General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsBlown Up & Burned Down South Carolina Beach Home
Best That All Remember Our South Carolina History.
Around 2:30 a.m. on June 2, the Federal Union Military Ships John Adams and the Harriet A. Weed split up along the river to conduct different raids. Harriet Tubman led 150 men on the John Adams toward the fugitives. Tubman, later commenting on the raid, said once the signal was given, she saw slaves running everywhere, with women carrying babies, crying children, squealing pigs, chickens and pots of rice. Confederate soldiers tried chasing down the slaves, firing their guns on them. One girl was reportedly killed.
As the escapees ran to the shore, Black troops in rowboats transported them to the ships, but chaos ensued in the process. Tubman, who didnt speak the regions Gullah dialect, reportedly went on deck and sang a popular song from the abolitionist movement that calmed the group down.
More than 700 escaped slavery and made it onto the gunboats. Troops also disembarked near Fields Point, torching plantations, fields, mills, warehouses and mansions, causing a humiliating defeat for the Confederacy, including the loss of a pontoon bridge shot to pieces by the gunboats.
The ships docked in Beaufort, where a reporter from heard what had happened on the Combahee River.
He wrote a story without a byline about the She-Moses but never mentioned Tubmans name. He wrote that Montgomerys gallant band of 300 soldiers under the guidance of a Black woman, dashed into the enemies country, struck a bold and effective blow, destroying millions of dollars worth of commissary store, cotton and lordly dwellings, and striking terror to the heart of the rebeldom brought off bear 800 slaves and thousands of dollars worth of property, without losing a man or receiving a scratch.
https://explorebeaufortsc.com/beaufort-history-harriet-tubman-and-the-combahee-ferry-raid/

70sEraVet
(4,986 posts)A brave woman. I'd hate to think what would have been done to her, had she been caught by Confederates!
Dear_Prudence
(887 posts)Before escaping, she was beaten and whipped. A heavy metal object thrown by the slave owner bashed in her head, causing traumatic brain injury. So, I agree; I hate to think what would have happened. But, like so many of us, I hate to think what had already happened.
Buzz cook
(2,800 posts)I doubt if Pete could stand up to Harriet's standards.
pansypoo53219
(22,630 posts)DEI! DEI! SLAVE REBELLION!!!! NOOOOOOOO!!!!
bronxiteforever
(10,822 posts)BattleRow
(1,880 posts)Here's a worthy recipient.
BaronChocula
(3,509 posts)I had read it years ago somewhere and just found it on Wikipedia. It's how she was quoted in a biography. But one thing we know of the time is that Blacks could have been quoted in an assumed vernacular they did not actually speak. Especially in the time before recording devices. That being said, here's the account:
I nebber see such a sight. We laughed, an' laughed, an' laughed. Here you'd see a woman wid a pail on her head, rice a smokin' in it jus' as she'd taken it from de fire, young one hangin' on behind, one han' roun' her forehead to hold on, t'other han' diggin' into de rice-pot, eatin' wid all its might; hold of her dress two or three more; down her back a bag with a pig in it. One woman brought two pigs, a white one an' a black one; we took 'em all on board; named de white pig Beauregard, and the black pig Jeff Davis. Sometimes de women would come wid twins hangin' roun' der necks; 'pears like I never see so many twins in my life; bags on der shoulders, baskets on der heads, and young ones taggin' behin', all loaded; pigs squealin', chickens screamin', young ones squallin'.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raid_on_Combahee_Ferry#Liberation_of_slaves
LastDemocratInSC
(4,158 posts)Robert Smalls stealing a Confederate gunboat from Charleston harbor and escaping with his family and some others.
https://emergingcivilwar.com/2022/02/01/robert-smalls-and-the-daring-capture-of-planter/