Court Opinion

ID: 9833259
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-01 22:34:04.159844+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:44:00.973481
License: Public Domain

On Motion for Rehearing.
[3] In passing upon appellee’s motion for a rehearing, it is perhaps proper that we detail more fully the pleadings and the facts with reference to the injuries relied upon for a recovery. The following are the material portions of the petition which relate to this feature of the litigation: “That immediately after the death of said child plaintiff sent his friends and agents, J. W. Oondrey and W. D. Kounce, for the benefit of plaintiff and his wife (and for the said Sam Smith and his wife), to said Mt. Vernon, instructing them to send a telegram to Sam Smith, notifying him and his wife of such death, and to come at once.” Then follow the message and other averments not material to be here considered. The petition continues: “That at the time of the delivery of said message the said agents of plaintiff informed the said agent of 'the defendant that the Sam Smith mentioned in the said message was the husband of the sister of Bill Horn’s (plaintiff’s) wife, and informed him that plaintiff’s wife was the mother of the baby named in said telegram, and that Bill Horn was its father, and informed said defendant’s agent that plaintiff’s wife desired her said sister to be notified of the death of the child, and informed said agent that plaintiff’s wife wanted and desired her said sister to be at the funeral and burial of said baby and to be with her, and informed said agent that she desired notice to be sent immediately of said death so that her said sister could come on the passenger train of the St. Louis Southwestern Railway Company of Texas, * * * in order to be at the funeral and burial of said child and to be with plaintiff’s wife, and informed said agent that plaintiff’s wife so desired.” In another portion the petition says: “If said telegram had been delivered according to said contract, the sister of plaintiff’s wife could have and would have boarded said train of said railroad at said time, and which said train did, in fact, leave said Ft. Worth at about said time, and could have and would have arrived at Saltillo on said line of railway and near the place of death and burial of said baby at about 2:30 p. m. of the same day, the said train of said road in fact arriving at Saltillo about that time, and said sister could have and would have been carried and transported from said Saltillo to the place of burial and funeral by private conveyance, which plaintiff then had in waiting for said sister for said purpose in time to have attended the funeral and burial of said baby, which would have been a great consolation, comfort, and satisfaction to plaintiff’s wife, being deprived of which to her damage hereinafter stated.” The petition then closes with the following aver-ments: “That plaintiff’s wife, by reason of the breach of said telegraphic contract and by reason of the negligence in failing to transmit and deliver promptly said telegraphic message as required by its duty under the law, was deprived of the immediate personal presence of her said sister at and after the funeral and burial of her little boy, deprived her of the present comfort, encouragement, assistance, consolation, satisfaction, sisterly and sacred communion and condolence of her said sister, which caused plaintiff’s wife much grief of mind, independent of the loss of her child, great disappointment, discomfort, disconsolate, sad melancholy and repining, and suffered and now suffers great mental pain and anguish, and in reflection and memory will continue so to suffer in the future, to plaintiff’s great damage in the sum of $1,750, which said damages was caused by a breach of said contract, and the proximate result of defendant’s negligence, and plaintiff lost the charges paid on the transmission of the message.” It will be observed that these averments do not disclose a situation different from that which ordinarily surrounds the mother upon the death of her child. There is nothing to indicate that she was not at the time attended by her husband and other relatives and friends who were able to provide all of the assistance necessary on such an occasion, and ready to render such comfort and sympathy as her condition made appropriate. The only purpose shown by the petition for which Mrs. Horn desired the presence of her sister was that she might receive from her the comfort and consolation to be expected from that particular relative. The testimony shows simply that Mrs. Horn and her sister had been reared in the same family, and were much attached to each other. The sister was married and lived with her husband in Ft. Worth, while Mrs. Horn resided with her husband and family near Mt. Vernon. Mrs. *561Horn’s testimony in tlie court below was very short. She merely said: “My name is Mrs. A. R. Horn. I am the wife of the plaintiff! in this case. On the night of the 15th day of May, 1910, we lost our little baby boy. I desired my sister, who lived at Et. Worth, to be at the funeral. She was not there.” This is the case made by the pleadings and the evidence. The question is, do the facts disclose a right to recover? The only injury claimed is the loss of the comfort and relief ordinarily to be expected from the presence and companionship of a sister. None was proved except such as might be presumed from the mere fact that the sister was not there. Under the rules heretofore announced by the Supreme Court of this state, we do not think the appellee is entitled to recover. W. U. Tel. Co. v. Arnold, 96 Tex. 493, 73 S. W. 1043; W. U. Tel. Co. v. Luck, 91 Tex. 178, 41 S. W. 469, 66 Am. St. Rep. 869; Rowell v. Tel. Co., 75 Tex. 26, 12 S. W. 534; W. U. Tel. Co. v. Simmons, 93 S. W. 686.
The grief or mental anguish of Mrs. Horn on this occasion evidently was caused by the death of her child, not by anything resulting from the failure of the appellant to transmit and deliver the message. The only sequence which can be referred to as resulting from the failure to deliver the message according to the contract was the loss of the presence of a sympathetic relative who might to some extent have mitigated or relieved the distress of the sorrowing mother. The injuries, therefore, did not result from a situation affirmatively brought about by the telegraph company, but from its failure to perform a service which might have furnished some relief from a condition with which it otherwise had no connection. In other words, the suit is one for damages resulting from continued mental distress, and the injury is in the failure to supply the agency by which it might have been diminished. Had Mrs. Horn been alone at the time of the death of her child, or among strangers and in need of assistance in the performance of the services required upon such occasions, or had she been so situated that the absence of her sister from the funeral of the child could justly be said to be an active cause for additional mental anguish, the situation would be different. This ease is distinguishable, we think, from that of W. U. Tel. Co. v. Simmons, supra. There the wife was alone with her children. One was sick, and the other dead. The husband was absent from home. She desired his presence and assistance, as well for the aid which he might render as for the comfort and companionship that would result therefrom. We know judicially that the ties between the husband and wife, and their relations toward their children, are such that when a child dies the absence of one of the parents from the funeral is itself the active cause of grief to the other. The court in that case held that the mental anguish suffered by the wife by reason of not having her husband present at the funeral was a proper element of damage. It may be assumed, we think, that the mere fact that a husband is absent and the wife deprived of his aid and comfort on such an occasion would be in itself a sufficient basis for additional mental distress. As between sisters having separate families and living in widely separated cities, no such presumptions will be indulged. Whatever may be said as to the sufficiency of the pleadings in this case to authorize a recovery, it cannot, we think, be claimed that any of those special conditions were proved that would justify the judgment rendered. Mrs. Horn while upon the witness stand did not testify to any facts which would authorize the jury to infer that she suffered any fresh mental anguish by reason of the absence of her sister. She merely stated that she desired that her sister be present, but that she was absent.
The motion for a rehearing is overruled.