Himler Coal Co. v. Kirk

266 S.W. 355, 205 Ky. 666, 1924 Ky. LEXIS 199
CourtCourt of Appeals of Kentucky
DecidedNovember 21, 1924
StatusPublished
Cited by20 cases

This text of 266 S.W. 355 (Himler Coal Co. v. Kirk) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Kentucky primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Himler Coal Co. v. Kirk, 266 S.W. 355, 205 Ky. 666, 1924 Ky. LEXIS 199 (Ky. Ct. App. 1924).

Opinion

Opinion of the Court by

Drury, Commissioner

Reversing.

The appellant sought to enjoin the appellees from interfering with or preventing its construction or operation of a railroad across' the land of appellees. The lower court denied the relief sought.

Prior to the 14th. of July, 1881, the Tug River Coal & Salt Company was the owner of a 15,000-aere tract of land, which fronted on Tug river from the mouth of Little Elle creek to the mouth of Wolf creek and extended back on to the waters of Rockcastle creek and included all the lands on Collins’ creek and Buck creek, and on July 14, 1881, it made, executed and delivered to James A. Barret a deed for a portion of the surface of said tract, which included the lands on Collins’ creek and Buck creek, and which includes lands claimed by the appellees. This deed called for 200 acres, more or less, but when boundary was run out, according to the description of the deed, it was found to contain 609 acres, and included the lands from the mouth of Collins’ creek to below the town of Warfield, which is situated at the mouth of Buck creek, with certain exceptions that do not affect this controversy. The grantee, James A. Barret, continued to own this surface to the time of his death. [668]*668He died intestate and was survived by his widow, Helen L. Barret, and two sons, J. D. Barret and A. Lee Barret, to whom this land descended; they divided this land and executed to each other deeds, and by the division made by the heirs, A. Lee Barret became the owner of certain surface, a portion of which the appellee, Ella Kirk, now owns. Prom the Tug River Coal & Salt Company the holdings of that company have passed by mesne conveyances to the Buck Creek Coal Company, and it has leased same to the appellant. The Hinder Coal Company, under and by virtue of said lease, put in its mines on Buck creek, a short distance above the lands of the appellees, and on the J. A. Barret tract, for the purpose of mining coal from under the Kirk property, as well as other properties that it had acquired by virtue of said lease, but all being a part of the tract formerly owned by the Tug River Coal & Salt Company. The point where the mines were put in is about two miles from the Norfolk & Western railroad, and on the opposite side of Tug river from the railroad. It was necessary to construct a railroad from its mines to a railroad bridge which was constructed across Tug river, and in order to reach, its mines from the bridge it was necessary, as appellant claims, for it to pass over one edge of the Kirk property with its right of way, and to take about three-tenths of an acre of the land for the right of way.

Appellant was incorporated by the state of West Virginia, and was given the right, among other things, to engage in mining coal and building railroads.. After appellant had located its railroad from the bridge to its mine, it was found it passed over the edge of the Kirk tract, and when it attempted to grade and construct its road, it was forbidden by Kirk to enter said land for that purpose, and then it was that appellant filed this action in equity against them in the Martin circuit court to enjoin and restrain them from interfering with it in the grading, construction a.nd operation of said road, and it entered its motion, after notice. A temporary injunction was granted and appellant executed a bond and constructed its road over the property. The case was then prepared and tried upon its merits, and resulted in a judgment dismissing the appellant’s petition.

The question involved in this case is this: Has the Himler Coal Company, by necessity, a right of .way over the Kirk property for the construction of its railroad, in order to remove the coal now being mined from beneath [669]*669the Barret homestead, of which the Kirk property is a part? The Himler Coal Company is also claiming the right to transport across the Kirk land not only the coal which it is now mining from beneath the Barret homestead, but the further right to .transport this coal which it owns outside of the Barret homestead. The question of the transportation of this other coal across the Kirk property is not now before us, and anything we might say about that would be merely dictum, and in this opinion we shall confine ourselves to the right of -the Himler Coal Company to transport across the Kirk property the coal beneath the Barret homestead.

When the Tug Biver Coal & Salt Company conveyed this surface to Barret, it retained the minerals thereunder, and its right to transport those minerals across the Kirk property depends upon whether or not the Himler Coal Company, as the mesne grantee of the Tug Biver Coal & Salt Company, has a right to open a coal mine on the homestead to mine the coal thereunder, and to transport it thereover to market. Its reservation of the minerals in the conveyance to Barret necessarily reserved to it and its grantees the right to dig through the surface to the minerals, to mine them in such way and in such quantities as not to destroy the support of the surface, to bring these minerals to the surface, and to transport them over the surface from the opening to the market. Such rights are absolutely necessary to the reasonable enjoyment of the minerals reserved. It was, therefore, impliedly reserved in the deed to Barret. Upon the principle of construction that, where a man grants a thing, he grants with it everything necessary to its enjoyment, it is held that by a grant of land, easements necessary for its enjoyment are created, ex necessitate, and pass by the grant, although not expressly named. Bentley v. Hampton, 28 R. 1083, 91 S. W. 266; Roland v. O’Neal, 122 S. W. 827; L. & N. R. R. Co. v. Ward, 150 Ky. 42, 149 S. W. 1145; Skaggs v. Carr, 178 Ky. 849, 200 S. W. 27; Brookshire v. Harp, 186 Ky. 217, 216 S. W. 379.

The effect of the conveyance by the Tug Biver Coal & Salt Company to Barret of the surface only, was the same as if Barret had been the owner of the entire estate and had conveyed to the Tug Biver Coal & Salt Company the coal beneath his land, and if he had done that, he could not now be heard to say: “It is true that I conveyed this coal to the Tug Biver Coal & Salt Company, but I didn’t grant to it any right to remove it.” [670]*670In other words; he cannot say: “ Yes, I sold it to them, bnt I am not going to let them have it.”

It appears that when the Tng River Coal & Salt Company made its deed to Barret, it reserved to itself not only the coal and minerals beneath the land conveyed to Barret, but also reserved impliedly the right to use the surface of the Barret property, as far as necessary, for the removal and transportation of the minerals which it reserved to market.

This surface was conveyed to Barret by deed of general warranty, and it is insisted that this general warranty would be inconsistent with 'an implied reservation of the right to sink a shaft to mine the coal, and the right to construct a railroad to transport the coal when mined. That question is fully answered in the case of Adams v. Marshall, 138 Mass. 228, 52 Am. Rep. 271, where the court said:

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Bluebook (online)
266 S.W. 355, 205 Ky. 666, 1924 Ky. LEXIS 199, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/himler-coal-co-v-kirk-kyctapp-1924.