Captain (soon to be Colonel) James M. Williams had been forming an African-American regiment in Kansas, made up largely of escaped slaves from Missouri, Arkansas, and Indian Territory, and some free blacks.

[3] Despite the uncertainty of the regiment's future as a federal military force, Kansas ensured the men were armed with a mix of good Austrian and Prussian muskets with bayonets.

The objective was to break up a guerrilla army based on Hog Island in the Osage River, near the Toothman homestead and about nine miles on the other side of the Kansas-Missouri border.

John Toothman had been identified as a guerrilla and imprisoned at Fort Lincoln, a Civil War prison camp near Fulton, Kansas.

As the Kansans approached on Monday, October 27, the scouts identified a large party ahead as local Confederate guerrillas under Bill Truman and Dick Hancock, as well as Missouri State Guard recruits under Colonel Jeremiah "Vard" Cockrell (all mounted.

)[5] Finding the enemy in greater force than anticipated, the Kansans fortified the Toothman homestead and used fence rails to create breastworks.

Southern cavalry who swept past Gardner found themselves hemmed in by volleys from the rest of the approaching Kansans.

Crew of Co. A.; Corp. Joseph Talbot, Privates Samuel Davis, Thomas Lane, Marlon Barber, Allen Rhodes, Henry Gash, all of Co F; and John Six-Killer of Seaman's Battalion.

[1][7] The heroic action of the African Americans was headlined as "desperate bravery;" and Bill Truman told supporters in Butler that the blacks had fought "like tigers.

"[1] The African Americans were fighting for their freedom, to ensure they never went back to slavery, and they knew the guerrillas would give them no quarter, having promised to kill blacks rather than take them prisoner.