Captain Todd and the New York press.
--The New York Herald contains the following hit at the Times:‘ The ‘"little villains"’ of the New York Times are quick to seize any opportunity for a back-handed blow at our present Federal Administration. They have been sorely disappointed and offended in the manner of the spoils, and they will have their revenge. It is evident they have not abandoned their scheme of turning ‘"Honest Old Abe"’ adrift, and of putting George Law in his place, and as the provisional president of a special committee. What else are we to infer from the Washington dispatch in yesterday's Times, in which this passage occurs?:--
"This gentleman (a refugee from Richmond,) also reports that the most brutal of the officers in charge of our prisoners were Captain Todd, Mrs. Lincoln's brother, and Gen. Winder, the brother of the Winder now in confinement at Fort Lafayette. Todd is such a brute that he would kick the dead bodies of our men, and call them damned Abolitionists. So depraved was this wretch that the rebel officers themselves preferred charges against Todd, and had detailed him to other duty."
This news concerning Todd involves alleged atrocities on his part which are too revolting to be true. We cannot believe them. They are malicious inventions. But why should the Times take such pains in holding this rebel, Todd, in this infamous light of a brutal Sepoy, before the world as ‘"the brother of Mrs. Lincoln?"’ Is she to be held responsible for the misfortune of having a brother in the rebel service? And are his alleged brutalities thus paraded before the public for the purpose of creating suspicion against Mr. Lincoln himself? Surely no friend of the President or his Administration would aid in giving currency to these shocking reports of the rebel brutalities of ‘"Mrs. Lincoln's brother."’ Under this belief we denounce these revolting slanders as a stealthy blow at the Administration from a skulking enemy in the disguise of a friend.
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