Grandpa Benjamin, my father's father, impacted me more than any other man. His first name is Benjamin. Some people called him Grandpa, some others,  mostly white people, called him uncle even though he was not their uncle.

Grandpa Benjamin was born in slavery on the day the first shot was fired at Fort Sumter, South Carolina, that began the Civil War. He lived all his eighty-eight years in a hamlet located in Southwest Alabama, the same place I lived during the first seventeen years of my life.

Grandpa Benjamin was a landowner and farmer. But it was his character that distinguished him and had the greatest impact on me. He had humility, courage and self-confidence. He shared many stories with me, some of them when only he and I were sitting before his fireplace which I had cut wood for, sometimes eating peanuts which he always kept in abundance and sweet potatoes that were roasted in his fireplace. The most memorable stories he told me were stories he said his mother had told him about their ancestors. She told him that his great-great-great-great grandparents had been kidnapped in 1776 by Europeans in Africa and brought  to Charleston, South Carolina. That was the year the Thirteen Original Colonies had been established by Great Britain became the United States of America.

Sortly after arriving in North America these two kidnapped victims were sold to different slave masters and they never again saw each other just as they never again saw their two small children that remained in Africa when they were captured. She told him that her first enslaved ancestor was impregnated by her slave master and continued her lineage of which you and I belong to. She also told me about the suffering and hardships endured by her enslaved great grandmothers and that slave masters were fathers of three generations of her ancestors, including my own father.

Grandpa Benjamin with his brother were the founding patriarchs of the Fields Community which was composed of about fifty of their desendants. He was founder of the Fields School which was attended by most of this writers' siblings and cousins, some for eight years, as I did during the first eight years of my schooling, in a schoolhouse Grandpa owned.

Grandpa Benjamin departed his mortal life when I was twenty years old. He has remained with me not just in DNA but in consciousness. Like Grandpa Benjamin I have worn a full beard for more than forty years. I have frequently turned to him for guidance, encouragement and love that only a Grandfather can give.

Grandpa Benjamin taught me how to be a man and allowed me to see the profile of a true friend. I have for most of my life and will continue to trust his judgment, which is never far from me on matters of morality, responsiblity, authenticity, self-respect and faith in myself, humanity and the Creator.

Thank you Grandpa Benjamin. This is a statement I have expressed over a million times to myself and to others.

Your Grandson,

Uriah

An Amazing Book about Grandpa Benjamin

Grandpa Benjamin by Uriah J. Fields is the story about my Grandfather. Partly imagination and a masterpiece of storytelling, Grandpa Benjamin is narrated by Grandpa Benjamin himself. He told this story to his grandson that his mother told him about their ancestors, beginning with the year 1776 when his great-great-great-great grandparents, were kidnapped in Africa and enslaved in America. Grandpa Benjamin is a character that, even in contemporary perspective, will live in the reader's imagination long after reading this book.

Grandpa Benjamin by Uriah J. Fields can be ordered on-line from: www.amazon.com or www.barnesandnoble.com.
To learn more about Uriah J. Fields visit the website below:

Copyright 2012 by Uriah J. Fields