Sabine & E. T. R'y Co. v. Joachimi

Citations

• 58 Tex. 456
• 1883 Tex. LEXIS 47

Syllabus

<p>1. Damages, measure op.— The plaintiff gave a railway company free right of way across his land, but stipulating that it should not cause an overflow of water on his field, which the road contracted that it would observe by constructing a water-way large enough to prevent overflow. The road violated its contract by constructing an insufficient water-way (which it failed to remedy when cautioned by plaintiff that it would cause him injury), whereby much of plaintiff’s growing crop of vegetables was destroyed and unplanted ground injured, greater labor being required to prepare it for planting by reason of the overflow. In an action for damages against the company, held,</p> <p>(1) The damages to which plaintiff was entitled were such as are recoverable in an action of trespass.</p> <p>(2) The plaintiff was entitled to recover only actual damages.</p> <p>(3) The measure of his actual damage to the growing crops was the difference between the value of such crops immediately after the injury and their value immediately before.</p> <p>(4) The inquiry as to value should be confined to the very time of the destroying flood, and the very place where it occurred, and should not extend to the date of the maturity of the crops nor to the place where it would usually find a market.</p> <p>(5) The measure of damages for injury to the unplanted ground would be the cost and expense of restoring the land to its former condition, and the loss occasioned by being deprived of the use of the same, with interest, No account of loss of profits by consequent delay in getting the crop to market can enter into the estimate.</p> <p>(6) The rule for damages here announced is confined to the exact state of facts made by the record.</p>