feet across the water of the draw, viz.: 2552 feet. The Afton was 35 feet wide and drew 5 feet, making a fourteenth of the sum. Now, one-fourteenth of five miles is five-fourteenths of one mile-about one third of a mile-the increase of the current. We will call the current five and a half miles per hour. The next thing I will try to prove is that the plaintiff's (?) boat had power to run six miles an hour in that current. It had been testified that she was a strong, swift boat, able to run eight miles an hour up stream in a current of four miles an hour, and fifteen miles down stream. Strike the average and you will find what is her average-about eleven and a half miles. Take the five and a half miles which is the speed of the current in the draw and it leaves the power of that boat in that draw at six miles an hour, 528 feet per minute and 8 4-5 feet to the second. "Next I propose to show that there are no cross currents. I know their witnesses say that there are cross currents-that, as one witness says, there were three cross currents and two eddies; so far as mere statement, without experiment, and mingled with mistakes, can go, they have proved. But can these men's testimony be compared with the nice, exact, thorough experiments of our witnesses? Can you believe that these floats go across the currents? It is inconceivable that they could not have discovered every possible current. How do boats find currents that floats cannot discover? We assume the position then that those cross currents are not there. My next proposition is that the Afton passed between the S. B. Carson and the Iowa shore. That is undisputed. "Next I shall show that she struck first the short pier, then the long pier, then the short one again and there she stopped." Mr. Lincoln then cited the testimony of eighteen witnesses on this point. "How did the boat strike when she went in? Here is an endless variety of opinion. But ten of them say what pier she struck; three of them testify that she struck first the short, then the long and then the short for the last time. None of the rest substantially contradict this. I assume that these men have got the truth because I believe it an established fact. My next proposition is that after she struck the short and long pier and before she got back to the short pier the boat got right with her bow up. So says the pilot Parker-'that he got her through until her starboard wheel passed the short pier. This would make her head about even with the head of the long pier. He says her head was as high or higher than the head of the long pier. Other witnesses confirmed this one. The final stroke was in the splash door aft the wheel. Witnesses differ, but the majority say that she struck thus.' Court adjourned. 14th day, Wednesday, Sept. 23, 1857. He said he should con Mr. A. Lincoln resumed. clude as soon as possible. He said the colored map of the plaintiff which was brought in during one stage of the trial showed itself that the cross currents alleged did not exist. That the current as represented would drive an ascending boat to the long pier but not to the short pier, as they urge. He explained from a model of a boat where the splash door is, just behind the wheel. The boat struck on the lower shoulder of the short pier as she swung around in the splash door; then as she went on around she struck the point or end of the pier, where she rested. "Her engineers," said Mr. Lincoln, “say the starboard wheel then was rushing around rapidly. Then the boat must have struck the upper point of the pier so far back as not to disturb the wheel. It is forty feet from the stern of the Afton to the splash door, and thus it appears that she had but forty feet to go to clear the pier. How was it that the Afton with all her power flanked over from the channel to the short pier without moving one foot ahead? Suppose she was in the middle of the draw, her wheel would have been 31 feet from the short pier. The reason she went over thus is her starboard wheel was not working. I shall try to establish the fact that the wheel was not running and that after she struck she went ahead strong on this same wheel. Upon the last point the witnesses agree, that the starboard wheel was running after she struck, and no witnesses say that it was running while she was out in the draw flanking over." Mr. Lincoln read from the testimonies of various witnesses to prove that the starboard wheel was not working while the Afton was out in the stream. "Other witnesses show that the captain said something of the machinery of the wheel, and the inference is that he knew the wheel was not working. The fact is undisputed that she did not move one inch ahead while she was moving this 31 feet sideways. There is evidence proving that the current there is only five miles an hour, and the only explanation is that her power was not all used-that only one wheel was working. The pilot says he ordered the engineers to back her up. The engineers differ from him and said they kept on going ahead. The bow was so swung that the current pressed it over; the pilot pressed the stern over with the rudder, though not so fast but that the bow gained on it, and only one wheel being in motion the boat nearly stood still so far as motion up and down is concerned, and thus she was thrown upon this pier. The Afton came into the draw after she had just passed the Carson, and as the Carson no doubt kept the true course the Afton going around her got out of the proper way, got across the current into the eddy which is west of a straight line drawn down from the long pier, was compelled to resort to these changes of wheels, which she did not do with sufficient adroitness to save her. Was it not her own fault that she entered wrong, so far wrong that she never got right? Is the defence to blame for that? "For several days we were entertained with depositions about boats 'smelling a bar.' Why did the Afton then, after she had come up smelling so close to the long pier sheer off so strangely. When she got to the centre of the very nose she was smelling she seemed suddenly to have lost her sense of smell and to have flanked over to the short pier." Mr. Lincoln said there was no practicability in the project of building a tunnel under the river, for 31 feet side te at the curren. wrong, so far wrong that she so strangely. When she go there "is not a tunnel that is a successful project in this world. A suspension bridge cannot be built so high but that the chimneys of the boats will grow up till they cannot pass. The steamboat men will take pains to make them grow. The cars of a railroad cannot without immense expense rise high enough to get even with a suspension bridge or go low enough to get through a tunnel; such expense is unreasonable. "The plaintiffs have to establish that the bridge is a material obstruction and that they have managed their boat with reasonable care and skill. As to the last point high winds have nothing to do with it, for it was not a windy day. They must show due skill and care. Difficulties going down stream will not do, for they were going up stream. Difficulties with barges in tow have nothing to do with the accident, for they had no barge.' Mr. Lincoln said he had much more to say, many things he could suggest to the jury, but he wished to close to save time. DEAR DUBOIS: TO JESSE K. DUBOIS. BLOOMINGTON, Dec. 21, 1857. J. M. Douglas of the I. C. R. R. Co. is here and will carry this letter. He says they have a large sum (near $90,000) which they will pay into the treasury now, if they have an assurance that they shall not be sued before Jan., 1859-otherwise not. |