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In the early morning hours of May 13, 1862, Robert Smalls, a 23-year-old Civil War-era slave, commandeered a Confederate ship, the Planter, in Charleston harbor, and sailed it with other members of the slave crew to freedom past five heavily fortified checkpoints before turning it over to the Union Navy.
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| Robert Smalls |
The daring act delivered Smalls from slavery, brought him worldwide renown, and served as the launching point for a remarkable post-war career that made him one of the most famous African-Americans in South Carolina history.
Before he died at age 76 in 1915, Smalls had become a noted community leader, businessman, and entrepreneur; a founder of the Republican Party in South Carolina; a major general in the state militia; a member of both houses of South Carolina's Legislature; a five-term U.S. Congressman; and a delegate to the 1868 and 1895 state Constitutional Conventions.
His achievements were all the more remarkable because at the time of his electrifying escape from slavery, Smalls could not read or write. He later achieved literacy by hiring a personal tutor.
"Smalls certainly was the most famous black political leader during Reconstruction in South Carolina, and his capture of the Planter made him a national hero during the Civil War," said Andrew Billingsley, a professor of sociology and African American Studies at the University who authored a 2007 biography of Smalls, Yearning to Breathe Free, Robert Smalls of South Carolina and His Families (University of South Carolina Press).
Though Smalls' role in the state's history is documented, it isn't widely known to the general public. But Billingsley, who also is a senior scholar in residence at Carolina's Institute for Families in Society, believes that publication of the book is adding momentum to a movement to affirm Smalls' rightful place in history.
After the Civil War, Smalls became a leader in the state's then black majority that helped usher in what Billingsley refers to as "biracial political democracy" for the first time in the state's 200-year history.
Though Reconstruction lasted only 10 years and was a turbulent period, the era is remembered for several landmark political achievements. Among them was creation of the highly regarded 1868 state constitution, establishment of a system of free compulsory public schools for black and white students, and the reopening of the University of South Carolina to whites and blacks, making it one of the first state universities in the South open to both races after the war.
In 1895 the state's Democratic leaders overturned the 1868 constitution and replaced it with another one that essentially dissolved black voting and other rights. But a motion at the 1895 convention backed by Smalls calling for creation of a college for blacks was passed and resulted in the founding of S.C. State University in 1896.
In 1877 Smalls was convicted (but later pardoned) for having taken a bribe when he was in the Legislature in what many observers believed was a trumped up case designed to force him from public office. But even that experience didn't keep him down, said Billingsley.
"Smalls did not allow personal defeats to keep him from trying again," he said. "He was a model of determination in his political career whose most important contribution to the state was his leadership in education."
Smalls established a school in Beaufort for newly freed black students and became superintendent of education for the county school system, noteworthy achievements for somebody who started out as an untutored man, said Billingsley. "But he was bright, aggressive, and after the war, wealthy, so he had a lot of influence in the realm of education.
"One of the things I learned from the Robert Smalls story is how things like courage, intelligence, persistence, and the ability to establish relations with people were personal attributes," said Billingsley. "He was able to work with people beyond personal conflicts. That's something all political leaders could learn today."
4/08
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Andrew Billingsley, professor of sociology and African American Studies
