2018 Delaware Code
Title 25 - Property
CHAPTER 1. DEEDS
Subchapter IV Powers of Attorney
§ 174. Persons serving with armed forces.

(a) No agency created by a power of attorney in writing given by a principal who is at the time of execution, or who, after executing such power of attorney, becomes either:

(1) A member of the armed forces of the United States; or

(2) A person serving as a merchant seaman outside the limits of the United States, included within the 50 states and the District of Columbia; or

(3) A person outside the limits by permission, assignment or direction of any department or official of the United States government in connection with any activity pertaining to or connected with the prosecution of any war in which the United States is then engaged,

shall be revoked or terminated by the death of the principal, as to the agent or other person who, without actual knowledge or actual notice of the death of the principal, has acted or acts, in good faith, under or in reliance upon such power of attorney or agency, and any action so taken, unless otherwise invalid or unenforceable, shall be binding on the heirs, devisees, legatees or personal representative of the principal.

(b) An affidavit executed by the attorney-in-fact or agent setting forth that he has not or had not, at the time of doing any act pursuant to the power of attorney, received actual knowledge or actual notice of the revocation or termination of the power of attorney, by death or otherwise, or notice of any facts indicating the same, shall, in the absence of fraud, be conclusive proof of the nonrevocation or nontermination of the power at such time. If the exercise of the power requires execution and delivery of any instrument which is recordable under the laws of this State, such affidavit (when authenticated for record in the manner prescribed by law) shall likewise be recordable.

(c) No report or listing, either official or otherwise, of "missing" or "missing in action," as such words are used in military parlance, shall constitute or be interpreted as constituting actual knowledge or actual notice of the death of such principal or notice of any facts indicating the same, or shall operate to revoke the agency.

(d) This section shall not be construed so as to alter or affect any provision for revocation or termination contained in such power of attorney.

Code 1935, § 3673A; 45 Del. Laws, c. 228, § 1; 25 Del. C. 1953, § 174.