By Phyllis Speidell

Astride his Tennessee walker, Major, the rangy, 6-foot-5-inch Ken Wright is an imposing figure and a flashback to the renowned Buffalo Soldiers of the mid-1800s.

The long-time Western Branch resident is co-founder and president of the Buffalo Riders of Hampton Roads, the African-American equestrian group dedicated to preserving and promoting the history of the Buffalo Soldiers and the black cowboys who helped tame the western frontier.

The Buffalo Soldiers date back to 1866. The Civil War was over, and an estimated 10,000 black soldiers remained in the still-segregated Army. The question, according to Wright, was what to do with those men?

“The answer was to put them on horseback and send them to Indian Territory, “Wright said. “They rode mostly mustangs, in some cases tied to the horses until they broke them. They were fierce, tenacious fighters, but they never knew the history they made.”

Congress created six all African-American army units in 1866 — the 9th and 10th Cavalry and four infantry regiments that, two years later, reorganized into the 24th and 25th Infantry.

Black soldiers received $13 a month for their five-year enlistment — more than most could earn in civilian life.

White officers led the black troops, although the command was not a popular one at that time, and black troops had to serve west of the Mississippi because of the rancor remaining from the Civil War.

The primary mission of the black units was protecting settlers and providing the infrastructure for new settlements to survive.

The story goes, Wright said, that the Cheyenne first saw the soldiers bundled in buffalo-skin coats against the winter cold, noticed the soldiers’ curly hair and brown skin and thought that, on horseback, they resembled a herd of humped-back buffalo. They called them Buffalo Soldiers.

The name became a sign of respect for the troops. When units of Buffalo Soldiers came to town, residents cheered their arrival. Normally black soldiers were required to dismount and walk into a town while the white soldiers rode, Wright said, but the Buffalo Soldiers were so popular they were allowed to ride.

When Wright organized the Buffalo Riders 20 years ago, he had to search for enough African-Americans who shared his passion for horses, trail riding and history. When the group began its annual parades in downtown Portsmouth, Wright realized that the common perception was that black men do not ride horses.

Recently Wright, in his Buffalo Rider regalia, stopped for coffee at a McDonald’s. When the young woman at the drive-through window asked if Buffalo Soldiers really rode buffalo, Wright replied “I’m on my way to an appointment, but I’ll be back to tell you all about it.”

He continues to tell people about the Buffalo Soldiers, black cowboys and their history at talks for civic groups, libraries and historical associations.

Wright, who is also an abstract painter working from the d’Art Center in Norfolk, counts Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama among his collectors. After graduating from Norfolk State, where he was a second lieutenant in the ROTC and majored in graphics and fine art, he worked as a page designer and graphic artist for The Ledger Star and The Virginian-Pilot for 39 years.

He grew up in Richmond, the youngest of four children, in a family of musicians. His father was a graphic artist for the W.T. Grant store on Broad Street, and Wright often accompanied him to the Museum of Fine Arts in Richmond.

Champion tennis player and activist Arthur Ashe was Wright’s childhood friend and classmate,

“When I was 11, we would play seven of us against him, and he’d serve so hard I couldn’t get to the ball,” Wright said.

Wright graduated from Richmond’s Maggie Walker High School, where he was the drum major, played basketball and played trombone, baritone and sousaphone in the band. He also met a young majorette, Simonetta, now an educator retired from the Portsmouth schools. The couple has been married for 48 years.

“I’m a city guy, but I’ve always loved horses,” Wright said. “My father had a friend in the country who had horses, so from when I was 7 years old, we went riding. When I was 25, I decided I wanted a horse, and I’ve had seven of them.”

Wright’s love of horses led to Western novelist Robert Vaughan using Wright as a prototype for a lead character his 2009 novel “Ride with the Devil” and to Wright playing a minor role in the TV miniseries “Sally Hemings — An American Scandal.”

Most of all, Wright appreciates that the horses led him to the Buffalo Riders and preserving the legacy of the Buffalo Soldiers.