De Witt v. Sides

KNIGHT, J.

This is an action in ejectment, wherein plaintiff obtained judgment for the recovery of the possession of a mining claim. Defendants have appealed on the

[645]

judgment-roll alone, contending that the findings are insufficient, to support the judgment.

The facts found were as follows: On March 31, 1924, Oscar de Witt, plaintiff’s grantor, posted a notice of location on the mining claim in question, situate on government land in Fresno County, but did not distinctly mark the location on the ground so that its boundaries could be readily traced. On April 2, 1924, he caused said notice of location to be recorded in the county recorder’s office in said county, and on April 26, 1924, which was within thirty days after posting the notice of location, accompanied by a man named King, undertook to again go upon said claim for the purpose of staking and monumenting the same, but upon reaching a point about one-half mile therefrom “they came to and saw a sign on a closed gate opening into the field embracing said mining claim, giving notice to all people not to enter into or on the territory within the gate” while a provisional quarantine was in effect, which the court found had been proclaimed on March 27, 1924, by the Governor of California on account of the hoof and mouth disease at that time prevalent among the cattle in that part of Fresno County. On the same day of the unsuccessful attempt to reach said claim de Witt conveyed all of his interest therein by deed to plaintiff.

The day following, and on April 27, 1924, knowing that de Witt had so posted said notice on such claim, “the defendants, persons and citizens of the United States, entered into and upon said mining claim and have ever since remained in possession of the same, and on April 30, 1924, . . . while in possession of said described mining claim, posted on said mining claim a notice in writing whereby they located the said land as a mining claim,” describing it, and on the same day “placed on said mining claim rock monuments sufficient to enable a person to readily trace the boundaries described in defendant’s location notice.” Thereafter they duly recorded said notice of location in the recorder’s office of Fresno County. The conclusions of law were “that said location notice so posted ... by the said Oscar de Witt was and is good and valid; that by reason of the provisional quarantine . . . plaintiff could not lawfully enter into and upon said min