Introduction.               xxxi




        (ibid., p. 218). On that day the Court ordered that the deputy surveyor for
        Calvert County lay out the lands of Nehemiah Blackiston and Edward Connery
        according to their deed.s from Thomas Gerard, in the presence of the sheriff of
        St. Mary's and of a jury summoned to attend the survey. The case came to
        trial on October 15, 1674. The jury to view the land and the surveying of it
        said that Nehemiah Blackiston's bounds set by his lease from Gerard were
        the same as those Robert Cooper had had before him, and that they existed
        before and at the time that Connery's lease, also from Gerard, was made. Now,
        when Blackiston and Connery appeared by their attornies, the jury found for
        the plaintiff, Nehemiah Blackiston, and the Court awarded him his costs and
        charges against Connery (ibid., pp. 317-318).
         Connery had lost to Blackiston, but he was not yet done fighting. Within
        a month or so of that decision, he brought suit against John and Rose Gerard,
        executors of the late Thomas Gerard, of St. Clement's Manor. Thomas had
        sold him the land from which he had been dispossessed and had covenanted
        to warrant the sale to him. This neither Thomas Gerard nor his executors had
        done, so Connery sued them for 40,000 pounds of tobacco (post, p. 491). They
        claimed that they had paid out more than the value of the estate, and both
        parties put themselves upon the country. When the case came up, on Febru
        ary 15, 1675, John and Rose came not, and Connery was awarded judgment
        by default, with a writ of inquiry of damages returnable next court. The jury,
        on May 7, 1675, awarded him 25,000 pounds of tobacco damages and 2434
        pounds costs (ibid., p. 553).
         Before the case of Thomas Gibson v. Arthur Turner came to trial, Gibson
        filed. a new declaration making James Neale and his wife defendants. A special
        warrant was ordered for a resurvey of the land in question (post, pp. 299, 464).
        Unless the lease, entry and ejectment were confessed, leaving only the title
        to be decided, the defendant, Turner, would confess judgment, and the plaintiff,
        Gibson, would get possession (ibid., p. 464). Neale, the new defendant, and
        Gibson, both put themselves upon the country, and each was ordered to pay
        the other's costs and charges. On October 16, 1674, the Court said that the
        action of ejectment was really taken in order to try title to a piece of land in
        dispute between William Russell from whom Gibson had leased, on the one
        hand, and James and Anna Neale on the other. Therefore they ordered a
        survey to be made by the surveyor general or his deputy, in the presence of the
        Charles County sheriff and of a jury of the neighborhood, and according to
        their directions. Sheriff Rozer did as he was directed, and the survey was made.
        When the Neales said they had had no notice of the resurvey, another with
        the same jury was made, with the same result. The jury on the land declared
        that “the land now in question . . . now in the possession of Margaret
        Lovett . . . by Virtue of a lease from the said James Neale . . . to be and
        lye within the meets and bounds of the Land belonging to William Russell”
        (ibid., 468). And yet, when, on February 11, 1674/5, the case came into court
        for decision the trial jury, sworn to say the truth “upon their Oathes doe say
        That they find for Capt James Neale defendant” (ibid., p. 469). The Court
        looked at the decision and deliberated on it at length. Then they granted that