Guttner v. Pacific Steam Whaling Co.

DE HAVEN, District Judge.

This is an action for a marine trespass and conversion. The libel charges that in the monih. of October, 1897, one Leavitt, master of the whaling bark Newport, owned by the defendant, took by force from the bark Navarch, then on the high seas, certain provisions, ship’s gear, whaling gear, tools, and other articles of which the libelants were then lawfully possessed as of their own property. The defendant, in .its answer, admits the taking of certain provisions at the time and place stated in the libel, but denies that the libelants, or any of them, were lawfully…