About 150 years ago, a few days after summer solstice, the gray skies above the Diomede Islands were heavy with smoke from whaling ships set ablaze by Confederate sailors who didn’t know the ...

Early Life and Enslavement: Robert Smalls was born in 1839 in Beaufort, South Carolina, into slavery. His mother, who was ...

Tomblin opens with a chapter on the formation and crewing of the Confederate Navy. She goes on to add chapters on shipboard routine, sailors’ lives, medical care, disciplinary issues, armament and ...