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117 Mass. 506

Brown v. Matthews

Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court · decided 1875-05-08

Petition, filed April 1,1873, under the Gen. Sts. e. 134, § 49, to compel the respondent to bring an action to try his alleged title to a parcel of land in Boston. The answer disclaimed title as to a part of the described premises; and, as to the residue, denied the seisin and possession of the petitioners, and alleged that the respondent was seised and possessed thereof.

Relies on Silsbee v. City of Salem

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1875-05-08

How this case has been cited

Cited by 3 later decisions — most recently January 1901

3 state decisions

101875188018901900decided

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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Gray, C. J.

¶1At the hearing of this petition before a single justice, there was evidence that the land in question, which had previously been flats partly covered with tide water, had been filled up by the Boston Water Power Company, while the respondent was president of that corporation, with gravel to the height of twelve feet, and, thus improved, conveyed by the cor*509porati on to the petitioners, who afterwards placed building stones upon the land, and fenced it, and paid the taxes thereon.

¶2These facts, taken in connection with the other evidence introduced by the parties, warranted the conclusion that the petitioners had, and the respondent had not, such a practical bond fide occupation of the premises as to constitute a substantial and exclusive possession; and that the respondent therefore should be ordered to bring an action to try the title. India Wharf v. Central Wharf, ante, 504.

¶3Ho reason is shown why this respondent, upon the trial of that action, should not be required to prove the seisin of his grantors, as well as all other facts necessary to maintain his claim.

¶4It is therefore ordered that he bring a writ of entry against the petitioners, returnable at the next term of the court, and that the petition stand continued meanwhile. Silsbee v. Salem, 103 Mass. 144. Ordered accordingly.

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