[2023] UKUT 200 (LC)

So we turn to the crucial document, the conveyance on 6 June 1918 of Lunsford Farm which it is agreed was completed after the Westcott conveyance.

The conveyance recited Lt Lucas-Shadwell’s title in fee simple both to the land conveyed and to adjoining land across which rights of way were granted. Like the conveyance of Westcott it recited that Mr Harvey had contracted to buy the land conveyed and that “the purchase money has been fully paid” but that no conveyance to him had yet been executed. And it recited the contract between Mr Harvey and Mr Dunlop. It then conveyed three parcels of land, respectively coloured pink, green and blue on the plan, of which the first is relevant:

“First All those pieces of land and Marsh Pastures known as Lunsford Farm situate in the Parish of Pett in the County of Sussex and comprising in the whole One hundred and sixty three acres one rood and eight perches or thereabouts which are more particularly delineated on the plan drawn in the margin of these presents and thereon coloured pink and are described in the first schedule hereto together with the messuage or farmhouse known as Lunsford Farm and the cottages and other buildings thereon.

The words “known as Lunsford Farm” were struck through where they first appear (the conveyance was of course written by hand) and the same words were inserted (with an arrow, in tiny writing between the lines) before “and the cottages” – I have underlined them here for clarity but they are not underlined in the original.

The “first schedule hereto” is set out in columns, the first headed “No on Plan”, the second “Description” and the third “Approximate acreage”. Amongst them was:

“210

Road .389”

Two plots are labelled “part 205” and “part 214” in the first column, but plot 210 is not so labelled.

The plan to the conveyance was shown at Figure 1 above, and it is obvious that the application land was not within the area coloured pink; Figure 4 is a magnified extract of the relevant area:

There lies the problem. The schedule lists plot 210, unqualified by the word “part”, and sets out its total area (specified to a thousandth of an acre), but the colouring on the plan on which the land conveyed is said to be “more particularly delineated” includes only part of the plot and excludes the application land. Which is to prevail?