Edgar and John left this morning for Connecticut.
Wrote a letter to Attorney-General Bates, transmitting copy of the report of Mr. Wilson inculpating Attorney Delafield Smith of New York in the management of the prosecution of the Navy Agent for embezzlement, suggesting that it be laid before the President for such action as he may order. I have already mentioned the course of Smith to him. I am apprehensive that Smith himself may be liable to be called to account for malconduct in other respects. But he is a pet of Seward, who sometimes closes his eyes to the obliquities of his friends.
It will not surprise me if Seward, Weed, and Smith make friends with Henderson and the Evening Post concern, with whom they have hitherto quarrelled, and try to screen or exculpate Henderson. In so doing a common war will be made on me. The Post has broken ground already in a remote way but sufficient to indicate malice and revenge, and their determination to defend Henderson's guilt.
SOURCE: Gideon Welles, Diary of Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy Under Lincoln and Johnson, Vol. 2: April 1, 1864 — December 31, 1866, p. 82-3
