228 Pa. 475 | Pa. | 1910
Opinion by
The requirement of the Act of April 8, 1833, P. L. 249, is, that "every will shall be in writing, and unless the person making the same shall be prevented by the extremity of his last sickness, shall be signed by him at the end thereof.” The question raised on this appeal is whether the paper which was admitted to probate by the register of wills of Montgomery county as the last will and testament of Agnes J. Stinson had been signed by her at the end thereof. On appeal to the orphan’s court of the county from the action of the register, the president judge of the orphans’ court of Berks county, specially presiding, held, in a well-considered opinion, that the will had been so signed. The document admitted to probate consists of a single sheet of legal cap paper, folded in the middle in the usual way along the short dimension, making four pages of equal size. There is no writing on the fourth page. The writing in issue appears upon the first, second and third pages of the paper. The document is holographic and the signature of Agnes J. Stinson appears about the middle of the second page, following the usual
A will is the legal declaration of a man’s intention which he wills to be performed after his death. Such declaration must, under our Wills Act, be in writing and signed at the end thereof by the testator, unless prevented by an absolute inability. His written declaration
While no one of our cases where the question in which the sixth section of the act of 1833 was passed upon is precisely like the one now before us, Baker’s App., 107 Pa. 381, is similar to it, and what was there said is here
The requirement of the English acts is similar to that of our act of 1833 as to where a will is to be signed. In Goods of Coombs, L. R. 1 Probate and Divorce, 302, a will filled the first and third pages of a sheet of foolscap paper, leaving no room af the bottom of the third page for the signatures of the testator and the attesting witnesses. These were written on the second page, and it was held that the will was duly executed under 1 and 15 Vict., which require wills to be signed “at the foot or end” thereof. In the Goods of Wotton, L. R. 3 Probate
It is urged by the learned counsel for appellants that their contention that the end of a will is the physical end of the writing — the point spatially farthest removed from the beginning — has been sustained by the New York court of appeals in Will of Andrews, 162 N. Y. 1. But that case differed in very important particulars from this. There the will was written upon a printed blank, folded in the middle so as to make four consecutive pages, with the attestation clause at the top of the second page. At that point it was signed by the testator and the subscribing witnesses, and the first two pages made a complete will. The third page contained other and complete dispositions of property, in no manner connected with what appeared on the first and second pages, except that the third page was numbered “2nd page” and the second page “3rd page.” In addition, the will was not in the handwriting of the testatrix, but in that of a person to whom the bulk of the estate was given as the residuary beneficiary. The case cannot be regarded as authority at all for the question now before us, which was properly disposed of by the court below, and its decree is affirmed at appellants’ costs.