Coffin v. Ogden

• Decision Date: 01 October 1873
• Citation: 21 L.Ed. 821,18 Wall. 120,85 U.S. 120
• Parties: COFFIN v. OGDEN
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

85 U.S. 120

21 L.Ed. 821

18 Wall. 120

COFFIN v. OGDEN.

October Term, 1873

APPEAL from the Circuit Court for the Southern District of New York, in which court Coffin filed a bill against Ogden et al. to enjoin them from making door locks of a certain kind, the exclusive right to make which he alleged belonged by the assignment of a patent right to him.

The case was one chiefly of fact, involving the question of priority of invention. The court below was of the opinion that the complainant, or rather the person under assignment of whose patent he claimed and was working, had been anticipated in his invention; and dismissed the bill. From that decree the defendants took this appeal.

Mr. George Gifford, for the appellant; Mr. B. F. Thurston, contra.

Mr. Justice SWAYNE stated the case, recited the evidence, and delivered the opinion of the court.

The appellant was the complainant in the court below, and filed this bill to enjoin the defendants from infringing the patent upon which the bill is founded. The patent is for a door lock with a latch reversible, so that the lock can be applied to doors opening either to the right or the left hand. It was granted originally on the 11th of June, 1861, to Charles R. Miller, assignee of William S. Kirkham, and reissued to Miller on the 27th of January, 1863. On the 10th of June, 1864, Miller assigned the entire patent to the complainant. No question is raised as to the complainant's title, nor as to the alleged infringement by the defendants. The answer alleges that the thing patented, or a material and substantial part thereof, had been, prior to the supposed invention thereof by Kirkham, known and used by divers persons in the United States, and that among them were Barthol Erbe, residing at Birmingham, near Pittsburg, and Andrew Patterson, Henry Masta, and Bernard Brossi, residing at Pittsburg, and that all these persons had such knowledge at Pittsburg. The appellees insist that Erbe was the prior inventor, and that this priority is fatal to the patent. This proposition, in its aspects of fact and of law, is the only one which we have found it necessary to consider.

Kirham made his invention in March, 1861. This is clearly shown by the testimony, and there is no controversy between the parties on the subject.

It is equally clear that Erbe made his invention not later than January 1st, 1861. This was not controverted by the counsel for the appellant; but it was insisted that the facts touching that invention were not such as to make it available to the appellees, as against the later invention of Kirkham and the patent founded upon it. This renders it necessary to examine carefully the testimony upon the subject.

Erbe's deposition was taken at Pittsburg upon interrogatories agreed upon by the parties and sent out from New York. He made the lock marked H. E. (It is the exhibit of the appellees, so marked). He made the first lock like it in the latter part of the year 1860. He made three such before he made the exhibit lock. The first he gave to Jones, Wallingford & Co. The second he sent to Washington, when he applied for a patent. The third he made for a friend of Jones. He thinks the lock he gave to Jones, Wallingford & Co. was applied to a door, but is not certain.

Brossi. In 1860 he was engaged in lockmaking for the Jones and Nimmick Manufacturing Company. He had known Erbe about seventeen years. In 1860 Erbe was foreman in the lock shop of Jones, Wallingford & Co., at Pittsburg. In that year, and before the 1st of January, 1861, he went to Erbe's house. Erbe there showed him a lock, and how it worked, so that it could be used right or left. He says: 'He (Erbe) showed me the follower made in two pieces. One piece you take out when you take the knob away. The other part—the main part of the follower—slides forward in the case of the lock with the latch, so you can take the square part of the latch and turn it around left or right, whichever way a person wants to.' He had then been a lockmaker eight years. He examined the lock carefully. He had never seen a reversible lock before. He has examined the exhibit lock. It is the same in construction. The only difference is, that the original lock was made of rough wrought iron. It was a complete lock, and capable of working. Erbe thought it a great thing. Erbe showed him the lock twice afterwards at Jones, Wallingford & Co's. He saw such a lock attached to the office door there and working, but don't know whether it was the first lock made or one made afterwards.

Masta. In 1860 he was a patternmaker for Jones, Wallingford & Co. Had known Erbe fourteen or fifteen years. Erbe showed him his improvement in reversible locks New Year's day, 1861. He examined the lock with the case open. 'You had to pull out the spindle, and the hub was fitted so that it would slide between the spindle and the plate and let the latch forward.' . . . 'The whole hub was made of three pieces. One part was solid to the spindle or hub shanks, and then the hub that slides between the plate and case, and a washer at the other side of the spindle.' 'There is not a particle of difference between the exhibit and the original lock. It is all the same.' He identifies the time by the facts that he commenced building a house in 1861 and that year is marked on the water conductor under the roof.

Patterson. Until recently he was a manufacturer of locks and other small hardware. In the year 1860 he was the superintendent of the lock factory of Jones, Wallingford & Co., and their successors in Pittsburg. He had known Erbe since 1856. About the 1st of January, 1861, Erbe showed him an improved reversible lock of his invention like the exhibit lock. The improvement 'consisted in constructing the hub or follower, so that when the spindle was withdrawn,...