Case ID: ga-app_22/html/0594-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "\n      Bloodworth, J.", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

9356.
    Central of Georgia Railway Company v. McRee.
    Decided August 1, 1918.
    Action for damages; from Early superior court—Judge Worrill. October 2, 1917.
    The petition as amended alleges, that the defendant 'has damaged the plaintiff in the sum of $50, by reason-of the following facts: “That on or about the ninth day of June, .1915, the defendant, by negligence of its servants, in and by the running and operating of its cars, engines, and other machinery, carelessly threw or otherwise set out fire from an engine on defendant’s railroad in said county and set fire to the grass and fence on plaintiff’s lands; which fire destroyed a considerable portion of plaintiff’s fence and damaged him in the above-named amount.” “Wherefore plaintiff prays judgment against defendant in the sum of $50, and. that process do issue,” etc. The grounds of the demurrer are: that no cause of action is stated; that “it is not alleged how much fence was destroyed, and the value of the fence alleged to have been destroyed is not alleged;” that “it is not alleged what the acts of negligence complained of consisted of;” and thát “the date on which the plaintiff claims that he was damaged is not alleged” (no date was given in the original petition).
   Bloodworth, J.

1. A petition' to recover damages from a railroad company, which alleges that the defendant “destroyed a considerable, portion of plaintiff’s fence,” is too indefinite to withstand a special demurrer which makes the objection that “it is not alleged how much fence was destroyed.”

2. The other grounds of the demurrer ar.e without merit. See, in this connection, Ellis v. Pullman, 95 Ga. 445 (3), 446 (22 S. E. 568); Augusta & Savannah Railroad Co. v. McElmurry, 24 Ga. 75, 78; Sims v. Western & Atlantic Railroad Co., 111 Ga. 820 (35 S. E. 696); Southern Pine Co. v. Smith, 113 Ga. 629 (38 S. E. 960); Atkinson, v. Dismuke, 11 Ga. App. 521 (75 S. E. 835).

3. The erroneous ruling on the demurrer, as set out above, rendered the further proceedings nugatory.

Judgment reversed.

Broyles, P. J., and EgrweJl, J., concur.

A. H. Gray, L. M. Bambo, for plaintiff in error.

Park & Stone, contra.