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92 HIGH COURT OF CHANCERY. of the slave, as the defendant's own absolute property, and that he has kept and used him ever since as such. That the statement of the bill, that the slave was put in the possession of the defendant, Hopkins, about the date of the mortgage, or shortly thereafter, is incorrect, is most clearly es- tablished by the evidence: which is equally conclusive in showing that the possession was held by the mortgagor until October, 1843, the period of the alleged sale set up in the answer. And upon a careful examination of the whole evi- dence, my conviction is very strong, that the true nature of the transaction is to be found in the answer. It is impossible, I think, to read the evidence, without coming to the conclusion, or at all events, without admitting that the weight of evidence is decidedly that way. There is, to be sure, some little diffi- culty in reconciling the proof of Ezra Sheckell, in relation to the draft for $300, which it appears was paid in the year, 1845, by the complainant to the defendant, and the conversation which the witness held with the defendant in the spring of 1847, with the other proof in the cause. But looking to the mass of evidence in support of the answer, the repeated, une- quivocal and incontestably proved admissions by the complain- ant, of the defendant's title, both in language and by acts, I do not feel justified in giving to that conversation, the effect claimed for it. If this $300 was paid in 1845, on account of, and in redemption of this slave, it is a little strange the com- plainant did not take a receipt for the money, explaining the character of the transaction. The slave had been in the pos- session of the defendant for two years, claiming him as his own; and it is impossible to suppose the complainant was ig- norant of, or had forgotten his declarations to the witness, Sparrow and others, in relation to him. Under these circumstan- ces it is certainly extremely improbable that he could have paid a large sum for the purpose of redeeming his property, and have no evidence of it, but a casual conversation between his brother and the defendant, held two year's subsequently. Besides, that conversation is, as it seems to me, very far from being an unambiguous admission of the ground taken by the |
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Reports of Cases in the High Court of Chancery of Maryland 1846-1854
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