"I have great pleasure in informing you that we have here completely settled the question whether colored men will not fight in America as well as their ancestors did in Africa. On the night of the 6th of June, about three thousand Texans came to our fortifications, and lay around our five hundred colored soldiers, besides a hundred white ones. Those three thousand rebels lay prowling around our men like so many cats, only waiting for the dawn of the 7th of June to gobble us up like so many poor, helpless mice. About three o’clock they came on with an awful rush, shouting, ’No quarter for niggers and their officers!’ They got into our works, and the way that men fell on both sides was dreadful. It was really awful the way my poor comrades were shot down, or killed with the bayonet, though at the same time we mowed them down like grass before the scythe. Those strong arms of ours that had made the South the rich land that it lately was, now laid its defenders even with the ground. There was hardly a single officer, either black or white, among us who was not either killed or wounded. How I escaped myself without a scratch is more than I can tell, where there were so very few who came out of the battle as they went in. To God be all the praise! "The gunboats Choctow and Lexington assisted us very much, for they kept throwing shells into the enemy, and made them fly in all directions, and even up into the air! The white men on our side—one hundred of them—also fought like lions. One division of the rebels hesitated about coming out of a redoubt they had got into their possession. They were not willing. But our brave black soldiers went in with a rush, and assisted them in making up their minds by taking the bayonet to them, and thrashing them with the butt ends of their guns, precisely like thrashing wheat! They reminded me of a lot of guilty cats when the dogs are on them. Having suffered the loss of hundreds of men, and been completely vanquished in the bargain, the rebels were forced to retreat, and this they did with as good a grace as they were able. "No doubt but the telegraph has already carried the news all over the Union how our six hundred intrepid soldiers beat three thousand rebels. This will settle, once for all, the insulting question, ’Will the black man fight?’ It will also secure for us more civil treatment from white soldiers, both North and South, and remind them that the Great Creator himself, and all foreign nations, make no difference whatsoever on account of the color of the skin. I would like to know what ’Old Massa’ thinks of things now. "I send my best love to all those who may enquire for me, and please write soon to your most affectionate husband, "Tuesday night, 9 o’clock. "THOMAS LINCOLN."