General Smith Hollins

• Decision Date: 10 March 1819
• Citation: 17 U.S. 438,4 L.Ed. 609,4 Wheat. 438
• Parties: The GENERAL SMITH: HOLLINS et al. , Claimants
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

17 U.S. 438

4 Wheat. 438

4 L.Ed. 609

The GENERAL SMITH: HOLLINS et al., Claimants.

March 10, 1819

APPEAL from the Circuit Court of Maryland. This was a libel, filed on the 4th day of October 1816, in the district court of Maryland, setting forth that James Ramsey, the libellant, had supplied and furnished for the use, accommodation and equipment of the ship General Smith, at Baltimore, in the district of Maryland, to equip and prepare her for a voyage on the high seas, various articles of cordage, ship-chandlery, and stores, amounting in the whole to the value of $4599.75, for no part of which he had received any compensation, payment or security. That the said ship was then owned by a certain George Stevenson, to whom he had applied for payment of said materials furnished, but without effect. And praying the usual process against the ship, and that she should be sold under the decree of the court, to pay and satisfy the libellant his claim. A claim was given for the ship, by John Hollins and James W. McCulloch, merchants, of Baltimore.

On the hearing of the cause in the court below, it was proved, or admitted by the parties, that the ship was an American vessel, and formerly was the property of George P. Stevenson, a merchant of Baltimore, and a citizen of the United States; and that whilst the ship so belonged to Stevenson, the libellant, a ship-chandler of Baltimore, furnished for her use various articles of ship-chandlery to equip and furnish her, it being her first equipment, to perform a voyage to a foreign country, to wit, to Rotterdam and Liverpool, and back to Baltimore. That Stevenson was also the owner of several other vessels, for which the libellant, from time to time, furnished articles for their equipment for foreign voyages, and that payments were made by Stevenson to the libellant, at different times, on their general account, without application to any particular part of the account. That the ship soon afterwards sailed, &c. That the ship departed from Baltimore, on the voyage, without any express assent or permission of the libellant, and also without objection being made on his part, and without his having attempted to detain her, or enforce any lien which he had against her for the articles furnished. That the ship continued to be the property of said Stevenson, during the said voyage, and after her return, and was not sold or disposed of in any way by him, until the 3d day of October 1816, when, finding himself embarrassed in his pecuniary affairs, and obliged to stop payment, he executed an assignment to the claimants of his property, including the ship General Smith, in trust for the payment of all bonds for duties due by said Stevenson to the United States, and for the payment and satisfaction of his other creditors, &c.

Another libel was filed, on the 11th of November 1816, against the same ship, by Rebecca Cockrill, administratrix of Thomas Cockrill, deceased, alleging that the said Thomas, in his lifetime, at Baltimore, in the said district, did furnish a large amount of iron materials, and bestow much labor and trouble, by himself, and those hired and employed by him, in working up and preparing certain iron materials for building and preparing the said ship for navigating the high seas, all which materials, and work and labor, were in fact applied and used in the construction and fitting said ship, according to a bill of particulars annexed. That the libellant had been informed and believed, that said ship was owned and claimed by various persons in certain proportions, but in what proportions, and who were the several owners she did not know, and could not, therefore, state. That neither the said Thomas, in his lifetime, nor the libellant, since his decease, had ever received any part of said account, nor any security or satisfaction for the same. Concluding with the usual prayer for process, &c.

A claim was given for the same parties, and at the hearing, the same proofs and admissions were made as in the suit of James Ramsey; except that it did not appear, that Thomas Cockrill had furnished any other vessels belonging to Stevenson with materials, nor that any payments on account had been made by said Stevenson to said Cockrill, or to the libellant, as his administratrix.

The district court ordered the ship to be sold, and decreed, that the libellants should be paid out of the proceeds the amount of their demands for materials furnished. In the circuit court, this decree was affirmed, pro form a, by consent, and the cause was brought by appeal to this court.

March 9th.

Pinkney, for the appellants and claimants, admitted the general jurisdiction of the district court, as an instance court of admiralty, over suits by material-men in personam and in rem, and over other maritime contracts; but denied, that a suit in rem could be maintained, in the present case, because the parties had no specific lien upon the ship for supplies furnished in the port to which she belonged. In the case of materials furnished or repairs done to a foreign ship, the maritime law has given such a lien, which may be enforced by a suit in the admiralty.

But in the case of a domestic...