Case ID: mass_170/html/0272-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "Holmes, J.", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

William A. Archambeau vs. New York and New England Railroad Company.
    Worcester.
    October 6, 1897.
    February 23, 1898.
    Present: Field, C. J., Allen, Holmes, Knowlton, Morton, Lathrop, & Barker, JJ.
    
      Personal Injuries — Receivers of Railroad — Action — Pleading.
    
    An action of tort for personal injuries sustained by an employee while a railroad was in the hands of receivers, cannot be maintained against the new corporation after the receivers have turned over the property to it; and this defence is admissible under a general denial.
    Tort, for personal injuries occasioned to the plaintiff on August 30, 1895, while acting as a brakeman upon the freight cars of the Norwich and Worcester Railroad Company. The answer was a general denial.
    Trial in the Superior Court, before Hopkins, J., who directed a verdict for the defendant, and reported the case for the determination of this court, in substance as follows.
    The defendant put in evidence a copy of the decree of the Circuit Court of the United States for the District of Massachusetts, dated January 26,1894, appointing one Platt of New York, and one Perry of Providence, Rhode Island, receivers of all the property of the defendant, including the railroads owned and operated by it. It was agreed that, prior to the date of the decree, the defendant was in occupation of and operating the railroad of the Norwich and Worcester Railroad Company under the lease of that company to the Boston, Hartford, and Erie Railroad Company, dated February 9,1869. It appeared that some of the persons in the employ of the New York and New England Railroad at the time of the decree aforesaid were continued in the employ of the receivers as their servants in operating the road. It also appeared that the receivers entered upon the possession of all the property of the defendant railroad at the time of their appointment, and continued exclusively to occupy and operate the same until midnight of August 31, 1895, when they turned all the property over to the New England Railroad Company, which corporation has operated the same ever since.
    The plaintiff contended that this defence was not open under the defendant’s answer, and also contended that the decree appointing the receivers did not relieve the railroad from liability.
    If the verdict ordered was right, judgment was to be entered thereon; otherwise, there was to be a new trial.
    The case was argued at the bar in October, 1897, and after-wards was submitted on briefs to all the justices.
    
      W. A. Gile & C. T. Tatman, for the plaintiff.
    
      F. P. Goulding & W. C. Mellish, for the defendant.
   Holmes, J.

Judgment on the verdict.