State Road Department v. Tharp

Terrell, J.-

The facts in this case are simple but they are laden with a'live question. Appellee owned a water mill on Hard Labor Creek in Washington County which he and his predecessors in title had been operating as a sawmill, grist mill, or shingle mill for more than seventy years. It was propelled by water impounded in a mill pond by erecting a dam across the creek to the east of the mill.

When the water left the millrace, it flowed through a-swamp area in five channels. At a point four or five' hundred feet west of the mill, the State Road Department erected a bridge and fill aggregating…