"I suppose that some of our friends on the other side of the fence will begin to tell us here that the colored man will not fight, and that there is neither pluck nor courage in him. We shall certainly be told a hundred thousand times that there is no fighting in him, and that he was never intended for anything but a docile slave! Such persons who say so have never read even the A B C of history; for colored men fought quite as well as white men on many a hard-fought field, both in the War of the Revolution, and in the War of 1812; and what we did once, and did well, we can do again, and do better, and with a better motive, too, because we will be fighting for our own complete emancipation, and to put an end, once for all, to slavery in the United States, and purge the nation of a great crime. (Loud applause throughout the hall). "I need not go back in history to prove the bravery of the African race, for this is a well-known fact, and the very school-books are full of it. The bravery of the slave is one of the main reasons why the slave-holders make such stringent laws in attempting to perpetuate their iniquitous system. They know our prowess, and the risks they would run in the case of a general rising, and therefore they exercise double caution in order to keep down even the slightest attempts at insurrection. But for all that, there is not the slightest doubt in my own mind that they will go out of the Union, as they have been promising us to do for the last fifty years, if they cannot get their own way! In all their plans, schemes and calculations, this slave-holding oligarchy have thrown the Almighty overboard, and every sacred right of the human race. They have treated the wronged and oppressed African as if he had neither rights nor feelings, and, indeed, as if he were not a human being at all. But there is a day coming, and it will soon be here, when the Great Creator of the entire human race will call an imperative halt to all this, and go into this war as we may, we will come out with four millions of people who will be redeemed from the yoke and curse of Southern bondage. (Loud cheers). "I did not intend to make a lengthy address. I only wished to point out that we are drifting into war, and my own willingness to lend a hand to liberate the oppressed slave." Tom now resumed his seat amidst great applause. The audience, though taken by surprise by his speech, were greatly delighted, because of his willingness to go to the field.