Clark v. Chamberlin

Decided March 15, 1873

Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court · decided 1873-03-15

Contract for the breach of an agreement for the purchase of land. Among other defences the Statute of Frauds was relied upon. The case was tried in the Superior Court, before Devens, J., without a jury, who, upon the facts as found by him, reported the case for the determination of this court. The facts, so far as they were material to decision, were as follows : The plaintiff, being the owner of certain land in Brookline,advertised and offered it for sale by auction.

Relies on Whelan v. Sullivan

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1873-03-15

How this case has been cited

Cited by 7 later decisions — most recently January 1942

7 state decisions

Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.

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Morton, J.

¶1The insuperable difficulty in the plaintiff’s case is, that the memorandum in writing does not contain a description of the premises sold sufficient to satisfy the Statute of Frauds. It describes the land sold as lots Ho. 1 and 2, but no plan is referred to, and none existed, fixing the location or limits of the lots. It does not in itself, or by reference to other writings, contain the means of identifying the premises. Whelan v. Sullivan, 102 Mass. 204.

¶2It shows that the defendant agreed to purchase a part of a large tract of land owned by the plaintiff, but furnishes no means of determining what or how large a part.

¶3Judgment for the defendant.