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59 Cal. 113

Biggins v. Champlin

California Supreme Court

Decided July 15, 1881

California Supreme Court · decided 1881-07-15

<p>Actual Location—Agreed Boundary Line—Acquiescence—Statute of Limitations—Patent.—The plaintiff’s grantor and the defendant proposing to build a division fence, the former pointed out a line to the latter as the correct Une, and the fence was built accordingly; and the line thus practically located was recognized and acquiesced in by the parties interested for a period of about eighteen years:</p> <p>Held, in an action of ejectment (a United States patent having issued for the land within five years before the commencement of the suit), that acquiescence for so long a time in the line as located was conclusive evidence of its correctness.</p>

Relies on Baldwin v. . Brown · Columbet v. Pacheco

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1881-07-15

How this case has been cited

Cited by 8 later decisions — most recently January 1962

8 state decisions

40188118901900191019201930194019501960decided

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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Ross, J.:

¶1This case involves the right to a strip of land embracing one acre and a fraction. The plaintiff claims it as a part of his tract, and the defendant as a part of his. Both plaintiff and defendant deraign title from M. G. Vallejo, who was the grantee from the Mexican Government of the Petaluma Bancho, situated in Sonoma County. The tract claimed by the plaintiff was, on the 20th of August, 1856, conveyed by Vallejo to one Munday, who entered into possession of it, and continued in possession until September 24th, 1864, when he conveyed it to the plaintiff. July 7th, 1856, Vallejo conveyed the tract claimed by the defendant to one Nancy Hinckston. Although this deed antedated the one to Munday, it called for the eastern boundary of the Munday tract as a boundary of the land conveyed by it. On the 4th of October, 1856. Nancy Hinckston conveyed to the defendant the tract acquired by her from Vallejo. The defendant thereupon took possession of it, and has ever since remained in possession.

¶2It having been proposed to build a division fence between the tracts, Munday and the defendant, in February or March, 1859, went upon the ground for the purpose of locating the dividing line with a view to building the fence. Munday pointed out a line to the defendant as the correct line. Defendant thereupon built the part of the fence he was required to build, on the line so pointed out—Munday building the other portion.

¶3The line thus practically located has been recognized and acquiesced in ever since as the true dividing line between the two, tracts, by the defendant and by Munday, while he owned the Munday tract, and afterwards by the plaintiff until the year 1877—a period of about eighteen years. Under such circumstances, it makes no difference that the parties, in making the location, acted under a mistake as to the true line. *117Acquiescence for so long a time in the line as located is conclusive evidence of its correctness. (Columbet v. Pacheco, 48 Cal. 395; Sneed v. Osborn, 25 id. 626; Baldwin v. Brown, 16 N. Y. 359; Reed v. Farr, 35 id. 113.)

¶4Judgment and order affirmed.

¶5McKinstby, J., and McKee, J., concurred.

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