Lieutenant Moss, who commanded Company H on the firing line on that day, has published an account in which he says: "The town was protected on the north by three blockhouses and the church; on the west by three blockhouses (and partially by the church); on the east by the stone fort, one blockhouse, the church, and three rifle pits; on the south and southeast by the stone fort, three blockhouses, one loop-holed house, the church and eight rifle pits. However, the Second Brigade was sent forward against the southeast of the town, thus being exposed to fire from fourteen sources, nearly all of which were in different planes, forming so many tiers of fire. The cover on the south and southeast of the town was no better than, if as good, as that on the other sides."
The cavalry regiments were no less conspicuous in their gallantry at San Juan than was the Twenty-fifth Infantry at El Caney. The brilliancy of that remarkable regiment, the Rough Riders, commanded on July 1st by Colonel Roosevelt, was so dazzling that it drew attention away from the ordinary regulars, yet the five regiments of regular cavalry did their duty as thoroughly on that day as did the regiment of volunteers.[22] In this body of cavalry troops, where courage was elevated to a degree infringing upon the romantic, the two black regiments took their places, and were fit to be associated in valor with that highly representative regiment. The Inspector-General turns aside from mere routine in his report long enough to say "the courage and conduct of the colored troops and First United States Volunteers seemed always up to the best." That these black troopers held no second place in valor is proven by their deeds, and from the testimony of all who observed their conduct, and that they with the other regulars were decidedly superior in skill was recognized by the volunteer Colonel himself. The Ninth Cavalry, although suffering considerably in that advance on East Hill, involved as it was, more or less, with Roosevelt's regiment, did not receive so large a share of public notice as its sister regiment. The strength of the Ninth was but little over one-half that of the Tenth, and its movements were so involved with those of the volunteers as to be somewhat obscured by them; the loss also of its commander just as the first position of the enemy fell into our hands, was a great misfortune to the regiment. The Ninth, however, was with the first that mounted the heights, and whatever praise is to be bestowed upon the Rough Riders in that assault is to be distributed in equal degree to the men of that regiment. Being in the leading brigade of the division this regiment had been firing steadily upon the Spanish works before the charge was ordered, and when the movement began the men of the Ninth advanced so rapidly that they were among the first to reach the crest.