## Facts

- In December 1846, Alexander Herring signed a written contract acknowledging full payment from John L. Kitchen for a tract of land on the southwest side of Black River, adjoining the lands of William Hofford and Martial, and promising to deliver a “good deed.”
- Kitchen paid the purchase price through a $325 note, with Pridgen as surety; Pridgen also drafted the contract and witnessed it.
- Herring placed Kitchen in possession in March 1847.
- The land’s chief value was its timber, and timber was cut from the tract under arrangements involving Pridgen and others.
- In January after the contract, Herring conveyed the same land by deed to Pridgen, and Kitchen was ousted from possession.
- Kitchen filed a bill in equity seeking specific performance, an accounting for timber profits, and injunctive relief; after filing, Musgrove continued cutting timber under an agreement to account to the prevailing party.
- Defendants asserted (i) a mistaken omission of an interest-from-date term on the purchase-money note, (ii) a mistake that title was intended for Pridgen rather than Kitchen, and (iii) rescission by mutual consent; the court found these defenses unsupported by the evidence.

## Issues

1. Whether the contract’s land description (“lying on the southwest side of Black River, adjoining the lands of William Hofford and Martial”) was sufficiently definite to support specific performance.
2. Whether equity may decree specific performance of a land-sale contract when the land is chiefly valuable for timber.
3. Whether alleged mistake (interest and intended grantee) or alleged mutual rescission barred specific performance.

## Decision

- The court ruled for Kitchen and held he was entitled to specific performance of the contract.
- The land description was sufficiently certain because it could be made certain through reasonable inquiry and extrinsic identification.
- The land’s principal value being timber did not make damages an adequate substitute or defeat specific performance.
- The asserted mistakes and rescission were not proven and did not defeat enforcement.
- The equitable relief contemplated an accounting tied to timber cutting conducted pending the litigation.

## Legal Principles

- A vendee of land is generally entitled to specific performance upon breach of a land-sale contract.
- A land description in a contract is enforceable in equity if it is capable of being made certain by reasonable extrinsic evidence.
- Specific performance is available for land contracts regardless of whether the land’s principal value is agricultural, mineral, or timber.
- A party seeking to avoid specific performance on grounds of mistake or rescission must prove those defenses with sufficient evidence; settlement-oriented payment offers do not, without more, establish mistake.

## Conclusion

The court enforced the land-sale contract by specific performance, holding that the tract was identifiable from the written description with extrinsic proof and that the land’s timber-based value did not alter equity’s usual preference for specific performance in land transactions; unproven claims of mistake and rescission did not bar relief.


Kitchen v. Herring, 42 N.C. (7 Ired. Eq.) 190 (1851)