Hunter v. Emerson
| Decision Date | 09 February 1903 |
| Citation | 75 Vt. 173,53 A. 1070 |
| Parties | HUNTER v. EMERSON et al. |
| Court | Vermont Supreme Court |
Appeal in chancery, Washington county; Start, Chancellor.
Bill by Ross Hunter against Thomas Emerson and another to prevent defendants from using a certain spring. Heard on plaintiff's exceptions to a master's report; and, from a pro forma decree in favor of plaintiff, defendants appeal. Affirmed.
Argued before ROWELL, C. J., and TYLER, MUNSON, WATSON, STAFFORD, and HASELTON, JJ.
Richard A. Hoar, for orator.
J. W. Gordon, for defendants.
It appears by the master's report that the orator owned two pieces of land, adjoining each other, which he bought of one Gouldsbury in 1890 and 1895, respectively, and that he built a house upon the first piece soon after its purchase; that the defendants, since 1880, have lived in the house then bought by said Thomas Emerson of one Rice, whose title is traced back to 1850. It further appears that the defendants, since 1880, and those who had owned and occupied the house before them for 40 years prior thereto, had obtained all the water necessary for domestic purposes from a "log spring" situated upon the second piece of land purchased by the orator; that in 1863 the defendants made an excavation in the ground near the spring, upon the second piece of land purchased by the orator, and that the water percolated through the soil, and filled the place, so that the defendants after that time got water there; that the following year, without the orator's knowledge, they put in a box to collect and hold the water; that when the orator learned of it, in 1897, he objected, and requested the defendants to remove it. After the orator moved into his house, in 1890, he used water from this spring in dry seasons, as he had occasion, and he also gave his neighbors the privilege of taking water there, but he got most of his water supply from another spring. The orator claimed exclusive ownership of the spring by virtue of his title to the two pieces of land, and that the defendants got water therefrom only by his permission. The defendants claimed ownership of the spring by their own and their predecessors' long-continued use of it; that such use had been open, notorious, and exclusive. It appears that prior to the time the orator's house was built the defendants and their predecessors in the ownership of the defendants' house had been the only users of the water, with the exception that passers-by and workmen occasionally got water there to drink. In 1899 the orator filled the log with stones, so that no water could afterwards be obtained. The defendants put a cover upon the box, and locked it The...
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Railroad Co. v. Roseville
...38 Ill. 322; Irwin v. Dixion, 9 Howard, 10; Lewis v. City of Portland, 42 Am.St. 772; Shellhouse et al. v. State, 11 N.E. 484; Hunter v. Emerson et al., 53 A. 1070; Langan et al. Whalen et al., 93 N.W. 393; Dovaston v. Payne, 2 Smith's Leading Cases, Hare and Wallace's Notes, 155; Kyle v. T......
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Daniel Fraser v. Thomas Nerney And Eugene Nerney
... ... Poronto ... v. Sinnott, 89 Vt. 479, 95 A. 647 ... The ... defendants rely upon Hunter v. Emerson, 75 ... Vt. 173, 53 A. 1070. But the facts in that case were ... different; they lacked one essential; it did not appear that ... the ... ...
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Fraser v. Nerney
...water from the spring does not affect the result. Poronto v. Sinnott, 89 Vt. ——, 95 Atl. 647. The defendants rely upon Hunter v. Emerson, 75 Vt. 173, 53 Atl. 1070. But. the facts in that case were different; they lacked one essential; it did not appear that the use of the water by the claim......
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