Clyde v. Wood

Headnote

Carriers — demurrage ■—■ contract by owner of steamer and barges to carry pipes and fittings — unreasonable delay in loading and unloading — damage from faulty loading.

Clyde v. Wood, 196 App. Div. 906 , affirmed.

Appeal, by permission, from a judgment of the Appellate Division of the Supreme Court in the second judicial department, entered March 22,1921, affirming a judgment in favor of plaintiff entered upon a verdict. The plaintiff, in 1917, was the owner and operator of a fleet of three canal boats and a canal steamer; the defendant, a manufacturer of cast-iron pipes and fittings, with his principal place of business in Philadelphia and with foundries in Camden and Florence, N. J., in the vicinity ■ of Philadelphia. The plaintiff made a series of contracts with the defendant in 1917 to transport, by means of

his fleet, certain quantities of pipes and fittings from Camden and Florence to the port of New York and points along the Sound. The suit was brought to recover $3,510 on two claims arising out of these contracts, the first, for $2,010 for demurrage or damages for unreasonable detention in the loading and unloading of the fleet; the second, for $1,500 damages for injury to one of the barges, attributed by the plaintiff to negligence of defendant’s servants in loading it in Camden. The defendant pleaded substantially a general denial of the plaintiff’s claims and also three counterclaims for damages suffered by the defendant in consequence of the plaintiff’s failure to transport part of the pipe as agreed, and of his delay in transporting part.