Weed split up along the river to conduct different raids. on June 2, the John Adams and the Harriet A. “They could have been blown up if they hadn’t had her intelligence.”Īround 2:30 a.m. “They needed to take gunboats up the river,” said Clinton. Instead, she committed everything to memory, guiding the ships towards strategic points near the shore where fleeing slaves were waiting and Confederate property could be destroyed, all while leading the steamers away from known torpedoes. En route, the Sentinel ran aground, causing troops from that ship to transfer to the other two boats.Īs explained in Catherine Clinton’s book, Harriet Tubman: The Road to Freedom, Tubman, who was illiterate, couldn’t write down any intelligence she gathered. The night of June 1, 1863, Tubman and Montgomery, on a federal ship the John Adams, led two other gunboats, the Sentinel and Harriet A. She could get Black people to trust her and the Union officers knew that they were not trusted by the local people.” Overnight Raids Launch From the River “She was fearless and she was courageous,” said Kate Clifford Larson, historian and author of Bound for the Promised Land: Harriet Tubman, Portrait of an American Hero. Montgomery had around 300 men, including 50 from a Rhode Island Regiment and Tubman rounded up eight scouts, who helped her map the area and send word to enslaved people when the raid would take place. Together, the two planned a raid along the Combahee River, to rescue enslaved people, recruit freed men into the Union Army and obliterate some of the wealthiest rice plantations in the region. Tubman partnered with Colonel James Montgomery, an abolitionist who commanded the Second South Carolina Volunteers, a Black regiment. “First and foremost, her priorities would be to defeat and destroy the system of slavery and in doing so, to definitely defeat the Confederacy,” said Brandi Brimmer, a history professor at Spelman College and slavery historian. In her new role, Tubman assumed leadership of a secret military mission in South Carolina’s low country. ![]() Tubman had proven herself invaluable at gathering clandestine information, forming allies and avoiding capture, as she led the Underground Railroad. ![]() During the Civil War, Harriet Tubman served as a spy and militia leader with the Union forces.įor months, Tubman worked as a laundress, opening a wash house, and serving as a nurse, until she was given orders to form a spy ring.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |