Robert Smalls, an enslaved man, commandeered a Confederate ship during the Civil War to bring slaves to freedom. Later, he was elected to the state Legislature and Congress.

A bipartisan panel of South Carolina lawmakers chose a visible area close to the Statehouse visitor's entrance for the location of the future monument to Robert Smalls.

A state panel has decided where a monument memorializing Civil War hero Robert Smalls will stand on the South Carolina State House grounds and what it will look like. The monument will be located in the northeast quadrant of the grounds between the Spanish American War Veterans monument and the African