressed promise of the devisee or legatee, or his assent which may be implied from his silence.</p> <p>2. Where a testatrix gives all of her estate to a person named “her heirs and assigns forever, she knowing full well my wishes and I having confidence that she will carry them out,” parol evidence is admissible to show that the legatee, who was also the executrix, was present when the will was executed, that she knew the purpose of the testatrix to give legacies of a designated amount to two of testatrix’s brothers, and the children of another brother, and that the devisee promised the testatrix to carry out her wishes in the settlement of her estate. The trust thus established is not defeated because the testatrix said at the time she gave instructions with reference to the distribution of the property that if the legatee should interfere with the executrix and make trouble, she, the executrix, should “close in on them.”</p>