Pettibone v. Smith

Smith sued Pettibone in case for the diversion of a stream of water upon which Smith owned land below where the diversion was caused. The stream was a very small one, — so small that a question was seriously contested on the trial whether the defendant had the right, as against those below him, to detain by a dam sufficient of the water to permit of his washing his sheep therein. The diversion consisted in taking it out of its natural channel for some distance, and then returning it again before it reached the land of Smith; and the real complaint was, not of the diversion itself, but that…