Pine Bluff daily graphic., 1915-12-15
First Likely to Be Filed To dav-A]l Grow Out of
 Compress Fire.
RAILROAD CANNOT
 LOSE IN LITIGATION
Though Cases Will Be in Names of To. cal Cotton Men as PlaintiiIs and Railroad as Defendant, Fight
 Really Between Insurers.

Eighteen or twenty suits, with as many insurance companies as plain- tltfs, and praying for damages which will aggregate something approximat- Ing half million dollars, are expect ed to De filed here, perhaps the first of them to be filed today, all with the St. Louis Southwestern railway com pany as the defendant, and all result Ing from the big fire on Sunday, No- vcmoer 2S, at the Pine Bluff Compress company's Doris B. compress
 The suits will be entered in the names of the insured, as well as of the insurance companies involved For instance, the title of the suits will be John smith Grocery company ct al, vs. St. Louis Southwestern Railway company Attorney James A. Wat kins of Little Rock is due to arrive in Pine Bluff this morning, to arrange for the filing of the suits.
 Investigators in the employ of the insurance companies have been busy since the fire, in the effort to ascer- tain as definitely as may be, the cause of the fire Their work is now con- pleted and their reports ready for sub mission. according to information ob- tained last night. and the filing of the suits is expected to result within the next few days.
 Each of the suits, it is stated will be separate and distinct, and each of the plalntlff insurance companies will seek to recover from the defendant railroad company the amount of losses sustained by policyholders in those companies, as a result of the fire. All the suits, however, will be based upon and supported by the same testimony and evidence. a vo- luminous amount of which is said to have been gathered by the investi- gators.
 Railroad Is Indemntfied. That the Cotton Belt railroad will not suffer a loss, even if the judg ment in the suits is rendered against it, was another statement made last night, by insurance authorities.
 The railroad company carries a policy, of unusual comprehensiveness by which it is indemnified against loss, especially through sparks. The company is protected from the "spark hazard" by the terms of this policy and as the expected suits will allege that the million dollar fire loss was the result of a blaze originating with a spark from a Cotton Belt locomo- tive. judgments against the railroad in these suits will really be paid by the big insurance corporation in which the railroad company holds it's policy.
 Some Companies Not Suing.
 All of the insurance companies which carried policies on the cotton destroyed in the fire are not to enter suit against the railroad, it is stated Inquiry along this line developed. 2 situation not generally known tt lay men, but which is interesting, espe' l cially at this time.
 Twenty-six of the old line insurance l companies, seven or eight years ago organized the Cotton Insurance asso citation, the headquarters of which arc at Atlanta, Ga. The Cotton Insurance association, through cooperation an( reinsurance, does the same sort O.
 business as the individual companies
 but goes even further. For instance
 t held the policy which is said tt
 protect the Cotton Belt from ]osse: ocea5ioned by sparks from the loco 1 motives.
 l These companies, which make uI
 the Cotton Insurance association, vii l not sue the Cotton Belt, because un
 der the circumstances, they would bs both plaintiff and defendant, as judg l