A Waterway Case Up

A WATERWAY CASE UP

A BRIDGEWATER DAM IN THE CIRCUIT COURT.

A Swarm of Witnesses to Prove How the Water Ran in the Olden Times.

Wednesday in the circuit court the case of Charles Finkbeiner vs. Christian Ernst occupied the boards. The plaintiff claims damages by reason of a dam constructed in a water course, by which the water that would otherwise flow across the defendant's farm is turned back upon the plaintiff, practically destroying tor tilling purposes a field of some eight or ten acres. The farms of the parties to the suit are located in Bridgewater township and on the south east quarter of section 24. Ernst owns the north 80 acres and between him and Finkbeiner one Hotrum owns 22 acres and Finkbeiner the remainder of the 80 acres. According to the statement of plaintiff the natural course of the water is northeast across Ernst's just touching the northeast corner of Hotrum and running for a few rods on Finkbeiner, then passing on to Ernest again. Now just over the line where the water course passes back onto Ernst a dam has been constructed which throws all the water back onto Finkbeiner, causing a field of his to be furrowed and gullied out and rendering much of it unfit for tillage. The claim of the defendant is that a number of years ago, before a certain ditch was dug, the water flowed across Finkbeiner as now, so that the dam only sends the water where it formerly flowed before the land was ditched. He claims also that much of the water which flows along the channel is the drainage of Hotrum's and Finkbeiner's lands.

A swarm of witnesses were present to testify and the testimony up to the time of going to press seemed to establish the fact that there were two waterways before the land was drained, one passing over the Ernst farm where a dam was built to stop it and the other over the farm of Finkbeiner where the whole of the water now flows.