In this screenshot from video, Tanya Bradsher, deputy secretary of the Department of Veterans Affairs, watches on Feb. 22, 2024, as new headstones are unveiled for 17 Black soldiers buried at Fort Sam Houston National Cemetery in San Antonio, Texas. The men were executed following the 1917 Houston Riots. The Army overturned the convictions last year and the men were granted honorable discharges. (Screenshot from Department of Veterans Affairs livestream)
AUSTIN, Texas — New headstones for 17 Black soldiers sentenced to death more than a century ago were unveiled Thursday at Fort Sam Houston National Cemetery in San Antonio after the Army deemed their trials unfair and granted each an honorable discharge.
During a ceremony to honor them, people dressed in the historic uniforms of Buffalo Soldiers, the nickname given to Black soldiers in some regiments beginning in 1866, lifted gold material from each of the headstones as the soldier’s name was spoken aloud. They revealed a gray marble marker bearing the soldier’s name, rank and home state.
The 17 soldiers honored Thursday were among 19 executed and 110 convicted of murder and mutiny in an event known as the 1917 Houston Riots or the Camp Logan Mutiny. The race riot occurred Aug. 23, 1917, as tensions between the Black enlisted soldiers of the 3rd Battalion, 24th Infantry Regiment, a Buffalo Soldier unit, and white Houston police officers and residents boiled over. It left 19 people dead.
After revealing the stone marking the grave of Pfc. Thomas C. Hawkins, his nephew Jason Holt knelt before it while holding the American flag that he received to honor his uncle’s service more than 106 years after his death.
Holt, an attorney from New Jersey, has been working toward this day along with other descendants of the executed veterans, though he said he still questions whether it balances the scales of justice. His uncle was among the first 13 men who were executed in secret on Dec. 11, 1917 — one day after the guilty verdict was approved.
“How do we in 2024 understand what it was like to be a soldier in 1917 in Houston, Texas?” he asked the crowd gathered for the ceremony. “They did what they needed to do as soldiers to support our nation and come home and not enjoy the same freedoms that they were out there in various military campaigns protecting for each and every one of us.”
All the men convicted were tried in three mass courts-martial at Fort Sam Houston in San Antonio. One attorney was appointed to represent all 118 soldiers charged. It led the Army to significantly overhaul its court-martial system and require the president to sign off on all executions.
Defendants on trial during the first court-martial at Fort Sam Houston, Texas, in November 1917. The Army reversed the convictions of 110 Black soldiers charged more than a century ago for mutiny, murder and assault in the 1917 Houston Riot. (National Archives and Records Administration)
The executed men were first buried near Salado Creek, the location where they were hanged. Each was buried with a glass bottle with their name inside.
Eventually 17 men were reburied at Fort Sam Houston National Cemetery with headstones bearing only their name and date of death. Two men’s bodies were returned to their families.
The Department of Veterans Affairs placed a sign near the graves two years ago explaining the history of the Houston Riots, the impact the trials had on military justice and the reason for the unusually bare headstones.
Along with the new headstones, the VA also provided full military honors Thursday and presented a folded flag to each of the three families present.
Aside from Holt representing Hawkins, the crowd included descendants of executed soldiers Cpl. Jesse Moore and Sgt. William Nesbit.
“These headstones will not erase history or right the wrongs of the past, but they will ensure that future generations can understand that history and remember their names,” Tanya Bradsher, the deputy VA secretary, said during the ceremony to commemorate the headstones.
The Army began its review of the trials in 2022 and decided three months ago to overturn the convictions because it found “these soldiers were wrongly treated because of their race and were not given fair trials.” Each man’s service record now bears an honorable discharge.
The new headstones unveiled Thursday acknowledge that reversal and allow their grave sites to match those of the other honorably discharged veterans in the rows around them. The historical sign has also been updated.
“It took us a while to get here, and we do ask for forgiveness for the injustice that was perpetrated on these soldiers. We’re doing everything we can to make this right,” Yvette Bourcicot, principal deputy assistant secretary of the Army for manpower and reserve affairs, said during the ceremony. “The Army is a learning institution, and we are learning as we go.”
