COMBEE: Harriet Tubman, the Combahee River Raid, and Black Freedom during the Civil War

Harriet Tubman’s legendary life is widely known: escaping enslavement, leading others to freedom via the Underground Railroad, and tirelessly fighting for change. But a crucial chapter often overlooked is her daring Civil War service as a spy for the US Army, detailed in Dr. Edda L. Fields-Black’s groundbreaking book, COMBEE: Harriet Tubman, the Combahee River Raid, and Black Freedom during the Civil War. A direct descendant of a soldier who fought in the raid, Fields-Black unveils Tubman’s command of spies and pilots and intelligence gathered from freedom seekers, which led to a raid that liberated 756 enslaved people from bondage on seven rice plantations. It was the largest slave rebellion in US history. Through unexamined documents, she brings to life the Combahee River Raid and the untold stories of those freed, their resilience, and the lasting impact of Tubman’s heroism.

COMBEE is winner of the 2025 Pulitzer Prize in History, 2025 Gilder Lehrman Institute Lincoln Prize winner, the Society of Civil War Historian’s 2025 Tom Watson Brown Award, the South Carolina Historical Society’s 2024 George C. Rogers Jr. Award, and the Association for Afro-American Historical and Genealogical Society’s 2024 Marsha M. Greenlee History Award. In addition, COMBEE earned Honorable Mention for the Organization of American Historian’s 2025 James A. Rawley Prize and is a finalist for the Columbia School of Journalism’s 2025 Mark Lynton History Prize and finalist for the Association for the Study of African American Life and History’s Book Prize. In addition, COMBEE was named among “The Best Nonfiction Books of 2024,” by Bloomberg.com,” “Also Recommended” among the “Best Books of 2024,” in The New Yorker, “Best Civil War Books of 2024,” Civil War Monitor, “Top 10 History Books: 2024,” Booklist, Oxford University Press Best “Books of 2024”. COMBEE inspired the art exhibit, “Picturing Freedom: Harriet Tubman and the Combahee River Raid,” which debuted at the Gibbes Museum of Art and runs May through October 2025.