Wise v. Nichols

• Decision Date: 05 April 1928
• Docket Number: 20995.
• Citation: 147 Wash. 375,266 P. 186
• Parties: WISE v. NICHOLS et al.
• Court: Washington Supreme Court

266 P. 186

147 Wash. 375

WISE v. NICHOLS et al.

No. 20995.

Supreme Court of Washington

April 5, 1928

Department 1.

Appeal from Superior Court, Clallam County; John M. Ralston, Judge.

Action by S.E. Wise against E. E. Nichols, Fred Owens, and Dick Owens, copartners doing business under the firm name and style of Angeles Gravel & Supply Company. Judgment for plaintiff, and defendants appeal. Affirmed.

Trumbull Severyns & Trumbull, of Port Angeles, for appellants.

Q. A Kaune, of Everett, and Wm. J. Conniff, of Port Angeles, for respondent.

TOLMAN J.

Respondent brought this action as plaintiff, alleging in his complaint the making of an oral contract with the defendants, by the terms of which he was to furnish a certain tug, with its equipment, tools, and crew, to do certain booming, rafting and towing of logs for an agreed compensation of 65 cents per thousand feet, and that the contract required him to prepare certain booming grounds for the catching and holding of the logs without other compensation; further alleging that he complied with the contract, working for a period of 31 actual working days, devoting three-fourths of the actual working time to the preparation of the rafting and booming grounds, and that when he had rafted and boomed less than 400,000 feet of logs, he was discharged without cause. He further alleges that the reasonable value of the work performed with the tug, equipment, tools, and crew was the sum of $45 per day, or a total for 31 days of $1,395, for which amount he demanded judgment.

To this complaint a general demurrer was interposed and overruled. The defendants answered, with certain denials, admissions, and affirmative matter, and the case was tried to a jury, which rendered a verdict in favor of the plaintiff for $1,124.27. On a motion for a new trial the verdict was reduced to $800, and from a judgment in that amount on the reduced verdict the defendants have appealed. No statement of facts is brought to this court.

Appellants seem to contend that the complaint was insufficient as against the demurrer, in that for a breach of a contract the measure of damages is the loss of the profits that would have been earned if plaintiff had been permitted to carry out the contract, and not the reasonable value of that part performed which was permitted, citing Davis v. Thurston County, 119 Wash. 414, 205 P. 840, Bailey v Furleigh, 121 Wash. 207, 208 P. 1091, and ...