They made an audacious stop to collect their families, and then one more ruse de guerre - he disguised himself as the captain. On May 12, Smalls enlisted the rest of the enslaved crew and sailed away.

To make a long story short, he knew that there was a (Union Navy) blockade just outside the mouth of Charleston River,' said Moore.

'He knew in slavery that his family could be separated from him in an instant.

'Going from a Confederate victory to this incredible story of a former slave, who commandeered a Confederate ship and turned it over to the Union Navy.' 'It is a move much more consistent with the Navy's values,' said Capt. The USS Chancellorsville is now called the USS Robert Smalls, the man who stole a Confederate steamer loaded with guns and delivered it to the Union Navy, delivering himself and 16 other crew and their families from slavery. Navy has finally shed the last two ship names that honored the Confederacy - and renamed one of them in honor of a man whose life story reads like an action movie hero. The USS Robert Smalls is shown here off the Japanese island of Iwo To, on its way to honor the fallen service members of the World War II battle of Iwo Jima.

The USS Chancellorsville has been renamed the USS Robert Smalls, to honor the enslaved man who stole a Confederate battleship in the Civil War and delivered to the Union forces, loaded with weapons.

American civil war navy ships