6 Ky. 125 | Ky. Ct. App. | 1813
This is a contest for land under adverse claims. ■ The appellants were complainants, and derive their title under a settlement and; pre-emption granted to Peter Flinn The certificate and entry of the settlement calls to lie “at the mouth of Brashears’ creekvin the fork of said creek and Salt river, crossing the creek to include a pond.” The entry upon the pre-emption warrant was made the 30th of March 178⅜, and calls to adjoin the settlement “on the north and east sides thereof, and to run north and east for quantity.”
Salt river and Brashears’ creek were agreed by the parties to have been notorious by those names, at and before the date of these entries, and to have continued so ever since.
A pond of the extent of about SO by IQO poles is delineated on the surveyor’s report, and from its situation may be included in the survey of the settlement by running it across the creek. But there being no other evidence of the pond than the surveyor’s report, it is con
The objects called for being established, there is no difficulty with respect to the manner in which the surveys should be made.
The line forming the northern boundary of the settlement should barely include the pond, and be run at right angles to a course from the point of confluence of Salt river and Brashears’ creek through the pond and bisecting it; the eastern and western boundaries should be formed by lines at right angles to the northern boundary, each being equidistant from the pond : the latter when it strikes the creek to run with it to its mouth, and the former to be extended across the creek to Salt river. The pre-emption should adjoin the settlement, when thus surveyed, on the north and east; its lines to be equidistant from the north and east lines of the settlement.
For all the land included in the settlement and preemption respectively, when thus surveyed, and which is
It is made a question whether the survey upon this entry should begin a mile from the mouth of the creek measuring along its meanders or on a straight line ? It is settled, that where a distance is given on a road, it ought to be ascertained by the windings of the road ; but it has also long since been settled, that where a distance is given on a stream like the present, which presents no impassable obstructions, the distance should be understood to be on a straight line.
-The point of beginning being thus fixed, it remains to be determined how the lines of the survey shall be run. The ordinary mode of surveying an entry with similar calls, would require the lines to be run at right angles, those extending up the stream to be parallel to the general course thereof so far as it would be included in the survey, and those extending across the stream
We are, therefore, of opinion that the survey should be extended from the beginning up the creek with the courses of its meanders, so far as will include the quantity in a survey the length of which shall be three times its width ; the side lines to be equally distant from the creek, and the end lines to be at right angles to the general course of the creek so far as the same shall be included in the survey. This mode of surveying, though different from that directed by the court below, will not give the appellants any other or more land than they will be entitled to under the decree of that court.
The decree must therefore be affirmed with costs.