Edwards v. The Joseph Farwell & Cargo

31 F. 844, 1887 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 258
CourtDistrict Court, S.D. Alabama
DecidedJune 6, 1887
StatusPublished
Cited by3 cases

This text of 31 F. 844 (Edwards v. The Joseph Farwell & Cargo) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, S.D. Alabama primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Edwards v. The Joseph Farwell & Cargo, 31 F. 844, 1887 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 258 (S.D. Ala. 1887).

Opinion

Toulmin, J,

When a vessel is disabled at sea, and puts into a port of refuge for repair, the ordinary expenses incurred are regarded as general average. A general average contribution is a division of the loss or expense among those benefited, and has its foundation in equity and natural justice. General average expenses include the charges of entering the harbor, as pilotage, towage, quarantine dues, docking, wharfage, [845]*845surveys on the ship and cargo, cost of unloading, storing, and reloading cargo, and an allowance for wages of the crew, and provisions from the moment of departure from the course of the voyage until the voyage is renewed, or until it is abandoned, and the interests separated. But these expenses of the delay are general average only up to the time the continuation of the voyage remains in expectancy. When there is no longer any fair expectation of a continuance of the voyage, it is considered' as broken up, and there are no longer any general average expenses. Where the interests are temporarily separated as a means towards an end, and it is expected to reload the cargo and complete the voyage, then, even though by reason of unforeseen circumstances this expectation is not realized, the entire expenses of saving the different interests, and protecting them until the hope of reuniting them is abandoned, are general average; the general rule being that when a cargo continues under the control of the master, so that it may be taken on board for the purpose of prosecuting the voyage, the common interest remains up to the time the voyage is or may bo resumed. If the voyage is not abandoned, and the cargo, although separated and removed from the ship, is still under the control of the master, and liable to be taken again on board for the purpose of being carried to its destined port, the relations of the several owners are in no respect changed. The common interest remains, and whatever is done for the common interest must be done at the common expense.

T find these principles well settled by the authorities, and by them 1 must be guided in reaching my conclusions in this caso. And there is another principle equally as well settled, and that is that when expenses arc incurred for the benefit of the ship alone, or for the whole or a part of the cargo only, they must be borne by the thing for whoso benefit they were incurred. Bee 1 British. Adm. Dig. 80, and notes; Padelford v. Boardman, 4 Mass. 548; The Star of Hope, 9 Wall. 203; Hobson v. Lord, 92 U. S. 397; McAndrews v. Thatcher, 3 Wall. 367; Nelson v. Belmont, 21 N. Y. 36; The Mary, 1 Spr. 17; Williams v. Suffolk Ins. Co., 3 Sum. 510.

The schooner Joseph Fanvell, being on a voyage from Laguna, Mexico, to the port of Now York, in the United Btates, with a cargo of sundries on board consigned to certain mercantile firms in Now York, encountered a very severe storm, by which she and her cargo was so damaged and injured that she could not complete her voyage without supplies and repairs. Under these circumstances, and with the hope of benefit to the vessel, her freight and cargo, the master bore away to the port of Mobile to refit the vessel, and to procure the necessary repairs for her to enable her to perform the intended voyage, and to safely carry the cargo to its place of destination. The vessel bore away on the eleventh day of October, 1886, and arrived in the port of Mobile on the fifteenth of that month, where, upon inspection and survey, it was found necessary to unload and care for the cargo, and to dock the vessel, that she might receive the necessary repairs. The vessel and cargo were insured, and this was known to the master. He hoped that temporary repairs ■on the vessel would enable Him to proceed on and complete his voyage [846]*846with the cargo in safety; but the surveyors found and reported that it could not be done; that the vessel was not seaworthy; and that general repairs were necessary to make her so.

The community of extraordinary peril commenced with the accident to the vessel, but the question is, when did it terminate? Owing to circumstances which seem to have been unavoidable, there was considerable delay in getting the vessel docked and in a condition to have the repairs made on her, and from the reports made by the surveyors it was apparent that the extent of repairs required would consume much time, and would cost a large sum of money,—greatly more than the value of the vessel. In this view of the cp.se, I was at first inclined to hold that the only expenses chargeable to general average were such as were incurred from the time of the departure from the course of the voyage to the time when the surveys and report wore made, on the principle, as I find it laid down in the books, that when an accident happens to a ship, and she is disabled, and puts into a port of refuge for repairs, if the repairs would last nearly as long or cost almost as much as building another vessel, the master should charter another vessel, and tranship the cargo. 1 Pritch. Adm. Dig. 626; 1 Pars. Ship. & Adm. 235, 336.

Ordinarily, when a ship is disabled, the master has the right to hold on to the cargo Avhile repairing the ship; but there is a limit to this right. The question is one of reasonable delay. The master has a right to retain the cargo if he can refit his own ship in a reasonable time. But where the vessel cannot be refitted in a reasonable time, and other transportation is accessible, the master has no right to hold on to the cargo, and repair. McGaw v. Ocean Ins. Co., 23 Pick. 405; Clark v. Massachusetts, F. & M. Ins. Co., 2 Pick. 105; Phil. Ins. § 1142. But, on further consideration of this case, my conclusion is that the liability of general average continued until the voyage can be fairly considered as having broken up, and this was when there was no longer any reasonable expectation of its being continued. The cargo was liable to contribute for any general average or expenses incurred as long as it was “at risk.” Physical destruction or direct physical injury to the cargo was not the only risk to which it was exposed. Its value depended, at least is supposed to have depended, in some degree, upon the successful prosecution of the voyage. Until that was broken up, the cargo, although it was separated from the ship, and put in a place of present safety, was not so completely separated from the ship and from the whole adventure as to leave no community of interest remaining. It was not entirely disconnected with the enterprise, and it must be regarded as still “at risk,” and liable to contribute, if it was still under the control of the master, and liable to be taken again on board for the purpose of being carried to its destined port. McAndrews v. Thatcher, 3 Wall. 347; Nelson v. Belmont, 21 N. Y. 36.

• I presume that there is not a doubt entertained that if the master had been successful in having the necessary repairs made in a reasonable time, and had resumed his voyage, and safely delivered the .cargo in the port of destination, the whole expense of the delay in the voyage would [847]*847have boon regarded as a general average adventure. But the suggestion is made that the cargo was separated from the ship, and that after this nothing was done for the common benefit of ship and cargo.

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Bluebook (online)
31 F. 844, 1887 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 258, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/edwards-v-the-joseph-farwell-cargo-alsd-1887.