It takes a special kind of person to stand up for justice when such an action will surely lead to ridicule and isolation.

A unique inner strength is needed to speak out against unjust authority while others stand in silence. Many would like to believe they could act as a lone dissenter, bravely facing cruel opposition in the name of righteousness.

But how many people could actually be that brave? Who would continue with a lengthy and difficult struggle when it’s so much easier to just quietly walk away?

Dr. Robert Sharpe faced such questions many decades ago and never once backed down in his fight for equality.

A native of Jamaica, Sharpe entered the U.S. Navy in 1944 and quickly discovered his skin color was a problem for many fellow sailors.

Still segregated in the mid-1940s, the Navy offered blacks few opportunities for advancement. Many black sailors served as stewards for the white officers and were given little hope for promotion.

Nearly every day of his 11-year naval career Sharpe endured overt racism. He became the target of countless racial slurs and demeaning comments while officers made no effort to stop the taunts. Some even seemed to encourage it.

Yet, despite all the abuse – which even included human feces being placed in his bunk – Sharpe never lost faith in himself or his God. Perhaps most remarkably, he continued to have faith in fellow human beings and maintained a belief that all people possess an inner goodness.

While serving aboard the USS Kershaw, Sharpe was court-martialed twice for refusing to shine officers’ shoes or clean their rooms, jobs that white sailors were not required to perform aboard that ship.

His inner strength and faith served him well. Sharpe would eventually work his way into becoming an unofficial corpsman and his actions in the early days of the Okinawa invasion helped save the lives of many Marines.

Five years later, Sharpe became one of the first blacks to graduate from the Naval Hospital Corps School in San Diego, CA.

The only black in a group of 120 corpsman, he received a special commendation for ranking first in the entire graduating class.

Currently a professor at N.C. Central University in Durham, Sharpe was certainly able to rise above the many limitations that others attempted to place upon him.

It was not a painless struggle. Heading to America

It seemed highly improbably that Sharpe would one day become a sailor in the U.S. Navy. Up until his 17th birthday, he had never even been in the United States.

Sharpe was born into a broken family on Oct. 17, 1925. His father, Christopher Columbus Sharpe, was a 19-year-old old American who fell in love with a young Jamaican girl, Angela.

But Christopher soon returned to the U.S. and only maintained intermittent contact with his son.

Although his family life was less than idyllic his surroundings certainly were. Beautiful scenery, gorgeous weather and a relaxed atmosphere were all part of growing up in Jamaica.

Still part of the old English Empire during Sharpe’s childhood, the island nation was a unique mix of Old World Europe and Caribbean customs.

“Growing up, it was totally British,” said Sharpe, whose deep baritone voice still carries a unique blend of British and Jamaican accents.

When Sharpe turned 17 in 1942, his father gave him the chance to live in America, a nation that afforded an intelligent young man many more opportunities than his homeland.

“He came to Jamaica to get me and then took me back with him,” said Sharpe.

Sharpe’s father had a wife, Mary, and five children in the town of Tarboro, NC. They quickly embraced Sharpe as if he had always been part of their family.

Leaving his home, friends and loved ones behind was difficult but Sharpe never regretted the decision.

“It was difficult on one side of the ledger because that was all I had known,” said Sharpe. “There were some emotional subjective feelings at that time but they were not strong enough to deter me from leaving. I stayed in touch for awhile afterwards but then the new era began in America.”

His new family’s loving attitude toward him also helped make the transition easier.

“(My stepmother) treated me like I had been with them the entire time,” said Sharpe. “It was a beautiful relationship.”

Sharpe never returned to Jamaica. His mother, who had two more children, soon died and he lost touch with his stepsiblings.

“I don’t know where they are at all,” said Sharpe.

Sharpe enrolled in Tarboro’s black school, Pattillo High, where he became the starting defensive end on the football team.

His British accent and maturity made him a bit of a mystery to his classmates.

“I spoke differently from everybody,” said Sharpe. “I was different from all the other fellows in our group. I was the serious one and they were all sort of carefree and happy-go-lucky.”

Sharpe had heard many terrible stories about racism in the South. When he arrived in Tarboro he was pleasantly surprised to find a community that was most progressive in race relations.

“Jamaica went through its period of slavery, too, but it was totally unlike here,” said Sharpe. “People in Jamaica were not suppressed as much as American blacks were in the South. We didn’t have the restrictive rules and regulations that were established, accepted and practiced in the South.

“When I look back on it now and think what the South was like in those days, Tarboro was not that Southern. Tarboro was so peculiar because although it was the South it did not have those restrictions. You could go anywhere you wanted except one drugstore. You couldn’t go in there and sit down and have a soda. But otherwise you could go in any other store. There appeared to be a very good relationship between blacks and whites.”

It also helped Sharpe that his father had become a well-respected evangelistic minister who held revivals throughout the East Coast.

“If my mother needed something I could go downtown to any store and say, ‘My mother needs this or that’ and they would say, ‘Oh, you are C.C. Sharpe’s son’ and I got it,” said Sharpe.

Handsome, athletic and serious about his schoolwork, Sharpe soon caught the eye of a beautiful young girl, Jessie Lee Parker. The two quickly became sweethearts up until their graduation in 1944.

Sharpe was drafted into the Navy and Parker went off to college. The two would not see each other again until a high school reunion in 1983.

“But I never forgot Jessie,” said Sharpe.

Parker’s husband passed away in 1997 and Sharpe’s wife died from cancer in 2000.

The two former sweethearts began corresponding and giving each other support during some difficult times.

In 2000 Sharpe wrote Parker and told her he still had feelings for her.

“She said she was looking for a good Christian man and I said, ‘That’s me.’ We got married in 2000.” (Robert Sharpe’s story will continue in next week’s edition.)