Pratt v. Prouty

• Decision Date: 27 February 1891
• Citation: 153 Mass. 333,26 N.E. 1002
• Parties: PRATT v. PROUTY et al.
• Court: United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court

153 Mass. 333

26 N.E. 1002

PRATT

v.PROUTY et al.

Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, Bristol.

Feb. 27, 1891.

Exceptions from superior court, Bristol county; JOHN W. HAMMOND, Judge.

Action by David Pratt against Charles N. Prouty and others to recover damages for personal injuries sustained by plaintiff while in their employ. Plaintiff was a little over 15 years of age. Defendants asked the court to instruct the jury that the evidence was not sufficient to justify a verdict for plaintiff, and excepted to his refusal to do so. There was a verdict for plaintiff.

J. & R.C. Brown, for plaintiff.

W.H. Fox and A.M. Alger, for defendants.

W. ALLEN, J.

The only negligence of the defendants alleged in the declaration, and which could have been found by the jury under the instructions of the court, was setting the plaintiff to work upon a dangerous machine without proper instruction or caution. To show negligence in the defendants it must appear that the danger was such that the plaintiff would not be presumed to know it, and that the defendants did not give him information of it. If he knew and appreciated the danger, he cannot recover. It is enough to refer to Coombs v. New Bedford Co., 102 Mass. 572;Sullivan v. Manufacturing Co., 113 Mass. 396;Rock v. Orchard Mills. 142 Mass. 522, 8 N.E.Rep. 401; Ciriack v. Woolen Co., 146 Mass. 182, 15 N.E.Rep. 579, and 151 Mass. 152, 23 N.E.Rep. 829; Coullard v. Tecumseh Mills, 151 Mass. 85, 23 N.E.Rep. 731,-in each of which cases the plaintiff was younger than the plaintiff in the case at bar. The machine was a skiving machine for shaving off one surface of bits of sole leather used in making the heels of boots. The leather is carried between two small, slowly revolving horizontal cylinders, and against a knife just back of the cylinders. The work of the plaintiff was to serve the pieces of leather to the cylinders, to be taken by them and drawn through between them and against the knife. The danger to be guarded against was that the fingers serving the pieces of leather to the cylinders would be caught between them and drawn through against the knife. This was an open and apparent and not a hidden danger. Not only were the cylinders and their movements plain to see, but their operation and effect in drawing in against the knife whatever came between them was obvious, and was constantly demonstrated in their use. That the plaintiff was a boy of at least ordinary intelligence is manifest, and is not...