Buffalo Soldier a Patriot to the End
From the Washington Post:
He was 111 when he died last week, believed to be the oldest of the Buffalo Soldiers — the black Army men on horseback who helped settle the West and fought abroad even as they were denied personal freedoms at home.
Mark Matthews was born in 1894, when Grover Cleveland was president, 28 years after the federal government had formed six regiments of black soldiers, largely to acknowledge the contribution they made during the Civil War.
“African Americans have [served] with honor and distinction for decades, lest we forget,” said Loretta Clarke of Southwest Washington.
As he was laid to rest yesterday with full military honors at Arlington National Cemetery, 1st Sgt. Matthews was remembered by family, friends and military colleagues as a dedicated father, a committed friend and a patriot, the elder statesman of a group that opened the door for blacks in military service long before the Tuskegee Airmen took to the skies.
“He was a piece of living history,” said Mary E. Brown, 85, vice president of the Baltimore chapter of Buffalo Soldiers Inc. and a close friend. She told a story about taking a dark blue cavalry hat and bright yellow scarf to the aging soldier last month on his birthday. “When I placed the hat on his head, he said, ‘This hat is too small.’ He was spit and polish until the day he died.”
More than 1,000 people attended two wakes for Matthews at Trinity AME Church in Northwest yesterday and Sunday. And more than 500 were present for his burial yesterday afternoon in a vault above his wife, Genevieve, who died in 1986.
Mary Matthews Watson, his daughter and caretaker, was given a folded U.S. flag in honor of her father, who was also the oldest man on record in the District. He died of pneumonia Sept. 6 at a Washington nursing home.
Then, learn more about the Buffalo Soldiers at the the Buffalo Soldiers National Museum website.