The Chicago v. Mock

• Decision Date: 31 January 1874
• Citation: 1874 WL 8777,72 Ill. 141
• Parties: THE CHICAGO AND ALTON RAILROAD COMPANYv.MARGARET M. MOCK, Admx.
• Court: Illinois Supreme Court

72 Ill. 141

1874 WL 8777 (Ill.)

THE CHICAGO AND ALTON RAILROAD COMPANY

v.MARGARET M. MOCK, Admx.

Supreme Court of Illinois.

January Term, 1874.

OPINION TEXT STARTS HERE

APPEAL from the Circuit Court of Morgan county; the Hon. CYRUS EPLER, Judge, presiding.

Messrs. DUMMER & BROWN, for the appellant.

Mr. WILLIAM H. BARNES, for the appellee.

Mr. JUSTICE SHELDON delivered the opinion of the Court:

This was an action brought by Margaret M. Mock, as the administratrix of the estate of Anthony Mock, deceased, her late husband, against the Chicago and Alton Railroad Company, for the alleged negligent killing of said Anthony Mock. The plaintiff below recovered, and defendant appealed.

The leading facts of the case are as follows: Manchester, in Scott county, was a regular station on appellant's road. Three trains passed there daily each way. The train which caused the injury in question was a through train, for the accommodation of Peoria through passenger travel, and did not stop at Manchester unless signaled to do so. Its time of arrival there was 3:30 A. M. About 3 o'clock on the morning of April 1, it being very dark and rainy, the deceased started from his home, at Manchester, to take passage thence to St. Louis, on this 3:30 A. M. train, taking with him a lantern to signal the train. In answer to his signal with the lantern, on the platform of the station, the engineer sounded the whistle to stop the train, but the rails being wet and slippery, the train passed the station about two hundred feet before it stopped. The conductor, with a lantern, took his position on the rear platform of the hind car, and the train was backed up until the back car was alongside the station platform. This car was lighted. The conductor got out on the station platform with a light, but could see or hear no one there. The train was composed of two cars. During the time the train was backing up, the brakeman was on the platform between the two cars, with a lighted lantern. The deceased was not seen or heard by any one, after his signaling the train on the station platform, until he was found killed on the track the next morning. The station agent was not at the station on arrival of the train.

On its own cars the appellant uses the Blackstone coupling, which brings the platforms of the cars, when coupled, within six inches of each other. One of the coaches of this train was a Peoria, Pekin and Jacksonville railway coach, which was attached at Jacksonville, and it, like all cars on the latter road, was coupled by a different sort of coupling, which left the cars...