Dabney v. The Mary Holland
Dabney v. The Mary Holland
Opinion of the Court
The brigantine Mary Holland in a voyage from Glasgow to Philadelphia, having encountered serious injury from storms, and leaking dangerously, put into Fayal where she was properly repaired and refitted. The sum of the contributory amounts of general average upon her cargo appears to have constituted a large proportion of the whole expenditure incurred.
The entire sum expended was raised at Fayal upon a bottomry bond of the vessel and cargo for the amount, including the marine interest of $9,688.25 payable ten days after arrival at Philadelphia, equal in our currency to $8,073.96, which became due on 3d April, i860. To enforce this bond against the vessel and cargo this libel was filed on the 5th of the same month. The vessel was a general ship. The respective owners or consignees of the cargo had received no statement of particular or general average, or of contributory interests. The case was, with their consent, heard summarily. After the addition of satisfactory proofs of the causes of the bottomry loan, and of the expenditures included in it, they made no per
These deductions appear by the clerk’s report to be $1,244.36, leaving as net proceeds of the vessel $1,355.64, which, and the amount of the freight, $1,581.73, together $2,937.37, are applicable in the first instance to the payment of the libellant’s demand. His demand with interest from 3d April last will by these credits have been reduced to $5,298.06. The whole of the cargo has also been judicially sold and the proceeds paid into the registry. The net proceeds of the several items composing it have been ascertained according to the clerk’s report by deducting the respective amounts of duties, freight, and other specific charges not, in their character, costs of suit, which were properly liens on the same, or on their proceeds. After these deductions, the net proceeds of the cargo, under six heads of ownership, were, according to the clerk’s report, in the aggregate, $5,079.87. It appears by the same report that the aggregate amount of general average on the cargo including the addition of maritime interest was $3,201.25, which, being deducted from the net proceeds of the cargo, and credited on account of the above balance of the libellant’s demand, leaves a fund of $1,878.62 towards the payment of the reduced balance of $2,096.81.
So far as the six amounts composing the $1,878.62 are to be applied towards the payment of this balance, the owners of the cargo will pay money which, as between them and the owner of the vessel, the latter partly should have paid.
The foregoing remarks, and the clerk’s report will perhaps facilitate the adjustment of claims of owners of the cargo whose funds have been absorbed in the payment of the bot-tomry debt upon the owners of the vessel or underwriters on her, and possibly the adjustment of claims of owners of the cargo, or their underwriters respectively, among themselves. But, the value at which the vessel should, for the purposes of such adjustments, be estimated elsewhere than in this court under whose process she has been sold, would perhaps depend upon views which cannot properly be considered here.
The decree will be that the several amounts reported by the-clerk as deductions from the gross proceeds of the sales of the vessel and several items respectively composing the cargo,, where not already paid, shall be paid out of the proper funds in the registry of the court, after which the costs remaining un
Reference
- Full Case Name
- DABNEY v. THE MARY HOLLAND
- Status
- Published