O'Neil v. Blodgett
Supreme Court of Vermont
This case was tried at the September Term, 1878, Essex County, Dunton, J., presiding. Action, trespass for assault and battery; plea, the general issue and notice.
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This case was tried at the September Term, 1878, Essex County, Dunton, J., presiding. Action, trespass for assault and battery; plea, the general issue and notice. The defendant claimed a prescriptive right to go to a brook near a bridge crossing the same, by the side of the road, on the plaintiff’s premises, for water, and that while he was on his way there and in the public highway the plaintiff assaulted him; and that what was done by him to the plaintiff was in the necessary defence of his person, etc. The plaintiff claimed that while he was putting up his fence, across the route of the…
1Opinion of the Court
The opinion of the' court was delivered by
Barrett, J.
The defendant had given evidence tending to show that the place where he got the water out of the brook was open to the highway so that travellers were in the habit of driving into the brook there to water their horses there, and across the same ad libitum. Being thus open, the going there by the defendant and his father and family, with pails and barrels, to get water, would not involve any element of evidence tending to show that they were doing it in the assertion of a right, as against the plaintiff’s title ; but only that they were…
2Cited by2 opinions
- Roberts v. WardWest Virginia Supreme Court · 1920
- Hunter v. EmersonSupreme Court of Vermont · 1903