Clark v. Halstead

Headnote

This was an action upon a joint promissory note executed by the defendants, who were husband and wife. The defendant Catharine answered, alleging that she signed the note as ■surety for her husband. The note was given for a water wheel purchased, by the husband and put into a mill upon premises of and owned by the wife. The court, upon trial without a jury, found that it was purchased by the husband as agent for his wife. The only question here was, as to whether there was any evidence to sustain this finding. The wheel was purchased, so far as appeared, without the authority or knowledge of .the wife; and the only evidence from which it could be inferred that she knew for what the note was

given, or that she adopted the purchase as her own, although made in the name of her husband, was the signing of the note by her first, in the usual place for a principal; and that neither of the defendants would swear that she did not know for what the note was given. She did swear that she signed the note as surety. Held, that the signature under the circumstances was some evidence, although slight, yet sufficient to sustain the finding here.