[HISTORY: Adopted by the Board of County Commissioners of
Worcester County 8-25-1981 by Bill No. 81-5 as Title 3 of the General Provisions Article
of the 1981 Code. Amendments noted where applicable.]
All deeds of conveyance and mortgages for and upon property
in Worcester County which may have been recorded without any certificate
of the clerk of any of the courts of this state accompanying the acknowledgment
thereof, in cases in which such certificates are necessary and proper,
certifying to the official character of the Justice of the Peace taking
the same and all deeds of conveyance and mortgages of property in
said county which have been recorded in said county without the seal
of the notary public before whom the acknowledgment was taken having
been first attached when the grantor resided in another state, and
the acknowledgment was made in that state, are declared to be valid
to all intents and purposes as if such defect and omission did not
exist, provided that the execution and acknowledgment of such deeds
and mortgages in all other respects conformed to the laws of this
state in such cases made and provided, saving, nevertheless, the rights
of bona fide purchasers and encumbrancers without notice, and excepting
also such as were in suit in courts of law or equity on May 31, 1882.
(a)
Records in pursuance of the Act of 1835.
(1)
All deeds, papers and documents recorded in pursuance of the
Act of 1835, Chapter 279, which provided for making records in place
of those destroyed or lost by the burning of the Courthouse of Worcester
County shall have the same legal effect to all intents and purposes
as the original records or papers would have had if they had not been
destroyed or lost.
(2)
In all cases where the record of any judgment or decree and
the original papers thereto belonging have been destroyed by the burning
of the Courthouse as aforesaid, a short copy of such judgment or decree
or a copy of the docket entries, under the Seal of the Clerk of the
Circuit Court for said county, with a certificate that the record
and papers have been destroyed, shall be received in evidence.
(3)
A writ of fieri facias or an authenticated copy or record thereof
issued on any judgment rendered before the first day of January 1835
shall be prima facie evidence of the judgment therein recited, and
it shall not be necessary to produce the original judgment or the
record thereof.
(b)
Fire of 1893.
(1)
In all cases where any of the papers, including bills of complaint,
answers, demurrers, pleas, replications, joinder of issue, evidence
taken by examiners, trustee's bonds, trustee's reports of
sales, auditor's reports and all other papers filed in the proceedings
in chancery cases, were destroyed by fire at the burning of the Courthouse
in the year 1893, the docket entries in the chancery docket of the
Circuit Court of Worcester County shall be received in evidence in
all cases by said Court and by any other court of this state with
the same conclusive force and effect as if any or all of the original
papers in any such chancery case or cases were in existence and actually
produced; and the docket entries in the chancery docket of said Circuit
Court for Worcester County, certified to, under the Seal of said Court,
by the Clerk thereof, shall be received and admitted for all purposes
as conclusive evidence of the regularity of the proceedings therein,
before any of the judges of this state, in the absence of said chancery
docket.
(2)
In all chancery cases in said Circuit Court of Worcester County
in which the papers were destroyed by said fire and in which the title
to real estate is involved and no deed has been executed and delivered
to any purchaser or purchasers thereof by any trustee or trustees
appointed by said Court, said Court, sitting in equity, is hereby
authorized and empowered, upon examination of the docket entries in
such case or cases and being satisfied that any such purchaser or
purchasers aforesaid have paid or secured the purchase money and are
entitled to a deed for such real estate, shall pass an order directing
the trustee or trustees in such case or cases to execute and deliver
a deed to such purchaser or purchasers, conveying the title to such
real estate, which said real estate shall be described in said order;
thereupon, such trustee or trustees shall execute and deliver a deed
as directed, and said deed or a duly certified copy thereof, together
with said order of the Court, shall be evidence of title of such purchaser
or purchasers, with the same legal force and effect as if the original
papers in such case or cases had not been destroyed by fire and were
offered in evidence.
(3)
In all cases aforesaid in which the auditor's reports were
destroyed by said fire, the Circuit Court aforesaid is hereby authorized
to refer said case or cases to the auditor of said Court, who shall
make a duplicate or duplicates of said audit or audits, as near as
may be, from all the evidence he can obtain, which duplicate or duplicates,
when finally ratified by said Court, shall be conclusive upon all
the parties interested therein.
(4)
All such orders of court, reports of sales, auditor's reports
and other papers in such case or cases shall be filed and recorded
the same as if such papers were original papers.
(5)
Subsection b(1) through (4) hereof shall not apply to any contested
case where said Court has not passed any decree or final order relating
to the subject under investigation.
