A soldier from one of the U.S. Army’s all-Black regiments, established after the Civil War, played a key role in training West Point cadets in horsemanship during World War II.
The Rev. Robert W. Dixon Sr., the last known surviving member of the U.S. Army’s all-Black Buffalo Soldier regiments, passed away on November 15 near Albany, N.Y., at the age of 103. According to his wife, Georgia Dixon, he died at a rehabilitation center.
During World War II, Dixon served as a corporal at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point. There, African American soldiers from the Ninth Cavalry Regiment, also known as Buffalo Soldiers, trained cadets in horsemanship and mounted tactics.
The Buffalo Soldiers, established after the Civil War, were an all-Black group of cavalry and infantry regiments. The name “Buffalo Soldiers” was given to them by Native Americans during the Western expansion of the post-Civil War 19th century, possibly referring to their curly hair or their fierce fighting spirit. The soldiers embraced this nickname.
Due to racial prejudice, these troops were limited to serving west of the Mississippi River, as many white Southerners refused to accept armed Black soldiers in their communities. They participated in the Indian Wars and helped protect settlers as they moved West. In the Spanish-American War, the skilled horsemen of the 10th Cavalry led the charge for Colonel Theodore Roosevelt’s Rough Riders in Cuba.
In the 20th century, official racism within the Army reduced the involvement of Buffalo Soldier regiments in major battles during both World War I and World War II. However, some of these troops did see combat, particularly during the invasion of Italy and in the Pacific theater during World War II.
At the same time, the soldiers’ skill in horsemanship was formally acknowledged. Starting in 1907, units from the Ninth and 10th Cavalry Regiments were assigned to the U.S. Military Academy at West Point to instruct cadets in military horsemanship.
Mr. Dixon, a New York City native, enlisted in the Army in 1941 and served at West Point throughout World War II.
His wife, whom he married in 1977, shared that she never knew where he learned to ride horses or the specifics of his duties at West Point. He was a humble, disciplined man and a Baptist pastor who rarely spoke about his time in the military, choosing instead to focus on the future.
Once, when Ms. Dixon went horseback riding with a friend, she mentioned that her husband showed no interest in joining them.
Robert Walter Dixon was born on September 11, 1921, in Manhattan, the youngest of five children born to Benjamin and Louise (Hammond) Dixon.
After the war, Dixon settled in the Hudson Valley, where he worked at I.B.M. in Poughkeepsie, N.Y. He retired in 1977 as a manager in charge of a unit that built computer motherboards. For 19 years, he also served as the part-time pastor of Central Baptist Church in Salt Point, N.Y., in Dutchess County.
Both Robert and his wife, a psychiatric nurse, had been married before. In 1977, they relocated with their blended family to Albany, where Mr. Dixon became the pastor of Mount Calvary Baptist Church. He served there for 36 years before retiring in 2013. From 1998 to 2005, he was the president of the Empire Baptist Missionary Convention of New York, a network of Black churches.
Dixon was also deeply involved in civic matters. He played a key role in establishing the Community Police Review Board in Albany and chaired the board from 1984 to 1998. Additionally, he led a commission dedicated to creating a memorial for the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in the city.
In addition to his wife, Mr. Dixon is survived by six children: Carolyn Suber, Terry, David, John, Jacqueline, and Robert Dixon Jr.; nine grandchildren; and two great-grandchildren. His son Gerald passed away in the 1980s.
The Buffalo Soldiers unit at West Point was disbanded in 1946 when the Army became fully mechanized. Two years later, President Harry S. Truman mandated the desegregation of the military. In 2005, Mark Mathews, the oldest living Buffalo Soldier at the time, passed away at 111 and was buried at Arlington National Cemetery.
The Buffalo Soldiers have been honored in popular culture, including in Bob Marley and the Wailers’ 1983 song “Buffalo Soldier” and the 1997 film “Buffalo Soldiers,” starring Danny Glover.
At the age of 101, Mr. Dixon visited West Point to see a monument dedicated to the Buffalo Soldiers, which was unveiled in 2021 on the very grounds where they had once trained future officers. This area is now called Buffalo Soldier Field.
During a celebration of his life, Aundrea Matthews, the granddaughter of a Buffalo Soldier and president of the Buffalo Soldiers Association of West Point, shared a story of Mr. Dixon’s visit. When cadets offered to help him, he refused. “When the soldiers tried to assist Rev. Dixon, he shook them off,” Matthews said. “At 101, he walked by himself and saluted the Buffalo Soldier monument.”