Palmer v. Goldsmith

• Decision Date: 31 October 1884
• Citation: 15 Bradw. 544,15 Ill.App. 544
• Parties: POTTER PALMERv.ADOLPH GOLDSMITH.
• Court: United States Appellate Court of Illinois

15 Ill.App. 544

15 Bradw. 544

POTTER PALMER

v.ADOLPH GOLDSMITH.

Appellate Court of Illinois, First District.

October Term, 1884.

OPINION TEXT STARTS HERE

APPEAL from the Superior Court of Cook county; the Hon. ROLLIN S. WILLIAMSON, Judge, presiding. Opinion filed November 11, 1884.

Mr. J. S. HUEY, for appellant.

Messrs. MOSES & NEWMAN, for appellee.MCALLISTER, J.

This was an action on the case by Goldsmith against Palmer to recover of the latter as bailee, the value of a package of jewelry, which, it was alleged, he had received of the plaintiff as such bailee, but had converted the same to his own use, or lost it through negligence. On the trial under the general issue, the plaintiff gave testimony tending to show that he, being a jeweler in the city of New York, and defendant the proprietor of a hotel in Chicago, March 24, 1881, sent from New York by express, a package of jewelry to be carried to Chicago, and there to be delivered into the keeping of defendant, at his hotel, for one A. Lilienthal, a traveling salesman of plaintiff; that said package was so delivered into defendant's care March 26, 1881; that soon thereafter said Lilienthal became a guest at said hotel, but that the package was never delivered to him. The defendant introduced evidence tending to show that said package was, on said 26th of March, delivered to Lilienthal, that he paid the express charges, which defendant had paid, and gave his receipt for the package.

For the purpose of proving the different articles, quantity and price of each, comprising said package, the plaintiff offered in evidence what was said to be a copy of an original memorandum book kept by him, in which said several matters were set down, and to lay the foundation therefor, gave evidence tending to show that at the time of putting up said package he had a memorandum book in which was written a list of the articles, the quantity of each, the price and the running number of each article so packed; that at the time after the controversy had arisen between him and defendant about the alleged loss of said package, after Lilienthal had corresponded with said defendant about such loss and after Lilienthal had returned to New York from the trip, for whose purposes said package had been sent to him at Chicago, the said copy of book offered in evidence was prepared by a clerk in plaintiff's store in New York, and by Lilienthal by copying, as they said, from such original memorandum book, and that being done, the original was voluntarily destroyed. Such...