The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1851-04-08 00:00:00

NISI PRIUS COURT.-WEDNESDAY.

STAINBANK AND ANOTHER V. FE RMIN G.—The plain-
tiffs, Messrs. Stainbanks, who are insurance brokers in
London, sought to recover from the defendant, an under-
writer in London. the amount of his subscription to a po-
licy of insurance, dated Ist December, 184&, upon the
Hartland, a vessel of 433 tons, formerly employed in the
timber-carrying trade between Bristol and Quebec.
Plaintiffs had no personal interest in this case; they had
effected this policy as agents for merchants in Liverpool,
who carried on business here under the name of Rankin,
Gilmour and Co., and who had a house in Quebec, con-

sisting of the same parties, trading under the name of
Gilmour and Co. These were the rea plaintiffs, and they
alone were interested in the policy.—After the facts of the
case had been proved at great length, a verdict was taken
for the plaintiffs of £2OO, leave being given to enter a
nonsuit upon certain points.

CUNLIFFE v. HARRISON.—An action for claret, sold
and delivered, to which the defendant pleaded non-
liability. The plaintiff has for many years carried on
business in Bordeaux as a wine mercnant : the defendant
is now partner in the house of Allanson and Brandreth,
wine merchants, Liverpool ; and the action referred to is
an alleged sale of claret by the plaintiff to the defendant
in September, 1847. A verbal order for a certain num-
ber of hogsheads of claret, of the vintage of 1844, was
given by defendants to the plaintiff; the plaintiffs sent
fifteen hogsheads, of which the defendant was only in-
clined, in the firstinstance, to take ten. The plaintiff, there-
fore, sold the other five, after delivery of them at the
defendant's warehouse, in bond, to another party ; and
the defendant, after trying the remainder of the wine,
declined to take any of it, on the ground that it was
defective in quality. An angry correspondence ensued
between the French and English houses, resulting in the
present action, by which the plaintiff sought to recover
about £5OO, the value of the ten casks of claret which
he had supplied to the defendant. Verdict for the plain-
tiff, debt £512, leave being given to the defendant to enter
a nonsuit, in case there was no evidence of delivery and

acceptance to go to the jury.
IlicoiNsoN v. HIGGINSON AND OTHERS.—The plain-
tiff, Elizabeth Higginson, was sister to the late Mr. John
Higginson, an eminent merchant of this town, who died
in 1834, leaving his wife, Sarah Ann, and his two sons,
J. and H. B. Higginson (the defendantO, executrix and
executors under his will. The object of the action was to
recover about £3700, alleged to be still remaining due,
including interest, upon a bond given by the deceased,
John Higginson, to his sister, the plaintiff, as security
for the loan of £4,ooo.—Mr. Deane, solicitor for the
plaintiff, produced an admission, signed by the three
defendants a day or two ago, in which they admitted that
the testator died possessed of goods, chattes, and other
estate, realized long before the commencement of this
action, amounting to a sum exceeding £B,OOO, after all
debts were paid ; also, that the debt was due by them to
the plaintiff.—ln cross-examination, Mr. Deane said the
estate was now in the hands of third persons ; in fact,
that Messrs. H. and J. Forshaw, the defendants' attor-
neys, were now the trustees of the property ; and this
action was defended in pursuance of an arrangement by
those third persons. He did not communicate with
Messrs. Forshaw before the defendants signed the admis-
sion. One of the defendants, Mr. Jonathan Higginson,
had become bankrupt since the death of the testator ;
and Mr. Jonathan Higginson was the only executor who
proved the will. The two male defendants had assisted
witness in getting up the case for the plaintiff.—The
Judge said he could not see how Mr. Atherton could
extricate himself from the situation in which the defen-
dants' admission had thrown him. It was a very myste-
rious case when the defendants themselves were no par-
ties in resisting the action.—Mr.Atherton submitted that
there was no evidence of the receipts of the assets by the
three defendants.—Verdict for the plaintiff.

NISI PRIUS COURT.-THURSDAY

James Phillips, 39, Thomas Jackson, 32, Frank Morris,
30, William Forrest, 32, Thomas Fitzsimmons, 34. and
Thomas Barker, 36, were charged with a conspiracy to
intimidate and prevent the workmen of Edward Sigley
and Son, of Ashton-under-Lyne, from following their bu-
siness as brickmakers, and destroying the property of the
said Edward Sigley. The indictment, which contained no
fewer than seventeen counts, set forth the charge in va-
rious ways—namely, the defendants were members of an
illegal society, that they left their employers' service im-
properly, prevented other workmen from continuing their
work, and destroyed the property of such employers.—
Mr. Serjeant Wilkins, on opening the case for the prose-
cution, said that if the defendants would acknowledge that
they had done wrong, he would ask his Lordship to allow
them to go, on undertaking to come up for judgment
when called on.—For a long time the men did not seem
inclined to comply with this suggestion, as they alleged
that they had not done anything wrong. Ultimately three
of the ringleaders pleaded guilty, and, after an admoni-
tion from his Lordship, they were discharged.
Wit.soN (ADMINISTRATOR) V. THE EAST LANCASHIRE
RAILWAY CCNIPANY.—James Wilson, the administrator
of Robert Middleton, on behalf of Charlotte Middleton,
was the plaintiff, and the East Lancashire Railway Com-
pany the defendants. The deceased was a commercial
traveller, residing at Manchester, and in the receipt of
£lOO per annum, with a promise of advancement. On
the morning of the 29th of August last the deceased left
Blackburn for Colne, taking a second class place in the
express train. On reaching the Marsden station the train,
which was going at the rate of 37 miles an hour, came in
contact with a truck placed on the siding. The carriages
were turned round on the line, two of them upset, and in
one of these was deceased. Immediately after the oc-
currence, he was conveyed to the station, and medical
assistance procured • but his injuries terminated fatally
the same night. The accident was alleged to have arisen
from the siding being too close to the main line, the want
of preper signals, and a clock to regulate the time, and
the absence of an efficient staff at the station. Since the
accident the siding at the station had been removed
to a greater distance from the main line, signals bad
been placed at the station, and better arrangements
made for. the prevention of similar occurrences. The

usual staff at the station was a station-master, a gate-
keeper, and a porter ; but, on the day in question,
there were only two persons in attendance, the porter
being sick. The gate-keeper, who was an old sailor,
extremely deaf (and received ss. a week for his labour)
was on this occasion obliged to discharge his own duties
as well as those of porter. Verdict for the plaintiff.—
Damages, X5OO. The foreman of the jury intimated it
as their unanimous opinion that there, had been gross
negligence on the part of the railway company, and that
it was a groat shame an old man should be hired at ss. a
week for such a duty as that he was required to perform.
He ought to have been an able-bodied man. The Judge
expressed his concurrence in this opinion.

NISI PRIUS COURT.-FRIDAY,

ROSETTO AND ANOTHER V. GIIRNEY.—This was a Suit
by Greek merchants in London, agents for Messrs. Jump
and Co., against the representative of the Alliance Ma-
rine Insurance Company, to recover £4,500, on the
ground of a constructive total loss of a cargo of wheat,
valued at £6,400, originally shipped from Odessa. The
defendant denied that the loss was total, and pleaded
that £3,505,' which he had paid into court, was the full
amount of his liability. The case lasted a considerable
time, and in summing up his Lordship told the jury that
he believed all the proceedings at Cove had resulted from
the " perils of the sea" ; that the ship had been driven
into such a position, that the owner assured could not
get out without paying more than the value of his interest
in the cargo. He would leave it to the jury to say whe-
ther a prudent uninsured owner would have thought it
worth his while to enter into a controversy with the sal-
vors, the bottomry-bond holder, and to have given bail
to the Admiralty Court. The jury immediately replied
in the negative ; and a verdict was entered for the plain-
tiff._ Damages to be settled out of court.

YATES V.r.GARDNER.—Mr. Joseph Brooks Yates, the
plaintiff in this action, sued the defendant, who is a
builder in this town, for the non-performance of an
agreement made to purchase certain lands in the neigh-
bourhood of Toxteth-park. The whole claim amounted
to about £9,559, with interest from the commencement
of the agreement. About fourteen pleas were urged in
defence, but the chief was that, since the promise had
been entered into to purchase, the defendant had become
insolvent. As the name of Mr. Yates, however, was not
included in the schedule of the defendant, it was con-
tended that this plea was void. A verdict was given for
the plaintiff for £11,391 on the common counts.