Bartley v. Borough Development Co.

214 F. 296, 1914 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 1808
CourtDistrict Court, E.D. New York
DecidedApril 13, 1914
StatusPublished
Cited by6 cases

This text of 214 F. 296 (Bartley v. Borough Development Co.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, E.D. New York primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Bartley v. Borough Development Co., 214 F. 296, 1914 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 1808 (E.D.N.Y. 1914).

Opinion

CHATFIELD, District Judge.

The Bartley Brothers is a log-sided scow, 100 feet by 30, with sides 9 feet high. She was built about 1901, apparently in first-class manner, and was kept in repair. She was overhauled and caulked in the year 1909, and about the 1st day of March, 1910, was chartered with her captain to the Borough Development Company, by Mr. Bartley, whose father was the president of the company which owned the boat.

The terms of this charter are stated to have been that she was to be loaded in deep water (that is, at the Twenty-Seventh Street or Harrison Street dumps of the respondent), was to be returned in good condition, and a compensation of $6 per day was to be paid therefor.

The next day a telephone message was received, and the boat, which was then at the Long Dock, was towed to Gowanus Canal and taken to the Third Street dump of the Borough Development Company. She had been at the Long Dock for something like a week, and a new captain was placed on board of her the day that she was chartered to the Borough Development Company. She arrived at the Third Street dump upon the afternoon of March 2d, and, according to the records of this company and the testimony of its employés, was not placed under the dump until the following forenoon. They state that she was taken into a position to be loaded at half past 10, and loading continued until half past 11. A message was then sent to the office of the company -that she had been taken out from the dump, because her captain reported that she was leaking. She was again placed under the dump at 2:30 and loaded until 3:30, when she was again taken leaking from the dump, and at 4:15 this condition was reported by the superintendent of the dump to the office of the Borough Development Company. A tug was sent to pump the boat out. Subsequently she was moved some 200 feet alongside the adjoining dock, and workmen 8 to 10 in number were set to work trimming the load, while 4 or 5 men removed some 8 or 10 cubic yards of material from the center of the boat to another scow. Hand pumps were procured from the vicinity, the boat was pumped out, repairs were made to the-leaks by nailing cleats (strips of what was said to be fire wood or pieces of boxes then upon the boat) over the leaking seams, and the boat was left for the night. The following morning she was found to be in such condition that she could be moved or taken to the Long Dock, and from there to Yonkers, where, after a trip 9 days in length, she was unloaded, returned, and' surveyed. Subsequently repairs were made and the boat put again in good condition.

The owner of the boat has sued for the amount of these repairs, alleging that the boat was improperly loaded.

It was suggested upon the trial and some of the testimony indicated that the boat had touched bottom, but the testimony as to the depth of the slip and the place of loading, as well as the testimony of the captain of the boat and those who saw her while she was in the position in which she rested while being pumped out, indicates that the boat did not rest upon the bottom in any such way as to cause the damage or the strain from which the leaks resulted.

[299]*299Many disputed points appear in the testimony. The witnesses called upon each side contradict each other, and the case has developed ■ into a difficult question of fact as to just how the damage was imparted to the boat. •

The general manager of the Borough Development Company testified that he received the message that the boat was leaking before he went.to lunch that day. After lunch he went down to the dock, found the boat at what is called the Pure Oil Dock (which is up the canal or to the east of the Third Street dumping board), and that he then spoke to the captain, who said the boat was “all right” and could receive more load. He then gave directions to the superintendent of the dump to finish loading the boat and went away. He did not go down to examine the hull, and estimates that she then had some 3 feet free-board and was somewhat more than half loaded.

Later in the afternoon he received the second report that the boat was leaking, and then went to the dock, where he again found the boat'' near the Oil Dock. He succeeded in stepping on board, either directly from the dock or by getting upon a boat lying at the end of the Bart-ley Brothers. On this visit he went down into the hold. He found the boat listed, some water, sufficient to cover the keelson and at one point some 3 inches over the keelson, so that he wet his feet when stepping upon the keelson, and the captain and the superintendent or runner for Bartley Brothers were making repairs by nailing strips of board over the leaks after having placed oakum in the seams.

Mr. Bartley arrived while this witness was upon the boat and men were directed to trim the boat so as to correct the list. Also, upon Mr. Bartley’s suggestion, certain of the material was removed. The boat was pumped out by hand, and during this time the tug which had been sent to do the pumping came but did not attempt,- or at least succeed, in doing any pumping. This witness, Mr. Van Etten, was said to be the man with whom Mr. Bartley had made the charter for the boat, but this he denies, and Mr. De Wilde, the clerk who kept the record for the Borough Development Company, testifies that the conversation as to the chartering of the boat was with him. Mr. De Wilde testifies positively that he received a message that the boat was leaking, before noon, and that he received a further message in the'afternoon that the boat had been taken out a second' time from under the dump because of her leaky condition.

The superintendent at the dump testified that the captain reported to him in the forenoon that the boat was leaking; that the carts which deposited the load upon the boat drove up on the dumping board by a ramp on which but one line of carts could pass to, and but one line of carts pass off, the board. There was at times a continuous line of carts going up and coming down from the street to the board. The board itself was 77 feet long and about 30 feet wide. It was- so constructed that it had an overhang of some 14 feet, and the carts were backed up, one alongside of the other, in turn. The material thus dumped over the face of the dump, from the back of the cart, would fall a little to the outside of the center of the boat.

[300]*300TRis witness testifies that a depth of 9 feet at the inner side of the berth, increasing to a depth of 16 or 18 feet some 30 feet out, extended along the whole face of the dump, and that no dredging was done throughout this period, but that many boats as large as the Bartley Brothers came in and out, and that no one of them, in any way, found trouble through lack of depth of water, or from any obstruction while they were under the dumping board.

[ 1 ] It is admitted by the Borough Development Company that their plan was to load all the boats in deep water. No attention was paid to the provision of that nature in the charter, and they intended to return the boat in as good condition as they received her, unless she proved to be unseaworthy, a breach of warranty that would relieve chem if the boat proved to be unable to properly perform the duties for which she was chartered. The Irrawaddy, 171 U. S. 187, 18 Sup. Ct. 831, 43 L. Ed. 130; The Joseph W. Fordney (D. C.) 193 Fed. 520United States Metals Refining Co. v. Jacobus, 205 Fed. 896, 124 C. C. A. 209.

Free access — add to your briefcase to read the full text and ask questions with AI

Related

W. E. Hedger Transp. Co. v. Columbia Transp. Co.
64 F. Supp. 191 (W.D. New York, 1945)
Patton-Tully Transp. Co. v. Barrett
37 F.2d 516 (Sixth Circuit, 1930)
The Senator Rice
15 F.2d 882 (E.D. New York, 1925)
The Arizona
267 F. 598 (E.D. New York, 1920)
C. F. Harms Co. v. Upper Hudson Stone Co.
225 F. 630 (E.D. New York, 1915)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
214 F. 296, 1914 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 1808, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/bartley-v-borough-development-co-nyed-1914.