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Initiative to Name a U.S. Naval
Vessel for Robert Smalls
It is difficult to say what is impossible, Kitt Alexander’s photographic exhibition, then named Legacy ~ The Life and Descendents of Robert Smalls ~ 1839-1915, created in 1996, details the intimate relationship of Smalls’ great-granddaughter Dolly Nash, then-71, with her ancestor. The exhibition was displayed at the Navy Museum in Washington, D.C. for Black History Month 1997. One day Alexander said to Ed Furgol, the museum historian, “You know, the Navy’s never really done much to honor Robert Smalls. Camp Robert Smalls at the Great Lakes Naval Training Center only trained black sailors for 3 years until the Navy desegregated training facilities. What if I ask the Navy to give him the Medal of Honor?” Furgol replied, “Well, Kitt, that wouldn’t work because he was never actually IN the Navy.” “Okay,” she responded seriously. “How about a ship then?” “NOW you’re talkin’,” he replied. Alexander conducted a 7-year campaign to have a naval vessel named for Smalls. In all, she sent some 400 packages requesting support for the initiative to individuals and representatives of educational, cultural and governmental institutions nationwide. Among some 100 supporters of the initiative are a former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, a former U.S. Poet Laureate, a Pulitzer prize winner, 3 consultants for Ken Burns’ film, The Civil War, and the Chief Justice of the Rhode Island Supreme Court [founder and Chair of The Lincoln Forum]. Four retired Navy admirals supported the initiative. Among them was the late Admiral Elmo R. Zumwalt, Jr., Chief of Naval Operations during the Vietnam War and a staunch proponent of black sailors. The director of the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of American History was among 4 museum directors who lent their support. The President of the National Trust for Historic Preservation was one of 10 supporters who head cultural institutions devoted to aspects of American history. Twenty-nine college and university presidents and chancellors and 34 college professors championed the initiative. Supporters hail from 28 states and the District of Columbia. On January 31, 2004, Brigadier General Brian I. Geehan, Army Chief of Transportation, named the Army’s newest Logistics Support Vessel (LSV-8) the Major General Robert Smalls. The $25 million vessel was christened and launched in Moss Point, Mississippi on April 21, 2004. The MG Robert Smalls (LSV-8) is 314 feet long; its beam is 60 feet. With a payload of 2000 tons the LSV-8 is the Army’s largest powered watercraft and will be used to transport cargo. The Army’s fleet of LSV’s plays an important role in re-supplying soldiers worldwide. The MG Robert Smalls is the first Army vessel to bear the name
of an African American and the first named for a Civil War hero.
The vessel will be commissioned September 15, 2007, in Baltimore’s
Inner Harbor, near her home port. **List of Supporters and Excerpts** |
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