From Civil War to Civil Rights - the path to align our Title 5 US Juneteenth Holiday

US Colored troops will hold their place in the Army of the United States as long as the government lasts.
-Colonel Benjamin Grierson,
10th United States Cavalry, 1867

2025 National Buffalo Soldiers Day marks the anniversary of the creation of the original segregated black Regular Army regiments known collectively as the Buffalo Soldiers, constituted by an act of Congress on July 28, 1866.

During the 1st Session of the 39th Congress, the US Army was dramatically reorganized and expanded following the end of the Civil War.

US Colored Troops who enlisted from California during our U.S. Civil War remain”hidden figures” just as Juneteenth remains a quasii-optional holiday for State of California employees.

After our U.S. Civil War, the US Army consisted of 60 regiments: 45 infantry; 10 cavalry; 5 artillery; and a corps of cadets at the United States Military Academy at West Point, "to be known as the Army of the United States."

The Army Reorganization Act of 1866 was a seminal moment for newly freed USCT soldiers in the US military. For the first time in the nation's history, the Regular Army featured permanent regiments of then known as Colored or Negro Soldiers.

Prior to the Civil War, soldiers of Pan African Ancestry, both enslaved and free had a proud lineage of Military Service paralleling the country's origin during the Revolutionary War and continuing for the next half-century.

American soldiers of Pan African Ancestry saw action during the War of 1812 and the Mexican-American War.

Colored soldiers served in volunteer regiments organized for the military emergency or were attached to Regular Army units.

It was not until the Civil War that a formal government organization was created to recruit and train free and formerly enslaved men for service in the Bureau of Colored Troops (United States Colored Troops).

Nearly 210,000, earned through service the right to be called African Americans in the US armies and navies during the war. Of that number, 1,918 men were recruited and enlisted from the State of California, according to the African American US Civil War Museum in Washington DC.

Our California Buffalo Soldier Project highlights
Gabriel Young, an enslaved man from May's Lick, Kentucky who self-emancipated by enlisting with the Co. F, 5th US Colored Heavy Artillery in Ohio.

He was the father of Brigadier General Charles Young, born enslaved on March 12, 1864, who was the highest-ranked Black officer in the US Army at the time of his death in 1922.

National Buffalo Soldiers Day, July 28, 1866, authorized the organization and recruitment of six regiments (2 cavalry and 4 infantry) to "be composed of colored men" and led by white officers.

The army designated the colored infantry regiments as the 38th Infantry, 39th Infantry, 40th Infantry, and 41st Infantry. The 9th Cavalry and 10th Cavalry comprised the mounted arm.

On March 3, 1869, Congress reduced the Regular Army from forty-five to twenty-five infantry regiments. The black infantry regiments were consolidated: the 39th and 40th became the 24th Infantry; the 38th and 41st became the 25th Infantry. The 9th and 10th cavalry regiments kept their original designations.