Before we start, you, VE, probably heard me say, were proud. Member of radio hope you from pure acts. A collection of the best podcast around Radio Tokyo has a monthly newsletter that features all of this shows in our network. It's called the citizen and is the best way to stay on top of our life events. Giveaways behind seen stories and photos plus personal updates from hosts. Like me, roman Mars and Airline woods subscribe right now it radio, Toby DOT, Fm Slash newsletter. Robert was was born in enslaved person in eighteen, thirty, nine. In view for South Carolina, he was born A mother who was a domestic for their master and their family was born in a little shack behind the Big House, so to speak,

he was born on a day that there was a hanging going on and enslave person was being executed and the whole town left, and so his mother, who was in her mid forties when she gave birth, delivered on the floor of the shack, I herself and I've always kind of just thought about that. I can imagine giving fourth in eighteen, thirty, nine in your mid forties by yourself on the floor, but such as how Robert came into this world. His mother's name was Lydia polite she was born enslaved and worked in the home of a man named John MC key chapters the seven children, including his youngest son, Henry

when John MC he died, Henry Mickey inherited Lydia Polite and when she gave birth to her son, Robert Smiles, Henry Marquis claimed him his property to And, what's your relationship to rapid stars, I am Roberts. Great great grandson, I am a had the real fortune of growing up with Roberts, going daughter, my grandmother was his grand daughter. Of course. This is Couple aware more. What I think broadly about The civil war at that's, that's kind of abstract kind of the thing it was so long ago, but when I think about Robert Small, I think about fisheries that connects to him. It's a much more tangible kind of a thing because we ve had these really long. Generations and down, and so the history is much more, more tangible and accessible. For me, MIKE

blue, where more says that Robert smiles is up was somewhat unusual. He and his mother worked in and when the keys huge house on Prince Street in beauty. South Carolina and lived in a small way behind it. Robert small was able to stay with his mother much longer than many enslaved. More slavery obviously was a business and at the first operate, I agree that a young child could be put to work in I have a meaningful way. They were taken from their mother, and put dork but Robert, because he with his mother. Is a domestic had an opportunity to grow up with her and to receive the benefit of our love and nurturing? by all accounts. She was obviously use very smart precocious. She often got in trouble because he

he bought against the rules for slave people with it, as the story goes, he was very distraught, for example, at the fact that he could not go to school, that he couldn't be taught to read and write when in the evening, when the whistle the bell was sounded as a curfew for enslaved people. He often rebelled against going in on himself getting and often found himself getting into trouble, but he was young. He was an opportunity to taste freedom, or at least once freedom or at to observe it from afar freedom in a way that that the vast majority of enslaved people couldn't, and that always, I believe, stuck in his mind when Robert Small was twelve years old. Henry the key sent him to work in Charleston about fifty miles from his mother in Buford.

In eighteen. Fifty one year before Robert arrived, nearly half of the population of Charleston was made up of enslaved men, women and children, and had been one of the primary ports for the transatlantic slave trade when Robert Small first arrived in Charleston. He worked as a waiter at a fancy. Hotel and then as a lamp later next, as stevedores loading and unloading cargo from ships, Henry Marquis took almost all the money, Robert burned. He let Robert keep a small portion for himself when Robert Small was seventeen and Mickey gave him permission to get married. He married and enslaved woman named Hannah Jones and had why great grandmother Elizabeth, his first child, First daughter, and so that really the family peace really,

drove a lot of his motivations and his thinkings, as it does for all young parents, certainly, but I think her hand, the idea that his family could be taken from him be sold away at any moment was something that really vexed in that really bothered him enough in a very dramatic kind of away, and he had freedom on his I wanted to figure out a way to protect his family. The first thing did actually was. He went and negotiated with his wife's master to buy their freedom. A man named Samuel, Kinmen, Aunt Hannah and her child with Robert, their daughter, Elizabeth Samuel, Kinmen told Robert that he would be willing to sell him. His wife and their daughter three hundred dollars

Robert worked on the on the docks he actually was able to keep. I don't like a dollar a week or something sending the rest of his way. Just down to his master and Buford and I'm with that money. He bought various tobacco candied fruit and his soul, that on the docks- and he was actually quite quite good- quite entrepreneurial and he actually put down a hundred dollar down payment on the life of his his family. I think that he was able to save every penny. He ever made selling various things on the docks and collected that hundred dollars and put the down payment down. They knew it would take years to save enough, and even if they did raise the money Robert himself, we still ends

saved by Henry Magee back in Buford, amen, Hannah and Robert had their second child, a sun. They named Robert Junior and they thought Samuel Kinmen would increase the price beyond reach. That was in February of eighteen sixty one. The next month in March of eighteen, sixty one Abraham Lincoln took office, and in April confederate soldiers fired the first shots of the civil war firing at Fort Sumter. A union held See Fort just off the coast of Charleston. By June, Henry Marquis had sent Robert smiles to work on a confederate ship. A hundred and fifty foot side, we'll steamship called the planter. It was one of the newest and fastest ships in the area. He started as a deck hand. Then he was promoted to what was called the wheelman, meaning he navigated the sand bars and shall

a water of Charleston Harbor. The planter had a crew of ten three White Confederate officers, the captain first mate and engineer the rest of the crew were enslaved men, the white officers weren't supposed to leave the ship. They are supposed to sleep on board, but rob small noticed that they I'm in go off and staying away overnight, leaned slaved crew members had to stay behind on the ship. One night someone put the captain's hat on Robert small head as a joke, and now is the moment when he first wondered. If he could impersonate the captain but take command of the confederate ship, he was forced to work on and get his wife and children out of their for good. I'm Phoebe

this is criminal families with the world, three tradition. Comp goes down that Hannah actually went to Robert and and today we discussed this and Robert said. Look. This is it's dangerous? I don't know if I'm gonna make it. Why don't I just go ahead and take the plan or to freedom and then I'll come back for you I'll, come back and get you and she's I know where you go. I go where you die, I die and they made the pact to two to go at this together. Roberts mouth out the secret meeting with the other enslaved crew members. They agreed to join and help him. They wanted to free their families, to everything was planned out very carefully.

On May twelfth. Eighteen, sixty two, the crew of the planter, had just finished along stint. Demanding work. Robert small suspected that the white officers would be eager to leave the ship for the night and, as afternoon turned into evening it appeared. He was right. The confederate captain first mate, an engineer all left the ship s, things were falling into place, two of the deckhands decided the risk was too high and they want to go any more Robert smiles told them. They could leave any hoped that they wouldn't say anything to anyone. Hannah smiles arrived the planter with her daughter and infant son. It was an uncommon for the wives of enslaved crew members to come visit the ships in the evenings, but they had to be home before curfew or risk being

cotton punished by slave patrols? The families of the other crew members began to arrive too and Robert outline the plan for everyone. They had made the decision, If something happened and they were caught a they were going to kill them I'll say they line the bottom of the boat with dynamite, and you know they they made that given that it was either going to be freedom or it was going to be deaf for them around three, a m on May thirteen. The crew began adding would to the fires and had to wait for the boilers to get hot enough to produce steam. Finally, it was time to go. The crew raised the ship's flags first, the confederate flag and then the state flag of South Carolina and then Robert took command of the ship and he dawn.

Straw, top hat, that the confederate captain of the planter used aware and this long overcoat. He had studied the gate of the Confederate Captain and they sailed out, and he he knew all the past codes that he had to execute. With the whistle to get pie. I think there were five forts there and sailed out. They sailed past confederate Guard belts, guard stations in for They had to move at a slow peace so that nothing would appear out of the ordinary one of them. Planters, engineers and enslave man named Alfred Gardena later said. I was taken so weak that I could hardly stand He remembered that everyone on board was terrified, except for Robert smiles. If he lost his nerve for a single minute. No one noticed it. He said at one point, Robert Small

We said to have saluted passing boat with a whistle another time as they pass to tow boat. He held out to its captain something about the fog. Gordian remembered that Robert Small kept the steamer right on its course and when he passed, the Confederate Stronghold Fort Sumter, Robert Small saluted it with a whistle and then added an extra quote as a farewell Confederacy we'll be right back support for criminal comes from article article combines the curator of a boutique furniture sore with a comfort,

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captain. Until they were out of range of the confederate cannons they might be safe. He knew that there is a fleet of union ships further out in the waters off Charleston any plan to approach them. For help once he believed he was beyond the rain? She veered south to this union blockade and he started sailing toward the? U S, s onward, which was the lead boat in the federal blockade. They are outside the mouth and one of the Robert was very careful knew all the details. It planned everything exe There was one detail that he had forgotten, and here it is at this point it was probably know for five o clock in the morning. Maybe the sun was just starting or them early light was just starting to peek over the horizon, and here is this

large, one of the largest boats the harbour with this enormous confederate, flag sailing toward the USSR or to the federal blockade, and so obviously that could have created quite a problem, but luckily Roberts, wife Hannah, my great great grandmother, had thought to so together some white sheets, and so they quickly Lord, the Confederate flag ways: the White flag of surrender ass. They approached the: U S, s homeward and ass. They approached the onward the store, as stories go the union. The military. Folks who were manning. The the onward. There will just in a man easement. As you know, this large boat comes with this crew of of black people. You know the general conception of what

black people could do. Was for nearly limited. You know, what's let's remember that a narrative had to be created for this country to do the things that they did tunes people. The narrative was that they were less than human, that they were not intelligent, that they will be that they were it'll vile, violent, aggressive. All these kinds of things. And so you know at this point here- is this enormous confederate bow coming with the schools and enslaved boy. I just you know it shocked that all waiver, the officers and the the full from the union there, but it made enormous news up and down the EAST coast and they were free. Laboured small reportedly said to the captain of the onward and delivering this war material, including these cannons

I think Uncle Abraham Lincoln can put them to good use of often thought like, as they were, stepping off the planter and onto the onward just what must stay have felt immediate. It was common, I'm sure, every enslave person I in the country dream that one point or another being free, but how many actually have the opportunity to actually do something about that and Robert we get the audacity really to to do this and down you know he was free and and again me just what they must have felt as they step their first steps of freedom to this union. Both just must have been incredible. You won't be surprised it the story was received differently in the north and wasn south and the North Robert was really

the story was was, was one is news, was great news was joyous. This joyousness Robert was taken to the north and they were parades and celebrations for him up and down the EAST Coast, Washington, Philadelphia in New York, boston- and who is really received as a as a hero. He was one of the first real heroes of the civil war. Obviously, in the south there was a little bit of a different reception. You know there was a bomb put on his head. He was persona non grata. He had really embarrassed. The confederacy has again that the conception was was that you know and slave people, black people were akin to be born in terms of their ability to think strategically into in adjusting to execute sort of a level kinds of reasoning and thinking in planning and so on.

Really called all of that into question. A few months later, Robert Small travelled to Washington and met with President Lincoln in person the story of what Robert Small said, is partly credited with persuading President Lincoln to allow african Americans. To enlist in the Union Army and Robert Small went back to South Carolina to serve as a naval pilot We had this unique ability to envision. Realities for himself to think about things, to dream about things, to actually make those things happen for himself, but then to extend those things to his family and then to fight for others to do that it. So he did that in this instance, he actually went back into the crucible of the war back

to the heart of things and and worked with the union as the pilot of this, both the planter that the same vessel that he used to to free himself, and so he moved back to to the low country here, South Korea minor and an end to make a long story. Short Robert became the first african American, to command the United States naval vessel. As a result, some heroics that he he executed their fighting for the union. During the civil war that must have been a minute, at that he did to sail the ship that he had once been forced to work on now is as the commander of it. I can't imagine the thought of that Israel, poetry to it. To be honest, I mean Numb he did speck.

Actual things in, and it was at a time when there was a lot to be done, and so he you know he stepped up in men- did a lot. Robert smiles bought the house on Prince Street in Buford, where he and his mother had once been enslaved. And so he lived there. He and Hannah my great great grandmother and others who live there and after the civil war, the wife of his former master, came to the house. She was both physically and mentally ill and she thought He was going home. She thought she was going to to her house she's in And informed and Robert you know, could as well founded in a number of different ways. Now this the woman who had owned him as a piece of property who, as you know, defined his life

as a piece of shadow and in so many different ways, but yet he embraced her and brought her ear. And cared. For her and even though, for example, she wouldn't eat at the table with them. You know just care for hurry, allowed her to live, and so to me that that story just touches me because you know you could have slam. The door in her face in a literally and figuratively and any didn't the civil war began to end on April. Ninth, one thousand eight hundred and sixty five when union soldiers entered Charleston the first just to arrive where african american many of them had been forced to

work in the city earlier in their lives, and now they returned deliberated. The period known as reconstruction attempted to bring the southern states back into the union and attempted to correct the inequities of slavery when he for him Lincoln was assassinated. The reconstruction effort was left in the hands of Vice President Andrew Johnson. Who'd said: white men alone must manage the south. Robert Small became act in politics he wrote legislation to create the first public school system for the state of South Carolina, which has often said to be the first free compulsory state, wide public school system in the country. He was elected to the South, Carolina House and Senate and was elected to the? U S house of Representatives, were he served numerous terms.

By one thousand eight hundred and seventy seven about two thousand african american men that held public office in former confederate states over the decades to come, state governments dial back the right. Freedoms african Americans had been granted during reconstruction, Jim Crow Laws, legal, I say creation, confederate monuments began to be installed across the country, not just in the south, and Robert Small Watches. Opportunities for equality were taken away, one after another. I think about just the struggle. Does that he must have experienced as reconstruction was dying as we were, going back to a period were african Americans, black people had little to no rights in our stripped of their ability to vote to an

paid in in society and in a meaningful way You know he had been there is one of the major personalities the major really warriors allowing justice throughout his life, and so I can only imagine that he must have been just completely disheartened. They are quotes if he is from one of the last constitutional conventions. I think the last one the key participated in that actually put the Jim Crow laws into effect and recast, society, Bacchus and sort of a white supremacist sort of a mould, and you know he is one of the quotes. The he said was. My race needs no special defence for the past history of them when this nation leader

I want to believe that they can compete with anyone anywhere. All they need is an equal chance in the bow of life. That line is engraved on a statue of Robert smiles that sits in the cemetery the Tabernacle Baptist Church in Buford these bearing they're a marker described. So we liberated himself and his family on May thirteenth. Eighteen, sixty two he's may thirteenth a special day for your family That is a great question because for me I I ways acknowledge it as my personal independence day, in order, of course, to life worth as a national independence day and done and you don't look, I think, as an african, again could always question the relevance of that day, because no one July for

seventeen. Seventy six or you know that the realm sense of that independence day. You know didn't have any relevance for people of african, essential or enslaved, Frederick Douglass as an amazing speech about that day. But for for my family may thirteenth yeah is our indifference. Instead, it is the day when you that that we commemorate when Robert you now sort of All this plan, together and and and executed with with boldness, was with aplomb with audacity and one his freedom, so yeah it's a very important day. You know you know, as as white people like me, think about

history and think about what stories or celebrated and taught in school stories of bravery stories of fight for your independence and which stories you aren't taught in abstract that I've I've never heard of Robert smiles on a map. Who really accomplished what seems to be just such a such a big feet great I mean I always like. I grew up outside of Boston. And I got a very new England Centric view of history, pretty much that it, didn't happen, north of Say, Washington, D, C, really was an important and, of course, that's ridiculous, but also as got older. I came to realize that history is less of a literal recitation of what happened. And much more of a tool of a sort of social construction. It's it's in. Our history is

they say is told by the victor And- and I think that that's true Mean Robert first of all, he was persona non grata, as mentioned in the south, and so even here in Charleston South Carolina, The city where who now he started his historical sort of a career? Let's say his story is still somewhat me, dumb and, of course, someone like Paul Revere. We about so often- and I I remember as a young child thinking- will let you know that that was cool What he did was cool, but that wasn't white rabbit. Swirls did so again. We, I couldn't be more biased but yeah. I think it's an amazing story it's an amazing american story. If, if we can be broad enough to consider that African American

history is in fact american history, then this is among the best of them. In my view, criminal is created by Lorn, spore and me You will soon. As our senior producer Susanna Robertson. Has our system producer audio mix by rabbis special thanks to matter jack. Julian Alexander makes original illustrations freak episode of criminal. You can see them. At this. Is criminal dot com or on Facebook and twitter at criminal show criminal, is recording the studios of North Carolina public Radio, w you and see where problem radio Toby from Pierre Ex a collection of the best podcast around I'm Phoebe judge. This is

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