Robert Smalls might just be one of the greatest Americans you have never heard of. I first heard of him in a tweet from Dr. Wilfred Reilly, a political science professor at Kentucky State University, which prompted me to research his life and reach out to Reilly for a lesson.
Smalls was an extremely courageous and fascinating individual. Born into slavery on a South Carolina plantation in 1839, he eventually changed the course of the Civil War.
Smalls’s first noted act of heroism came when he was enslaved and was forced to fight on the side of the Confederacy. He served as a pilot on the Confederate transport ship, CSS Planter. He would eventually commandeer the ship and guide it to a Union-controlled port in the South, handing it over to the Union Navy. His bravery led to a meeting with President Abraham Lincoln. This incident helped persuade Lincoln to allow black soldiers to fight for the Union.
“The example of what he did and his personal conversations with Lincoln were one of the things that inspired President Lincoln to specifically let black troops into the Army and the Navy,” Reilly told me.
This act alone should have warranted Smalls having a movie made about him. Consider some of the cinematic classics that cover this time period, such as Glory, Amistad, and 12 Years a Slave. A biopic about Smalls should have been made a long time ago. But this wasn’t even the end of his amazing story. After the war, he would help transform society, especially in South Carolina.
“He formed business partners with both black and white people,” Reilly said. “He was elected to office, and he helped get signed the legislation that began the South Carolina public schools. He also started the South Carolina Republican Party.”
Smalls was a loyal and dedicated Republican. He was elected to office at both the state and federal levels. He was first elected to the South Carolina House of Representatives in 1868. In 1870, he was elected to the South Carolina state Senate and remained in office until 1875. In 1882, he was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives.
“I never lose sight of the fact that, had it not been for the Republican Party, I never would have been an office-holder of any kind — from 1862 to the present,” Smalls wrote in 1912 to Sen. Knute Nelson of Minnesota. In this letter, Smalls famously declared the Republican Party was “the party which unshackled the necks of four million human beings.”
“Every colored man who has a vote to cast would cast that vote for the regular Republican Party and thus bury the Democratic Party so deep that there will not be seen even a bubble coming from the spot where the burial took place,” he said in a campaign speech after experiencing intimidation and threats from his Democratic opponents.
He was also the original activist in integrating public transportation systems. Smalls led a boycott against Philadelphia transportation systems in 1867 after he was asked to give up his seat to a white passenger — an act that perhaps foreshadowed Rosa Parks.
“His whole story is just kind of fascinating,” Reilly said. “He was this sort of warrior, forced to be a pilot on this Confederate fighting boat. He stole the boat and took it to a Union port. Joined the other side of the military. Did well in the war. Met the president, integrated the military. Went home, made some money, started the local Republican Party, and started the local school system.”
“And the final aspect of this whole remarkable story is that later in life, he ended up buying the plantation house that his former master had owned,” Reilly continued. “After he bought it, his former slavemaster’s wife of the former plantation owner was worried about being kicked out of the plantation and penniless. So Smalls, in what he described as a ‘radical act of mercy,’ let her live there. She remained there until she died. But Smalls owned the mansion that he once did chores in as a peasant.”
That is one heck of an impressive life story and one that more people should know about.
