Case ID: scl_23/html/0263-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "Curia, per O’Neall, J.", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

Union Insurance Company ads. W. A. Caldwell & Co.
    The seaworthiness of a vessel is a question of fact for the determination of the jury.
    BEFORE O’NEALL, J., AT CHARLESTON, MAY TERM, 1837.
    This was an action on a policy of insurance, on the body, apparel, tackling, and furniture of the brig Washington’s Barge, at and from Charleston to Barbadoes, with liberty to touch at these ports.
    On the 11th of December, 1835, the policy was made; the brig sailed soon after. It appeared that the brig was built in the Chesapeake Bay; that she was bought for the plaintiffs in New York. On arriving at Charleston, she was surveyed, and found to need repairs on account of injury sustained in a gale of wind. She was, in January, 1834, sent to the ship yard of Knox. Mr. Manson, a ship carpenter of high character, stated she had been originally iron fastened, but that before she came to Charleston she had been copper-fastened. He superintended closely and particularly her repairs at Knox’s ship yard. She was well and thoroughly repaired. He said her bottom was -stripped ; he examined it. None of the original iron fastenings were exposed. He described the manner of copper fastening after a vessel had been iron fastened, which is, to drive in the iron fastenings, and plug the holes with white pine ; it swells and makes them watertight. He raised the copper line four inches, drove in the iron fastenings to the line so- raised, and copper-fastened her. He re-fastened with copper the wood ends forward; the bottom was first covered with paper dipped in tar, and then sheathed with copper. When she went out of his hands she was seaworthy for any voyage. Copper, he said, whenever in contact with iron, corroded it.
    Captain Lacoste, the mate of the Washington’s'Barge, when undergoing repairs, concurred fully in the statement made by Mr. Manson, of the fidelity with which the brig was repaired. He, soon after she had left the shipyard of Knox, went a voyage in her to Wilmington, in which she encountered a heavy gale; she rode it out well, and was in fine condition before and after. Since her repairs at Gustavia, in the island of St. Bartholomew, hereafter to be spoken of, the vessel had been on several foreign voyages of great length, and in them all had performed very well.
    Mr. McNellage, one of the port wardens of Charleston, concurred fully in the statement of Mr. Manson, and Lacoste, about the repairs of the brig.
    Capt. Myers proved, that the vessel was, when she sailed from Chai’leston, perfectly seaworthy. Soon after sailing she encountered heavy, squalls and rough seas; a succession of storms followed, which damaged the hull, tore the sails, and caused the vessel to spring a leak; she ran for the nearest port, Charleston, in the island of Nevis ; finding she Could not there be refitted, she proceeded to Gustavia, in the island of St. Bartholomew, where she was repaired. She was found on an examination to have opened her waterways ; that her butts and wood ends had sprung; her seams in the bottom had opened; four of her rib timbers on the starboard, and one on the larboard quarter, were broken.
    The surveyors at Gustavia said that they took off some of her ceiling, and two sheets of her copper, and found the injuries which have been stated. They also said they found her iron spikes in the bottom corroded, and that this, with the other injuries, caused the leak. Captain Myers, who superintended the repairs, and saw the entire condition of the vessel,.said that her iron spikes had not corroded, and that the leak arose from the davits and wood ends forward having-given way.
    The costs of repairs to which the company.would be liable, were adjusted to the satisfaction of all concerned, at one thousand six hundred and forty-nine dollars and twenty-eight cents, with interest from 6th July, 1836.
    His Honor stated in his report that the only question made in the case was the seaworthiness of the brig; that he submitted it as a question of fact to the jury, if it could be properly said to be a question, when there was no reasonable ground to create a doubt about the seaworthiness of the brig at the time she sailed from Charleston.
    
      The jury found for the plaintiff.
    The defendants appealed, and moved for a new trial, on the following grounds:
    1st. That the testimony in the case proved the unsea-worthiness of the brig, and the verdict of the jury was against evidence.
    2d. That the verdict was against law and fact.
    Hunt, appellant’s attorney.
    DeSaussure, contra.
   Curia, per O’Neall, J.

This Court is satisfied with the result of the case below.

The motion is dismissed.