Statue location honoring Robert Smalls at SC State House picked. Here’s where it will go
A monument honoring a former Black Congressman who commandeered a Confederate ship during the Civil War is slated to stand outside of the visitor’s entrance of the State House.
The Robert Smalls statue will face the State House and the George Washington statue. But the location in the northeast quadrant of the grounds between the African American history monument and the Spanish American War Veterans monument allows the statue to even “see” the monuments honoring Ben Tillman and Wade Hampton.
Tillman, a former governor and U.S. senator, advocated for the lynching of Black people. In recent years, there have been calls to remove the Tillman statue and remove his name from buildings around the state. Hampton was a Confederate general, and served as a governor and U.S. senator. Hampton also fought to restore white supremacy.
Placement by the public entrance allows will put the statue in view of groups visiting the State House, especially school groups.
“As these younger generations of citizens visit the state house, they will walk by the Robert Smalls,” said state Rep. Jermaine Johnson, D-Richland.
The Smalls statue will depict him in a three-piece suit wearing a bow tie.
“This depiction is actually consistent with everything else we have around here,” Johnson said. “Put him up there as an equal to everybody else. This is an equal human being. This is a man who did extraordinary things, but he’s an equal, and we need to go ahead and exemplify that with our actions and treat him as an equal.”
The monument will have a panel with a biography, including Smalls being born into slavery, how he commandeered the Confederate Ship Planter in 1862 to bring 15 other runaway slaves to Union forces, served as a delegate to the South Carolina Constitutional convention in 1868, which required compulsory education for all children, served as a state representative and state senator, and was elected to Congress in 1874.
Another panel will have the quote from Smalls from the 1895 South Carolina Constitutional convention, “My race needs no special defense, but the past history of them in this country proves them to be the equal of any people anywhere, all they need is an equal chance in the battle of life.”
The commission picked Basil Watson, from Lawrenceville, Georgia, to sculpt the statue. Watson also sculpted the memorial to desegregation on the University of South Carolina campus.
Fundraising for the statue will be led by former state Sen. Gerald Malloy, D-Darlington, who was on the Robert Smalls Monument Commission before losing his reelection bid.
The cost of the statue will be determined by the price of materials used and ultimate height but commission members are confident they’ll be able to bring in enough cash to make the monument a reality.
“We’re starting to get some donations coming in that are allowing the commission to pay for the artists to do their actual work and build this maquette,” said state Rep. Brandon Cox, R-Berkeley.
Cox said there’s no estimate for building the monument at this time and said $5 million was a high estimtae for other monuments around the State House grounds.
“But, this is 2025, some things cost more than they did when they were built 10 years ago,” Cox said.
This story was originally published January 8, 2025 at 2:41 PM with the headline "Statue location honoring Robert Smalls at SC State House picked. Here’s where it will go."
