Stewart v. Ohio River R'd

18 S.E. 604, 38 W. Va. 438, 1893 W. Va. LEXIS 86
CourtWest Virginia Supreme Court
DecidedDecember 6, 1893
StatusPublished
Cited by28 cases

This text of 18 S.E. 604 (Stewart v. Ohio River R'd) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering West Virginia Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Stewart v. Ohio River R'd, 18 S.E. 604, 38 W. Va. 438, 1893 W. Va. LEXIS 86 (W. Va. 1893).

Opinion

FIolt, Judge :

This is an action of trespass on the case brought by plaintiff Stewait against the defendant company in the Circuit Court of Mason county on the-day of April, 1889, for injury to a lot of land situate in the town of West Columbia. The defendant appeared and demurred, and plaintiff’ filed an amended declaration. To this also defendant demurred, but the court overruled the demurrer, and defendant entered the plea of not guilty. The jury found for plaintiff and assessed his damages at two hundred and eighty five dollars. During the trial of the cause various objections were made by defendant to the introduction and rejection of certain evidence, which appears in the certificate of evidence, which objections the court overruled, and the defendant’s exceptions were noted in the certificate of evidence. The defendant .also took three bills of exception — No. 1 for the refusal of the court to give defendant’s instruction No. 1; No. 2 for refusing defendant’s instruction No. 2; and No. 3 for overruling defendant’s motion to set aside the verdict and grant it a new trial, upon the ground that the verdict was contrary to the law and the evidence and was excessive. All the evidence is certified and made by reference thereto part of this bill No.. 3. The court overruled the motion and gave judg-[440]*440■meut, and defendant obtained a writ of error with super-sedeas.

The plaintiff in error (defendant below) assigns eight distinct grounds of error, which may be considered under four heads: (1) The sufficiency on demurrer of plaintiff’s amended declaration ; (2) in admitting for plaintiff and refusing for defendant, certain testimony.on the trial; (3) in refusing to give the two instructions asked by defendant; (4) in overruling defendant’s motion for a new trial.

The- declaration as amended contains but one count in case. Though somewhat long, I give it in full not alone or in the main on account of the demurrer, but because in my view it shows the gravamen — the gist — of the action to be permanent injury tp plaintiff’s right as an abutting owner in his lot on Coal street, by causing great depreciation in value; and on that question, as it may appear from both the pleadings and the evidence, the vital point in the case must turn.

“Amended declaration.’ State of West Virginia, Mason county, to wit: In the Circuit Court thereof.

“The amended declaration of C. V. Stewart against the Ohio River Railroad Company: C. V. Stewart, by way of amendment to his former declaration filed herein, complains of the Ohio River Railroad Company, a corporation under the laws of the state of West Virginia, which does business in said state, and has its principal office in the city of Parkersburg, in said state, and which has been duly summoned to auswer a plea of trespass on the case, for this, to wit, that the said plaintiff now is, and long has been, the owner in fee simple and occupier of a certain lot or parcel of land situate in-the town of West Columbia, in the county and state aforesaid, and bounded on the west by Coal street, and on the north by the public road or street leading from the Chio river to, and intersecting with, the Ripley and West Columbia pike, so that said lot is a corner lot, and very valuable, and upon which lot or parcel of laud belonging to this plaintiff is situated a frame dwelling house, storehouse, stable and other buildings necessary and proper for the free use and enjoyment of the same, and which lot, with the buildings thereon, the s$id plaintiff now is, and [441]*441long hath been using, occupying and enjoying as a home and residence and place of business; and the plaintiff says that he used, occupied and enjoyed said premises as aforesaid, free from all obstructions, obstacles, incumbrances, interferences, or hindrances, as of a right he ought and should have done, until the happenings of the matters and things, and the acts and doings, hereinafter specified and complained of, namely, that during the time said premises were occupied, used and eujoyed by this plaintiff in the manner hereinbefore set forth, the said defendant, through and by its agents and employes, took possession and appropriated to its own use and benefit, to wit, on the-day of-, 1886, in the county aforesaid, that part of said Coal street which forms the western boundary of plaintiff’s said premises, and defendant made deep and dangerous excavations in said street, and along the same, and immediately in front of plaintiff’s said property, and built thereon its railroad bed and laid its railroad track on the same, and ever since the day and year last aforesaid the said defendant has been, and Still is, using the same as a railroad right of way and railroad track, and the said defendant, ever since the day and year last aforesaid, has run its cars, locomotives, trucks, hand cars, engines, and all other rolling stock over the said Coal street, in the operation and carrying on of its business as a common carrier of freight and passengers, to the great and irreparable injury and damage to the said plaintiff in the use and the enjoyment of his said premises, and without compensating him therefor.

“And the plaintiff further says that the deep and dangerous excavations and cuts made in and along said Coal street immediately in front of his premises by said defendant, as aforesaid, have entirely destroyed the use of said Coal street by this plaintiff, so that this plaintiff can not now have access to and from his said premises on the ‘western side thereof as he had theretofore done; that his said premises front upon said Coal street, and that he can no longer approach his said premises by means of said Coal street with wagons or other vehicles; and that said street was in constant use, in going to and from plaintiff’s said premises, until it was destroyed by the said defendant, as aforesaid.

[442]*442Plaintiff further avers that said excavations and cuts made in said street by said defendant are deep and dangerous, and that in some places the said excavations in front of plaintiff’s said premises are as much as four feet in depth, and leave a narrow strip between said cut and plaintiff’s said houses and buildings not exceeding six or eight feet in width.

“Plaintiff further avers that his only means of access to and from his said stable situate on said premises was over and along said Coal street, and that he can not now reach said stable with a wagon or other vehicle, and that his said stable is rendered almost practically useless to this plaintiff by reason of the destruction of said street by the said defendant as aforesaid; and the said railroad passes so near to the said stable that it is unsafe and dangerous to keep hay, oats, or other feed therein, or to confine or shelter stock therein, because of the great danger from fire originating from sparks issuing from the locomotives constantly passing along said street immediately in front of said stable; and the ground upon which said stable is located can no longer be appropriated to any valuable or practicable use or purpose, by reason of the loss of the use of said Coal street and its near proximity to said railroad track; and so plaintiff says that he has had to abandon the use of said stable, and the use and enjoyment of the ground upon which it stands.

Free access — add to your briefcase to read the full text and ask questions with AI

Related

West Virginia Dept. of Transportation v. Margaret Z. Newton
773 S.E.2d 371 (West Virginia Supreme Court, 2015)
Peddicord v. County Court of Marshall County
3 S.E.2d 222 (West Virginia Supreme Court, 1939)
Dell Coal Co. v. County Court of Boone County
178 S.E. 621 (West Virginia Supreme Court, 1934)
Shirley v. Russell
140 S.E. 816 (Court of Appeals of Virginia, 1927)
Town of Galax v. Waugh
129 S.E. 504 (Supreme Court of Virginia, 1925)
Welty v. Taylor
115 N.E. 257 (Indiana Court of Appeals, 1917)
Buckhannon & Northern Railroad v. Great Scott Coal & Coke Co.
83 S.E. 1031 (West Virginia Supreme Court, 1914)
Hill v. Norton
82 S.E. 363 (West Virginia Supreme Court, 1914)
Wallace v. Chesapeake & Ohio Railway Co.
80 S.E. 499 (West Virginia Supreme Court, 1913)
Fowler v. Norfolk & Western Railway Co.
69 S.E. 811 (West Virginia Supreme Court, 1910)
Cotts v. Wheeling & Elm Grove R. R.
59 S.E. 766 (West Virginia Supreme Court, 1907)
Barnes v. City of Grafton
56 S.E. 608 (West Virginia Supreme Court, 1907)
Morrison v. Fairmont & Clarksburg Traction Co.
55 S.E. 669 (West Virginia Supreme Court, 1906)
Swift & Co. v. City of Newport News
52 S.E. 821 (Supreme Court of Virginia, 1906)
Guyandot Valley R'y Co. v. Buskirk
50 S.E. 521 (West Virginia Supreme Court, 1905)
Hast v. Railroad Co.
44 S.E. 155 (West Virginia Supreme Court, 1903)
Guinn v. Ohio River R.
33 S.E. 87 (West Virginia Supreme Court, 1899)
Board of Education v. Kanawha & M. R.
29 S.E. 503 (West Virginia Supreme Court, 1897)
Blair v. City of Charleston
35 L.R.A. 852 (West Virginia Supreme Court, 1896)
Rowe v. Shenandoah Pulp Co.
26 S.E. 320 (West Virginia Supreme Court, 1896)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
18 S.E. 604, 38 W. Va. 438, 1893 W. Va. LEXIS 86, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/stewart-v-ohio-river-rd-wva-1893.