In 1862, an enslaved man stole a Confederate warship, and sailed his family to freedom.
By The Black History Room1 min read
Robert Smalls. Robert Smalls - Brady-Handy. Mathew Benjamin Brady / Levin Corbin Handy / Adam Cuerden. between 1870 and 1880. Public domain. Source.
Before dawn on 13 May 1862, Robert Smalls, wearing the captain's straw hat, steered the armed steamer Planter out of Charleston harbor, past Fort Sumter, with sixteen people aboard. Under a white bedsheet, he handed the ship to the Union blockade. He later bought the house where he had been enslaved and served five terms in the US Congress.
