Dows v. Faneuil Hall Insurance Company

• Decision Date: 03 September 1879
• Citation: 127 Mass. 346
• Court: United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court
• Parties: Gustavus D. Dows v. Faneuil Hall Insurance Company. Same v. Traders & Mechanics' Insurance Company. Same v. Merchants' Insurance Company

127 Mass. 346

Gustavus D. Dows v. Faneuil Hall Insurance Company. Same v. Traders & Mechanics' Insurance Company. Same v. Merchants' Insurance Company

Supreme Court of Massachusetts

September 3, 1879

Argued March 8, 1878

Suffolk.

Judgment on the verdict for the plaintiff.

B. F Butler & D. B. Gove, for the plaintiff.

C. R Train, for the defendants in the first and third cases.

D. S. Richardson, for the defendant in the second case.

Gray C. J. Colt & Soule, JJ., absent.

OPINION

Gray C. J.

These actions are brought upon three policies of insurance, each of which insures the plaintiff against loss or damage by fire "on his stock in trade as an apothecary, contained in brick building situate 525 Washington Street corner of LaGrange Street, Boston."

The evidence at the trial tended to show that, by a sudden combustion of inflammable gas, brought into contact with some burning substance, an explosion, accompanied by a flash of light and a loud report, took place in one of the upper stories of the building, which was of such force as to lift up the roof over the rear part of the building, to blow outward the larger portion of the walls on the two sides next the streets, and to cause the instantaneous fall of the whole roof, the interior partitions and the contents of the rooms, including a stove with a coal fire burning therein, in a mass of ruins upon the plaintiff's shop in the lower story; and that, immediately after the explosion and fall, a fire, caused thereby, and kindled by the burning coals from the stove, broke out in the fallen ruins, and destroyed the plaintiff's stock to the amount insured by all the policies.

The explosion in the upper story having been caused by fire, the insurers, if no clause had been inserted restricting their liability for losses by explosion, would have been liable for the losses, whether by the explosion or by the subsequent fire, to the amount of the insurance. Scripture v. Lowell Ins. Co. 10 Cush. 356. The verdicts charged the defendants only with the destruction of goods by the fire which broke out immediately after the destruction of the building and before there had been opportunity to remove the goods. The description of the goods in the policies as "contained in brick building" does not prevent the insurers from being held liable for this loss. This point was adjudged in Lewis v. Springfield Ins. Co. 10 Gray 159, which does not appear to have been brought to the notice of the court that decided Nave v. Home Ins. Co. 37 Mo. 430, cited for the defendants.

The rights of the parties depend upon the legal effect of the special clauses inserted in the several policies.

By the policy of the Faneuil Hall Insurance Company, "in case steam-power is used in or about the property insured, and the boiler shall burst, or any property insured is struck by lightning or damaged by explosion from any cause, this company is not liable unless fire ensues, and then for the loss or damage by fire only." If this clause had provided that the insurers should not be liable at all in case of explosion, they might...