In re Coe

• Citation: 183 F. 745
• Decision Date: 12 December 1910
• Docket Number: 8.
• Parties: In re COE et al.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Second Circuit

183 F. 745

In re COE et al.

No. 8.

United States Court of Appeals, Second Circuit.

December 12, 1910

White &amp Case (J. Du Pratt White and J. M. Hartfield, of counsel), for appellant.

Rounds Hatch, Dillingham & Debevoise (R. S. Rounds, of counsel), for appellee Sovereign Bank of Canada.

Benjamin F. Jones, for bankrupt Coe.

Before LACOMBE, COXE, and WARD, Circuit Judges.

WARD Circuit Judge.

We hand down with this an opinion in the matter of J. V. A. Cattus, a bankrupt, holding that under the trust receipts in common use the banker who advances the purchase price of the goods is the owner of them, and what is there said on this subject need not now be repeated. The course of dealing in this case was that the Sovereign Bank of Canada issued to Cadenas & Coe letters of credit under which their agents in South Africa were authorized to value on the National Bank of South Africa, correspondents of the Sovereign Bank, up to a certain amount for the price of ostrich feathers. Under this credit the South African bank discounted drafts drawn upon Cadenas &amp Coe by their South African agents for the price of the goods with bills of lading indorsed in blank attached, which drafts and bills of lading it forwarded to the agents of the Sovereign Bank in New York, which delivered the bills of lading to Cadenas & Coe against their acceptances of the drafts and trust receipts in the following form:

'Drawn against L/C 538-2050. 1-8 Due in London, Mar. 2, 07.

'Bailee Receipt.

'Received from the Sovereign Bank of Canada. Bill of Lading and Invoices for seven cases (311 pounds) Ostrich Feathers,-- and we hereby undertake to sell the property therein specified, for account of the said Bank, and to collect the proceeds of the sales thereof, and to deposit the same immediately on receipt thereof in the said Bank at New York to the credit of . . . thereby acknowledging ourselves to be Bailee of the said property for the said Bank.

'The Bank may at any time cancel this Bailment of Trust, and in such event, we hereby undertake and agree to return all unsold goods at once on demand, or to pay the value of the said goods at the Bank's option.

'Dated at New York the 30th day of November, A.D., 1906.

'Cadenas & Coe.' Cadenas & Coe collected the price of the feathers, deposited the same in their general account, applied it in their business, and then failed. The firm, as well as Edward P. Coe William H. Knox, the partners composing it, were...