Stiles v. Geesey
| Decision Date | 30 May 1872 |
| Citation | 71 Pa. 439 |
| Parties | Stiles <I>versus</I> Geesey. |
| Court | Pennsylvania Supreme Court |
Before THOMPSON, C. J., READ, AGNEW, SHARSWOOD and WILLIAMS, JJ.
Error to the Court of Common Pleas of York county: No. 34, May Term 1872 W. C. Chapman and I. L. Mayer, for plaintiff in error, cited Shearman & Redfield on Negligence, sect. 33, 34; Murphy v. Deane, 101 Mass. 455.
Cochran & Hay, for defendant in error, cited Norristown v. Moyer, 17 P. F. Smith 353; Brown v. Lynn, 7 Casey 510; Shaw v. Reed, 9 W. & S. 72; Davies v. Mann, 10 M. & W. 546; Beach v. Parmeter, 11 Harris 196; Gray v. Scott, 16 P. F. Smith 345.
This was an action by Jacob Geesey against Thomas Stiles, to recover damages for an injury to his horse and wagon by the negligent driving by the defendant's son of his team and wagon along a public highway. The road was twenty feet wide, and the plaintiff's horse and wagon were hitched to a staple on a cherry tree on the side of the road in front of the house of Henry Myers. Mrs. Geesey who drove the wagon, went into the house after she had hitched it to the tree. William Stiles, who drove his father's team and wagon loaded with lime, was obliged in going down a hill to get off his saddle-horse to draw the rubbers on his wagon, and he walked down to Myers's barn and then loosened his rubbers again. From the barn towards the house the grade is ascending, and seeing Ephraim Strayer, one of the witnesses, on a wagon in Myers's barn-floor, unloading corn-fodder, he stopped a moment to exchange a few words with him, his team moving on slowly at the time with the load up the hill, keeping the travelled track of the road till the front horse was just behind Mr. Geesey's spring wagon, standing unattended where it was left; at this point of time Stiles was behind his own wagon, but did not see the obstruction in the road in time to avoid a collision. The team and spring wagon got fastened together. The left hind wheel of Mrs. Geesey's wagon was caught between the rubber and hind wheel of Stiles's wagon. Stiles halloed "Whoa," and his horses stopped. The mare had her left front leg broken, and some days after had to be killed. The next day a number of the witnesses, who collected at the place of the accident, drove a stake in the road just where the left wheel of Stiles's wagon passed along. Both plaintiff and defendant were present. The stake was driven in to mark the track of the wagon, and that place was not disputed at the trial. It was one or two feet from the bank at the left-hand side of the road. Actual measurements showed that there was a space from that stake to the lower rut of the road of six and a half feet, and from that rut to the cherry tree a further space of eleven and a half feet; allowing six feet for the breadth of Stiles's wagon, there was a breadth of twelve feet of the road left for Mrs. Geesey's...
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