The Robert Graham Dun, 128.

• Decision Date: 11 October 1895
• Docket Number: 128.
• Citation: 70 F. 270
• Parties: THE ROBERT GRAHAM DUN. v. GRANT et al. CROWELL et al.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — First Circuit

70 F. 270

THE ROBERT GRAHAM DUN.

CROWELL et al. v. GRANT et al.

No. 128.

United States Court of Appeals, First Circuit.

October 11, 1895

Eugene P. Carver and Edward E. Blodgett, for appellants.

Benjamin Thompson, for appellees.

Before COLT and PUTNAM, Circuit Judges, and NELSON, District Judge.

PER CURIAM.

This is a proceeding by the owners of the three-masted schooner Robert Graham Dun to limit their liability, under Rev. St Sec. 4283, on account of a collision which took place between that vessel and the two-masted schooner Captain John, off Cape Cod, on the evening of September 20, 1893, which collision resulted in the sinking of the Captain John, and the drowning of three men who were on board of her, and constituted her whole crew. The owners of the Robert Graham Dun contested their liability for the collision.

There can be no question, upon the evidence disclosed in the record, that the court below was right in holding that the master of the Robert Graham Dun failed, without reasonable excuse, to perform the duty imposed upon him by the act of September 4, 1890 (26 Stat. 425), to lie by after the collision and render assistance to the men on the Captain John, and that the subsequent drowning of the three men on the latter vessel must be attributed to this neglect of duty. It is also equally clear, upon the evidence, that the owners of the Robert Graham Dun wholly failed to establish their defense,-- that as the two vessels approached each other, the Robert Graham Dun having the wind free, and the Captain John being closehauled on the port tack, and having the right of way, the latter vessel changed her course, and ran across the bows of the Robert Graham Dun, and thus caused the collision. The evidence and facts in the case are fully discussed in the opinion filed by the district judge, and it is only necessary here to say that this court fully agrees with his conclusion in these particulars, and the reasons given for arriving at them. We refer to and adopt his opinion as the opinion of this court.

The administrators of the three men who were drowned filed claims in the court below to recover damages for their sufferings. The claims were referred by the court to a commissioner. It appeared that about an hour after the collision the steamer H. F. Dimock, on her trip from Boston to New York, passed over the wreck, and those on board of her saw the face of one man clinging to the rigging,...