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i. Campagnie v. Hamburg-Amerika, 36 Phil. 590, G.R. No. L-10986, March 31, 1917.-Facts: In july 1914, defendants vessel undertook to carry a cargo of rice meal in the French port of Saigon for

delivery to Dunkirk under a contract of affreightment with a French shipper. While loading of the cargo was made,

rumors of the outbreak of war between French and Germany spread. The master of the Germany vessel, after

completion of the loading of the cargo and after being refused by the French Governor at Saigon for pass or safe-

conduct, fled with his vessel and her cargo and took refuge in Manila. Considering the nature of the cargo and its

impossibility of being delivered to its destination within reasonable time, the master of the vessel consulted the

shippers instructions as to the disposition of the cargo, but the shippers agent refused to assume responsibility.

Defendants agent in Manila, upon the courts authority secured by the master of the vessel, sold said rice meal and

deposited the proceeds thereof with the court minus the expenses incident to the sale.

Issue: W/N vessel owner liable? No

Held: Plaintiff files an action for recovery of the proceeds of the sale and the resulting damages. Defendant also

claimed, in a cross-complaint, contribution from the plaintiff for general average for the expenses incurred by the

vessels stay in Manila. Trial court decided for the plaintiff including damages for defendants breach of the charter

party. Both parties appealed.

the danger from which the master of the vessel fled was a real and not merely an imaginary one. Seizure at the hands

of the enemy, though not inevitable, was a possible outcome of a failure to leave the port of Saigon; and it cannot besaid that under the conditions existing at the time when the master elected to flee from that port, there were no

grounds for a reasonable apprehension of danger from seizure by French authorities, and therefore no necessity for

flight. The deviation of the vessel therefore, from the route prescribed in her charter party, and the subsequent

abandonment by the master of the voyage contemplated in the contract of affreightment, must be held to have been

justified by the necessity under which the master was placed to elect that course which would remove and preserve

the vessel from danger of seizure by the public enemy of the flag which the vessel sailed; and that neither the vessel

nor her owners are liable for the resultant damages suffered by the owner of the cargo.