BOOK REVIEW: The Emancipation of Robert Sadler by Robert Sadler with Marie Chapian

The Emancipation of Robert Sadler:  The Powerful True Story of a Twentieth~Century Plantation Slave

Author:  Robert Sadler with Marie Chapian
Paperback:  254 pages
Publisher:  Bethany House; 2nd edition (June, 1975)
Language:  English

The powerful true story of a man who was a twentieth century plantation slave ~ beating and burnings of black Americans a half century after the Emancipation Proclamation.

The Emancipation of Robert Sadler was a very moving and thought~provoking book.  The insight shared with the reader allows one to feel the plight of young Robert after his father sells him into salvery with his two older sisters.

After being moved around from one slave factory to another, young Robert and his sister come to be the slaves of Master Beal, a plantation owner and Ku Klux Klan member.  He is a strict, disciplinarian  slave owner who does what he wishes with his slaves and many have died for seemingly mindless things. 

Robert is unable to speak properly and he is very young when he joins the Beal residents and because of this, he is placed as a house slave.  His primary care is to keep the huge veranda swept, the fires burning and playing nanny to the Beal's youngest daughter, Anne.  He is taunted, teased, beaten, burned and suffers many horrid things along his life's journey.  

Robert watches as his sister dies, his caregiver is branded for his acts of rebellion and those who swore to care for him, disappear and runaway in the middle of the night.  With nothing left, Robert decides to runaway and steps into the unknown, not knowing how to read nor write and never knowing anything in his life except that of being told what to do and when to do it.

With many ups and downs, Robert comes to find God and turns his life over to the Creator of All.  He prays, meditates and listens with his heart that which God wishes for him to fulfill.  Becoming a preacher to all walks of life was the solution to the suffering he saw in the streets every day and he does so with passion.

I thought The Emancipation of Robert Sadler deserved a four out of five stars.  It was compelling to read and had a great flow to the plot and storyline.  I felt his later years were thrown at the reader instead of having us immersed into the story as it did in the first early years section.  I would've liked to have seen the same flow unfold throughout the whole story.

**  Reviewed by me...as I see it~!!  **