The new statue, which was erected on Buffalo Soldier Field, will stand on the same campus as the tributes to Robert E. Lee.
Eddie Dixon, who created the statue honoring the Buffalo Soldiers, after the statue was unveiled at Buffalo Soldier Field at the U.S. Military Academy in West Point, N.Y., on Friday, Sept. 10, 2021.
“These men trained cadets who then went on to be leaders in the Army as commissioned officers,” said Command Sgt. Maj. Sa’eed Mustafa, whose great-uncle Sgt. Leon Tatum was a Buffalo Soldier. “And yet they were never ever given their just due.”Underscoring the significance, the unveiling of the tribute to Black soldiers came just days after the removal of a different military monument hundreds of miles away in Richmond, Virginia, the former capital of the Confederacy.
Although an athletic field on the grounds had been renamed in their honor in 1973, the actual memorial to the soldiers was a large rock bearing a plaque. To the group, the Buffalo Soldiers Association of West Point, the honor felt small on the 16,000-plus sprawling acres of West Point, which also has memorials to Lee, including a building, a road and a gate that bear his name.
It was sculpted by Eddie Dixon, himself a former member of the military, who also created the Buffalo Soldier Monument at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, which was dedicated in 1992. “When I was coming up, we had no role models that we could talk to,” Dixon said at the unveiling, standing at the base of his towering statue. “We didn’t know we had Buffalo Soldiers.”
As a young man in the 1930s, catching a glimpse of the Buffalo Soldiers as they passed through his hometown, Coatesville, Pennsylvania, drew him to the armed service, said Aundrea Matthews, a granddaughter. He was drawn by the allure of the sharp uniforms and the way the soldiers spoke, she said. The units were disbanded in the late 1940s as the Army ceased the use of horses in warfare, around the same time the military was ordered desegregated. But for years, little changed in the treatment of the former Buffalo Soldiers, some of whom took other jobs on the base, according to an oral interview given by Matthews. When he returned to West Point after fighting in Germany during World War II, he and fellow Black GIs were relegated to cafeteria wait staff, serving cadets, he said.
Deutschland Neuesten Nachrichten, Deutschland Schlagzeilen
Similar News:Sie können auch ähnliche Nachrichten wie diese lesen, die wir aus anderen Nachrichtenquellen gesammelt haben.
Kate Middleton just posted and signed off a rare personal tweetThe Duchess of Cambridge is getting involved in a big talking point, posting a rare personal tweet about Emma Raducanu making the US Open final.
Weiterlesen »
Why are Covid cases so high when millions are fully vaccinated? Blame the delta variant, experts sayThe number of Covid cases being recorded daily in the West remains high, and even resembles earlier peaks at different points during the pandemic.
Weiterlesen »
Lee statue base reassembled after failed time capsule searchWorkers returned to the site in Richmond where a statue of Gen. Robert E. Lee stood for more than a century, but won't resume their search for a 134-year-old time capsule state officials believe is buried in the statue's enormous granite pedestal.
Weiterlesen »
New capsule installed within pedestal where Lee statue stoodWorkers at the site in Virginia's capital where a statue of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee was taken down this week installed a new time capsule Saturday within the statue's massive pedestal, after efforts to locate an 1887 capsule were suspended.
Weiterlesen »
Sophia Grace and Rosie are all grown up! See the cousins celebrate Rosie's 15th birthdayThe cousins rose to fame when they appeared on 'The Ellen DeGeneres Show' in 2011.
Weiterlesen »
Iranians worry that their new government is ineptIran’s foreign minister has close ties to groups that America deems as terrorists. That makes re-engaging with the world difficult
Weiterlesen »