Death or Freedom

From the shadows of slavery to one of the most incredible escapes in history.

A photo of the Robert Smalls House, 511 Prince St., Beaufort, SC, taken from my walk through the Old Point this past week.

In Beaufort, history is not just remembered; it’s felt, woven into the fabric of our daily lives. I never stroll through Beaufort’s Old Point without envisioning the stories these centuries-old homes could tell.

As I pause on 511 Prince Street, I imagine Robert Smalls as a small child working beside his mother as slaves in this magnificent home along a quiet street shaded by ancient live oaks with beards of Spanish moss blowing gently in the wind. They lived in a small cabin behind the house owned by Henry McKee. Who would ever have thought Smalls would emerge from the dark shadow of slavery to carve his name in the annals of history?

There is a great deal of speculation regarding the identity of Smalls’ father. There is no conclusive evidence that he was the illegitimate son of his owner, but he received preferential treatment over the other slave children, exempt from the more strenuous chores assigned to the other slaves.

When he was 10, his mother arranged for him to be sent into the fields to witness the reality faced by ordinary slaves. Other slaves were brutally punished by the whip-wielding field hands. Outraged by what he witnessed, he changed the course of his life. He was jailed for protesting, and his mother became concerned for his safety. She persuaded her owner to send him to Charleston to work on the ships in the harbor, where this experience later on served him well.

Robert Smalls did the unimaginable.

In 1862, Smalls was a young enslaved crewmember on a Confederate transport ship in Charleston Harbor named the CSA Planter, where he waited in the darkness for the tide to be just right. Smalls had earned the trust of his enslavers and was permitted to work on the docks in Charleston and eventually aboard the Planter. He had a plan and knew if his plan did not succeed, he, along with 15 others, would die.

It’s painful to consider what brought him to this place where he was willing to risk his life and the lives of his children and friends. I cannot imagine the courage and desperation he must have felt.