Case ID: ill-app_201/html/0470-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "Mr. Justice McDonald", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

Alexander Smith et al., copartners, trading as Peabody, Houghteling & Company, Defendants in Error, v. Isaac Ettelson, Plaintiff in Error.
    Gen. No. 21,464.
    (Not to he reported in full.)
    Error to the Municipal Court of Chicago; the Hon. John A. Mahoney, Judge, presiding. Heard in the Branch Appellate Court at the October term, 1915.
    Affirmed.
    Opinion filed October 10, 1916.
    Statement of the Case.
    Action by Alexander Smith, Augustus S. Peabody, William E. Stirling, James L. Houghteling, Jr., Burton Thoms and E. M. Mills, copartners, trading as Peabody, Houghteling & Company, plaintiffs, against Isaac Ettelson, defendant, on a contract of indemnity. To review a judgment for plaintiffs, defendant prosecutes a writ of error.
    The contract of indemnity was based upon a letter which the defendant wrote plaintiffs on September 9, 1913, as follows:
    “Peabody, Houghteling & Co.
    “In consideration of your acceptance of my application for a bond issue of $40,000 and for other good and valuable consideration, I agree to protect you against claims of any broker who may have presented this matter to you. "
    Simultaneously, plaintiffs sent defendant a letter wherein they accepted his application in question. The application referred to in each of the aforesaid letters was dated August 27, 1913, and read in part as follows:
    “I hereby engage your services to procure for me a loan or bond issue at your option * * *.
    “As security for such loan I will give a principal note and interest notes or a series of $100 bonds and a mortgage or trust deed.”
    
      Abstract of the Decision.
    1. Contracts, § 190
      
      —when instruments should he construed together. Where parties have executed several instruments contemporaneously relating to the same subject-matter, all of such instruments should be construed together in determining the real intention of the parties.
    2. Contracts, § 193*—what considered in construing contract of indemnity. Letters of the plaintiff to the defendant and of the defendant to the plaintiff referring to another letter of the defendant concerning an application for a loan by the latter from the former, considered together with the application in construing a contract whereby the defendant contracted to indemnify the plaintiff against claims for commissions by third parties for procuring the loan.
    3. Indemnity, § 8*—how contract of construed. Where the defendant by letter made an application to the plaintiff for a loan to be evidenced by the defendant’s notes or by a bond issue, at the option of the plaintiff, and, before the loan was made, wrote to the plaintiff referring to the application, that he would indemnify him against claims by third parties for commissions in procuring the loan, the two letters were construed together to mean that the defendant would indemnify the plaintiff irrespective of how the loan was evidenced, as that was a mere incident to the loan.
    Isador Fried and Blum & Blum, for plaintiff in error.
    Charles G. Little and George W. Gordon, for defendants in error.
    
      
      See Illinois Notes Digest, Vols. XI to XV, and Cumulative Quarterly, same topic and section number.
    
   Mr. Justice McDonald

delivered the opinion of the court.