"Bucks, constitute the brutal black man out to cause havoc"

I'm a northerner, from Minnesota; I had never heard anyone I know use the term "black buck", or "buck" meaning a black person. I've heard it quite a bit for young male American Indians. I don't mean in any way to be saying "southerners racist/northerner not". I just mention that specific point about language to preface the following:

A few years ago, I picked up the crossword in the Flint, Michigan newspaper. One of the clues was, "a black buck". I actually missed the implication completely, and asked myself "a black buck of what kind of animal?". I picked up my wife's crossword dictionary, and found an answer that fit, apparently an archaic term for a young black man that I have never heard of before or since. I strongly suspect it was primarily slave-market terminology. I've kicked myself repeatedly since because I didn't register a complaint about the appearance of that crap in a modern newspaper.