CONVERSION OF TIMBER 83 



will amount to a conversion of all, l and the same is true 

 where the conversion of the part has impaired the value 

 of that remaining even though the intention to convert the 

 remainder is not shown. 2 Conversion by an agent will 

 ordinarily render his principal liable, 3 but where a manu- 

 facturing corporation had leased a mill to another, the 

 fact that the lessee had conducted the mill in such manner 

 as to lead people doing business with him to believe that 

 the mill was operated by the owners was held not to make the 

 owners of the mill liable in trover for shingle blocks delivered 

 to the lessee of the mill. 4 An innocent purchaser of per- 

 sonal property at an invalid public sale will be liable for 

 conversion if he appropriates the property to his own use. 5 



79. Conversion in Actions against an Innocent 

 Timber Trespasser. Although the doctrine of conversion 

 in the common law applied only to personalty and the action 

 of trover was not applicable to injuries to the realty, in 

 modern practice trover is one of the most common remedies 

 for the severance and asportation of growing trees. Un- 

 fortunately there has been no uniform theory as to the 

 basis upon which recovery of damages should be allowed, 

 and in many decisions, where substantially the same measure 

 of damages Was allowed, the legal ground upon which the 

 damages were fixed has been differently stated. The varia- 

 tion has arisen largely from the efforts of the court in each 

 case of innocent trespass to make reasonable allowance to 

 the trespasser for the expenditures which he had in good 

 faith laid out upon the timber, or other object severed from 

 the soil, so far as such expenditures had resulted in an en- 

 hanced value of the thing severed; but confusion has also 

 resulted partly from the more liberal manner in which some 



1. Gentry v. Madden, 3 Ark. 127; Thompson v. Moesta, 27 Mich. 182; Brown v. 



Ela, 67 N. H. 110, 30 Atl. 412; Corotinsky v. Cooper, 26 Misc. (N. Y.) 138, 55 

 N. Y. Suppl. 970. See Wolf v. Wolf, 158 Pa. St. 621, 28 Atl. 164. 



2. Bowen v. Fenner, 40 Barb. (N. Y.) 383. 



3. Southern Ry. v. Raney (Ala.) 23 So. 29; Kentucky Stave Co. v. Page, (Ky. 1910) 



125 S. W. 170; Schlater v. Gay, 28 La. Ann. 340; Bockes v. McAfee & Son Co., 

 165 Mich. 7, 130 N. W. 313; Ayres v. Hubbard, 71 Mich. 594, 40 N. W. 10; 

 Smith v. Webster, 23 Mich. 298 (Mistake of servant); Carman v.New York,14 

 Abb. Pr. (N. Y.) 301; But see Satterfleld v. Western Union Tel. Co., 23 IllApp. 

 446, and Fairchild v. New Orleans etc. R. Co., 60 Miss. 931, 45 Am. Rep. 427. 



4. Fox v. Burlington Mfg. Co., 7 Wash. 391, 35 Pac. 126. 



5. Harrell v. Harrell, 75 Ga. 697; Ward v. Carson River Wood Co., 13 Nev. 44; Rosa 



v. McGriffin, 2 Tex. App. Civ. Gas. Sec. 458. 



