Beedle v. Bennett

• Decision Date: 23 May 1887
• Parties: BEEDLE v. BENNETT and others
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

122 U.S. 71

7 S.Ct. 1090

30 L.Ed. 1074

BEEDLE v. BENNETT and others.

May 23, 1887.

Bill for injunction and account by Frank O. Bennett and others, appellees, exclusive owners for the state of Ohio of reissued letters patent No. 4,372, of May 9, 1871, to Nelson W. Green for an improved method of constructing artesian wells, against A. T. Beedle, appellant. There was a decree sustaining the patent, adjudging the appellant an infringer, and awarding the appellees damages in the sum of $10 for each well, with interest from the date of the filing of the bill, and costs. [72]

Arthur Stem, for appellant.

John F. Follett, Thos. H. Kelley, and David M. Hyman, for appellees.

MATTHEWS, J.

This is a bill in equity filed by the appellees, May 15, 1883, to restrain the alleged infringement of reissued letters patent No. 4,372, issued to Nelson W. Green, for a driven well. The cause was heard, by stipulation between the parties, upon an agreed statement of facts set out in the record, as follows:

'For the purpose of saving the expense of taking testimony, it is hereby agreed, by and between the parties hereto, that the above cause, and the others hereinafter referred to, may be tried upon the following agreed statement of facts; said statement to be accepted as proof of the facts recited as fully and completely as if the same had been duly and formally proven:

'It is agreed that Nelson W. Green was the patentee of a new and valuable process in the construction of wells, and claimed to be its first and original inventor, for which process he received original letters patent of the United States, No. 73,425, on the fourteenth day of January, 1868, and for which reissued letters patent No. 4,372 were granted to Nelson W. Green on May 9, 1871, the application for which having been filed February 24, 1871. That the title to the letters patent sued on for the state of Ohio is in the complainants. That the defendants have had in use on their farm for the past seven or eight years one or more driven wells, which wells were put down for the defendants by an ordinary well-driver in the following manner: A tube, of which the lower portion was perforated with small holes, and the lower end provided with a point, was driven into the ground until it projected into the water, without removing the earth upwards, as in boring. The water then entered the tube through the perforations, and was pumped up through the tube by an ordinary pump. That the defendants have never driven wells for themselves except as above described or for other purposes; never have sold, or offered for sale, driven wells, or the materials for driving them, but have simply used their own wells for their personal use on their farms.

'It is agreed that printed copies of the original and reissued letters patent granted to N. W. Green in 1868 and 1871, Nos. 73,425 and 4,372, respectively, may be offered in evidence at the hearing, and may be accepted as proof with the smae force and effect as if formally proven; that the said N. W. Green made his alleged invention or discovery as early as 1861, when he put down on his own grounds, at Cortland, New York, the first driven well for the purpose of demonstrating his discovery; that he, at the time of his alleged invention, claimed to have made a valuable discovery, and to have invented a new process; that he then declared an intention to secure his process by letters patent, and expressed his belief that large profits would accrue therefrom; that he at that time, having been partly educated at West Point, was engaged in organizing a regiment at Cortland, N. Y., his residence, and was expecting soon to take part in the war of the rebellion; that in June, 1861, he put down a well at his house in Cortland, and in October, 1861, he publicly drove a well, in the manner described in his original patent, at the fair grounds near Cortland, for the use of the soldiers in camp, and demonstrated to his own complete satisfaction its success; that he gave orders and directions for the construction of proper apparatus for driving such wells, and made arrangements for its transportation with his regiment as it was moved to the seat of war that on the sixth of December, 1861, while in discharge of what seemed to be his duty, he felt compelled to shoot one of the captains of his regiment named McNett; that the shot was not mortal, but inflicted serious injury; that, in the then state of the public mind, this occasion gave rise to intense public excitement, out of which sprang a controversy of extraordinary bitterness, involving numerous persons, and continuing for several years; that the effect upon Green was disastrous in the extreme; that he was suspended from his command, then tried by a court of inquiry at Albany, and reinstated in command; that his regiment, after having, it is said, required the protection of a battery to save it from violence at the hands of evil-disposed people of the country, removed to Washington, where Green was relieved from command, and then dismissed the service, and subjected to military charges; that he was, in addition, harassed by civil suits brought to charge him with a personal liability for articles used by his regiment; that he was also arrested and then indicted for the shooting of McNett, and after repeated postponements of the trial, effected because of the excited state of the public mind, was tried in 1866, and the jury, having disagreed, was discharged; that during this period he also became involved in church difficulties arising out of the shooting of McNett, was expelled from the church, and compelled to appeal to the bishop, and also became involved in litigation with the pastor of his church; that his efforts during this period to secure a reversal of the order dismissing him from the service were constant and absorbing, and were attended with sucb anxiety of mind as to give rise to the charge that he was insane; that this state of things...