The Ole Oleson

20 F. 384, 1884 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 89
CourtDistrict Court, E.D. Wisconsin
DecidedMay 12, 1884
StatusPublished
Cited by6 cases

This text of 20 F. 384 (The Ole Oleson) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, E.D. Wisconsin primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
The Ole Oleson, 20 F. 384, 1884 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 89 (E.D. Wis. 1884).

Opinion

Dyer, J.

Objections are filed to claims made by Bernard Kienast :and August Walkowski to a share of the proceeds arising from the sale of the schooner Ole Oleson upon a libel for seamen’s wages. The intervenors were employed as stone-pickers by the master of the vessel, who was also managing owner, to gather stone on the shore of Lake Michigan at or near Alpena, and .to assist in loading the stoiie on board as cargo to be carried to Chicago. While engaged in this service they lived and slept on the vessel as she laid off shore; and the master testifies that when the weather was such that stone ■could not be gathered, the schooner would run into Alpena, and the intervenors would then lend a hand in hoisting sail. But they did not accompany the'vessel on her voyages, and were not employed as seamen, the vessel having a full crew without them. The only question is, was the service which they rendered in picking up stone for the vessel a maritime service, and I am constrained to hold that it was not.

Three cases are relied on in support of the alleged right of these claimants to payment from the fund in the registry, namely: The Canton, 1 Spr. Dec. 437; The Ocean Spray, 4 Sawy. 105; and The Minna, 11 Fed. Rep. 759. These cases are all distinguishable from this.

In the case of The Canton, the employment of the libelants was to load the vessel at Quincy with stone, not as quarrymen, but to take the stone on board from a wharf, to navigate the vessel to Boston, and there to unload her. As was said by Judge Sprague, they must have been able to “hand-reef and steer,” the ordinary test of seamanship. These duties they performed, and so they were not landsmen merely, hut actually participated in the navigation of the vessel.

[385]*385In tl .6 case of The Ocean Spray, the Yessel went upon a voyage for sea . The libelants shipped as sealers, and were hired to take seal fo.i the vessel at a stipulated sum per month, and their shipping agreeno snt bound them also “to lend a hand on board whenever they were w mted. ” On the voyage they helped make and reef sail, heave the an ¡hor, and clear decks, but did not stand watch. They also procun d drift-wood and water for the use of the vessel. They thus aided i 1 the navigation and preservation of the vessel, and, as Judge Dbaoy well states the case, they were co-laborers in the leading purpose othe voyage. Upon the principle applicable to surgeons, stewar< Is, cooks, and cabin boys, they were to be considered as mariners. They engaged for the voyage, were employed in promoting the pu pose of the voyage, and aided in the navigation of the vessel; and, a¡ Judge Deady says, without their services the voyage must have b 3en profitless, because the purpose of it could not have been accomplished. Moreover, the vessel was expressly pledged as security foi the payment of the wages of the sealers for the round trip.

The case of- The Minna seems at first sight to rub the case in hand more (losely. The Minna was engaged exclusively in fishing. As the ca, :e is stated, she ran out from Alpena every morning to the fishing grounds, threw her nets, made a catch of fish, and returned to pon , where the fish were discharged and prepared for market. Her er >w consisted of a master and engineer. The libelant was employed as a fisherman, and though he took no part in the navigation of the ug, his contract required him to go out with the tug every day, to set i nd lift the nets, clean the fish, discharging the catch and reeling tin nets on shore, where he lodged at night. His services were, tlierefc re, as Judge Büown decided, in furtherance of the main object of the enterprise in which the vessel was engaged. He assisted in the nain purpose of the vessel’s employment. His services were mainly performed on board the tug, and wore necessarily connected with, í> nd part of, the service in which the tug was engaged. They were, t icrefore, maritime in their character.

In t íe case in hand the intervenors were mere landsmen. They procur id cargoes on shore for the vessel, and assisted in loading them on boa ci. In a general sense their services were in furtherance of the ve; sel’s employment, but not more so than the services of stevedores, md the present weight of authority is that stevedores have no maritii 10 lien upon a ship for services in loading and stowing her cargo. Paul v. Bark Ilex, 2 Woods, 229, and cases there cited. The service i of the intervenors were completed before the voyages of the vessel • «-ore begun. They did not attend her upon her voyages. They were L borers on shore, and the nature of their contract was not affected by the fact that they obtained their meals and at night slept on boa 4 the vessel as she laid off shore or harbor. In material respects, the case, I think, differs from that of The Minna and the other cases cited, and I shall sustain the objections to these claims on the [386]*386ground that the services of the intervenors stand on the same footing as those of stevedores. I thus rule, not without some hesitation, for, as an original question, I must confess I have never been able to see why the employment of a stevedore should not be regarded entitling him to a maritime lien.

Objections are also filed to a claim against the proceeds, in the registry of the court, of $248.30, made by one Robert Peacock, which claim arose upon the following state of facts: The Oleson, being at Bay de Noquette, in Michigan, her master, who was half owner of the vessel, purchased from Peacock a cargo of culled lumber to carry to Racine, Wisconsin, the home port of the vessel. The contract of purchase was in writing, and was as follows:

“Bay de Noquette, September 3, 1883.
“When schr. Ole Oleson unloads the load of culls, she, by her captain, promises to pay to the order of R. Peacock the sum of two hundred forty-eight 30-100 dollars, being the amount due for the cargo now loaded. This lumber was sold the vessel so'she could make a freight. Interest after due until paid.
Schr. Ole Oleson, of Racine,
“By her Captain,-John Schultz.”

The cargo was carried to Racine, was there attached and sold, and the demand of the vendor, Peacock, for the purchase price has ever since remained unpaid. The question is, did Peacock acquire a maritime lien on the vessel, for the amount due him for the lumber, which took precedence of a prior mortgage on the vessel ? The instrument executed by the master does not, by its terms, purport to create a liem It is true that in the last clause it is stated that the lumber “was sold the vessel so that she could make a freight;” but it does not, in terms, assume to give the vendor of the lumber a lien. The only question, then, is, does the maritime law give the vendor a lien on the vessel from the mere fact that the master bought the cargo for the purpose of earning freight ? Or, to state the proposition in another and more general form, can a master and part owner of a vessel purchase'a cargo on credit and thereby create a maritime lien for the purchase money, on the vessel ? So far as the power of the master, acting-simply in that character, to bind the owners of a vessel in the purchase of cargo, is concerned, adjudged .cases seem to have settled the question, beyond controversy, in the negative.

In Hathorn v. Curtis, 8 Greenl. 360, the court said:

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Bluebook (online)
20 F. 384, 1884 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 89, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/the-ole-oleson-wied-1884.