Introduction to Miller et al. v. B. Holladay and W. Holladay
Miller, Haws, JS, and H. Smith v. B. Holladay and W. Holladay
Hancock Co., Illinois, Circuit Court, 7 May 1841
Historical Introduction
In November 1840, , , JS, and initiated a civil suit against Benjamin and William Holladay, seeking $2,000 in compensation for damage to the steamboat Nauvoo. In the late 1830s, the government had purchased the steamboat Des Moines as part of operations led by Lieutenant Robert E. Lee to improve navigation and travel conditions by blasting and removing rock on narrow portions of the , beginning at the Des Moines rapids. After the federal government ordered the project to be discontinued in 1840, Lee sold the Des Moines at auction on 10 September 1840. JS, Hyrum Smith, Haws, George Miller, and purchased the steamboat by promissory note for $4,866.38, payable in eight months, and renamed it the Nauvoo. The Holladays were hired to pilot the boat, but due to alleged “unskilfullness and willfull mismanagement” as well as reckless piloting, they damaged it by running into a sandbar, causing several timbers in the hull to split and crack. At the time, the boat, which was en route from , Illinois, to , was laden with 180 tons of lead belonging to Campbell & Co. The incident delayed the shipment five months and resulted in significant loss to the company.
On 30 November 1840, JS, , and other signers of the note filed a “” civil action against the Holladays in the Circuit Court, claiming damages of $2,000. Samuel Hicks filed an affidavit charging the Holladays with intentionally and willfully destroying the boat. Hicks also stated that unless the court intervened to require the defendants to appear at trial, they might flee the area and the plaintiffs would lose their judgment. Based on the affidavit, the circuit court clerk issued a writ of . The Holladays were then arrested, after which they entered into a binding them to appear at the April 1841 term of the circuit court for the trial and were released on . When the term began, the circuit court clerk summoned Thomas Oram and a steamboat captain named Newton Waggoner to testify in the Holladays’ behalf, but neither Oram nor Waggoner could be found. In addition, on 23 April 1841 the law firm Walker, Little & Morrison—presumably , , and —filed the plaintiffs’ outlining their cause of action against the Holladays. In May 1841, the case was dismissed by motion of the plaintiffs for unknown reasons.
Calendar of Documents
This calendar lists all known documents created by or for the court, whether extant or not. It does not include versions of documents created for other purposes, though those versions may be listed in footnotes. In certain cases, especially in cases concerning unpaid debts, the originating document (promissory note, invoice, etc.) is listed here. Note that documents in the calendar are grouped with their originating court. Where a version of a document was subsequently filed with another court, that version is listed under both courts.
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