Maine Lumber Co. v. Maryland Casualty Co.

216 A.D. 35, 214 N.Y.S. 621, 1926 N.Y. App. Div. LEXIS 9156
CourtAppellate Division of the Supreme Court of the State of New York
DecidedMarch 19, 1926
StatusPublished
Cited by2 cases

This text of 216 A.D. 35 (Maine Lumber Co. v. Maryland Casualty Co.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of the State of New York primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Maine Lumber Co. v. Maryland Casualty Co., 216 A.D. 35, 214 N.Y.S. 621, 1926 N.Y. App. Div. LEXIS 9156 (N.Y. Ct. App. 1926).

Opinion

Merrell, J.

The action was brought to recover the sum of $86,000 upon a bondgiven by the respondent, Maryland Casualty Company, to secure the performance by the defendants, Tazewell Timber Corporation and W. & S. Job & Co., Inc., hereinafter referred to as the Tazewell Corporation, of a contract with the plaintiff. The plaintiff, appellant, is an English corporation, having its principal office at Liverpool, Eng. The Tazewell Timber Corporation was organized in March, 1920, in the State of Virginia. It acquired a tract of timberland of approximately 5,600 acres and had entered upon lumbering operations thereon. At first the Tazewell Timber Corporation manufactured lumber by the rather primitive means of a circular-saw mill. Desiring to increase its output it began, in July, 1920, to erect what was known as a band-saw mill. The improved mill was completed in December, 1920. In January, 1921, the Tazewell Timber Corporation entered into negotiations with the plaintiff for the sale of its lumber. A written contract was finally entered into between the parties. The contract was negotiated by means of cable communication. The plaintiff, as a condition to entering into a contract with the Tazewell Timber Corporation, required that the timber corporation furnish a surety company bond for the faithful performance of its contract with the plaintiff. Thereupon the Tazewell Timber Corporation made written application to the defendant, respondent, Maryland Casualty Company, for a bond “ guaranteeing performance of contract for delivery of lumber,” etc. The written application bore date March 3, 1921. At the time of applying to the respondent for the surety bond, the Tazewell Company had prepared its proposed contract with the plaintiff, appellant, and said contract [37]*37was submitted to the respondent surety company with the written application for the bond. The application was upon the surety company’s printed form. In the opening sentence of the written application for said bond the Tazewell Timber Corporation stated: “ We desire the Company to execute Bond for us in the sum of $86,000.00, running to Maine Lumber Co., Ltd., and in such form as may be satisfactory to you and the obligee, * *

As particulars regarding the nature of the bond, the application stated: “ Guaranteeing performance of contract for delivery of 800,000 feet of prime oak, poplar and chestnut at $60.00 per M and 1,000,000 feet of #1 Common and Selects at $38.00 per M feet F. O. B. cars N. & W. By. Siding Burkes Garden, Virginia.”

The bond for which the timber company applied was executed by the respondent, and together with the proposed contract, which, until then, the plaintiff had never seen, was then sent to the plaintiff at Liverpool, where the contract was executed by the plaintiff and returned to New York in the latter part of March, 1921. The defendant W. & S. Job & Co., Inc., a New York corporation, joined with the Tazewell Timber Corporation in making said contract with the plaintiff, and the bond of the respondent, Maryland Casualty Company, as surety, joins both the Tazewell Timber Corporation and W. & S. Job & Co., Inc., as principals. The contract thus entered into between the plaintiff and the defendants, other than the respondent, was for the purchase by the plaintiff from the Tazewell Timber Corporation of 1,800,000 feet of lumber of certain specified grades at a total price of $86,000. Delivery of the lumber was to be F. O. B. cars at Burkes Garden, a railroad siding some five or six miles from the mill of the defendants. As to the manner in which payment for the lumber thus sold and to be delivered to the plaintiff was to be made, the contract provided that the plaintiff was to advance to the Tazewell Timber Corporation and its associate, W. & S. Job & Co., Inc., from time to time as requested, amounts sufficient to meet the payrolls and current bills of the lumber manufacturers. Such advances were to be made by the plaintiff by accepting upon presentation drafts or trade acceptances drawn by the Tazewell Timber Corporation or by payment of cash or assignment of customers’ trade acceptances as might be mutually agreed upon between the parties. The contract further states that such advances on drafts were to be debited by plaintiff to a special account with the Tazewell Timber Corporation and W. & S. Job & Co., Inc. Shipments of the lumber were to be made on orders of the plaintiff and were to be credited by the plaintiff against such advancements made by it and wVn the amount of lumber shinned was equivalent to the [38]*38amount advanced, thereafter the lumber manufacturers were to draw at sight with documents attached to cover the amount of each shipment. The lumber when first manufactured and as it came from the mill required seasoning and it was necessary to stack the same for three or four months before shipment was made. It was thus necessary for payment to be made by advances against shipments after the lumber had been seasoned. Upon the execution of the contract the Tazewell Timber Corporation and its associate commenced the manufacture of the lumber for the plaintiff. The lumber was placed for the purpose of curing in the Gratton Storage Company, a company organized for the purpose of carrying out the provisions of the contract which provided that the plaintiff should have a lien for due performance of the contract and the repayment of the advances made thereunder upon all cut logs then on the premises of the timber company and upon any logs thereafter cut during the term of the contract, and also upon all manufactured products of said logs until the manufactured lumber was placed aboard cars at the railroad siding at Burkes Garden, Va. The Tazewell Timber Corporation requested of the plaintiff advances from time to time in the months of April, May and June, 1921, pursuant to the provisions of the contract. Drafts and trade acceptances were drawn by the Tazewell Timber Corporation and the same were accepted by the plaintiff, appellant. These acceptances were used by the timber corporation in the ordinary course of business and were negotiated through the Greenwich Trust Company. In all, the advancements and trade acceptances thus made by the plaintiff aggregated $86,000, the entire purchase price of the lumber contracted for. The Tazewell Timber Corporation received from the Greenwich Trust Company in cash upon such trade acceptances the full sum of $86,000. The business enterprise of the Tazewell Timber Corporation was a failure. Its timber turned out to be of inferior quality, and not up to the character of the lumber for which the plaintiff had contracted. Out of 1,000,000 feet of various kinds of lumber which were put into the warehouse of the Gratton Storage Company there were only about 25,000 feet of prime lumber, and 62,000 feet of No. 1 common and selects of oak, poplar and chestnut. This comparatively small amount of lumber up to contract was all that was sufficiently dry and delivered prior to September, 1921. On September 1, 1921, the Tazewell Timber Corporation went into the hands of a receiver. A large part of the lumber manufactured was low-grade, wormy and of different varieties of wood from those called for by the contract. The tract upon which the lumbering was done appears to have been cut over without [39]*39regard to the kind of timber cut. Notwithstanding the fact than the plaintiff had advanced the full purchase price of the lumber for which it had contracted of $86,000, there was only delivered to the plaintiff 25,000 feet of prime lumber out of 800,000 feet provided in the contract and 62,000 feet of No. 1 common and selects out of 1,000,000 feet covered by the contract.

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216 A.D. 35, 214 N.Y.S. 621, 1926 N.Y. App. Div. LEXIS 9156, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/maine-lumber-co-v-maryland-casualty-co-nyappdiv-1926.