Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 4.djvu/250

 S36 ffESEBAIi BSPOBTSB. ���Mbbohants' Steam-Ship Co. of Charleston, South Cabo- LiNA, ». The Schoonbb S. C. Tbyon. �(District Court, D. Mwrylana., 1880.) �L COLLISIOK — SCHOOITEB AIO) StKAMBB — BtIDENCI! C0K7LICTma— �ScHOONSK HeliD m Fattlt. �In Admiralty. �John H. Thomas, for libellants. �Brown e Smith, for respondents. �MoEEis, D. J. The case for the steamer, as stated in the libel, is that she left the port of Baltimore on the afternoon of the eighth November, 1879, with eight passengers and a full cargo of merchandise, on one of her regular voyages from Bal- timore to Charleston, South Carolina ; that about 9 : 45 p. m., the night being starlight, with a slight haze on the water, the •wind a seven-knot breeze from the southward, the steamer going on her course S. by E. one-half E. down the Chesa- peake bay, at nine miles an hour, having ail her regula- tion lights burning, and her second mate, with an experienced eeaman, in the pilot-house, and two lookouts in the bow, ■when, about eight miles above Cove Point, one of the lookouts reported a red light one and one-half points over the steam- ei'B port hovr; that the second mate and the manat thewheel satisfied themselves that the light was on a sail vessel about one and one-half miles off, coming up the bay with a fair wind, and ported the helm of the steamer so that she fell ofF about one point and a half ; that when the said vessels were within 800 or 400 yards from each other, and were sufficiently apart not to justify any apprehension of danger, the schooner being still on the steamer's port bow, and showing only her red light, the schooner suddenly, and without cause, starboarded her helm and showed both her lights; that the steamer's helm was then put hard a-port, and her engines stopped, but said vessels were so near together that the schooner struck the steamer amidship on her port side, cutting her to the water's edge, and doing her such damage that she sank in ����