Flint & P.M.R. Co. v. McPherson
| Decision Date | 04 December 1900 |
| Docket Number | 850. |
| Citation | 105 F. 210 |
| Parties | FLINT & P.M.R. CO. v. McPHERSON. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Sixth Circuit |
After dark on the evening of the 19th day of February, 1898, at Sanford, Mich., the plaintiff below, while in the discharge of his duties as a brakeman for defendant, fell or was knocked from one of its trains against a pile of wood which had been placed close to the track of the railroad for shipment. The plaintiff was an experienced brakeman, and had been in the defendant's employment as such on one of its freight trains for some months. The pile of wood was about 105 feet long, and extended along the north siding of the defendant's road at Sanford, and within less than 6 feet from the north rail. The engine had been detached from its train, and had come onto this siding for the purpose of taking out a loaded car which stood thereon some distance beyond two other cars on the same track; and the plaintiff having opened the switch to let the engine on the siding assisted in coupling the cars which stood at various distances from the switch, and, when all were coupled, had got upon the one of them nearest to the engine, which then moved towards the main track. Ladders for ascending and descending were located at each end of the car, and on the left-hand side of the end as the car was approached. This well-established and now admitted fact located the ladder on the rear of the car at a place different from where the plaintiff stated it to be in his pleadings. The night was dark, and the snow was falling. When the engine proceeded to move off the siding with the three cars thus attached to it the plaintiff, with his lantern, being, as stated, on the top of the car nearest to the engine, started to get off in order to throw the switch, as was his duty, and in attempting to descend the ladder, in some way, which he could not with entire clearness explain, fell or was knocked off. Some of the sticks of wood projected a considerable distance beyond the face of the pile, and thus probably came within less than eight inches of a car passing over the track. McPherson was thrown against the woodpile, and from thence towards the train, where one arm, falling under the cars, was so nearly cut off as to require amputation. The plaintiff had seen the woodpile several times in passing through Sanford on the train on the main track, but and never observed it closely and did not know its exact distance from the rails. The rules of the defendant company required that wood for shipment should not be piled nearer to the track than six feet from the rail, but the station agent had permitted in this instance a violation of that rule. No one except the plaintiff saw the accident, and his memory was-- perhaps naturally-- much confused by the rapid and unfortunate succession of dangerous events in which he was injured. At the trial below there...
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