(One of the great faults of mankind is the belief that his individual perceptions represents truth. This belief, which in reality is often a falsehood, is grounded in egotism, narcissism and the mistaken belief that one is superior to the other. I grew up in the African-American community of Athens. Even then some thought of it as “Boogertown” and some today think that it is riddled with drugs, violence and all manner of negative things. But as I reflect back, on this Veteran’s Day week, while growing up, I never saw “Boogertown” or drugs and violence. I only saw a community of greatness.

On almost every corner, I saw heroes.

I saw a Tuskegee Airman whenever Leroy Murray came home. Charlie King was a Buffalo Soldier with the 25th Infantry Regiment. Tommie Townsend lived down the street from me and was a Montford Point Marine. Wilmer Harris earned a purple heart with the 761st Tank Battalion, called the best Negro Tank Battalion in World War II, a moniker the 761st rejected, settling instead for the title “Best Tank Battalion in World War II.” Blendor Crooks was a Buffalo Soldier who fought in Korea. Frank Payne fought in World War II and in Korea.

Even today, when I look around, I see men and women who gave their all for a country that did not always give back. Ninety-two-year-old Egbert Peoples Jr. fought with the 25th Infantry Regiment in World War II; Billy King earned two Bronze Stars in Vietnam; Walter Benford earned a Purple Heart with two oak leaf clusters — essentially three purple hearts — in the same war; Charles Malone served with the United States Marines in Vietnam.

These men were and are carrying on a legacy that was handed down to them by men who served in the 110th and 111th United States Colored Troops during the Civil War, men like Seymore Turner, who served with the 3rd Alabama Infantry in the Spanish-American War, and men like Cpl. Harmie Mason, who served with the 366th Infantry Regiment in World War I.)

“Gas! Gas!” screamed a soldier in an adjacent trench.

Two hundred yards away, Harmie Mason heard the alarm and slipped his mask from its holder. As he was putting it over his face, it slipped from his grasp and fell onto the muddy ground. Before hurriedly retrieving it he inhaled a wisp of the deadly gas.

Harmie Mason was born in 1896 in Limestone County. He was the son of Sallie Hammond and the stepson of Green Hammond, and like most colored boys in Alabama around the turn of the century, his occupation was farm laborer. His stepfather farmed around 40 acres of land, not the 40 acres and a mule that were promised to slaves at the end of the Civil War, but land that he purchased from a local farmer. Throughout his growing years, the family lived in the Slough Community near the present-day Huntsville-Brownsferry and Lucas Ferry Road intersection.

A bright boy who took education seriously, he attended the segregated Oak Grove School, sometimes walking 5 miles to get to the school on Cowford Road. There, with his sister Henrietta, he learned what was then called his ABCs.

A strapping teenager who stood almost 6 feet tall, he could work as long and as hard as any man under the hot Alabama sun.

On April 6, 1917, when Harmie was 21 years old, the United States declared war on Germany, triggering America’s largest military mobilization to date. The U.S. Army, numbering just over 200,000 men, expanded by drafting men into National Army Divisions.

Ten days after turning 21, Harmie received mobilization orders to report to Camp Dodge, Iowa. He reported for mobilization in early October 1917 and in late October of the same year, he was among 2,600 colored inductees from Alabama, who, along with men from Iowa and Illinois, were mustered to form the 366th Infantry Regiment.

The 366th was an all-colored unit that served with distinction in World War I. The unit was one of the exceptional Negro units with all its own officers and personnel.

Harmie and the others men of the 366th trained at Camp Dodge until departing by train in early 1918 for eventual deployment and combat in France as part of the 92nd Infantry Division. The division had been organized at Camp Funston, Kansas, in October 1917 and included colored men from all over the U.S.

Before departing for France, the 92nd received the name “Buffalo Soldiers” as a tribute to the four Buffalo Soldiers Regiments that fought on the American Plains in the late 19th century. These four regiments were named Buffalo Soldiers by the Comanche or Cheyenne as a sign of respect because of their toughness and ability to fight.

Harmie and the 366th arrived with the 92nd in France and were deployed to the front lines in August 1918. There, they earned participation in three battles: St. Die, Meuse-Argonne and Marbach.

Cpl. Harmie Mason, Company E. 366th Infantry, was honorably discharged on March 22, 1919.