mortgage, execution was sued out against the premises and a sale thereof was made by the Sheriff to Lyne Starling, whose deed bore date of July 11, 1809. This deed contained no recital of an appraisement of the value of the mortgaged premises, and there was no evidence offered on the trial that such appraisement was in fact made. The heirs of John Allen denied the validity of the sale to G. W. Allen and the authentication of the mortgage given to Langdon, and particularly excepted to the sale of Starling on the ground that there was no evidence of the appraisement of the premises. One suit was determined in the Supreme Court of Ohio (3 Ohio 107, 178) and in the United States Court for the District of Ohio. The suits were instituted against the owners who claimed title through Lyne Starling, and were defended by him. He was at first represented by Henry Clay, and afterwards by Henry Baldwin, of Pittsburgh. In 1826 the suits were determined in his favor. The Allen heirs, prior to the commencement of the above suits, instituted proceedings in ejectment for the recovery of the premises in the United States courts. One of the suits was decided against them, and the other failed for want of prosecution. In 1846 Starling quieted the title to the same premises against William Neil and the heirs of John Allen. Neil had obtained a conveyance of a oneeighth interest in the tract from some of the Allen heirs.57 In deciding one of the above cases (3 Ohio, 107) the Supreme Court held that, although John Allen had sold his interest in the halfsection prior to the issue of his patents, his conveyance passed the title to his grantee. The provision in the act of Congress of April 7, 1798, above quoted, providing that no claim under that law should be assignable until the lands were granted to the persons entiled to the benefit of the act, was construed to give the right to the government to declare a forfeiture if a claim was assigned before the patent issued, but the government having waived such right and having perfected the title by issuing the patent, the patentee and his grantee became subject to the principles of the common law and the title acquired by G. W. Allen was good.

About the time the title to halfsection twentyfive was in dispute, that of the owners of halfsection twentysix was also assailed. The halfsection was patented by Benjamin Thompson and conveyed by him to James Strawbridge, who executed a power of attorney to John McDowell authorizing him to sell the prem

On March 12, 1808, McDowell as attorney in fact conveyed the halfsection to Alexander McLaughlin and John Kerr. The instrument recited a conveyance from McDowell for Strawbridge instead of from Strawbridge to McDowell, his attorney in fact. The deed was signed "John McDowell, Attorney in fact for John Strawbridge." Attached to the deed was a receipt for the purchase money. About 1825, Anthony W. Cooley obtained quitclaim deeds from the heirs of James Strawbridge conveying their interest in the halfsection. Proceedings in ejectment were instituted by him, but at the April term of the Court of Common Pleas of the year 1827, in a suit in which McLaughlin and Kerr were plaintiffs and Cooley and the Strawbridge heirs were defendants, the title of the plaintiffs was quieted.

Certain persons claiming to be the heirs of Hugh Stephenson by a proceeding instituted in the United States District Court, disputed the title of Lucas Sullivant

to survey 2668. The suit was dismissed in 1822. In 1838, James Stephenson and others made a second attack on the title of the same premises in the Court of Common Pleas of this county against the three sons of Lucas Sullivant. Their bill in equity recited that Hugh Stephenson, a colonel in the Virginia line on continental establishment, was entitled to 6,666 acres of land in the Virginia Military District, and that he died leaving a wife and a posthumous child, Richard Stephenson, his only heir at law; that Richard Stephenson died without issue, leaving no heirs excepting his fraternal uncles; that certain illegitimate children of Hugh Stephenson assumed control of his warrant and assigned it to Sullivant, who located the same and obtained a patent for the land in question. The bill further charged that Sullivant fraudulently obtained an assignment of the plats and certificates for the land in question and procured patents therefor in his name. The prayer was that the defendants be required to convey the land to the plaintiffs and account for lands sold. The bill was dismissed in 1840, without prejudice, at the complainant's costs, and the title has not since been questioned.

59

The title to three hundred acres of land in the third quarter of Clinton Township was in question in the case of Lessee of Moore v. Vance. An action in ejectment was brought to oust Joseph Vance, who had purchased from his brother Alexander, by whom the premises had been purchased from Jonathan Dayton through Dayton's attorney in fact, Joseph Vance. Dayton had also executed a power of attorney to one Bonham, authorizing him to sell the lands to Moore; the lands were conveyed to Moore by such attorney. The deed to Alexander Vance was acknowledged and recorded but was not witnessed. The acknowledgment was made outside of the Northwest Territory but inside of the United States, and was taken by J. C. Symmes, a judge of the Territory. The court held that as the law then existed witnesses were not necessary and that the deed conveyed the title to Alexander Vance.

60

After the Penitentiary was removed to its present site the tenacre lot set apart by the original proprietors of Columbus became the subject of litigation. It was contended on the one hand that the lot reverted to the original proprietors or their heirs, and on the other that the title remained in the State. An action in ejectment was brought March 26, 1847, against Edward N. Slocum, QuartermasterGeneral, to recover possession of the property. The suit was brought in the name of Gustavus Swan and M. J. Gilbert. Elijah Backus appeared as attorney, and it was generally understood that he was prosecuting for his own benefit. default judgment was rendered in favor of the plaintiffs in 1851. On September 26, 1854, the State brought an action in ejectment to regain possession of the lot. Two years later judginent was rendered in its favor. Under an act of March 17, 1856, the premises were replatted, appraised and sold.

Although the early suits involved the title to large tracts of land, their value at the time the suits were instituted was less than that of some of the lands which have recently been and are still in litigation. In 1890 a number of cases were brought in the Court of Common Pleas by the heirs of John Brickell for an accounting of rents and profits and the partition of a tract of seven and a half acres of land extending northward from Spruce Street, between High and Park