Clear+Vivid with Alan Alda Edda Fields-Black: The Harriet Tubman you didn’t know
Mar 31, 2026
Edda Fields-Black, historian of the U.S. low country and author of a Pulitzer-winning book on Harriet Tubman, tells the little-known story of Tubman’s role in the 1863 Combahee River raid. She recounts planning, the chaotic dawn escapes, how language and Gullah culture shaped communication, the fate of the 756 freed people, and using pension files to restore names and stories.
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Harriet Tubman Leading the Combahee River Raid
- Harriet Tubman led a spy and pilot crew and personally guided vulnerable people to the boats during the Combahee River raid.
- Edda Fields-Black recounts Tubman entering slave cabins at 4 a.m., carrying infants and urging the elderly into rowboats amid chaos.
Timing Made the Raid Militarily Advantageous
- The raid targeted rice plantations in June because planters typically evacuated then, leaving mostly enslaved people behind.
- Edda Fields-Black explains Confederate troop reassignment and seasonal planter absence made the river an ideal moment for liberation.
Visceral Moments During the Escape
- The escape was chaotic and visceral: steamships' vibrations, smoke, whistles, and frantic people piling into rowboats.
- Fields-Black narrates vivid images like a child digging into a smoking rice pot, women with twins clinging to skirts, and two pigs named Beauregard and Davis.
