129 Ga. 791 | Ga. | 1907
Sterling E. Shackelford and others brought an action against Anna A. Orris to recover a described parcel of land. Upon the trial the plaintiffs offered in evidence, as a necessary-link in the chain of title upon which they relied, a deed from Ann E. Wilkinson to Wm. E. Shackelford, trustee, dated May 24, 1893, and recorded January 17, 1894, in which the property sought to be conveyed was described as follows: “A tract or parcel of land situate, lying, and being the County of Bichmond and State of Georgia, containing fifteen (15) acres, more or less, on the Louisville public road, about seven miles from Augusta and being a portion of a tract of land bought by the party of the first part from Butler and Mims, and from Mrs. Francis Shopp, in 1878, deeds to said property being duly recorded in the clerk’s office. The 15 acres hereby conveyed are bounded as follows: north by lands of T. B. Crouch and Wm. Stucker; south by lands of the party of the first part; east by the Louisville public road; and west by the Louisville plank road (old Southwestern road).” The defendants objected to the deed going in evidence, on the ground that it was “void, because the description in it is too uncertain to be supplemented by parol evidence.” Before ruling on the admissibility of the instrument, the court permitted the plaintiffs to introduce' certain oral and documentary evidence tending, as claimed, to support the admissibility of the deed. Such documentary evidence, in our opinion, threw no light on the question. The substance of the testimony of James M. Bozier, so far as material, was as follows: He and William Hill own the land formerly owned by Crouch and Stucker. The line between the. land of witness and the Wilkinson land is straight. Witness does not know whether the land between the land owned by Hill and the Wilkin- ■ son land is straight or not The Louisville road and the Southwestern plank road are not parallel, they have crooks in them. D. V. Beeves testified: He is the county surveyor of Bichmond county. He surveyed and platted a fifteen-acre tract of land, the same being a portion of the Wilkinson place, and described in the deed under consideration. “The north line of that tract is marked straight on the plat; it is straight on the ground; there may have been a time, perhaps, when there was a bend in it; but now, bj agreement of all parties, the line has been made perfectly straight from the Louisville road across to the Southwestern plank road;
The question whether the deed excluded from evidence was void, for uncertainty in the description of the land sought to be thereby ■conveyed, may be readily solved, in our opinion, by the application of a few well-settled rules of construction of descriptions of realty sought to be conveyed. A deed will not be held to be void for uncertainty, if, by any reasonable construction, it can be upheld.' 3 Wash. Real Prop. §2320; Payton v. McPhaul, 128 Ga. 510 (58 S. E. 50). In other words, that construction which renders the instrument valid and operative shall be adopted, rather than one which renders it void. Martindale on Conveyancing, §100. If the description of the premises given in a deed affords sufficient means of. ascertaining and identifying the land
Judgment reversed.