Kursheedt v. Standard Bleachery Company

• Decision Date: 09 November 1908
• Citation: Kursheedt v. Standard Bleachery Company, 71 A. 39, 77 N.J.L. 99 (N.J. 1908)
• Court: New Jersey Supreme Court
• Parties: EDMUND B. KURSHEEDT ET AL. v. STANDARD BLEACHERY COMPANY ET AL

71 A. 39

77 N.J.L. 99

KURSHEEDT et al.

v. STANDARD BLEACHERY CO. et al.

Supreme Court of New Jersey.

Nov. 9, 1908.

(Syllabus by the Court.)

Action by Edmund B. Kursheedt and others against the Standard Bleachery Company and others.Verdict for defendants.Order to show cause made absolute.

Argued, June term, 1908, before GUMMERE, C. J., and TRENCHARD and MINTURN, JJ.

Chauncey G. Parker and Francis H. Kinnicutt. for plaintiffs.

John M. Bell, for defendants.

TRENCHARD, J.The plaintiffs were in the business of making aprons from bleached goods called "lawn," and bought the goods unbleached "in the gray," as it is called, and at different times between January 1, 1905, and May, 1907, sent such goods amounting to 3,159,873 yards to the defendants' bleachery to be bleached.The plaintiffs' claim was that the process of bleaching caused a stretch or increase in the goods bleached, amounting to at least 1 per cent of the yardage, and that by the contract between the partiesthe plaintiffs were entitled to this stretch, and, notwithstanding the plaintiffs' rights, the defendants had appropriated the stretch to their own use.The defense seems to have been a denial that the goods had been stretched by the bleaching in the defendants' works.

The jury found a verdict for the defendants, whereupon the plaintiffs obtained a rule to show cause why a new trial should not be granted on the grounds, among others, of newly discovered evidence and that the verdict was contrary to the weight of the evidence.

Reviewing the evidence before the jury, it appears that there was no substantial dispute that, under the contract between the parties, the plaintiffs were entitled to the stretch, if any, that arose from bleaching.To sustain the verdict for the defendants, the jury must...