Page:The English Reports v1 1900.pdf/583
Clarke's estate, for portions for those daughters, alledging, that his father had nothing else to give them; and proposing, if the respondent would consent, that his father would at present allow him £260 a year for his maintenance, and at his death leave him the furniture of the capital house; but threatening, if he refused, to keep him at home, and allow him nothing. Under these circumstances, the respondent was drawn in to execute certain deeds which were prepared by his father's directions, and bore date the 15th and 16th of June 1724, and afterwards to join in a recovery; but the respondent was not allowed to advise upon the deeds, and was assured and depended upon it, that they were for no other purpose than as aforesaid, there being nothing more proposed, or asked of him. But he afterwards found, that he and his brother Stephen were thereby made only tenants for life successively of Clarke's estate, with remainder, in strict entail, to their respective issue male; remainder to Stephen, the respondent's father and his heirs; and that a proviso was thrown in at the end of the deed, that nothing should in any wise impeach or make void the jointure theretofore made by Stephen, the father, to the appellant Ann for life, in case she should happen to survive him, by virtue of a power given him by Clarke's will.
Stephen, the father, by deeds dated the 14th and 15th of July 1725, confirmed the deeds of the 13th and 14th of January 1717.
[279] The said Stephen, by his will, dated the 3d of August 1726, devised all the said Urith's copyhold lands, and a close called Bullock Storth, and a house called Chantry, to the appellant Ann and her four daughters, and gave the said Cornelius Clarke's whole estate, in case of failure of issue male of the respondent and his brother Stephen, to the said four daughters, and the heirs of their bodies; and he also gave them all his personal estate, amounting to £4000, and made the appellant Ann his executrix; and on the 1st of October 1727, he died. Soon after which, the appellant Ann brought an ejectment for the lands limited to her in jointure, and obtained a verdict.
The respondent, some-time after his father's death (and not before) discovered, and got into his hands his said mother's marriage agreement and settlement, and then finding what large provisions had been made for the appellant Ann and her daughters, he was advised, and on the 20th of February 1727, did bring his bill in Chancery against the appellant Ann and her daughters, for a specific performance of his mother's marriage agreement, and to restrain the appellant Ann from proceeding at law on the ejectment she had brought for her pretended jointure; and that he might be quieted in the possession of all Cornelius Clarke's estate, and for a discovery of his father's real and personal estates, and that the indenture of the 16th of June 1724 might be set aside, as having been unfairly obtained.
The appellant Ann, (while a widow,) for herself, and as guardian for her said daughters, put in an answer; and after her marriage, she and the appellant Gervas put in another answer, and thereby insisted on all the said deeds and provisions made for her and her children, and said, that on her marriage, the said Stephen Offley told her, he could not, in his father's life-time, provide for her and their children in the manner he intended; but verbally promised, that on his father's death, when the whole of Clarke's estate would come to him, he would make her a handsome estate, and sufficiently provide for her children.
On the 24th of February 1730, this cause was heard before the Lord Chancellor King, when his Lordship declared, that the respondent, by virtue of the said marriage agreement, and of the said settlement made pursuant to it, was entitled to hold the said Clarke's estate, discharged of the jointure claimed thereout by the appellant Ann, and decreed accordingly, and that the injunction should be perpetual; and as to the rest of the respondent's bill, his Lordship thought fit to dismiss the same.
From this decree the appellants appealed; and to obviate the principal objection, that though this was a good appointment of a jointure, in pursuance of a power subsisting at law, yet the execution of that power being contrary to the covenants contained in the articles and settlement made in pursuance thereof, it ought not to have been executed, to the prejudice of the uses therein contained; it was said (J. Willes, N. Fazakerly), that in the articles of 1700, Robert Offley the father only covenanted, and not Stephen the son, who had the power of appointing
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