(18) Then Joab sent and told David all the things concerning the war; (19) And charged the messenger, saying, When thou hast made an end of telling the matters of the war unto the king, (20) And if so be that the king's wrath arise, and he say unto thee, Wherefore approached ye so nigh unto the city when ye did fight? knew ye not that they would shoot from the wall? (21) Who smote Abimelech the son of Jerubbesheth? did not a woman cast a piece of a millstone upon him from the wall, that he died in Thebez? why went ye nigh the wall? then say thou, Thy servant Uriah the Hittite is dead also.
It should seem, from the apprehension Joab expressed of the king's displeasure, that he had no knowledge of David's adultery, and the motive for which he had wished the death of Uriah. From the king's letter, indeed, he saw that Uriah's death would be pleasing to him, and that the intelligence of this would soften his displeasure at the success of the Ammonites. The story of Abimelech, which Joab thought the king would consider a similar case to this of the death of Uriah, is related in Judges 9:50-55.