Scottish Court of Session Decisions

Subject_1 DECISIONS of the LORDS OF COUNCIL AND SESSION, collected by JAMES BURNETT, LORD MONBODDO.

Dodds
v.
-

Date: 13 June 1766

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The question here was about lands purchased by a wife, the disposition bearing that the price was paid by her, though it did not appear that she had any money of her own. These lands she afterwards sold, and the husband now comes and claims them from the purchaser, upon this ground, that the money with which they were bought was the husband’s, which the wife had either stolen, or the husband had given her it. Lord Pitfour said, that in either case the singular successor was safe, for, having purchased the lands upon the faith of the records, he was not concerned how the money was got with which his author bought the lands; and the case is quite different from that where the lands themselves are gifted by the husband to the wife; for, in that case, no doubt, the husband, by revoking the donation, annuls the sale, and can evict the lands from any purchaser from the wife. Lord Kaimes went so far as to say, that even the husband could not have action against the wife for the lands themselves, but only for the money which he had given her, or which she had taken from him. But I should think that the lands would be a surrogatum in place of the money, with respect to the wife, who certainly was debtor in the money, but not with respect to the purchaser, who never was debtor to the husband in the money.

The Lords sustained the purchase.