Wilson v. Miller

Record of the Month!

Game Design Challenge Update: Although we didn’t receive any entries for the Game Design Challenge from our April Record Feature, we do have 3 new versions of Bingo to share! All materials are available through the Student Resources page of the Archives website. Each version of Bingo has 20 unique printable cards and caller’s cards.  

Burr Wilson v Philip Miller circa 1893; The above file contains witness testimony and bone fragments, filed in 1896. 

For the month of June we are featuring an unusual 1893 court file that was unearthed during the 2019 Licking County OHRAB project. While it is not out of the ordinary for court records to include evidence as part of the case file, the evidence submitted in 1896 that was attached to this civil dispute was bone-chilling.

In August of 1893 Burr Wilson sued Philip Miller for damages in the amount of $150 ($4,273 in today’s money) for the loss of his horse, Jack, due to an incident involving another horse, Toney, who belonged to Miller. Both men had been renting parts of the pasture where the incident took place from a third party, a woman named Mary Lavin, who would eventually be called to testify in front of the jury. The principle factors in the dispute were: who had the right to have their animals in the pasture at the time of the incident, the disposition and health of the horses involved, and the market value of Wilson’s horse.

Wilson alleged that Toney, owned by Philip Miller, viciously attacked Jack, a healthy horse valued at around $150. During the ensuing chaos, according to Wilson, Toney kicked one of Jack’s front legs with enough force that it was almost severed, which had resulted in Jack having to be euthanized. Wilson further claimed that Miller did not have the right to have his animals in the pasture where the incident occurred.

Meanwhile, Miller contested the value of the Wilson’s horse and claimed that Jack had been placed in the pasture due to failing health. Miller also refuted Wilson’s description of Toney as vicious, instead testifying that Toney had always had a very kind disposition and got along fine with other horses. Both men claimed that the other did not have right to contain their animals in Lavin’s pasture. To prove his claims, Wilson presented a wide range of evidence to the jury, from witness testimony to bone fragments of Jack’s leg. The fragments presented to the court were marked as “exhibit A” and affixed to the front of the testimony transcript.

To find out if the jury found the bone fragments along with the testimony present compelling, please feel free to call us at 740-670-5121 or email us at archives@lcounty.com.