Eaton v. Lancaster

Decision Date29 June 1887
Citation10 A. 449,79 Me. 477
PartiesEATON v. LANCASTER and others.
CourtMaine Supreme Court

On exceptions by plaintiff from supreme judicial court, Lincoln county.

Action on the case to recover damages for the loss of a horse destroyed by fire in the stable of the defendant. The presiding judge ordered a nonsuit after the plaintiff's evidence was introduced, and the plaintiff alleged exceptions.

J. E. Hartley, for plaintiff. Wm. H. Fogler, for defendants.

LIBBEY, J. After the plaintiff's evidence was all out, the presiding justice ordered a nonsuit, to which the plaintiff excepted. If there was any evidence which, if believed by the jury, would authorize a verdict for the plaintiff, a nonsuit should not have been ordered. The following facts are not controverted. On the eleventh day of July, 1885, the defendants were livery-stable keepers in Belfast, and on that day the plaintiff's horse and harness were delivered to them at their stable to be kept for hire for an indefinite time. In the night of that day the stable took fire from some cause, and the plaintiff's horse, and all the horses in it, but one, were burned. About 1 o'clock in the night three men, McCabe, Twombly, and Casey, drove into the stable a team belonging to the defendants, which they had been using. They were to some extent intoxicated. After the team was put up they went into the loft of the stable which was full of dry hay, to stay during the night. About half an hour after the stable was on fire in the loft, and Twombly and Casey were burnt in it, McCabe escaping slightly burned. McCabe and Twombly were servants of the defendants, employed in their stable during the day, but were not on duty that night, and were not doing any act for the defendants. One Mcintosh was a servant of the defendants, and that night was charged with the duties of night watch, and the general care of the stable. One of the regulations of the defendants for the care and management of the stable was that no one should be permitted to sleep in the loft during the night. Mcintosh knew that the three men were smokers, smoking pipes, and were in the habit of carrying their pipes and matches with them.

The plaintiff claims that he made out his right to recover on two grounds: First, that the fire was set to the stable carelessly by the three intoxicated men, two of whom were then in the employ of the defendants. Second, that the three intoxicated men were permitted by Mcintosh, the night watch, to go into the loft to sleep, and that that act was not the exercise of due care over the plaintiff's property, and that by reason of that careless act the stable was burned, and the plaintiff's horse and harness were destroyed.

By the contract of bailment the defendants were bound to exercise ordinary care over the plaintiff's property,—that degree of care which prudent and careful men would evercise oyer their own property under the circumstances. They were liable for the negligence of their servants in the performance of any duty in regard to the care and custody of the plaintiff's property, within the general scope of their own employment.

As to the first ground of the plaintiff's claim, we think it entirely fails, as neither of the three men were in the performance of any act for the defendants during that night, but were acting as they pleased for their own pleasure.

Upon the second ground of the plaintiff's claim there is more doubt. The plaintiff's claim is that Mcintosh permitted the intoxicated men to go into the loft for the night; that this was within the scope of his general employment, and in the performance of his duty as night watch; that it was a careless, negligent act on his part for which the defendants are responsible, and was the proximate cause of the loss of plaintiff's property. These propositions are all controverted.

The first fact embraced in this ground of claim is that Mcintosh permitted the three intoxicated men to go into the loft to sleep for the night. The burden is on the plaintiff to prove it. The only direct evidence in regard to it comes from Mcintosh. lie says the men went up in his presence: "They came into the office where I was before going up to lie down up-stairs; they then stepped out of the office and went across the barn floor to go up into the loft, and did go up into the loft—a hay loft—loose hay in it; should say the loft was sixty to seventy-five feet long and perhaps thirty-five feet wide. It was...

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11 cases
  • Dworkin v. L.F.P., Inc.
    • United States
    • Wyoming Supreme Court
    • September 18, 1992
    ...26 S.C. 187, 1 S.E. 594 (1887); Lingenfelter v. Louisville & N.R. Co., 9 Ky.L.Rptr. 116, 4 S.W. 185 (1887). See also Eaton v. Lancaster, 79 Me. 477, 10 A. 449, 449 (1887) ("If there was any evidence which, if believed by the jury, would authorize a verdict for the plaintiff, a nonsuit shoul......
  • Tomlinson v. Sharpe
    • United States
    • North Carolina Supreme Court
    • March 20, 1946
    ... ... Pacific Gas & Elec. Co., 99 ... Cal.App. 81, 277 P. 878. See also Morier v. Ry. Co., ... 31 Minn. 351, 17 N.W. 952, 47 Am.Rep. 793; Eaton v ... Lancaster, 79 Me. 477, 10 A. 449; Ireton v. Ry ... Co., 96 Kan. 480, 152 P. 625, L.R.A. 1917F 1120, and ... Goodloe v. R. R., 107 Ala ... ...
  • McKinney v. Bland
    • United States
    • Oklahoma Supreme Court
    • March 25, 1941
    ...of the rule appears, however, not to be borne out by the facts when the cases are examined. In this connection see Eaton v. Lancaster, 79 Me. 477, 10 A. 449; Williams v. Jones, 3 H. & C. 256, 159 Eng. 528; Heard v. Flannagan, 10 Vict. L.R.Law 1, and Yore v. Pacific Gas & Electric Co., 99 Ca......
  • Maloney Tank Mfg. Co. v. Mid-Continent Petroleum Corp., 331.
    • United States
    • U.S. Court of Appeals — Tenth Circuit
    • March 30, 1931
    ...There are cases which do not recognize the master's liability, even where the smoking is done in dangerous surroundings. Eaton v. Lancaster, 79 Me. 477, 10 A. 449; Williams v. Jones, 3 H. & C. 256, 159 Eng. Reprint 528; Heard v. Flannagan, 10 Vict. L. R. Law 1; Yore v. Pacific Gas & Elec. C......
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