1. When persons summoned as garnishees in a libel in admiralty
in personam are adjudged by the court to have a fund of
the principal defendant in their hands and to pay it into court,
and the libellant afterwards obtains a final decree against him
with an award of execution against the fund in their hands, the
first order is interlocutory, and they can appeal from the last
decree only.
2. A final decree of acquittal and restitution to the only
claimant in a prize cause determines nothing as to the title in the
property beyond the question of prize or no prize, and another
person, who actually conducts the defense in the prize cause in
behalf and by consent of the claimant, without disclosing his own
title under a previous bill of sale from the claimant, is not
estopped to contest the claimant's title in a subsequent suit
brought by creditors attaching the property or its proceeds as
belonging to the claimant.
Appeals from the Circuit Court of the United States for the
Southern District of New York.
The facts are stated in the opinion of the Court.
MR. JUSTICE GRAY delivered the opinion of the Court.
This is a libel in admiralty, filed in the District Court for
the Southern District of New York by John N. Cushing and others
against John Laird, Jr., to recover damages for the destruction of
the libellants' vessel, the
Sonora, by the
Alabama. The defendant was not found and never appeared in
the cause, and his credits and effects were attached in the hands
of Foster & Thomson, garnishees.
The garnishees answered that they had in their hands a fund
amounting to $31,441.62, known as the proceeds of the steamer
Wren, which was the property of Charles K. Prioleau, and
not of Laird. Upon the trial of the issue raised by this answer,
the district court, in April, 1873, adjudged that the fund belonged
to Laird, and ordered the garnishees to pay it into court.
See 6 Benedict 408. From that decree the garnishees
Page 107 U. S. 70
appealed to the circuit court. The district court afterwards, in
September, 1873, entered a decree in favor of the libellants
against Laird for the sum of $143,298.70 and costs,
"and that the libellants have execution thereon, to satisfy this
decree, against the property of the said respondent, and especially
against his property, credits, and effects in the hands of Foster
& Thomson, garnishees."
From this decree also the garnishees appealed to the circuit
court. The circuit court dismissed the first appeal and retained
the cause for hearing on the second appeal only, and, upon
consideration, entered a decree by which it was adjudged that the
fund in the hands of the garnishees was not the property of Laird,
and could not be subjected to the payment of the decree against
him, the attachments against the garnishees were discharged, and
both decrees of the district court, so far as affected them and the
fund in their hands, were reversed with costs.
See 15
Blatchf. 219.
The findings of fact by the circuit court are printed at length
in 15 Blatchf. 220-236, and, so far as they are material to be
stated, are as follows:
The steamer
Wren was built at Birkenhead, England, in
1864, by Laird Bros., and was registered on the 24th of December,
1864 at Liverpool, in accordance with the laws of Great Britain, in
the name of John Laird, Jr., as owner; a certificate of the
registry was issued in due form; the vessel sailed from Liverpool,
having the certificate on board as part of her ship's papers, and
it did not appear that she ever again entered a British port. On
the 3d of January, 1865, after she had left Liverpool, Laird
executed to Charles K. Prioleau, of Liverpool, a member of the firm
of Fraser, Trenholm & Co., for the consideration of �15,450, a
bill of sale of the vessel, which, on the first of May, 1865, was
duly entered at the custom house in Liverpool, and the vessel
registered in the name of Prioleau as owner. On the 13th of June,
1865, on the high seas, on a voyage from Havana to Liverpool by the
way of Halifax, Nova Scotia, some of the crew took forcible
possession of the vessel, overcame her officers, ran her into Key
West, and there delivered her to the naval authorities of the
United States.
On the 16th of June, 1865, the attorney of the United
Page 107 U. S. 71
States for the Southern District of Florida filed in the
district court for that district an information against the vessel
as prize of war. She was taken into the custody of the marshal, and
a monition issued to all persons interested to appear on the 27th
of June and show cause against a decree of condemnation. On the
26th of June, Edward C. Stiles, master of the vessel, appeared in
court and filed a claim, stating that he was the master, and, as
such, the lawful bailee of the vessel, and claimed the same for the
owner thereof, and that Laird, a British subject, residing the
England, was the true and
bona fide owner of the vessel,
and that no other person was the owner thereof, as appeared by her
register in the possession of the court, and as he was informed and
believed, denying that she was a prize of war and praying
restitution and damages.
The only certificate of registry found on board was that granted
on the 24th of December, 1864, upon which were noted at the British
consulate in Havana, changes of masters on the 24th of March and
the 10th of June, 1865, and at the foot of which was the
following:
"Note. A certificate of the registry granted under the merchant
shipping act, 1854, is not a document of title. It does not
necessarily contain notice of all changes of ownership, and in no
case does it contain an official record of any mortgage affecting
the ship."
On the 17th, 19th, and 20th of June, 1865, the depositions of
the master and other officers of the vessel were taken
in
preparatorio, and on the 27th of June, the court proceeded to
hear the case upon the allegations and pleadings, the depositions
taken
in preparatorio, and the papers, letters, and
writings found on board the vessel. On the 29th of June, the court,
of its own motion, directed the prize commissioner to take
immediately the testimony of the officers, and of any other
witnesses who might be produced by the claimants from persons on
board the vessel, upon specified interrogatories; of two persons
named, and any others on board produced by the captors, upon some
of the same interrogatories, and of any witnesses, produced either
by the captors or the claimants from persons not on board, upon
certain other interrogatories, and allowed two days to the parties
to produce witnesses. Under this order, testimony was taken, and on
the 3d of July,
Page 107 U. S. 72
the court resumed the hearing upon the allegations and
pleadings, the depositions taken
in preparatorio, the
papers found on board, and the depositions taken under the order
allowing further proof.
The court, on the 8th of July, announced its opinion condemning
the vessel, but, on account of exceptions taken to some rulings,
delayed making a decree in form until the 15th of August, when it
was duly entered, reciting that a claim had been interposed by the
master in behalf of Laird, that the case had been heard as
aforesaid, and that it appeared to the court that the
Wren
was, at the time of capture, the property of enemies of the United
States, and adjudging her to be condemned and forfeited to the
United States as lawful prize of war, and to be sold by the
marshal, and the proceeds to be deposited with the Assistant
Treasurer of the United States, subject to the order of the court.
From that decree the claimant, on the same day, appealed to this
Court. The vessel was afterwards sold, and the proceeds of the sale
deposited with the assistant treasurer.
Prioleau still resided in England, and it did not appear that he
had any actual knowledge of the proceedings for the condemnation
until after the entry of the decree. He afterwards retained Foster
& Thomson, the garnishees in this case, attorneys and
counselors at law in the City of New York, to do whatever might be
necessary for the protection of his interests, and they procured a
copy of the record of the district court and had the appeal
docketed in this Court, employed additional counsel, who argued the
case here on the record sent up. No additional testimony was taken,
and no change in the pleadings made or applied for. Upon the
argument in this Court, the counsel for the United States insisted
that it appeared from the evidence that the vessel, at the time of
the capture, was the public property of rebel enemies, and, in
support of this position, referred to the testimony of witnesses
who swore that Fraser, Trenholm & Co. were her owners. The
counsel for the appellant insisted that there was not a particle of
evidence that she was ever enemies' property, but that the evidence
was conclusive that she was at all times the property of Laird, a
British neutral.
Page 107 U. S. 73
This Court at December term, 1867, reversed the decree of the
district court and remanded the cause with directions to restore
the vessel to the claimant without costs. Mr. Justice Nelson, in
delivering the opinion, said that the only question in the case was
whether the vessel was the property of enemies of the United
States, and in discussing this question observed that upon the
proofs that the claimant built the vessel and put the master in
command in this, her first voyage, the presumption would seem to be
very strong, if not irresistible (nothing else in the case), that
he continued the owner for the short period of six months that
elapsed after she was built and before the seizure took place; that
in addition to this, she was in command of a master claiming to
represent Laird as owner; that these acts, in connection with the
registry, afforded strong evidence that the title of the vessel was
in the claimant, and that although it was not unnatural to suspect
from the surrounding facts and circumstances that the so-called
Confederate States or their agents had some interest in or
connection with her, there was no sufficient legal proof that they
owned the vessel.
After that decree of this Court, Foster & Thomson made and
sent to Prioleau a draft of a power of attorney to be executed by
Laird and by Stiles, and in due time received from Prioleau the
power so executed, authorizing Foster & Thompson to receive
from the United States, or from any officer or depositary thereof,
restitution of the proceeds of the sale of the
Wren, and
obtained a mandate from this Court, and sent it, together with a
copy of their authority, to the attorney of the United States for
the Southern District of Florida, requesting him to see the
appropriate decree entered and a draft upon the assistant treasurer
in New York for the payment of the money to their order transmitted
to them, and also employed F. A. Dockray, an attorney in Florida,
to aid them in procuring the money from the registry of the court,
and did not, in any of their letters to the district attorney or to
Dockray, mention that any other person than Laird was or pretended
to be the owner of the fund in court.
Some of the libellants in this case having filed a libel in that
court to recover for the wrong complained of in the present
Page 107 U. S. 74
suit, with a prayer for an attachment of the fund in the
registry, and an attachment having been made accordingly, an
arrangement was made between Foster & Thomson and J. L. Ward,
proctor for the libellants, with a view of transferring the
litigation to New York for the convenience of the parties, and of
having the fund transmitted to Foster & Thomson, in New York,
as authorized attorneys in fact of Laird, to be held by them long
enough to enable process to be served upon them in behalf of the
libellants. Pursuant to that arrangement, Dockray, acting under his
employment by Foster & Thomson, appeared in behalf of Laird in
the libel filed against him in Florida and claimed the proceeds of
the
Wren in the registry of that court, and exhibited the
mandate of this Court, and upon his motion, with Ward's consent,
the attachment was dismissed, and a decree entered, by which, after
reciting the decree of this Court reversing the decree of
condemnation and ordering the property to be restored to the
claimant, it was ordered, adjudged, and decreed that the proceeds
of the
Wren, after deducting costs, charges, and expenses,
and amounting to $31,441.62, on deposit with the Assistant
Treasurer of the United States at New York, be paid to said John
Laird, claimant, and, it appearing that Foster & Thomson were
his lawfully authorized attorneys, that said proceeds be paid to
them. That sum was accordingly transmitted to Foster & Thomson,
and is the matter in controversy in this case. In the course of the
negotiations which preceded that arrangement, Ward was in no manner
given to understand that there was any ownership or claim of
ownership of the fund other than such as appeared on the face of
the record and the power of attorney filed with the mandate, and in
point of fact he did not know or have any reason to believe that
Foster & Thomson were acting in any other capacity than as
attorneys for Laird and Stiles, representing their several
interests, as disclosed by the record in this Court. Foster &
Thomson never had any personal communication with Laird, nor
received any instructions from him, but were actually employed by
Prioleau, and communicated with Laird through him only.
The libellants requested the circuit court to make the following
conclusions of law:
"1. The prize court in Florida
Page 107 U. S. 75
condemned the
Wren as enemy property."
"2. The supreme court in reversing that decree decided that the
Wren was not enemy property, but was property of John
Laird, Jr."
"3. the garnishees, acting for Prioleau, procured the supreme
court to make that decision."
"4. Prioleau is chargeable with notice of all the proceedings in
the prize court and in the supreme court."
"5. The proceeds of the
Wren in the prize court were
subject to the attachment served upon them in the District Court of
Florida at the time when the consent of the libellants' proctor to
the dissolution of such attachment was obtained."
"6. The decision of the supreme court binds the garnishees
herein and Prioleau, and is conclusive against them, and cannot be
reexamined in the suit."
"7. Prioleau is estopped from denying in this suit that John
Laird, Jr., was the owner of the
Wren, and of the proceeds
thereof when the same were attached herein."
"8. The garnishees are estopped from setting up that these funds
in their hands are not subject to the attachment in this suit, and
also from setting up that John Laird, Jr., was not the owner
thereof, or that Prioleau was the owner thereof when the attachment
herein was served."
The circuit court declined to make the conclusions of law
proposed by the libellants, and made and filed the following
conclusions of law:
"1. As Prioleau was in fact the owner of the
Wren at
the time of her capture, he was in law the owner of the proceeds in
the registry of the court after her sale."
"2. The sentence of acquittal in the prize cause relieved the
fund in court from all claim on the part of the captors, and left
the owners free to assert their rights as against the world."
"3. The decree in the prize suit did not adjudge the fund to
Laird as owner, or deprive Prioleau of his interest."
"4. The delivery of the fund to Foster & Thomson, as agents
of Laird, placed them in the same situation in respect to it that
would have been occupied by Laird if it had been put into his hands
instead of theirs."
"5. As Laird was not the real, but only the apparent, owner of
the fund, he would have taken it, if payment had been made to him,
in trust for Prioleau."
"6. Foster & Thomson, as his agents, hold it upon the same
trust, and are not accountable to the libellants in this
action."
"7. The decree of the district court requiring Foster &
Thomson to pay the find
Page 107 U. S. 76
into court, and subjecting it to the payment of the amount found
due the libellants from Laird, was wrong and should be
reversed."
The circuit court allowed a bill of exceptions tendered by the
libellants, in which they excepted to each of its conclusions of
law, and to its refusal to make each of the conclusions of law
proposed by them.
The libellants appealed from the last decree of the circuit
court in favor of the garnishees; the garnishees appealed from the
earlier decree of that court, dismissing their appeal from the
first order of the district court against them, and the two appeals
have been argued together.
In a court of admiralty, as in a court of common law, a process
of foreign attachment is auxiliary and incidental to the principal
cause. Second Rule of Practice in Admiralty, 3 How. iii;
Manro v.
Almeida, 10 Wheat. 473;
Atkins v.
Fiber Disintegrating Company, 18 Wall. 272. Neither
the principal defendant nor the garnishees can appeal until after a
final decree against them. The first decree against these
garnishees, ascertaining their liability, was interlocutory only,
and, if the libellants had ultimately failed to recover judgment
against the principal defendant and execution against the
garnishees, would have been of no avail to the libellants, and of
no effect against the garnishees. The appeal of the garnishees from
this interlocutory order of the district court was therefore
rightly dismissed by the circuit court, and the order of dismissal
must be affirmed.
Upon the merits of the case, as presented by the appeal of the
libellants from the final decree of the circuit court in favor of
the garnishees, this Court, after full consideration of the
elaborate arguments of counsel, is satisfied of the correctness of
that decree upon principle and authority.
Prize courts are not instituted to determine civil and private
rights, but for the purpose of trying judicially the lawfulness of
captures at sea, according to the principles of public
international law, with the double object of preventing and
redressing wrongful captures, and of justifying the rightful acts
of the captors in the eyes of other nations. The ordinary course of
proceeding in prize causes is ill adapted to the ascertainment
of
Page 107 U. S. 77
controverted titles between individuals. It is wholly different
from those which prevail in municipal courts of common law or
equity, in the determination of questions of property between man
and man.
In
Lindo v. Rodney, 2 Doug. 613, 614, Lord Mansfield
said:
"The end of a prize court is to suspend the property till
condemnation; to punish every sort of misbehavior in the captors;
to restore instantly,
velis levatis (as the books express
it, and as I have often heard Dr. Paul quote), if, upon the most
summary examination, there don't appear a sufficient ground; to
condemn finally if the goods really are prize, against everybody,
giving everybody a fair opportunity of being heard. A captor may,
and must, force every person interested to defend, and every person
interested may force him to proceed to condemn, without delay."
From the necessity of the case, and in order to interrupt as
little as may be the exercise of the belligerent duties of the
captors, or the voyage and trade of the captured vessel if neutral,
the proceedings are summary. The libel is filed as soon as possible
after the prize has been brought into a port of the government of
the captors, and does not contain any allegation as to title, nor
even set forth the grounds of condemnation, but simply prays that
the vessel may be forfeited to the captors as lawful prize of war.
The monition issued and published upon the filing of the libel
summons all persons interested to show cause against the
condemnation of the property as prize of war, and is returnable
within a very few days -- too short a time to allow of actual
notice to, or appearance or proof in behalf of, owners residing
abroad.
The law of nations presumes and requires that in time of war
every neutral vessel shall have on board papers showing her
character, and shall also have officers and crew able to testify to
facts establishing her neutrality. The captors are therefore
required immediately to produce to the prize court the ship's
papers, and her master, or some of her principal officers or crew,
to be examined on oath upon standing interrogatories, and without
communication with or instruction by counsel. The cause is heard in
the first instance upon these proofs, and they show clear ground
for condemnation or for acquittal, no
Page 107 U. S. 78
further proof is ordinarily required or permitted. If the
evidence
in preparatorio shows no ground for condemnation,
and no circumstances of suspicion, the captors will not ordinarily
be allowed to introduce further proof, but there must be an
acquittal and restitution.
The Aline & Fanny, Spinks,
Prize Cases 322, and 10 Moore P.C. 491;
The Sir
William Peel, 5 Wall. 517,
72 U. S. 534.
When further proof is ordered, it is only from such witnesses and
upon such points as the prize court may in its discretion think
fit.
It is doubtless true, as said by Chief Justice Marshall in the
passage cited by these libellants from
Jennings v.
Carson, 4 Cranch 2,
8
U. S. 23, that
"the proceedings of that court are
in rem, and their
sentences act on the thing itself. They decide who has the right,
and they order its delivery to the party having the right. The
libellant and the claimant are both actors. They both demand from
the court the thing in contest."
But the point there adjudged was that, pending the proceedings,
the property was in the possession of the court, and not left in
the possession of either party, without security, and there is no
intimation that a claimant, who proves his right as against the
captors to have the possession of the vessel restored to him, must
also prove his title in the vessel as against other persons not
before the court.
The Prize Court will not, indeed, permit a stranger to dispute
the right of the captors, and generally requires a claim to be made
by or in behalf of the general owner, and upon oath. But the
claimant is required to give evidence of a title to the property,
not for the purpose of having that title established by the decree
of the prize court, but only for the purpose of showing that he is
acting in good faith, and is entitled to contest the question of
prize or no prize, and to have restitution of possession in case of
acquittal. From the necessity of the case, the claim is often put
in by the master on behalf of the owner, and it is sufficient if
the master's oath is to belief only.
By the practice prevailing in England at the time of the
declaration of independence, and for some years before and after,
the master often put in a general claim for himself and all others
interested, without naming them.
The Hendric &
Page 107 U. S. 79
Alida, Marriott, 96, 99, 123;
The Prosperite,
id., 164;
The Jungfre Maria, id., 273, 283. In
the report made in 1753 by Sir George Lee, judge of the Prerogative
Court, Dr. Paul, Advocate General, Sir Dudley Ryder, Attorney
General and afterwards Chief Justice, and Mr. Murray, Solicitor
General, and afterwards Lord Mansfield, which was embodied in the
famous answer to the Prussian memorial, the only requisite
mentioned of a claim of ship or goods is that it "must be supported
by the oath of somebody at least as to belief." 1 Collectanea
Juridica 129, 135. Sir William Scott and Sir John Nicholl, in their
letter to Chief Justice Jay, when minister to England in 1794,
stating the general principles of proceeding in prize causes in
British courts of admiralty, observed that those principles could
not be more correctly or succinctly stated than in an extract which
they gave from that report, including the passage just quoted; and,
in describing the measures which ought to be taken by the neutral
claimant, said:
"The master, correspondent, or consul applies to a proctor, who
prepares a claim, supported by an affidavit of the claimant,
stating briefly to whom, as he believes, the ship and goods claimed
belong, and that no enemy has any right or interest in them."
Wheaton on Captures 311, 314.
It has often been said by judges of high authority that the
claimant has the burden of proving his title to the property. But
in the leading cases in which this was said there was but a single
claimant, and either, as in
The Walsingham Packet, 2
C.Rob. 77, 87, and
The Bremen Flugge, 4 C.Rob. 90, 92, the
words "support his title" were used as equivalent to the general
expression "prove the neutrality of the property,"
Croudson v.
Leonard, 4 Cranch 434,
8 U. S. 437;
The Mary, 9
Cranch 126,
13 U. S. 146;
Story's note, 1 Wheat. 506;
The Amiable
Isabella, 6 Wheat. 1,
19 U. S. 77; or
else the neutral claimant asserted a title in property appearing to
have once belonged to an enemy, as in
The Rosalie &
Betty, 2 C.Rob. 343, 359;
The Countess of Lauderdale,
4 C.Rob. 283, and
The Soglasia, 2 Spinks 101;
S.C. Spinks, Prize Cas. 104. And in
The Maria, 11
Moore P.C. 271, 286-287, Lord Chief Justice Cockburn, delivering
the judgment of himself, Lords Justices Knight, Bruce, and Turner,
Sir Edward Ryan, Sir John Dodson, and Mr. Justice
Page 107 U. S. 80
Maule, reversing upon the facts a decree of Dr. Lushington,
emphatically declined to assent to the application of the rule to a
case in which the property appeared to be neutral, although not
shown to belong to the claimant.
The proceedings of a prize court being
in rem, its
decree, as is now universally admitted, is conclusive, against all
the world, as to all matters decided and within its jurisdiction.
Williams v.
Armroyd, 7 Cranch 423;
Bradstreet v. Neptune
Ins. Co., 3 Sumn. 600. But it does not, as Chief Justice
Marshall observed, "establish any particular fact, without which
the sentence may have been rightfully pronounced." If the vessel is
condemned as prize, and sold by order of the court, the decree of
condemnation and sale is conclusive evidence of the lawfulness of
the capture and of the title of the purchaser. But if, as is usual,
it does not state the ground of condemnation, it is not even
conclusive that the vessel is enemy's property, for it may have
been neutral property condemned for resisting a search, or
attempting to enter a blockaded port; and, "of consequence, this
sentence, being only conclusive of its own correctness, leaves the
fact of real title open to investigation."
Maley v.
Shattuck, 3 Cranch 458,
7 U. S. 488.
So a decree of acquittal and restitution conclusively determines
as to all the world that the vessel is not lawful prize of war.
The Apollon, 9
Wheat. 362;
Magoun v. New England Marine Ins. Co., 1 Story
157. But, as it operates
in rem, it is not invalidated by
the fact that pending the proceedings the sole claimant has died
and his representatives have not been made parties.
Penhallow v.
Doane, 3 Dall. 54, 86 [argument of counsel --
omitted],
3 U. S. 91; Story's
note, 2 Wheat.Appendix 68; 3 Phillimore's International Law, sec.
492. It does not establish the title of any particular person,
unless conflicting claims are presented to the court and passed
upon. In
Penhallow v. Doane, Mr. Justice Iredell said:
"In case of a
bona fide claim, it may appear to be good
by the proofs offered to the court, but another person living at a
distance may have a superior claim which he has no opportunity to
exhibit. It is true, a general monition issues, and this is
considered notice to all the world; but though this be the
construction of the law from the necessity of the case, it would be
absurd to infer in fact that all the world had actual notice,
Page 107 U. S. 81
and therefore no superior claimant to the one before the court
could possibly exist."
3 Dall.
3 U. S. 91.
When no other person interposes a claim, restitution of ship or
goods is ordinarily decreed to the master as representing the
interests of all concerned, or to the person who by the ship's
papers or by the master's oath appears to be the owner. As said by
Mr. Justice Story, and repeated by Sir Robert Phillimore:
"The property, upon a decree of restitution, may be delivered to
the master as agent of the shipper, for in such case the master is
agent of the shipper, and is answerable to him."
2 Wheat.Appendix 70; 3 Phillimore's International Law, sec. 495.
See letter of Sir William Scott and Sir John Nicholl to
Chief Justice Jay, above cited, and
Rose v.
Himely, 4 Cranch 241,
8 U. S. 277, in
which Chief Justice Marshall said:
"Those on board a vessel are supposed to represent all who are
interested in it, and if placed in a situation which requires them
to take notice of any proceedings against a vessel and cargo, and
enables them to assert the rights of the interested, the cause is
considered as being properly heard, and all concerned are parties
to it."
Even when conflicting claims of title are put in, the prize
court will not ordinarily determine between them, unless one of the
claimants is a citizen of its own country.
Thus, in a case in which an American vessel was taken by the
Danes and captured from them by an English ship of war, and brought
into the High Court of Admiralty as prize, the master made
affidavit that he had previously sold her, under the pressure of
necessity, by reason of injuries from perils of the sea, to one
Ormsby, an American, from whom the Danes took her, and separate
claims were presented in behalf of Ormsby, and of Coit and Edwards,
also Americans, who were admitted to be the original owners, and
whose names appeared as such in the register and other papers of
the ship. Sir William Scott, after observing upon the circumstances
attending the sale by the master, said:
"But the court is not called upon to determine upon the validity
of the title, which may be matter of discussion hereafter in the
American courts. It is only required to give possession. . . . The
ship's register, and all the papers, point to Coit and Edwards as
the owners of the vessel,
Page 107 U. S. 82
and I have no hesitation in restoring the possession to them. .
. . I therefore restore the possession of the vessel to the persons
appearing by the register and ship's papers to be the owners,
without prejudice to such rights as Mr. Ormsby, or any other
persons, may have acquired by purchase or otherwise, as shall
appear to the proper court of justice in America."
The Fanny & Elmira, Edw.Adm. 117, 120-121.
In
The Lilla, 2 Sprague 177, affirmed on appeal, 2
Cliff. 169, an American vessel owned by Maxwell, a citizen and
resident of Maine, was taken by a Confederate privateer and carried
into Charleston, South Carolina, and there condemned and sold by a
tribunal, acting under the assumed authority of the Confederate
States, to persons who took her to England, where she was
registered in the name of one Bushby, after which she was captured
on the high seas and brought in by a United States gunboat. Claims
were presented by Maxwell and by Bushby, and after hearing counsel
in behalf of each claimant, as well as of the captors, the court
decided against the claim of Bushby, and ordered the vessel to be
restored to Maxwell, on condition of payment of salvage to the
recaptors. But the opinion of Judge Sprague shows that jurisdiction
over the question of title was exercised only to protect the rights
of one of our own citizens against foreigners to property in the
possession of the court, and that if the question of ownership were
wholly between foreigners, the court might refuse to decide it. 2
Sprague 187.
As incidental to the question of the lawfulness of the capture,
prize courts have doubtless jurisdiction to determine the liability
of the captors for damages, expenses, and costs occasioned by their
own wrongful acts, or by the fault of those in charge of the prize
while in their custody.
Le Caux v. Eden, 2 Doug. 594, 610;
The Siren, 7
Wall. 152; 1 Kent Com. 359. But the learning and research of
counsel have failed to furnish a single case where there was but
one claimant of property libeled as prize of war, in which a prize
court has undertaken to pass upon the validity of his title as
against other persons, or in which its decree has been set up in a
subsequent suit as an adjudication of that title as between him and
them.
All the proceedings in the case of the
Wren were
according
Page 107 U. S. 83
to the usual practice in prize causes. The libel was filed
within three days, and the monition was returnable, and the hearing
upon the evidence
in preparatorio had, within fourteen
days, after the capture. The only claim put in was by the master
under oath, stating positively that he was the master and as such
lawful bailee of the vessel, and claimed her for the owner. The
further statement in the claim that Laird, and no other person, was
the true and
bona fide owner of the vessel, was only upon
information and belief, and reference to her register in the
possession of the court. That register was dated at Liverpool six
months before, showed Laird to have been the owner, and had at its
foot a memorandum stating that by the Merchant Shipping Act 1854
(St. 17 & 18 Vict. c. 104), it was not a document of title, and
did not necessarily contain notice of all changes of ownership. The
court ordered further proof from certain witnesses on specified
interrogatories to be taken forthwith, and after a final hearing
upon the whole evidence, announced, within twenty-two days from the
filing of the libel, its decree of condemnation, which was
afterwards entered in form.
The decree of this Court on appeal merely reversed the decree of
condemnation and directed the vessel to be restored to the
claimant. The references in the argument of counsel before this
Court, and in its judgment delivered by Mr. Justice Nelson, to the
evidence upon the question whether she was the property of Laird or
of other persons, were only by way of assisting in the
determination of the sole question at issue, whether she was or was
not enemy's property and therefore lawful prize.
The
Wren, 6 Wall. 582. The final decree of the district
court recited the decree and mandate of this Court, and in
conformity therewith ordered the proceeds to be paid to Laird, the
person appearing to be the owner by the ship's papers and according
to the best information and belief of the master, as stated in the
claim put in by him. Neither the decree of this Court nor the
subsequent decree of the district court determined, or assumed to
determine, any question of title as between Laird and Prioleau, or
other persons who had not appeared in the cause nor contested
Laird's claim.
The libellants, in this suit against Laird personally, and
Page 107 U. S. 84
against Foster & Thomson as his garnishees, have the burden
of proving that the fund in the hands of the garnishees belongs to
Laird. There is nothing in the acts of Prioleau, or of the
garnishees as his attorneys, which estops the garnishees to deny
that fact and to put the libellants to proof of it. He had no
knowledge of the prize proceedings until after the decree of
condemnation. Having a title to the vessel under the bill of sale
from Laird, he prosecuted the appeal from that decree in Laird's
name and by Laird's authority. Whatever effect Prioleau's omission
to disclose his own interest might have had, if discovered, upon
the issue in the prize cause, or might have by way of estoppel, if
the present suit were brought by the United States, he has done
nothing which Laird or Laird's creditors have been misled by or
have acted upon. The title in the vessel, as between Laird and
Prioleau, was in Prioleau. The garnishees, being attorneys both of
Laird and Prioleau, received the proceeds in the name of Laird, but
for Prioleau. There being no estoppel, either of record or
in
pais, the libellants fail to prove that the fund belongs to
Laird, and cannot therefore maintain their attachment.
This case does not present the question whether, if Prioleau
were plaintiff or actor, seeking affirmative relief against Laird
or against these libellants, he must be considered as standing in
such a position, by reason of his having concealed from the prize
court his own title to the vessel, and of his having permitted
restitution to be decreed to Laird, that the court would decline to
assist him, upon the principle applied in
De Metton v. De
Mello, 12 East 234, and 4 Camp. 420.
Decrees affirmed.
MR. JUSTICE BLATCHFORD did not sit in this case, and took no
part in its decision.