Savage v. New York, N. & H.S.S. Co.
| Decision Date | 06 March 1911 |
| Docket Number | 176,177. |
| Citation | 185 F. 778 |
| Parties | SAVAGE v. NEW YORK, N. & H.S.S. CO., Limited (two cases). |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Second Circuit |
The following is the opinion of Hough, District Judge:
On the 26th of June Mrs. Savage was a passenger on respondent's steamship Rosalind, bound from New York to Halifax. While the steamer was in Long Island Sound, during calm weather, she fell upon the promenade deck, breaking both bones of one leg and simultaneously dislocating her ankle. At the time Mrs Savage was 64 years old, and, according to a physician who has testified in her behalf, in a neurasthenic condition. At the time and place of her fall, no one was in her immediate vicinity, and her efforts to obtain assistance were not immediately successful. To her (naturally) 'it seemed a great while' before any one perceived her plight. She 'should say' that she was 'lying there five or ten minutes. ' The time was almost certainly much less than this; but there was an appreciable period between her fall and the time when any one but herself knew she had fallen.
The suffering naturally attendant upon such injuries as above noted was aggravated by the impossibility of simultaneously setting the broken bones and reducing the dislocation of the ankle without anaesthetics; and although she seems to have been attended by a remarkably competent physician and surgeon, who happened to be a passenger on the Rosalind, he was unable to obtain any anaesthetic on board the ship. In result the necessary surgical operation was delayed until arrival in Halifax. This delay, and the age and condition of the patient, produced a long convalescence and, according to the uncontradicted evidence, permanent disability.
Speaking untechnically, the cause of this lamentable accident was a chain box extending on both port and starboard sides from deckhouse to rail, covering a necessary portion of the steering gear. On each side of the promenade deck, therefore these chain boxes formed an obstruction more than half a foot high and about a foot wide, and extending as above noted across the deck. The only door into Mrs. Savage's stateroom was within a few feet of the port chain box over which she fell. She had come on board during daylight, had gone to her stateroom, had come out therefrom, but had not noticed the chain box. She then went to the other side of the deck with her traveling companions, and there spent the rest of the afternoon, apparently not noticing the corresponding chain box on that side of the vessel, although she must have been sitting for hours within a few feet of it.
It may be noted that the principal libelant is a lady of intelligence, who has traveled much and is entirely accustomed to passenger life on steamers. After sunset of the day first mentioned (which was the day of the beginning of the voyage), the libelant rose from her chair on the starboard side of the deck, saying that she would go to the other side of the vessel to see the 'afterglow.' She passed from starboard to port aft of the deckhouse which contained her own stateroom, and in walking forward on that portion of the promenade deck which exactly corresponded to the one she had just left she tripped and fell over the chain box, receiving injuries to recover for which this action is brought.
Much of the testimony adduced in the causes relates to the time when the injury was received. A number of passengers (who, of course, only knew of libelant's injuries after she had been discovered lying helpless on the deck) declare that it was dark. That is a matter of opinion as to which observers at the same instant of time might differ; but the following facts are shown by uncontradicted evidence: After Mrs. Savage was hurt, some period of time elapsed before she was discovered. Her injury was first made known to a passenger who went in search of her daughter and son-in-law, who were traveling with her and had remained on the starboard side of the deck. After they had gone to Mrs. Savage's assistance, the fact that a passenger had been injured was reported on the bridge to the first officer, whose watch terminated at 8 p.m., and he noted in the scrap deck...
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