Logan v. the Western Union Tel. Co..

• Decision Date: 31 January 1877
• Citation: 84 Ill. 468,1877 WL 9414
• Parties: MILTON T. LOGANv.THE WESTERN UNION TELEGRAPH COMPANY.
• Court: Illinois Supreme Court

84 Ill. 468

1877 WL 9414 (Ill.)

MILTON T. LOGAN

v.THE WESTERN UNION TELEGRAPH COMPANY.

Supreme Court of Illinois.

January Term, 1877.

WRIT OF ERROR to the Circuit Court of Cass county; the Hon. CYRUS EPLER, Judge, presiding.

This was an action brought by Milton Logan, against the Western Union Telegraph Company, in the circuit court of Cass county. The defendant appeared and filed a demurrer to the declaration. The court sustained the demurrer and gave judgment on the demurrer, in bar of the action, and for costs. The plaintiff below brings the record here on writ of error, and the only question presented is, did the circuit court err in sustaining the demurrer to the declaration?

The declaration was in these words, viz:

“Milton Logan, the plaintiff in this case, complains of the Western Union Telegraph Company, summoned, etc., of a plea of case; for that, whereas, heretofore, to-wit: on the 21st day of September, A. D. 1873, and from thenceforward to the commencement of this suit, the defendant being a body corporate, under the name and style aforesaid, was the owner of certain telegraph wires and the processes and apparatuses thereunto appertaining, for the communication of intelligence and dispatches rapidly and by means of electricity from one point, place or station, to another, and that said defendant operated and controlled the same from Blair, Nebraska, to wit: at the county aforesaid, to Beardstown, Illinois, to-wit: at the county aforesaid, and intermediate and between said places. And the plaintiff avers that it was the duty of the defendant, by and through its authorized agents in that behalf, for compensation and reward to it paid or given, to transmit and carry over by and through said telegraph wires, apparatuses and processes aforesaid, with reasonable care, safety and diligence, messages, dispatches or communications of request, demand, information and intelligence, commonly called ‘telegrams,’ from one point or station of the defendant to another, to-wit: from the said Blair, Nebraska, to-wit: at the county aforesaid, to Beardstown, to-wit: at the county aforesaid; and from Beardstown, to-wit: at the county aforesaid, to Blair, Nebraska, to-wit: at the county aforesaid. And that it was the further duty of said defendant to deliver the said ‘telegrams' or ‘messages,’ upon the reception of the same at the office of the place of the destination of the same, to the person or persons, party or parties, to whom the same should be sent or directed and addressed, with reasonable diligence, and without delay or neglect. Plaintiff avers, that on, to-wit: the 22d day of September, A. D. 1873, at Beardstown, to-wit: at the county aforesaid, the wife of him, the said plaintiff, and the mother of his son, C. C. Logan, to be hereinafter named, was lying dangerously ill and upon the point of death; that the plaintiff's son, C. C. Logan, was then living and residing at Blair, Nebraska, aforesaid, at to-wit: at the...