Robert Smalls

Criminal

Vox Media Podcast Network

True Crime, Society & Culture

4.7 • 39.4K Ratings

🗓️ 7 February 2025

⏱️ 35 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

On May 13, 1862, in Charleston, South Carolina, a man named Robert Smalls took command of a Confederate ship called The Planter and liberated himself and his family from slavery. As they passed the Confederate-held Fort Sumter, Robert Smalls was said to have saluted it with a whistle, and then added an extra one, “as a farewell to the confederacy.” Robert Smalls’ great-great-grandson, Michael Boulware Moore, tells the story. This episode was first released in June 2020. Say hello on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. Sign up for our occasional newsletter, The Accomplice. Follow the show and review us on Apple Podcasts: iTunes.com/CriminalShow. We also make This is Love and Phoebe Reads a Mystery. Artwork by Julienne Alexander. Check out our online shop. Episode transcripts are posted on our website. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Ah, Benny's parents, thanks for coming.
0:02.3	Hiya.
0:02.9	So, Benny has really blossomed this term.
0:05.6	You're telling me, he outgrew his bike. We sold it, on eBay.
0:09.6	Oh, that's not quite what I meant.
0:11.1	It's free to sell on there?
0:12.3	Free to sell?
0:13.4	Easy too. Sold Benny's bike, your guitar, my jacket.
0:16.8	You sold my guitar?
0:19.9	Shall we talk about Benny?
0:22.1	When it's this easy to sell for free, you can't help but say when it's eBay.
0:26.7	Things people love. T's and C's apply, excludes vehicles.
0:30.7	Support for Criminal comes from Apple Podcasts.
0:34.0	Sometimes you get an urge to look back at your past,
0:36.6	and the decisions you regret or the connections you lost.
0:40.1	And you start to wonder, what if things have gone differently?
0:44.2	Heavyweight is a podcast that looks into that question and tries to make things right.
0:48.8	Listening to a single episode, you can laugh, cry, reflect on crossroads in your own life
0:52.9	or even find the closure you might be searching for.
0:56.3	Listen to Heavyweight right now on Apple Podcasts.
1:01.6	Robert was born an enslaved person in 1839 in Beaufort, South Carolina.
1:17.3	He was born to 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
	...

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