Louisville & N.R. Co. v. Dawson

• Decision Date: 13 May 1915
• Docket Number: 303
• Citation: 68 So. 674,14 Ala.App. 272
• Parties: LOUISVILLE & N.R. CO. v. DAWSON.
• Court: Alabama Court of Appeals

68 So. 674

14 Ala.App. 272

LOUISVILLE & N.R. CO. v. DAWSON.

No. 303

Court of Appeals of Alabama

May 13, 1915

Appeal from Circuit Court, Coffee County; H.A. Pearce, Judge.

Action by T.J. Dawson against the Louisville & Nashville Railroad Company. From a judgment for plaintiff, defendant appeals. Affirmed.

R.H Arrington, of Enterprise, for appellant.

W.W Sanders, of Elba, for appellee.

BROWN J.

This is an action for personal injuries inflicted on the appellee through the alleged negligence of the defendant, its servants or agents while he was a passenger on the defendant's train, the injuries occurring in Geneva county, and it is conceded as a fact that the plaintiff resided in Coffee county at the time the suit was brought. It is also admitted by the defendant that at the time the suit was filed the defendant was engaged in the business of operating a railroad for the carriage of freight and passengers running through Coffee county, over which it operated its trains daily; that some time prior to the commencement of the suit the defendant maintained a depot at "Pink, or Kingston, Ala.," in Coffee county, in connection with the ordinary business of the defendant of transporting freight and passengers, and during that time regularly employed a station agent at its depot, but at the time suit was filed no such depot agent was employed, and none had been employed since, but that its freight and passenger trains stopped at said station, and the agents and servants of the defendant delivered and received freight, accepted and discharged passengers; that on freight delivered charges had been prepaid, and on freight received charges were collected at destination; and that fares were collected by the conductor from passengers when they entered the train. It was also admitted that the building formerly used for a depot was on the defendant's premises, and that at the time the suit was filed it was used by the public transacting business with the defendant, as occasion required for the storage of freight and for the convenience of passengers, and in this way the defendant engaged in business in Coffee county, Ala.

On these facts we entertain no doubt that the defendant, at the time the suit was filed, was engaged in "doing business by agent" in the county of plaintiff's residence within the meaning of section 6112 of the Code of 1907. Sullivan v. Sullivan Timber Co., 103 Ala. 372, 15 So. 941, 25 L.R.A. 543; Beard v. U. & A. Pub. Co., 71 Ala. 60; International Cotton Seed Oil Co. v. Wheelock, 124...