Freedom on the Sea: The True Story of the Civil War Hero Robert Smalls and His Daring Escape to Freedom

Debut author Boulware Moore recounts the true story of his great-great-grandfather, U.S. politician Robert Smalls (1839–1915), who freed 16 enslaved individuals—including himself, his crew, and their families—during the Civil War. Beginning with Smalls’s arrival from Beaufort to Charleston, South Carolina as an enslaved 12-year-old, engrossing text focuses on the figure’s skill with boats, his close-knit family’s life together, and the troubling truth that “being enslaved meant that any one of them could be sold away at any time.” Atmospheric collage-style imagery from Collier (Maya’s Song) transports readers to the time period as Smalls becomes a wheelman on a side-wheel steamer, the Planter, and, after the Civil War’s start, seeks liberation for his family. Knowing that it will take him years to amass the fee to purchase their freedom, Smalls hatches a plan to use the Planter—now transformed into a Confederate military boat transporting troops and equipment around South Carolina waterways—to sail to a Union warship blockade, and to freedom. A nail-biting sequence of events, portrayed in images that marry landscape and portraiture, accompany Smalls on his extraordinary journey in this affecting historical telling. An author’s note concludes. Ages 4–8. (May)