| From the Richmond Dispatch |
| |
| April 3, 1861 |
| |
| Editors of the Dispatch |
| A communication regarding Mr.
Thos. R. Sharp, which appeared in your yesterday issue, is false in its
main facts. True Mr. Sharp was born in Pennsylvania, but his parents
were natives of the Southern State of Delaware, and he came to Virginia
while an infant, and has been educated and reared in the city of
Richmond, among your own citizens, and is truly, in every sense, a
Southern man. He is also charged with seceding from a Southern railroad
without leave or license; this is false, and can be proved by such
testimony as would give the lie to the assertion. He was induced, at the
solicitation of his friends, to resign his position at the South and
apply for the office of Superintendent of the Richmond & York River
Railroad, and the testimonials which he procured from the railroad with
which he was connected at the South, of his qualifications as an
Engineer and Superintendent, were of so high a character as to secure
for him the unanimous vote of the President and Directors of that road.
These testimonials can be shown, and the former President and Directors
of the York River Railroad will fully substantiate this statement. His
leaving that road was a personal matter entirely, for proof of which,
the public are referred to the former President of the road. So much for
the covert attack of "A Tax-Payer and Gas-Consumer." |
| As a practical engineer, and
one able to manage and conduct the Gas Works, Mr. Sharp has not his
superior, and if elected, will not have to pay for the learning to
fulfill the duties of the office. It is a curious fact that he should be
so assailed, when a near relative of the present incumbent, if report
speaks truly, has not only applied, but has actually been appointed to
an office, (against the known wishes of almost every man, woman, and
child in Richmond,) by a Black Republican President. Truly, "Those who
live in glass houses should not throw stones." Mr. Fry may be or may not
be a "Southern man;" with this we have nothing to do, but it is natural
to suppose that those who would accept at the hands of Abe Lincoln any
office in a Southern city, surely have the seeds of Black Republicanism
in them. |
| Also, a Tax-Payer and Gas
Consumer, and a True Out and Out Southern Man. |
|