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40 Me. 409

Atwood v. Williams

Supreme Judicial Court of Maine

Decided July 1, 1885

Supreme Judicial Court of Maine · decided 1885-07-01

On Facts Agreed. Assumpsit, on a receipt given by defendant to the plaintiff, to keep and re-deliver the brig “John Hathaway,” &c., “ which property the said officer has taken by virtue of a 'writ against Daniel Millett, and to enforce a lien provided for in c. 125, E. S., in favor of Samuel Carter,” &c. Defendant was owner and builder of the brig, and contracted with one David Millett to perform a certain part of the work. This job was performed and Millett paid.

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1885-07-01

How this case has been cited

Cited by 7 later decisions — most recently April 1901

1 federal appellate · 6 state decisions

30188518901900decided

Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.

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Tenney, J.

¶1The R. S., c. 125, § 35, gives to any ship-carpenter, caulker, blacksmith, joiner, or other person, who shall perform labor, or furnish materials for, or on account of any vessel building, &c., a lien on the same for his wages or materials. This provision is as comprehensive in securing those who perform labor and furnish materials about a vessel in the process of building, or of being repaired, as is the statute of 1848, c. 72, § 1, giving to persons, who shall labor at cutting, hauling and driving logs, masts, spars or other lumber, a lien thereon. The latter has received a construction from the Court, that it extends to persons, who shall perform such labor under a person, who contracts with the owner of the lumber, equally with those, who labor under a contract with the owner himself. Spofford v. True, 33 Maine, 283; Doe v. Monson, ibid., 430. The principle of these cases is applicable to that now under consideration.

¶2The action must be against the person, who procured the services to be performed. No other can be liable for such a claim. Ames v. Swett, 33 Maine, 479.

¶3The vessel was properly attached for the purpose of securing the lien. And if the attachment had continued, till judgment was recovered, she could have been disposed of to satisfy the execution, which issued upon that judgment. The attachment was relinquished, in consideration of the receipt given; and it differs in no essential particular from receipts taken for any other property attached on mesne process.

¶4*412The defendant has failed to fulfil the promise made in the receipt, and according to the agreement he must be

¶5Defaulted.

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