The Emancipation of Robert Sadler by Robert Sadler, Marie Chapian Page B

my breast. Each one o’ them. I done washed their bodies and tuk care of ’em when they was sick. I done fed ’em they meals and I done put ’em in the bed at night. . . .” Her voice trailed off and I saw a tear streaming down her face.
    Later that morning Big Mac told me her own little two-year old boy had died the night before in the quarter.
    The slave women bore children by their own men as well as by the white bosses, who used them whenever they wanted to. These women worked either in the field from 4:30 in the morning till after dark or, like Harriet, worked at the Big House all day and night. When they finally went home to their shanties and their own children for the few hours before they’d have to return to work, they’d be too exhausted to care for and feed their own families rightly. So the job was left up to the children themselves. The older children had the responsibility of taking care of the babies and little ones. Sometimes an old slave granny was put to work minding the children in the quarter when she got too old to go to the field.
    I learned that Harriet had seven children of her own, and while the master’s babies were sucking at her breast, her own children were going hungry down in the slave quarter.
    Harriet had a husband once but he had been sold to a plantation owner in Alabama. “After he gone,” Big Mac said, “Harriet never smile no more.”
    These were things my child’s mind could not understand, but even if I couldn’t understand, I felt bad about Harriet’s baby dying because I remembered how bad I felt when Mama and my little sister, Ella, died. Dying was not good. It meant they weren’t anymore. Just like my mama. She was there all the time, and then one day she wasn’t there. She was no more. It makes you sad and it makes you lonesome.
    Saturday night was supposed to be payday for the field hands. Since the Big House was now my prison, I could see what went on from there. The men would line up at the smokehouse, or the plantation store, and the boss there would give them their provisions—usually flour, sugar, some salt pork, beans, cornmeal, and some tobacco. Then they’d tell them how much they owed, and it was always more than what the pay was. So there was no exchange of money. Sometimes when they’d come for their pay the boss would say, “Master Beal is out of town. Won’t be back till Monday. He’ll pay yoll then.” Of course Master Beal would forget to pay them on Monday, and every day for that matter. It was very rare when he would throw a dollar or two their way.
    With winter coming, shoes were needed and so was warmer clothing. Not everybody got shoes, and not everybody got another layer of clothing. Many field hands took sick and died in the winter months, and many were crippled up by the cold. I hoped I would get some shoes or maybe some trousers. I began to ask Harriet about it. She was indifferent, and I realized it was futile to continue to ask.
    I missed Pearl. I longed to see her, and soon I became desperate to see her. Knowing that my punishment would be a whupping if I were caught, I began planning to sneak down to the quarter. I got my first chance one evening when the children were in bed sleeping. Master Beal was away, and Miss Harriet was upstairs with Mistress Beal. The house was still. I crawled out of bed, and barely breathing, moved through the kitchen, the porch, and then out the door and down the steps. I was careful to keep in the shadows of the yard. When I passed the woodpile and the stable, I came to the dirt path to the quarter and broke into a run.
    When I reached Buck and Corrie’s shanty, they were surprised and then excited to see me. Pearl held me in her arms and squeezed me so tight she took the breath out of me. We laughed and cried and hugged, and everybody talked at once.
    â€œThey gonna whup you for this, chile,” Pearl warned. She