Bridger v. Asheville & Spartanburg R. R.

Citations

• 27 S.C. 456
• 3 S.E. 860
• 1887 S.C. LEXIS 149

Syllabus

<p>1. In action by a father against a railroad company to recover damages resulting from injuries received by his son, a lad of ten years of age, while playing on an unlocked turn-table of defendant, testimony is admissible as to the lad’s intelligence and his capacity to know and understand the danger, but not as to his prudence or recklessness in encountering it.</p> <p>2. Evidence offered by plaintiff of former accidents upon this same turntable was properly excluded- — -knowledge of such accidents not having been brought home to defendant.</p> <p>3. The father having nursed his boy while suffering from the injuries received, the judge charged the jury that contract wages lost by the father while so nursing was a proper element in the measure of damages, but that speculative and uncertain earnings were not. Held, that this charge was as liberal to the plaintiff as the law allowed.</p> <p>4. In this action, the record of a former action of the son, by the plaintiff as his guardian ad l-item, against this defendant to recover the damages of the son by reason of the same injuries, was properly excluded. It was res inter alios acta.</p> <p>5. Plaintiff having proved that one railroad company kept its turn-table locked, defendant was properly permitted to show in reply, and as ail element in the question of negligence, that other well regulated railroad companies did not keep their turn-tables locked.</p> <p>6. Plaintiff was not permitted to testify whether he thought it possible that his children could have visited the turn-table without his knowledge — whether his children had spoken to him of any such visit— when was the first time he had heard of such visit — and whether, if they had previously visited it, he or his wife would have known it. Held, that these questions, calling for opinion, hearsay, and inference, were properly excluded.</p> <p>7. The injury complained of having been received in North Carolina, the law of that State as to the age at which a boy may