Johnson v. Cobb

Citations

• 29 S.C. 372
• 7 S.E. 601
• 1888 S.C. LEXIS 149

Syllabus

<p>1. In action for the recovery of land, plaintiff can recover only by proving title in himself; but where he proves title as heir at law of B, it is sufficient if he further shows that defendant went into possession and claimed his title also under B.</p> <p>2. The admissions in the answer sufficiently identified the tract of land described in the complaint, by stating its former ownership and boundaries, notwithstanding a difference in the number of acres.</p> <p>3. Motion for security for costs, made at the trial on only three days’ notice, was not improperly refused. Is the refusal of such a motion appealable ?</p> <p>4. A proceeding instituted in the old court of ordinary (which was a court of special and limited jurisdiction), by the grandfather of two infants, for the sale of a tract of land, -without any notice to the infants, to whom the land exclusively belonged, was absolutely void, and the purchaser under such proceeding acquired no title.</p> <p>5. Under the old statute of limitations (prior to the code), a person could not, by adverse possession, defeat the claim of the rightful owner to land, without showing that she (the adverse possessor), or those under whom she claimed, had held the land adversely for ten consecutive years, five of which were after the owner's majority. Under the code, the adverse holding must be for ten years after disability removed.</p> <p>6. Where lands held by a trespasser are sold for partition after his death and purchased by one of the heirs, who afterwards conveys it to the other heir, these purchasers are not in possession by descent from their ancestor, but as of a new entry, and their trespass cannot be tacked to the ancestor's trespass to complete the statutory bar. The statute of limitations in force when their trespass commenced will control the case.</p>