St. Louis Southwestern Railway Co. v. Mitchell

37 L.R.A.N.S. 546, 142 S.W. 168, 101 Ark. 289, 1911 Ark. LEXIS 456
Supreme Court of Arkansas·Decided December 4, 1911·Published·Cited by 2 cases

Opinion

Wood, J.

On the 4th day of December, 1909, the appellee loaded two ear loads of hogs in 36 ft. cars at -Pekin, on the line of the Jonesboro, Lake City & Eastern Railway, about 10 miles east of Jonesboro. There were 158 hogs, weighing from 120 to 130 lbs., put in one car, and 144 hogs, averaging about 165 lbs., were put in the other car. The temperature at the time of this shipment ranged from 56 to 42 degrees. The hogs arrived on the connection between the Jonesboro, Lake City & Eastern Railway and the appellant’s line about 9:30 p. k., and were received by the appellant about 11:00 p. m., and shipped out of Jonesboro to destination at 12:15 A.. M. next day. The shipment was made by appellant under a contract, wherein the appellee agreed that the defendant should be exempt from liability for loss arising from heat, suffocation, overloading, carrying and other accidents not arising from its negligence. And the appellee in the same contract assumed all risk, the expense of unloading, feeding and watering and otherwise caring for the stock while in the yards or pens. The stock arrived at Illmo, Mo., on December 5, 1909. The appellee brought this suit against the appellant to recover damages for the loss of his hogs, alleging that when the two cars arrived at Jonesboro he demanded that they be unloaded beiore being forwarded to their destination, and that the apppellant refused to unload the hogs, or permit them to be unloaded, and that, by reason of the refusal of the appellant to unload the hogs, they died en route between Jonesboro and Illmo, and that appellee was damaged thereby in the sum of $471.75. The appellant’s answer admitted that it received the hogs for shipment at time mentioned, but denied that appellee requested them to be unloaded, and denied that it refused to permit the hogs to be unloaded, and alleged that they died either from disease or from overloading them. The appellant also set up the contract above mentioned.

The testimony on behalf of appellee tended to prove that between 5 and 6 o’clock on December 4, 1909, appellee told the shipping clerk and agent of appellant at Jonesboro that the hogs had been shipped from Pekin and would arrive that evening, and that he wanted appellant to unload them when they arrived at Jonesboro, and that the custom of appellant had been with hogs delivered to it from Lake City road to unload them at night at Jonesboro, and let them rest until the next morning, and then ship them out on the fast stock train, and that appellant requested that his hogs be unloaded in accordance with this custom. It appeared that it would require from 30 minutes to an hour to load a car of hogs at Jonesboro. The appellant refused to unload the hogs, giving as a reason for its action in so doing that the pens were full, and that they had no room for them, and that the hogs would either have to remain on the sidetrack during'the night or be moved on the first outgoing train. The appellee consented for the hogs to be shipped on the first train out of Jonesboro, rather than have them remain in the standing cars until the next morning.

There was testimony on behalf of appellee tending to show that the hogs were not overloaded, and-also that they were not diseased, and the verdict of-the jury on these questions must be taken as conclusive against appellant. The testimony on behalf of appellant tended to show that the appellee did not make any request of its agents and servants at Jonesboro to have the hogs unloaded, and that on account of the crowded condition of its stock pens on that night it could not and did not receive or accept the hogs, except upon the condition that they should be shipped out that night on the first train; that the accumulation of stock in its stock yards on that evening was not and could not have been anticipated by appellant, as .it was an unusual condition; that the hogs were overloaded before it received them for shipment, and that appellant had no notice of that fact.

We have held that a carrier is not required to provide in advance for any unprecedented and unexpected rush of business, and that he will therefore be excused for delay in shipping or in receiving goods for shipment until such emergency can in the regular and usual course of business be removed; citing St. Louis S. W. Railway Company v. Clay County Gin Co., 77 Ark. 357. But that is not this case.

Where a common carrier accepts live stock for transportation, knowing at the time that the condition of its facilities is such that a loss will result to the shipper by reason of the shipment, then such carrier will be responsible for the loss, because carrier will be negligent in undertaking the shipment under such conditions. The jury might have found from the evidence in this record that such was the case here.

The appellee testified that it had always been the custom to unload at Jonesboro, because they got a better run; if they unloaded them, they got on a stock train in the morning that got out about 7:30. Appellant had established the custom presumably for the reason that it was necessary in the proper transportation of hogs. It was shown that the hogs of appellee, when they were received by appellant for shipment, were in good condition, that they were free from disease, and that they were not overcrowded in the cars; in other words, that the cars were not overloaded.

The testimony of appellee tended to show that his hogs that died were the largest and fattest ones, and that it was necessary to unload such hogs at Jonesboro in order to prepare them for shipment through to St. Louis.

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St. Louis Southwestern Railway Co. v. Mitchell, 37 L.R.A.N.S. 546, 142 S.W. 168, 101 Ark. 289, 1911 Ark. LEXIS 456 (Ark. 1911).

37 L.R.A.N.S. 546 (St. Louis Southwestern Railway Co. v. Mitchell) — published by Counsel Stack Legal Research, free access to 12M+ legal documents.

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