Daniels v. Hart
| Citation | 118 Mass. 543 |
| Court | United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts |
| Decision Date | 22 October 1875 |
| Parties | Lewis R. Daniels v. William T. Hart & another |
Worcester. Tort under the Gen. Sts. c. 63, § 101, to recover damages for the destruction of grass, fences and trees upon the plaintiff's land in Blackstone, by fire communicated thereto by a locomotive engine. Writ dated July 6, 1874. The case was submitted to the Superior Court, and after judgment for the defendants, to this court, on appeal on an agreed statement of facts, in substance as follows:
The defendants were the trustees under a mortgage dated March 19 1866, from the Boston, Hartford and Erie Railroad Corporation to Robert H. Berdell and others, which mortgage transferred to the trustees named therein all the franchises, properties and rights of the corporation, and the defendants were in the actual use, operation, management and control of all the franchises, property and railroads of said railroad corporation, including the railroad from Woonsocket to Bellingham, having the legal title to the same as said trustees from July 19, 1871, to the present time.
The Providence and Worcester Railroad Corporation commenced running locomotive engines and cars upon the Boston, Hartford and Erie Railroad from Woonsocket to Bellingham about May 2, 1870, and since the defendants, as trustees, came into possession of the road, have continued to run their engines upon it from Woonsocket to Bellingham, through Blackstone, to the present time, under an agreement never put in writing between the trustees and the Providence and Worcester Railroad Corporation, under which the latter corporation paid the trustees for the use of the road for the year ending September 30, 1873, the sum of about thirteen thousand dollars. The terms of the agreement were that the Providence and Worcester Railroad Company should draw their own passengers and freight cars over said road, and pay the defendants a certain sum per passenger and a pro rata proportion of the freight received.
On June 17, 1873, at Blackstone, a locomotive engine of the Providence and Worcester Railroad Company, while running upon the defendants' road under said agreement, communicated the fire which caused the injury to the plaintiff's property, sued for in this action.
If, upon these facts, the plaintiff could recover, the damages were to be assessed by auditors, to be agreed upon or appointed by the court; otherwise, judgment to be entered for the defendants.
Judgment for the plaintiff; damages to be assessed.
S. A. Burgess, for the plaintiff.
F. P. Goulding, for the defendants.
The provision of the Gen. Sts. c. 63, § 101, by which every railroad corporation is made responsible to any person or corporation whose buildings or property are injured by fire communicated by its engines, is not penal, but remedial, giving all the damages to the party injured. Reed v. Northfield, 13 Pick. 94. Ross v. Boston & Worcester Railroad, 6 Allen 87. Perley v. Eastern Railroad, 98 Mass. 414.
A railroad corporation cannot mortgage its franchise and railroad without the authority of the...
To continue reading
Request your trial
-
Moorshead v. United Rys. Co.
...v. Same, 18 Mo. App. 388; Brown v. Same, 27 Mo. App. 396; McCoy v. Same, 36 Mo. App. 445; Quested v. Railroad, 127 Mass. 204; Daniels v. Hart, Treas., 118 Mass. 543; Bower v. Railroad, 42 Iowa, 546; Whitney v. Railroad, 44 Me. 362, 69 Am. Dec. 103; Stearns v. Railroad, 46 Me. 95. When the s......
-
Moorshead v. United Railways Co.
...116 Cal. 97, 58 Am. St. R. 140; Bean v. Railroad, 63 Maine 295; Lakin v. Railroad, 13 Oregon 436; Nelson v. Railroad, 26 Vt. 721; Daniels v. Hart, 118 Mass. 534; Railroad Dunbar (20 Ill. 623), 71 Am. Dec. 296 (note); Harmon v. Railroad, 28 S.C. 401; Hawkins v. Railroad, 119 Ga. 159; Phelps ......
-
Moorshead v. United Railways Company of St. Louis
...Brown v. Railroad, 27 Mo.App. 394; McCoy v. Railroad, 36 Mo.App. 445. (6) Such cases as Quested v. Railroad, 127 Mass. 204, and Daniels v. Hart, 118 Mass. 534, must also eliminated, because the very act authorizing the lease expressly provided that the lessor should remain liable for the ac......
-
Wall v. Platt
...to the corporation which receivers of a railroad corporation usually do. Cases in this state tend, we think, to support this view. In Daniels v. Hart, supra, it was held that the statute to mortgagees who were in possession of a railroad for the purpose of foreclosure, and who were operatin......