Pullman Co. v. McGowan

210 S.W. 842, 1919 Tex. App. LEXIS 462
CourtCourt of Appeals of Texas
DecidedMarch 12, 1919
DocketNo. 6175
StatusPublished
Cited by15 cases

This text of 210 S.W. 842 (Pullman Co. v. McGowan) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Texas primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Pullman Co. v. McGowan, 210 S.W. 842, 1919 Tex. App. LEXIS 462 (Tex. Ct. App. 1919).

Opinion

. FLY, C. J.

This is a suit for damages, instituted by J. A. McGowan ágainst the Pullman Company, the San Antonio & Aransas Pass Railway Company, and the St. Louis, Brownsville & Mexico Railway Company, in which it was alleged that the first-named railway company operated a line of railroad from San Antonio to Sinton, Tex;, and the last-named railway company a line from Sin-ton to Brownsville; that the three companies were operating sleeping coaches belonging to appellant over the two lines from San Antonio to Brownsville; that on October 26, 1914, McGowan bought a ticket from the San Antonio & Aransas Pass Railway Company from San Antonio to Brownsville, and also secured a ticket for the sleeper between the two points; that he was assigned his berth in the sleeping coach, and was transported to Sinton, and the sleeping coach placed by the initial carrier on transfer track used by the two railway companies, and while there the servants of appellant awakened the pleader and directed him to leave his berth and transfer to another sleep'er, which he did by walking through mud and water, exposed to cold, and when he reached the other sleeper no berth was furnished him, and he was compelled to sit the rest of the night in his wet clothing, the car not being heated. He alleged that he had become ill from the exposure, and sustained great and permanent -damages. The cause was submitted to a jury on special issues, and upon the answers thereto judgment was rendered in favor of appellee MteGowan against appellant for $30,000. Upon the cross-a.ction of appellant against the San Antonio & Aransas Pass Railway Company the verdict was in favor of the latter, and the suit was dismissed by McGowan as •against the St Louis, Brownsville & Mexico Railway Company. This appeal is by the Pullman Company alone.

The facts showed that appellant was negligent in causing McGowan to leave the sleeping coach at Sinton during the night, in bad weather, and walk through mud and water to get another coach, and in hot heating the second coach, and in not providing a berth for him in the second coach. That negligence was the direct and proximate cause of illness and a fatal disease from which he will never recover. The jury found that the Aransas Pass Railway Company had not been gpilty of negligence causing the injuries to McGowan, and the evidence was sufficient to justify such finding.

The petition was clear and explicit in al[844]*844leging the negligence of appellant and its connection with and relation to the two railway companies, and the-first assignment of error, which assails the action of the court in not sustaining the two special exceptions to the petition, is overruled. The petition goes into details and minutia, probably not absolutely required, and it is certainly not open to the charge of vagueness, inconsistency, uncertainty, or a failure to allege any and all facts necessary to show the liability of appellant. The exceptions are so indefinite and uncertain as to come almost, if not quite, within the definition of a general demurrer. They fail to specifically point out the objections to the petition.

There is no merit in the second assignment of error, and it.is overruled. If the exception, which it is claimed should have been sustained, was acted upon by the court, the record fails to show it. However, if it had been, it should have been overruled.

■ The allegations of the petition clearly show that the negligence of appellant was the direct arid proximate cause of the sickness of McGowan and the damages resulting therefrom. Appellant compelled him to leave its coach in which he was sleeping and go out into an inclement night and enter another coach in which no arrangements were made for his accommodation or comfort, and sickness was produced by such negligence from which he will never recover. The third, fourth, and fifth assignments are overruled.

[1] The following question was .asked Dr. Wolf, a physician who had treated McGowan :

“Doctor, from your treatment of him, from all you saw of the case, saw of Mr. McGowan, and adding to that' the hypothesis that I put to you, that in the latter days of October he was subjected to an exposure while on a trip to Brownsville, in which he was required to get out of his berth in a warm sleeping car, out into the cold, cool, damp air; that it was wet and damp; that he got his feet, both muddy and wet, and then sat in a cold car afterwards for several hours in a thoroughly chilled condition, and then contracted this cold and this grippe, in which you saw him in the early days of November — with the history of that exposure, and then the cold- and grippe, as you first saw him, and the history of the case sub-. sequently, as you know it, what would you say in your opinion was the origin of the tuberculosis 1"

To that question before answered was added:

“That, when taking this trip to Brownsville, he was in good health, was a strong, robust man; then he sustained that exposure, as I outlined in this same question, returned to San Antonio, and was in the condition that you saw him in November, when he had the bad cold and bronchitis — upon that hypothesis, what would you say; where did the tuberculosis have its origin?”

The objection urged to the question was:

“Because it is a hypothetical question in which all the facts are -not before the witness, and, on account of the great uncertainty that attends an opinion of that kind, we do not think that such an opinion is competent- testimony, and we object to it for those reasons.”

It will be noted that the objection is very general and indefinite, and when the attorney for McGowan asked for the facts omitted, none were given, although counsel attempted to answer the question. The objections are too general and indefinite to be sustained. The question objected to was put as a hypothesis or an opinion based upon proven facts, and was properly presented, and the answer of the witness thereto was unobjectionable. Expert testimony is elicited by hypothetical questions and is the opinion of the expert based upon certain facts stated in the question or heard by the expert from other witnesses. Dr. Wolf clearly qualified himself as an expert. The matter is thus clearly presented by Chief Justice Shaw in Dickenson v. Fitchburg, 13 Gray (Mass.) 646: .

“In order to obtain the opinion of a witness on matters not' depending upon general knowledge, but on facts not testified of by himself, one of two modes is pursued, either the witness is present and hears all the testimony, or the testimony is summed up in the question put to him; and in either case the question is’ put to him hypothetically, whether, if certain facts testified of are true, he can form an opinion, and what that opinion is.”

Rogers on Expert Testimony, p. 65, states:

“Counsel, in framing the hypothetical question, may base it upon the hypothesis of the truth of all the evidence, or on an hypothesis especially framed on certain facts assumed to be proved for the purpose of the inquiry. The question is not improper simply because it includes only a part of the facts in evidence.”

The same questions were asked and like answers returned by other medical experts without objection. The sixth assignment of error is overruled.

[2] The seventh assignment of error objects to interrogatories to J. S. Bowles, Albert Brown, and Mrs.

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Bluebook (online)
210 S.W. 842, 1919 Tex. App. LEXIS 462, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/pullman-co-v-mcgowan-texapp-1919.