Meridian Chapter of the National Buffalo Soldiers Honors Those Who Came Before Them

MERIDIAN, Miss. (WTOK) – The Meridian Chapter of the National Buffalo Soldiers celebrated Sunday by honoring many who came before them.

On Sunday at 1:30 p.m., the group met at the Harley-Davidson building near the Meridian Uptown Mall and traveled to Lauderdale County’s largest African-American cemetery on 10th Avenue.

The holiday was established on July 24, 1992 by former President George H. W. Bush and was proclaimed on July 28 as Buffalo Soldiers Day.

This honors Congress’s action of July 28, 1866, to establish the 9th and 10th Cavalry Regiments and the 38th, 39th, 40th, and 41st Infantry Regiments.

“The Buffalo Soldiers were the name given to the 9th and 10th Cavalry Regiments during the non-Indian Wars; they were black soldiers that were created as part of the First Army of the United States in peacetime. Right after the Civil War, they created six units of colored troops. The 9th and 10th were sent to fight in what we now call the Indian Wars, the Westward Expansion, and it was from those Native Americans that we got the name Buffalo Soldiers,” said Buffalo Soldiers Meridian Chapter Secretary Terrance Roberts.

This group of bikers continues to ride across Mississippi, around town and around the world.

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