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H. 4236

STATUS INFORMATION

House Resolution
Sponsors: Rep. Hodges
Document Path: l:\council\bills\gm\29798htc13.docx

Introduced in the House on May 29, 2013
Adopted by the House on May 29, 2013

Summary: Harriet Tubman's Combahee River Raid

HISTORY OF LEGISLATIVE ACTIONS

     Date      Body   Action Description with journal page number
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   5/29/2013  House   Introduced and adopted (House Journal-page 3)

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VERSIONS OF THIS BILL

5/29/2013

TO REMEMBER AND COMMEMORATE THE ONE HUNDRED FIFTIETH ANNIVERSARY OF HARRIET TUBMAN'S COMBAHEE RIVER RAID IN BEAUFORT COUNTY THAT RESCUED EIGHT HUNDRED SLAVES AND SUPPLIED UNION FORCES WITH THOUSANDS OF DOLLARS IN CONFISCATED GOODS ON JUNE 2, 1863.

Whereas, it is altogether fitting that the South Carolina House of Representatives should pause in its deliberations to recall the daring raid twenty-five miles up the Combahee River from Port Royal, planned and executed by Harriet Tubman, reverently known as "Moses" by those whom she freed from slavery; and

Whereas, on June 2, 2013, the sesquicentennial anniversary of the Combahee River Raid will be commemorated at Tabernacle Baptist Church in Beaufort where Dr. Kate Clifford Larson, author of the celebrated, Bound For The Promised Land: Harriet Tubman, Portrait of An American Hero, will address the participants; and

Whereas, Harriet Tubman, the first woman to plan and execute an armed expedition during the Civil War, had recruited three hundred slaves for the Second South Carolina Volunteers commanded by Union Colonel James Montgomery; and

Whereas, she acted as Colonel Montgomery's advisor for the raid, sailing with him and those same black volunteers up the Combahee in the lead military vessel, the Adams, which successfully navigated the heavily mined waters without incident; and

Whereas, when Colonel Montgomery landed on the foggy morning, he dispersed some of his regiment to ferret out any Confederates hiding in the fields and woods and sent word to slaves to hasten to the river under the protection and freedom of the Union regiment; and

Whereas, they had met with little resistance as they effectively diffused Confederate gunners along the river and began setting fire to several plantations, destroying homes, barns, rice mills, and steam engines; and

Whereas, on the information supplied to Ms. Tubman by slaves acting as scouts for the Union, she had learned the locations of Confederate warehouses and stockpiles of rice and cotton from which the Second South Carolina confiscated thousands of dollars worth of rice, corn , cotton, horses, and other livestock; and

Whereas, they opened the sluice gates which flooded the fields, making the beautifully growing crops a total loss and leaving devastation for the Confederates. All was accomplished without losing one volunteer from the regiment; and

Whereas, despite threats from overseers, plantation owners, and managers, some eight hundred slaves sallied forth when the steamer whistles sounded their signal for them to abandon the plantations and board the ships: the sight of the streaming masses laden with their worldly goods awed even Harriet Tubman; and

Whereas, the members of the South Carolina House of Representatives commend the observation of the one hundred fiftieth anniversary of Harriet Tubman's Combahee River Raid and the heroism of all those who participated. Now, therefore,

Be it resolved by the House of Representatives:

That the members of the House of Representatives of the State of South Carolina, by this resolution, remember and commemorate the one hundred fiftieth anniversary of Harriet Tubman's Combahee River Raid in Beaufort County that rescued eight hundred slaves and supplied Union forces with thousands of dollars in confiscated goods on June 2, 1863.

Be it further resolved that a copy of this resolution be presented to Tabernacle Baptist Church.

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