Haycraft v. Davis

• Citation: 1869 WL 5139,49 Ill. 455
• Parties: JAMES J. HAYCRAFTv.BENJAMIN F. DAVIS.
• Decision Date: 31 January 1869
• Court: Supreme Court of Illinois

49 Ill. 455

1869 WL 5139 (Ill.)

JAMES J. HAYCRAFT

v.BENJAMIN F. DAVIS.

Supreme Court of Illinois.

January Term, 1869.

APPEAL from the Circuit Court of Jersey county; the Hon. CHARLES D. HODGES, Judge, presiding.

The opinion states the case.

Messrs. WARREN & POGUE, for the appellant.

Messrs. ROBINSON & KNAPP, for the appellee.

Mr. CHIEF JUSTICE BREESE delivered the opinion of the Court:

This was an action of detinue for a promissory note made by James Brown, brought to the Jersey Circuit Court by Benjamin F. Davis, the payee, against James J. Haycraft, and tried by a jury on the general issue and several special pleas. The issues were found for the plaintiff, and the usual judgment was entered, that defendant deliver up the note or pay the plaintiff the value thereof, which was found by the jury to be $1,112.07, a motion for a new trial having been denied.

To reverse this judgment the defendant appeals to this court, making the point that the verdict was contrary to the law and the evidence. The claim was, that the note had been pledged for a particular purpose, and that purpose accomplished by the payee, the pledgor.

The only testimony to sustain the action was that of the plaintiff himself, and he gave his understanding of the transaction. The point in controversy was, for what was this note left in pledge with the defendant? The plaintiff stated it was only to secure the defendant in his endorsement of plaintiff's note to one Vaughan, for $300. The defendant, and two disinterested witnesses, stated in the most unqualified manner, the defendant was to hold it as security, also for another debt of $93, which the plaintiff owed defendant on account of a quantity of whiskey received of defendant, belonging to one Marshall, and for which defendant was responsible to Marshall. The evidence on this point is clear and explicit. The defendant so testified, and so did Brown and Marshall. There can hardly be said to be any conflict of testimony on this point. It amounts to this, simply, that plaintiff swore Brown's note was pledged for the Vaughan note only, whilst these three witnesses, two of them wholly disinterested, swore it was to be held in pledge for this $93 for the whiskey. It was a flat contradiction of one witness by three others. The evidence so greatly preponderates in favor of the defendant, that we are at a loss to perceive why the jury found as they did, there not being the slightest imputation upon the credibility of those witnesses, and two of them wholly disinterested.

The case of Wallace v. Wren, 32 Ill. 146, cited by appellee, was a case of warranty of soundness of a horse, and the testimony was so conflicting upon the question, some witnesses testifying one way and some...