Born into slavery in Beaufort

Added: 2026-06-02

[00:00:00]The man who owned a city: How Robert Smalls went from enslaved sailor to South Carolina congressman. In 1862, a man born into slavery in Beaufort, South Carolina carried out one of the boldest and most dangerous escapes of the entire Civil War. His name was Robert Smalls.

[00:00:16]At just 23 years old, Smalls was forced to work aboard a Confederate military transport ship called the CSS Planter.

[00:00:23]But before sunrise on May 13th, while the white officers were asleep on shore, Smalls secretly took command of the vessel.

[00:00:30]Disguised in a captain's uniform, he sailed directly past five heavily armed Confederate checkpoints around Charleston Harbor. One mistake would have meant execution, but he fooled every guard. Once beyond the harbor, Smalls raised a white flag and surrendered the ship to the Union Navy, delivering valuable Confederate weapons, maps, and intelligence. The North celebrated him as a hero overnight. With reward money from the mission, Smalls later purchased the very Beaufort home where he had once been enslaved as a child. He eventually served five terms in Congress, fighting for education and civil rights across South Carolina after the war finally ended.