Gould v. Atlantic City Railroad
Gould v. Atlantic City Railroad
Opinion of the Court
Opinion by
The plaintiff, on April 2,1916, was a regular passenger in a car of the defendant company en route from Cape May to Philadelphia. The train, composed of five cars, stopped at Wildwood Junction, where several other cars were attached to the train. While effecting this coupling, the plaintiff received his injuries, and the exact facts are important in determining the liability of the defendant. There is no suggestion of his contributory negligence, as he was in the place arranged for his occupancy and quietly sitting in a seat in a regular coach. He describes the accident as follows: “The seat in front of me was turned so as to face me and occupied on the window side by a friend named Peterson, who has since died. I was seated on the side next to the aisle, with my elbow on the arm of the seat; we waited for a few minutes at Wildwood Junction when the other cars were attached to our train with such an unusual and extraordinary force, it gave such a crash that I lost my balance and my arm (elbow) lodged into my abdomen, and then I fell forward, and then back on the seat again, and all at once I got a severe fainting pain in the left side of my abdomen; at first it was like an electrical shock, a very sharp pain, then I felt kind of fainting; I suffered pain continually all the time until we came to Camden; I struck against the arm of the seat. Mr. Peterson fell off his seat too. Mr. Clark noticed me and when I got out of the car at Camden he helped me from the car into the ferry; I arrived home by a trolley about eight o’clock; showed the place to my son; I was shook up all the way through; had a black and blue mark on the left hand side
In all the material facts relating to the accident, the plaintiff was corroborated by James U. Clark, who was seated in the second seat in front of him, and stated, — when they coupled or backed into the cars that we were in, they backed in with terrific force, which probably jarred everybody on the train; when asked what he meant by terrific force, he replied, “Well, it was more of a crash into the cars, than it was a backing into the cars. I took Gould off the train. He seemed to be suffering and he was as white as a ghost and I assisted him to the boat. He was very pale after the jolt.” The family physician and the surgeon confirmed the plaintiff’s statement as to his injuries, and treatment. Tending to show the plaintiff’s good health, he testified that prior thereto, his general health was all right; that he had never been involved in an accident, and never had hernia or rupture. This was supplemented by the testimony of a physician and surgeon who had examined him physically in January, 1914, and in April, 1915, over his entire body, heart, lungs and inguinal region, to comply with certain requirements for admission into a fraternal order, and found no evidence of a hernia or rupture. There is nothing to suggest that the plaintiff’s injuries were simulated, or that he was not seriously injured on the defendant’s car on April 2, 1916, or that he in any degree contributed to the accident. The words used by witnesses to describe an accident vary largely with their ability and power of explanation, their state of mind, bias or interest, and in determining the extent or degree of violence alleged, it is as important to consider the physical results produced, as well as the reasonably colorable narrative given by the parties and that of obsery
The testimony in this case supplies all that was lacking in that one, and the words used have no doubtful meaning in describing an unexpected and violent coupling through the negligence of the defendant’s employees, by which the plaintiff was injured.
The judgment is affirmed.
Reference
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- Gould v. Atlantic City Railroad Company
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- Syllabus
- Negligence — Railroads—Passenger—Weight of testimony — Number of luitnesses. In an action by a passenger against a railroad company to recover damages for personal injuries, the case is for the jury, and a verdict and judgment for the plaintiff will be sustained, where the testimony of the plaintiff and another passenger shows that the injury was sustained at a junction point where cars were coupled, according to the account of the two witnesses, with “unusual” and “extraordinary” and “terrific” force, and without warning, throwing the plaintiff forward in his seat with such violence as to result in hernia, although twelve witnesses, employees of the defendant and passengers, testified in substance that the coupling was effected without disturbing any other persons in the cars, and without unusual violence. In such a case the defendant cannot complain of the trial judge’s action in submitting the case to the jury, if it appears that he did not minimize the effect of the numerical preponderance of the witnesses for the defendant, and the legitimate advantage to which the defendant was entitled by reason of this marked numerical preponderance of witnesses. Fomwalt v. Philadelphia R. T. Co., 65 Pa. Superior Ct. 559, distinguished.