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Events on May 13 in history

USS Planter (1862)
1862May, 13

The USS Planter, a steamer and gunship, steals through Confederate lines and is passed to the Union, by a southern slave, Robert Smalls, who later was officially appointed as captain, becoming the first black man to command a United States ship.

USS Planter (1862) was a steamer taken over by Robert Smalls, a Southern slave and ship's pilot who steered the ship past Confederate defenses and surrendered it to Union Navy forces on 13 May 1862 during the American Civil War. The episode is missing from Scharf's History of the Confederate States Navy, except for one sentence saying that Smalls "stole" the ship.For a short period, Planter served as a gunboat for the Union Navy. As the ship burned wood, which was scarce where the Navy was operating, the Navy turned the ship over to the Union Army for use at Fort Pulaski on the Georgia coast. In 1863 Smalls was appointed captain of Planter, the first black man to command a United States ship, and served in that position until 1866.

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Events on 1862

  • 30Jan

    USS Monitor

    The first American ironclad warship, the USS Monitor is launched.
  • 31Jan

    White dwarf

    Alvan Graham Clark discovers the white dwarf star Sirius B, a companion of Sirius, through an 18.5-inch (47 cm) telescope now located at Northwestern University.
  • 13Mar

    Emancipation Proclamation

    American Civil War: The U.S. federal government forbids all Union army officers from returning fugitive slaves, thus effectively annulling the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 and setting the stage for the Emancipation Proclamation.
  • 15May

    Abraham Lincoln

    President Abraham Lincoln signs a bill into law creating the United States Bureau of Agriculture. It is later renamed the United States Department of Agriculture.
  • 17Aug

    Dakota War of 1862

    American Indian Wars: The Dakota War of 1862 begins in Minnesota as Lakota warriors attack white settlements along the Minnesota River.