Every once in awhile you stumble upon a book that once started so engrosses you that you can’t put it down. Buffalo Soldiers by Tom Willard was such a book for me. This is the story of the first black American cavalry soldiers, who served in the west and helped to subdue the Indian tribes to make way for western expansion.

It’s ironic that these black men, almost all former slaves, chose to enlist to serve the country that enslaved them, but they wanted to stand up and be counted as Americans and as men . They endured a lot, from lower pay and less privileges than their white counterparts, to downright hatred and violence from the very people they were there to protect.

Tom Willard makes this a very personal story, we follow Augustus Sharpe from his enlistment as a young newly freed slave through his fighting years , as he is promoted to eventual Sergeant Major (as high as a black man could go in those early years) to his retirement after fighting in Cuba with Teddy Roosevelt. Along the way the 10th Cavalry come into contact with people like George Armstrong Custer, Wild Bill Hickok and Buffalo Bill Cody. They have a large part in the defeat of Geronimo.

This book is the first in a series that follows this Black-American Military family right up to present day Desert Storm. I am looking forward to learning this aspect of history from these excellent books. ( )

One of the best westerns, military fiction novels ever. Why do not more people know of it? Sgt. Major Augustus Sharpe and his wife Selona are two of the best developed characters I have encountered in either westerns or military fiction. It is nice to see a story of brave, hard solders who are not supermen and women who are not just bed partners. Mixed with the well written action sequences and all permeating racial injustice and you have one of my all time favorite books. ( )