Hawkins V. McGee
At the age of 11, George A. Hawkins received a thin pencil-sized electrical burn after turning on the kitchen light after a bad storm. Specialists from Montreal were called in but they told George's parents that the damages were minor, and that they should leave it alone. Dr. Edward R. B. McGee would later graft skin from Hawkin's chest, and preform surgery to make "things better" but it actually made things worse. George was born in 1904 in Berlin to Charles and Rose Hawkins. Mr. McGee was a very prominent man in Berlin, being the mayor form 1928-1931 he also served on the Board of Health and was once in charge of Crippled Children's Services. After George's incident, Dr. McGee promised that the surgery, if done, would give George a "hundred percent perfect hand" because he told them that he had preformed this same operation many times as a U.S. war doctor in Germany during World War I. McGee operated on Hawkins in 1922, taking skin from George's chest, although he told George's mother that the graft would come from the thigh. It is thought that McGee failed to remove the scar tissue before preforming the graft, thus causing many post-surgery complications. After healing, the hand is said to have partially curled up and bled off and on, problems that George suffered from for the rest of his life. The part on his chest where McGee took skin from is also said to have been as thin as the skin of an onion. Problems got worse when Hawkin's hand started to grow hair, thus the future cause would be nicknamed the "hairy hand" case. |
Hawkins filed a lawsuit against McGee for breach of contract in 1926. The jury ruled in Hawkins favor, but the amount was too large for them to award in trial court. They said that the only way the could award him would be if they lowered the sum to $500 dollars. The cause then went to New Hampshire Supreme Court. They also ruled in favor of Hawkins, although precedence would have ruled in favor of McGee on just the basis of the verbal claim.
It was deemed an unusual cause because the fact that McGee lied to the Hawkins family, he said that he preformed the surgery in Germany but he actually only witnessed the surgery being preformed in Germany, thus it was not his place to preform this type of surgery on someone. The court decided that Hawkins should receive the difference between the promised "perfect hand" and the hand in its current state. Hawkins eventually settled their claim for a sum of $1,400 dollars. He would later go back to the specialists in Montreal to see if the hand could be repaired, but the doctors said surgery would do little good.
The "hairy hand" case was relooked at in 1931, when Edward McGee filled a lawsuit against the United States Fidelity and Guaranty Co. in the First Circuit Court of Appeals, which was his insurance company at the time. McGee wanted them to cover the costs that he had to pay Hawkins. The company declined, which the court ruled on their side. This "hairy hand case" was made famous by the book and film "Paper Chase" and is now one of the first cases discussed by students studying law in every university in America.
The Hawkins family didn't find out that this cause became famous until Gail (Hawkins) Horton, George's niece, entered law school at Boston University Law School in 1964. Despite being a famous case, only the Hawkins family knows the effect on both George, who suffered lifelong emotional distress and was very sensitive about his hand, and his parents truly were. George died in 1958 of a massive heart attack, he worked many years for the Brown Company here in Berlin. McGee also spent the rest of his life here in Berlin.
It was deemed an unusual cause because the fact that McGee lied to the Hawkins family, he said that he preformed the surgery in Germany but he actually only witnessed the surgery being preformed in Germany, thus it was not his place to preform this type of surgery on someone. The court decided that Hawkins should receive the difference between the promised "perfect hand" and the hand in its current state. Hawkins eventually settled their claim for a sum of $1,400 dollars. He would later go back to the specialists in Montreal to see if the hand could be repaired, but the doctors said surgery would do little good.
The "hairy hand" case was relooked at in 1931, when Edward McGee filled a lawsuit against the United States Fidelity and Guaranty Co. in the First Circuit Court of Appeals, which was his insurance company at the time. McGee wanted them to cover the costs that he had to pay Hawkins. The company declined, which the court ruled on their side. This "hairy hand case" was made famous by the book and film "Paper Chase" and is now one of the first cases discussed by students studying law in every university in America.
The Hawkins family didn't find out that this cause became famous until Gail (Hawkins) Horton, George's niece, entered law school at Boston University Law School in 1964. Despite being a famous case, only the Hawkins family knows the effect on both George, who suffered lifelong emotional distress and was very sensitive about his hand, and his parents truly were. George died in 1958 of a massive heart attack, he worked many years for the Brown Company here in Berlin. McGee also spent the rest of his life here in Berlin.