House v. Talbot

Citations

• 51 Tex. 462

Syllabus

<p>Forfeiture of survey—Abandonment of location.—B located .a land certificate June 20,1852; survey of same June 30,1852; field-notes returned to the general land office June 7, 1853, without return of approval by surveyor, though the records of the surveyor’s office showed registry of the field-notes. On June 30, 1853, O, who appeared to have had an interest in the certificate, withdrew the field-notes from the general land office, and two days afterwards B relo1 cated the certificate on the same laud; but neither the field-notes and certificate of relocation nor the original certificate were returned or filed in the general land office within the year following. On June 13, 1871, a duplicate of the original certificate was filed in the general land office. On April 14, 1870, D, having actual notice of B’s claim, filed on the same land, and on March 9, 1871, had a survey made, and a patent issued to him July 20,1871. The evidence tended to show that at the date of the location of D’s certificate B’s field-notes were not in the general land office. B paid taxes on the land and exercised acts of ownership from 1853 to 1872. In a suit by B against D for the recovery of the land: Held—</p> <p>1. The failure of B to have the certificate, with the field-notes of his survey, returned to the general land office, did not work a forfeiture of his survey, if valid in other respects.</p> <p>2. The withdrawal of B’s field-notes in June, 1853, and his failure to procure their return to the general land office until after the location of the laud by D in April, 1870, constituted an abandonment and forfeiture in law of B’s location, whatever may have been his intention.</p>