Because literacy for blacks outside of religious instruction was discouraged at the time It is not known with certainty how Shiner learned to read and write, but historians have speculated that he may have learned from a small school at the Navy Yard run by white abolitionists.
How Shiner learned to read and write. This was what it is not known with certainty. Literacy for blacks outside of religious instruction was discouraged at the time. He may have learned from a small school at the Navy Yard run by white abolitionists. This was what historians have speculated.