Payne, John Ward, and Pompey Factor received the Congressional Medal of Honor, America’s highest military decoration, for their actions during the Indian Wars. All three men were black Seminoles known as Seminole Negro ...Indian Scouts. Payne served as a trumpeter, Factor was a private, and Ward was a sergeant attached to the 24th Infantry Regiment. On April 25, 1875 they along with one other man “participated in a charge against 25 hostiles while on a scouting patrol” by the Pecos River in Texas. Not much else is known of their lives other then Payne was born in 1854 and died January 14, 1904, Ward was born in 1848 and died May 24, 1911, and Factor was born in 1849 and died March 28, 1928.