Stephens, Jackson & Co. v. Martins

Citations

• 1 Monag. 376
• 17 A. 242
• 1889 Pa. LEXIS 1337

Syllabus

<p>In an action for damages for personal injuries caused by the alleged negligence of the defendants in not giving warning of a sand blast ” in the operation of a section in a slate quarry, the plaintiff, who was employed, by other parties than the defendants, to split up the slate after it was taken out of the quarry, gave evidence that he was injured by being struck by a rock thrown out by a sand blast from defendants’ premises. The defendants claimed that there was a custom, amongst the operators of the different sections of the quarry, to give notice of the blast to the workmen on the landing above, who, in turn, would notify the other workmen. The evidence as to what was the customary mode of warning was conflicting, but a number of witnesses, who were near the plaintiff at the time of the accident, testified that they heard no notice of the blast. Other witnesses who were in the same neighborhood testified that they heard a warning given. The court refused to instruct the jury that the verdict must be for the defendants, under the evidence, and charged that, if the jury found that, at the time of the accident, the plaintiff did not know of the alleged custom of giving notice of the blasts, and had no notice, either actual or constructive, of the particular blast in question, then he would be entitled to a verdict. Held, on writ of error by the defendants, that the charge was as favorable as the defendants could ask, and was no cause for reversal.</p>