Morrish v. Morrish

Citations

• 262 Pa. 192
• 105 A. 83
• 1918 Pa. LEXIS 619

Syllabus

<p>Equity — Equity practice — Two-witness rule — Application—Married women — Husband and wife — Suit by wife for her separate property — Deed to husband shortly before marriage — Fraud—Accounting — Evidence—Sufficiency—Laches — Estoppel — Presumption — Limitation—Goal royalties — Interest—Acts of April 22,1856, P. L. 582-8, Sec. 6, ■and March 27,1918, P. L. H.</p> <p>1. The two-witness rule does not require that every detail of one witness’s testimony must be corroborated by the direct evidence of another, but only that a litigant’s material, or controlling, allegations must be sustained by either one other witness or equivalent corroborating circumstances.</p> <p>2. Where at a hearing of a suit in equity for the cancellation of a deed and for an accounting, no point was raised, at the conclusion of the plaintiff’s case, that her case had not been sufficiently proved ■as required by the two-witness rule and thereafter the defendant appeared as a witness for himself, and admitted that the deed, sought to be cancelled, had, in fact, the effect contended for by plaintiff, the two-witness rule no longer had any application.</p> <p>3. In a suit by a married woman to compel her husband to re-convey to her certain property which she had conveyed to him just prior to her marriage, where it appeared that such conveyance was absolute in form, and where there was evidence that it was induced by false representations on the part of the husband as to the effect of the conveyance and that he had stated to her that it merely gave him control of the property so that he might manage it for her benefit; and where defendant admitted on the stand that it was not intended that he should have absolute control of the property, although, in his answer, he claimed absolute ownership thereof, the court properly entered a decree in favor of plaintiff.</p> <p>4. In such ease the wife is a competent witness, the Act of March 27, 1913, P. L. 14, using the words “separate property” in a broad and