Here's a little slice of East Texas culture that came across my desk today. Two cotenants of a tract of land that was conveyed to them as being 12.526 acres using a description by metes and bounds that upon its face appears to have been the work of an above-average surveyor proceed a few years later to divide the 12.526 acres into two pieces by exchanging deeds in favor of each other.
One tract is described as follows:
All that certain tract or parcel of land in the P.N. Naught Survey, Abst. 007 of Eastex County, Texas. This meaning to be one half of that as deeded to Lemuel Hanks and Elijah Hanks by Jethro Slim on Sept. 23, 1971 and of record in Vol.[No.] Pg.[No.] of the deed records of Eastex County, Texas and described as thus:
BEGINNING at the North corner of the above mentioned tract;
THENCE WEST 1132 feet to stake for corner;
THENCE SOUTH 110 feet to stake for corner;
THENCE EAST 1252 feet to stake for corner;
THENCE NORTH 365 feet and back to the place of beginning, containing 6.25 acres of land, more or less.
The other is described as follows:
All that certain tract or parcel of land in the P.N. Naught Survey, Abst. 007 of Eastex County, Texas. This meaning to be one half of that as deeded to Lemuel Hanks and Elijah Hanks by Jethro Slim on Sept. 23, 1971 and of record in Vol.[No.] Pg.[No.] of the deed records of Eastex County, Texas and described as thus:
BEGINNING at a stake 365 feet east from the North corner of the above mentioned tract,
THENCE WEST 1132 feet to stake for corner;
THENCE SOUTH 110 feet to stake for corner;
THENCE EAST 1262 feet to stake for corner;
THENCE NORTH 365 feet and back to the place of beginning, containing 6.25 acres of land, more or less.
Reading "described as thus" brings back memories of following some surveying from that era twas done by State of Texas taught employees that were let loose on weekends to practice on civilians for dirt cheap wages in order to keep their regular job.
A Harris, post: 434711, member: 81 wrote: Reading "described as thus" brings back memories of following some surveying from that era twas done by State of Texas taught employees that were let loose on weekends to practice on civilians for dirt cheap wages in order to keep their regular job.
Yes, the "described as thus" is definitely a bit odd. The earlier deed to the whole 12.526 acres uses the more conventional form: "and being described by metes and bounds as follows, to-wit", but that prior description clearly was the product of an actual surveyor.
In the deed to the 12.526 acres that was then divided into two tracts of 6.25 acres, more or less, that was in fact a line that was described as being 1132.00 ft. in length. The bearing of that line? S20?ø12'51"W
The rest of the story is that the 12.526 acres was described as running the following courses between 1/2" iron pipes marking corners which I've extracted from a more complete and detailed metes and bounds description:
N69?ø26'29"W, 729.91 ft.,
S20?ø12'51"W, 1132.00 ft.,
S63?ø14'44"E, 219.99 ft., and
N46?ø34'51"E, 1284.77 ft.,
So, one can see how far downhill things went when the tract was partitioned just a few years later.
