Buffalo Soldiers

Plains Indians named the African American cavalry stationed on the Great Plains after the Civil War the “Buffalo Soldiers,” which eventually referred to both the black cavalry and infantry in the West. Following the Civil War, in 1866 Congress authorized six regiments of the regular U.S. Army to be staffed by blacks two cavalry and four infantry. By 1869, in an overall troop reduction, Congress cut the number of black infantry units to two, and potential black soldiers enlisted in either the Ninth or Tenth Cavalry or the Twenty-fourth or Twenty-fifth Infantry. During the latter nineteenth century these black regiments represented 10 percent of the army’s effective strength, and in many western commands black soldiers made up more than one-half the available military force. Although their contributions were significant, their varied experiences were always tempered because they were black soldiers in “white” and “red” territory. The Buffalo Soldiers played a vital role in Oklahoma and Indian Territory as well as in other regions of the West. Both the Ninth and the Tenth cavalries and the Twenty-fourth Infantry served in Indian Territory during the latter nineteenth century.