A project is on foot, in Pittsburg, Penn., to erect a monument over the remains of Rev. Mr. Spaulding, in Amity churchyard, Washington county, Penn., who, as it is claimed, wrote for his own amusement and that of his friends, a romance, which afterwards became the "Book of Mormon." Mr. Spaulding is said to have placed his manuscript in the hands of Rev. Robert Patterson, father of one of the editors of the Presbyterian Banner, of Pittsburg. It was copied by Sidney Rigdon, then in his employ, by whom it was afterward conveyed to Joseph Smith, the Mormon prophet. It might be thought, however, that a sufficient manument to Rev. Mr. Spaulding and his eccentric production had already been erected in the city of Salt Lake.


Notes: (forthcoming)

Old Newspapers -- No. 23.
______

[continuing Harris account from previous issue] This famous trout lived to grow, and thrive under the liberal hand of Nathan who often spent the pleasant hours of mid-day, catching grasshoppers for his favorite fish, feeding them directly into its month with his own hand. Here he used to while away hours together, while Rhoda and the boys were planning where to plant the corn or prognosticating the map of the weather. He possessed, to a remarkable degree, a spirit of rest. He did not allow the onerous duties of the farm to weigh heavy on his mind and his zeal for letting things run, as the saying is, was so great that he let the [stile] of his barn rot away with the accumulation of barn yard material. If the necessities of the farm demanded the attention of Nathan, he would exhibit symptoms of a decline, but if a "huskin frolick" or a "logging bee" was [-- the -----], his youthful exhubrance was unbounded. On such occasions he was the centre figure of the group, and whatever in the way of joke that was aimed at "Uncle Nathan," was always received in the best of humor. He was a public man; ready for fun on public occasions but willing that others should accept of public duties as well as public honors.

At the time of Harris' advent to the settlement, there was heavy timber on the hills and in the valleys below his farm and also to the west of it. Wintergreen Hill and the land to the west for some distance was what was termed "openings," or "barrens," and after the clearing was well under way to the north and south of Nathan's there was left a strip of woodland, joining the timber on the east with that of the west. This strip was a little south and west of Nathan's house and through it the wild game used to find covert [sic - cover?] in going from one piece of timber to the other. It was called a "runway" and hunters used to train their hounds to drive the game in the direction of it, when they would strive to escape by going through to the east or west woods as the case might be. The custom of Nathan was to mount his old grey mare when he heard the hounds and post himself in the road, which was little better than a path through the woods, and there await the appearance of the deer or whatever the game might be. The old mare knew her business, and as soon as Nathan had discharged his rifle, she would turn and gallop away down the road, and in a short time bring up on the west road, near where is now the residence of Mr. Pratt; Nathan in the mean time loading his gun with mare under full headway. Here he would arrive before the game, and get another shot, often taking two deer, one at each crossing.

Whatever may have been the idiosyncrasy of Nathan Harris, he was a man of most excellent good judgment of which his land purchase fully attests. Though be may not have been a thorough practical farmer, he was nevertheless far-sighted and a good judge of land. The purchase which he made in 1754 for $300 is now worth more than $100,000 if we include the railroad, and some of the best farms in this vicinity are included within its boundaries. Watered by Red creek and the various springs that flow from the hillsides, and with plenty of good uplands, they are fitted for all practical purposes, whether agriculture or the dairy. But there is another feature of this purchase which must not be overlooked in our sketch, and that is the farm now owned by Thomas H. Chapman: the farm that was sold to raise money wherewith to pay for the printing of the "Book of Mormon" or Mormon Bible as it is called. This farm was deeded by Nathan to his son Martin and in our next we will give some sketches of the life and times of this founder, as we might say, of the Church of Latter Day Saints, which is now drawing the attention of the civilized world toward their harum in the Salt Lake valley.

Nathan Harris lived where he first settled until the fish and game became scarce, when he began to exhibit symptoms of uneasiness, and had there been no Eldorado for him to flee unto, he might have went into a decline and left his bones here. But the much-longed-for region was to be found in Ohio and thither he went; where the deer still continued to roam free, and where his unerring rifle continued for several years to send its deadly bullet to the fore-shoulder of his favorite game. Nathan lived to be quite an old man, though his age at death we are unable to state. His life was a quiet one, and he was universally honored by his neighbors for his kindness of heart and willingness to assist those in need. In the settlement of this town he was a prominent feature and his remembrance is still cherished by the remaining few who knew him personally.


Notes: (forthcoming)

Old Newspapers -- No. 24.
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Martin Harris was born 1786, and came here with his parents when only eight years old. He inherited the longevity as well as the energy and activity of his mother, of whom it is said that she could spin a day's work at the age of eighty-seven, and as I have never as yet learned of his death, it is safe to mention his longevity, for he was an octogenarian several years ago, and if still living, has [recently] attained the age of his mother at her decease. Of those who formerly resided in this vicinity, perhaps there was no man who received so many rebuffs, and whose acts incited so many unfeeling comments as did those of Martin Harris. Until he had arrived at the age of thirty-five years, he was an industrious, hard-working farmer, shrewd in his business calculations, frugal in his habits, and what was termed a prosperous man in the world.

Martin Harris received of his father, Nathan Harris, Oct. 5, 1813, the farm now owned by Thomas H. Chapman, one and one-fourth miles north of this village. This farm contained 121 acres. Stephen Phelps and Ira Selby were witnesses to the deed. Jan. 4th, 1814 he received an addition from the same of 25 acres; Stephen Phelps and Daniel Twadell witnesses. Dec. 7, 1814, Emor Harris deeded an addition of four acres on the east side of Red Creek, making In all 150 acres, the present area of the farm.

Martin Harris married his own cousin, Dolly Harris; a union which though contrary to laws and customs, proved to be a pleasant one for both until Martin became estranged by the Mormon delusion. On this farm they together toiled early and late from the time of their marriage until the summer of 1828. Shortly previous to this he had become somewhat religiously awakened and began the study of the Bible. He also became quite skeptical, as well as superstitious, believing in miracles, wonderful dreams, spiritual interposition, special providences, &c. He pursued the study of the Bible with great tenacity, committing to memory whole books, and at the time of the Mormon incubation, could quote chapter and verse with surprising correctness. When Joe Smith first [revealed] to him the wonders of him new religion, it found a fertile soil in Martin's brain, where it took root, and he became an incurable monomaniac in religious matters. Yet only in this was Martin deemed insane; on other subjects he exhibited all of his former clearness of brain; he could drive a good bargain, and manage his farming matters, as well as ever, only when he had his "spells" on.

The cunning foibles of Joe Smith so preyed upon the superstitious mind of Martin that he became his most efficent tool, and in June 1828, consented to a contract with Smith in which he was to secure [the profit from] printing the Book of Mormon. With this consenting the trouble of Martin began. Had it not been for this, I might have closed the record here, there would have been much less notoriety attached to Palmyra as the birth-place of Mormonism, and Martin Harris might have lived and died on his farm instead of becoming an alien from his native place, a wanderer without a home, or, if not living, filling an unknown grave. But Martin became infatuated with the [idea] of a new church as described by Joe, and the promise of being an apostle, led him on, contrary to the advice of his friends and the pleadings of his wife who denounced the whole affair as a piece of ridiculous nonsense." Prior to the printing of the Book, and while Martin was considering the proposition made by Smith in which he was to be paid $1.25 for the books and the [first cost?] would only be about 60 cents, Martin was permitted to take home a portion of the manuscript to read, and during the long winter evenings he would sit by the great open fire-place and study his new text, stopping now and then to pour a little inspiration into the ear of Aunt Dolly, who usually answered by telling him to "shut up." This farce became so [obnoxious?] to the good wife, that finally she determined to end it, and. accordingly, one night when Martin was dreaming that "he dwelt in marble halls," Aunt Dolly [rose] quietly and taking the roll of manuscript, went to the fire-place and laid it between the charred logs and ere the morning came, it had ascended in smoke through the throat of the great chimney. The next morning Martin sought for the manuscript telling his wife the most fearful consequences would follow its loss; to which she turned a deaf ear, refusing to give any clue to the whereabouts of the paper. This was the final [point] of their separation, which was mutually adjusted the following summer and a portion of the farm set off and deeded to her exclusively. Martin believed that she had the manuscript, or had given it to some other person, which was also the opinion of Smith and his followers, and this suspicion was embodied in the preface of the Mormon Bible, as a safeguard against any future contingency that might arise therefrom. It reads as follows:

"To The Reader. -- As many false reports have been circulated respecting the following work, and also many unlawful measures taken by evil designing persons to destroy me, and also the work, I would inform you that I translated, by the gift and power of God, and caused to be written, one hundred and sixteen pages, the which I took from the Book of Lehi, which was an account abridged from the plates of Lehi, by the hand of Mormon; which said account, some person or persons have stolen and kept from me, notwithstanding my utmost exertions to recover it again -- and being commanded of the Lord that I should not translate the same over again, for Satan had put it into their hearts to tempt the Lord their God, by altering the words, they did read contrary from that which I translated and caused to be written; and if I should bring forth the same words again, or, in other words, if I should translate the same over again, they would publish that which they had stolen, and Satan would stir up the hearts of this generation, that they might not receive this work: but behold, the Lord said unto me, I will not suffer that Satan shall accomplish this evil design in this thing: therefore thou shalt translate from the plates of Nephi, until ye come to that which ye have translated, which ye have retained; and behold ye shall publish it as the record of Nephi; and thus I will confound those who have altered my words. I will not suffer that they shall destroy my work; yea, I will shew unto them that my wisdom is greater than the cunning of the Devil. Wherefore, to be obedient unto the commandments of God, I have, through his grace and mercy, accomplished that which he hath commanded me respecting this thing. I would also inform you that the plates of which hath been spoken, were found in the township of Manchester, Ontario county, New York.   THE AUTHOR."

Notes: (forthcoming)

Old Newspapers -- No. 25.
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Martin Harris continued for many years in ignorance of the fate of the manuscripts, and I believe that Joe Smith did not live long enough to learn the history of their destruction; that the later editions of the Book or Mormon also contain the same saving preface as given in my last article. This piece of mischief on the part of Aunt Dolly had no beneficial effect on Martin to wean him from the fate that awaited him, but rather impelled him onward. He vowed that he would not allow her in his room and she declared she would [never] trouble him on that score. So determined were they in occupying separate apartments, that both expressed themselves to the hired man, that if he ever knew of their occupying the same sleeping room, they would give him their best cow.

Now this hired man had some originality about him, and one night when all was still and very dark without, he took a tin lantern, tied it to a pole, lighted the candle and put it up to Aunt Dolly's window, her room being directly over Martin's. He would slide the lantern along the window-sash, making a noise and then drop It suddenly, putting out the light. Lighting up again he would repeat the operation and Aunt Dolly was soon heard going down stairs and entering Martin's room, who demanded what possessed her to come there at that hour of the night. That hired man did not fail of having a witness present, and the next morning they relinquished their title to the best cow according to agreement. Martin and his wife settled their points of difference by a division of the property, as I stated in a previous article.

The printlng of the Mormon bible began in August 1829, and was finished about the same time the following year. This first and only edition printed here, consisted of 5000 copies, for which Martin Harris was to pay $3,000 and Smith and his followers were to pay him at the rate of $1.25 per copy, which was not a bad investment, providing the contract was fulfilled on their part. But this they failed to do, and in the spring of 1831 Martin was put to his trumps to raise the money wherewith to pay off the mortgage on his farm, which had been put there two years before to raise money with which to start the work. He did not look long, and before me on the table now lies "Articles of agreement made and concluded this first day of April, in the year Eighteen hundred and thirty-one, between Martin Harris of the one part, and Thomas Lakey of the other part, both of Palmyra" &c. The farm was sold for twenty dollars per acre and immediate possession given. One-third of the purchase money was to be paid on the first of May following, and the balance in two annual instalments, payable in the month of October. The purchaser was to have one-half of the wheat on the ground, the other half belonged to Mr. Dike who had sown it on shares. They bound themselves in this agreement in the sum of $500 and three weeks thereafter the money was paid, bonds given and deed executed by Martin, with only his signature, the instrument being now before me.

Shortly after the completion of the printing of the Book of Mormon, Martin Harris began to sell the work, and was dally seen on the streets inviting his friends and neighbors to buy. His form was conspicuous, with a grey suit of homespun, his head surmounted by a large stiff hat, while under his arm he carried several copies of the book.

Chade Southwick, the father of W. H. Southwick, resided on the same lot where the latter now does. He was a man who regarded the doctrines of Jno. Calvin in rather a vague light, but as a neighbor and citizen was respected by all. He loved fun, and a good joke was better than a dainty morsel.

One day in the spring of '32, Martin met Southwick on the street crossing near the Hotel, and Invited him to buy a book. It was a wet, muddy time and the streets were then in a very primitive condition, in regard to side-walks, and as the two stood talking, Southwick asked Martin what his position was in the new church. Martin said he was an apostle endowed with power to preach. "Ah! then thee's an apostle, is thee?" said Southwick. "And can thee follow out the injunction of our bible, wherein it says "If they smite thee on one check turn the other?" "Surely I can." said Martin, at the same time turning his cheek up [towards Uncle Chade] in a meek manner. This was more than Chade could stand; there was too much fun there to be lost, and drawing his heavy hand he laid Martin scrawling in the mud, his bibles in one direction and his hat in another, while Chade who was lame and used a cane, stamped it for home as fast as he could go, and just made oat to escape the hand of Martin, by closing his front door and turning the bolt in the lock. Martin having picked himself up, left his apostolic mantle of charity with the hat and bibles, and ran with all his might to overtake Chade, and now stood leaning over the gate daring the latter to come oat: offering all kinds of invectives and illustrating by his motions how he would thrash the ground with him if be dared to put has foot without the gate. Chade did not see fit, however, to go out, he only opened the door slightly and told Martin that he knew what would await him if he came out and he preferred to stay where he was. This only added fuel to the flame and Martin resorted to the office of H. K. Jerome, then a young justice of the peace, and demanded a warrant for Chade Southwick. Jerome, after much hesitation on the part of Martin, got him to tell the whole story, which looked so ridiculous that he gave vent to a peal of laughter, which was participated in by others present, and so enraged Martin that it was difficult to keep him from administering a flagellation to the young squire. He was induced, however, to go and pick up his bibles, [assume] his apostolic garb and return to his [duties]....


Notes: (forthcoming)

Old Newspapers -- No. 26.
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At the time of the establishment of the Mormon church, which took place in 1830, Martin Harris was no doubt, the only real believer in the doctrines, if any there really were, of the new dispensation. By command of Smith, which he claimed to have received by revelation, Martin was not permitted to sell the Book for less than $1.25, while the father of Smith was, by the same revelation permitted to sell at less figures, or even barter it away for necessary household and table expenses. But we find among some old papers,a bill of goods left by Martin Harris with certain persons, among which is [---ed] [300] copies of the Book of Mormon, which these persons were to sell for $1.25 and receive 25c for their commission. As the revelator, Smith possessed no very extensive knowledge of the rules of business, the commission clause was left out of the revelation but adopted by Martin; who did not believe it a sin under the circumstance; though he had great regard for the revelation, and believed that if he sold the books for less than the stipulated amount he could be struck dead in an instant.

Though Martin showed a business tact in disposing of the books, they were nevertheless dead property and the revenue derived from the sale was small indeed. Martin had longed and waited years for something to turn up that would feed his imagination better than barren hope. He had read of the wonders to come in the latter day, and now believed that day had arrived, and that his peculiar fitness to act a seer and prophet, was not to be overlooked by the powers that controlled the future. It was an auspicious time. He felt that his longings after spiritual wonders was about to be satiated; and the prospects of filling his pocket also with the material wealth of earthly prosperity, was a pleasing feature of the drama; for he loved money and was willing to receive it though it came without labor. But when he found that he was not to realize the remuneration for which he sought in the sale of his books, he grew despondent and Joe Smith had to resort to another revelation to keep him steadfast in the faith. By artful cunning and deceitful flattery, he made him believe that he was to become one of the great spiritual lights of the world, and that he was called to preach, baptize and prophecy. He essayed to preach and at first seemed to be making progress in this direction as his knowledge of the Scriptures gave him ample scope to illustrate his peculiar ideas, and many came to listen for the novelty of it. But his audience soon diminished to such an extent that he was obliged to give up his preaching. In baptism he succeeded no better, for want of converts and his animal organization was not adapted to the cold water of Red creek, and in this he made signal failure. But he could prophecy, and in this particular he seemed for a time to succeed very well, [---] no one cared to turn away from him, for all believed he was honest in his convictions, while they pitied him in his delusion.

The following story illustrates one of the prophecies of Martin Harris, and also the spirit in which his prophetic knowledge was received by the people of Palmyra:

In 1832 Martin went to Ohio and joined the other Mormons who had preceeded him at Kirtland. He had made a signal failure in his endeavors to save the people of Palmyra or turn them from the evil of their ways, for which he had so labored, and shaking the dust from his feet, he made a prophecy before his departure. This prophecy was made in the hearing of several different persons and a Mr. Fred Smith, who was then a Justice of the peace took it down in writing and persuaded Martin to [sign it ---- perfecting] a binding contract.

It was to the effect that if Palmyra did not sink before he returned, he would give his head for a football, or that he would surrender to Smith that most important function of his animal organization to have and to hold of his own. This paper Smith kept safely until 1836, when Martin returned to visit again his old home; which he had heard was still to be found hereabout. Shortly after Martin's arrival, he was quietly seated in the store of Zebulon Williams, with his back toward the front door, conversing with several of his old acquaintances, and telling them of the beauties of Kirtland and the welfare of the new church of Latter Day Saints. when in came Smith who walked directly up behind Martin and putting his arm about his head turned to walk off carrying the head with him. Martin was dumbfounded for a moment: then by a powerful movement released himself at the same time asking Smith what he meant by such usage. "I mean," said Smith, "to take that head for it's mine," and again made demonstrations to that effect. Martin eluded him, still expostulating and Smith insisting on having the head. At this others interfered, and then Smith took out his wallet and coolly produced the paper declaring the head was his and demanded of the bystanders if his claim was not good. Like Shylock he insisted on having his own. Martin acknowledged the signature, bat asked that more time be granted, for the Lord had put off the day of retribution, through the prayers of his patron saints, himself and Brother Joseph Smith, whom he had left in Ohio. Esquire Smith who was in no way related to Joseph, only that he belonged to the universal family of that name, consented to let Martin continue the use of his head, and only remembered it thereafter as a [p----al] joke.

Martin Harris followed the Mormons to Missouri but did not give up his abode in Kirtland Ohio, until [1841?] when he again visited Palmyra and [then] went to the former State where he continued to reside until within a few years. Shortly after his first settlement in Kirtland, he married again and [raised] a large family. His wife was a woman of strong Mormon faith and [after] the settlement in Utah, [she went with ---] of the [Saints] to Salt Lake taking her children. Martin paid his last visit to Palmyra about [1848] and, if report is correct, joined his family in Utah about [1868]. Whether he is now living or not, I cannot say, but his history proves the fallacy of the faith he espoused, and we may wrap the mantle of charity around the poor, broken-down old man, who might have lived to be a blessing to mankind and an honor to the place of his nativity.

Since writing the foregoing, I have learned from a gentleman right from Salt Lake, that Martin Harris was there last fall; that he now resides somewhere in the territory, with his family; that he had not learned of his death and that he is well taken care of by the Mormon Government.


Notes: (forthcoming)

The  Conferences.

The Central New York and Northern New York Conferences met this week: the first in Palmyra, and the other in Rochester. We hoped to be able to give our readers the entire proceedings, with the appointments, in this paper, but shall not be, as the sessions are more prolonged than usual. The reports are given so far as could be, without delaying our issue unseasonably. Next week they will be completed....

Palmyra, at which village the Central Conference held its session, with Bishop Peck in the chair, is one of the many beautiful and thrifty villages with which Central and Western New York abounds. It lies twenty-three miles east of the city of Rochester, on the direct N. Y. Central R. R. In addition to its own inherent excellencies, it has fame, as the location where the notorious Joseph Smith originated that gigantic imposture -- "Mormonism." Many of the elder citizens remember him as a lazy boy, of a shiftless family, employed as a day laborer. He, with his father before him, was filled with superstitious notions, of which the whole country gave evidence in the numerous holes dug by them to find hidden treasure. Joe was in the habit of carrying a mysterious stone in his hat, by the light of which he professed to see into the earth. When only about eighteen or nineteen years old, he professed to find the golden plates. The hill is near Palmyra, a small, conical hill, and the hole is still pointed out, we believe, which was dug to obtain them. With the plates, he professed to find a pair of spectacles, by which he was enabled to read the characters of the mysterious writings. This he could do, and professed to do in the dark. He would sit in dark room alone, and read aloud, and Sidney Rigdon, [sic] his accomplice in another room, wrote down what he delivered. It was suspected, however, that Sidney, who was a fanatical minister, among the "Disciples," and had some education, was author as well as amanuensis. Smith had no education. No one ever saw these plates hat Smith. He satisfied his dupes by showing them, as he said, sewed up in, a canvas bag, and affirming that the Almighty would strike any one dead, who presumed to look upon them uncovered, except himself.

Martin Harris, a farmer of the town, worth $10,000 was seduced to furnish the means, about $5,000, for the publication of the Mormon Bible, which was printed in Palmyra. Harris' farm, which was hypothecated for the purpose, still goes by the name of the "Mormon Farm," and is now advertised for sale, as we saw in the Palmyra paper. Martin Harris is still living in Salt Lake City.

P. P. Pratt, from Ohio, the citizens say, gave Smith the first assistance, He was passing through Palmyra on the canal, and heard of the wonder, and stopped to enquire, and espoused the cause. He and Rigdon gave shape and influence to the movement, and made its first headquarters at Kirtland, Ohio, where they lived. The imposture gathered strength, and soon Smith and his leaders had wealth in abundance, and the vagabond boy became a prophet

Palmyra has about three thousand inhabitants, and is well built up. It has four churches standing on four opposite corners, representing Methodism, Presbyterianism, the Baptists and Episcopalians. The M. E. Church is a very handsome structure, built recently, of brick, with stone trimmings and symmetrical spire. Though the village is small, and the Conference large, the hospitality of the people is equal to the demand. The ministers are well entertained, and we heard Brother Farmer, the pastor, say that he had homes to spare. We have recently observed, the larger the city in which our Conferences are held, the greater the difficulty in securing accommodation. We would recommend that the sessions be held where the Conference is wanted, and the people are hospitable. There are a large number of such villages in Central and Western New York....


Notes: (forthcoming)

The Albany Times, commenting on the announcement that Mr. Sidney Rigdon, of Friendship, N. Y., has recently had a severe attack of paralysis, revives some interesting reminiscences concerning this remarkable man. He was one of the founders of the Campbellite or Christian faith. But he finally abandoned the Church, quit preaching, and devoted himself to journalism and the study of geology [sic]. While thus engaged he made the acquaintance of Joe Smith, the founder of Mormonism. Those who ought to know, assert that the "Golden Bible or the Book of Mormonism" is the product of Sidney Rigdon's mind and pen. He became an active Mormon, and went with Smith to Kirtland, Ohio, and afterwards to Nauvoo, Illinois, where he ranked in the Church, only second to Smith. He renounced Mormonism when the polygamy revelation was made. Mr. Rigdon is said to be a man of great intelligence, and of remarkably pure life. Before he dies he ought to tell the world what he knows about the Mormon Church.


Notes: (forthcoming)

A  Noted  Character.

Sidney Rigdon, of Friendship, Alleghany county, recently had a severe attack of paralysis. In connection with the fact the Albany Times presents a statement regarding Mr. Rigdon that will be now to most people: "He was early a member of a Christian church, and became a minister of the denomination of which he was a member. He was really the foundor of what is now known in the Campbellite, or Christian faith. He was urging the non-sectarian idea of Christianity when Campbell first sought to give it a place in the world as an organised church. Mr. Rigdon finally lost faith in the religion of his adoption, abandonod the pulpit, and devoted himself to journalism and the study of geology. In the latter he was astonishingly proficient. While thus engaged, the pretended revelations of Joe Smith attracted the public attention. They were not long in finding a defender in Sidney Rigdon, and the Golden Bible, or the Book of Mormon, we have no doubt, is the product of his mind and pen. He became an active Mormon, and went with Smith to Kirkland, Ohio, and from thence to Nauvoo, Illinois, where he ranked in the church only second to Smith. When the polygamy revelation came, Rigdon promptly declined to accept it as a part of his faith, and left the Mormon city for his old home in Pittsburg, Pennsylvania. His religion was not coupled with immorality. For many years past he has resided at Friendhip, Alleghany county, in this State, with his children who are settled there. He in man far advanced in years. In 1863 the editor of the Times endeavored to learn, in conversation, the religions views of Mr. Rigdon, and utterly failed; and he believes that the most intimate friends of Mr. Rigdon are no bettor informed on the subject.


Notes: (forthcoming)

Communications.
_______

Westward on Foot, Forty Years Ago.
_______

People generally suppose that Mormonism is really the entire offspring of Joseph Smith, that he was the sole originator of the scheme. This is a great mistake; a Christian gentleman and two keen, unscrupulous rascals were the trinity that gave Mormonism to the world.

Solomon Spaulding, an educated Congregational Clergyman, lost his health, gave up his charge, and traveled considerably in what was then called the far west. He became much interested in those old mounds that abound in the regions of the Ohio river and its tributaries. He possessed a vivid and speculative mind, and at once began to try not only to account for the ancient remains, but to decide the question of who and what were the people who raised them up.

Priestly [sic - Josiah Priest?] takes the ground that the present Indian tribes are the descendants of the ten lost tribes of Israel, and that the mound builders were a prior race. Spaulding takes the descendants of the lost tribes to be the true authors of these remains, and our Aborigines to be their extermimators. I think Priestly has the most evidence for his theory, but both lack substantial facts. However, Mr. Spaulding had his notions, and jotted them down in his notes, and when he went home he drew them out into a manuscript, and called it Nephi, in honor of an ideal being his dreaming fancy saw as leader and prophet of these children of the lost tribes, who he imagined were the authors of these old monuments. Soon after the completion of his manuscript, Mr.Spaulding became very much poorer in health, and at the same time was greatly embarrassed for means to get along; his friends advised him to publish his work, and he sent it to a publisher in Pittsburgh in the hope of realizing some help from it; but soon after Mr. Spaulding died and his family lost sight of the manuscript.

At that time Sidney Rigdon was employed in the printing office where the manuscript of Spaulding had been left, and, as was afterwards clearly shown, he took possession of it. About the same time Joseph Smith visited that vicinity; indeed, the sublime Joe, found the seraph Emma there, afterwards exalted to the bosom of the prophet, becoming thereby Mrs. Emma Seraph Joe. Chance, or fate, or some other genial harmonia, brought Smith and Rigdon together. Joe had already made pretensions to a Seership, or, in other words, to be gifted with the power of second sight. He had obtained some money, and a great but peculiar notoriety in finding stolen property. Most people agreed with Joe in this, that he found it very often by second sight, for they foolishly imagined that he had seen the stolen things before. Joe had led several expeditions in digging for buried money.

When these men met and formed an acquaintance each felt the other's spirit pulse, and sighted each other's character. Here the first tangible idea of Mormonism was born in the brain of Rigdon, and it came forth like Juno from the head of Jove, a full-sized Goddess -- like Richard the Third, it was born with teeth, and was lame and unfashionable. The idea was this: Joe was already a Seer, it was but one step more for him to become a prophet, have a revelation about hidden leaves, written over in an unknown tongue, then, as a Seer, to follow up these revelations, and find the golden plates, then by Divine inspiration decipher them into plain English, and find a few fools to furnish the money for publishing the new gospel; -- get Rigdon to print the bibles; then let Joe take them and preach from them; organize new churches, of latter day Saints; and, lastly, have a second revelation, declaring Sidney Rigdon tobe the High Priest of the new dispensation, and the thing would be done.

This was Rigdon's plan. By this plan Joe was to be Rigdon's cat's paw. Joe consented, but Joe was not caught. Joe would bring it all about except the second revelation, and the cat's paw business. Joe could see the High Priest dodge, and so kept the head of the church to himself, and gave his friend Sidney the second place. The Mormon church with characters reversed was Joe's idea. As the serpents of Moses swallowed those of the Magi, so Joe's idea swallowed Rigdon's. Joe beat, and the Mormon church was born.

Some years after this, one Hurlburt, Mormon Elder, prosecuted Smith for threatening his life. At this time the Saints abode at Kirtland, Ohio. The trial came off at Paynesville. During that trial it was fully proved that Joe's golden plates, Joe's revelation, and Joe's unknown tongue, that had been crystalized into the Nephi, or Golden Bible, was really nothing more than Spaulding's manuscript, stolen by Rigdon, and altered and garbled by Joe into what they called Golden Bible or book of Mormon. The low cunning of early Mormon history, came from Joe Smith, but for many years Sidney Rigdon furnished brains for the whole concern. He was the power behind the throne that ruled the king.

Smith, by cunning falsehood and fraud, of which he was a perfect master, succeeded in oganizing a few churches. He ordained and sent out many Apostles and scattered his Golden Bible far and near; then he led the host to Kirtland, and became the outside soul of the enterprise, leaving Rigdon to choose between the second place in the kingdom, or to back out entirely. Sidney did not back much; no, he gracefully yielded to his hard necessity and the cunning prophet.

Since that date the history of Mormonism is better known and more truthfully told. I have no more space for facts in this article, but, by the way of the boy, I have learned many anecdotes of the Divine Joseph that are rich and rare, silver clues to his Divine nature. One of these times, dear reader, when you want something to stir your intercostals, when you feel that peculiar all-over-ishness, that can not be satisfied without a fat, wholeSome, full-sized laugh, perhaps I can give you a few small slices of Joe.

Singular results and singular opinions follow the history of some men. Many grand men that have struggled hard for human good, have gone to their graves unnoted and unsung, and others of the same class have gone from time covered with obliquity. Another class of low, vulgar, hard-hearted, revengeful spirits have fallen upon curious times, have served the purposes of politicians or other questionable men, and thus are honored as heroes, philanthropists and martyrs. Of this class was Morgan, ambitious, dictatorial, quarrelsome and revengeful. He wanted the fraternity to help him to office, but they knew his unfitness and would not consent. He got into quarrels and lawsuits with his neighbors, he wanted the masons to back him up in his falsehoods and wrong doing, and because they would not, he swore revenge. He said he would rip them up, tear them down, pay them off; under this state of mind he wrote his exposure.

There was one man in the country in particular with whom Morgan had a great deal of trouble, that resulted in quarrels, fights and lawsuits. This man was not a mason. He swore out a warrant and shut Morgan up in Canandaigua jail. Soon there was a rumor that Morgan's friends were going to break open the jail and set him at liberty. To avoid this result the sheriff took a posse of men and removed Morgan to a safer place of confinement. -- A mob collected at the time of his removal and strove to liberate him and a fight ensued, but suffice it to say the sheriff succeeded and removed the prisoner. All this happened in the region near Port Gibson.

The boy at the time of his visit and the man years since has been well acquainted with scores of reliable men who knew Morgan well and knew his history minutely up to the date when he was removed from Canandaigua jail. The facts after his removal are under a cloud. No one has ever appeared to swear positively to his fate. -- One class contend that he was murdered, and pretend to tell how it was done, but of this there is no evidence except that Morgan has not been seen in this country since. Another class contend that he was sent in disguise to Europe, and has never dared to return or expose himself. Even there these persons allege that he has been several times seen and identified. Among these uncertainties a few things are certain: first, Morgan's exposure was an act of pure revenge; second, he was untruthful, quarrelsome and revengeful; third, he was first imprisoned by an anti-mason for alleged crime; fourth, he was removed from Canandaigua by the sheriff for fear of a mob liberation; fifth, Morgan has not been seen in this country since; sixth, his body nor any of his clothing has ever been identified; seventh, no positive evidence of his taking off has ever been produced. And there the matter stands to-day, and there it probably will stand until God lays bare all human secrets and rights all the wrongs of time. I believe in this great day of justice because I believe in an infinite God. Then, praise our Heavenly Father, truth and love shall triumph over all things else.

The writer, might go on with this history and draw fine moral lessons from it, but there is not room in this article, and he is pledged in the next to move on in the journey.

Well, the boy has had his visit out, he has been the rounds saying good-bye to uncles has eaten his last good bits with his aunts, has heard his grandfather's best story repeated, has hugged his kind hearted old grandmother, has kissed his female cousins, (for he was a boy you know, and had no taste for kissing boys; it was more trouble he thought to shake hands with male cousins). Now he and the writer are ready next week to shoulder the pack and resume the journey on foot once more.

S. J. DECKER.


Notes: (forthcoming)

Brigham  Young.

The story of Brigham Young's life is more marvelous than romance. His active career is drawing to a close. He is not "Spoiling for a fight" any more.... Brigham Young is neither more nor less than a shrewd, thoroughbred Yankee adventurer. Mormonism did [not?] make him, but he made Mormonism. He is entirely devoid of devotional sentiment, and what seems stranger in view of the place he fills, he seldom affects the sentiment. He was born in Whittington, Vermont, on the first of January, 1801. In 1830 Joseph Smith, a vagabond in Palmyra, in this state, declared that he had discovered the Book of Mormon graven on plates of stone [sic] by the hands of the angelic host. It was an absurd idea, but he found believers who, notwithstanding his notorious character, were ready to follow him. It is a suggestive fact that no draft ever drawn on the credulity of mankind failed to be honored by a respectable number of the human family. Smith acted in collusion with Sidney Rigdon, who wrote the Book of Mormon. Rigdon, who long ago deserted the faith, is still living, and if he were so inclined he could a tale unfold which would be entitled to a place in the world's history. It was in 1832 that Brigham Young joined the Mormons. He had everything to make and nothing to lose. He acquainted himself with the doctrines, which at that time were neither peculiarly absurd nor grotesque. The Book of Mormon was fairly written and inculcated good morals. We believe it promised that true believers should inherit the earth, or a good share thereof. It was on this point that Brigham Young dwelt. He was profuse in promises of temporal blessings, and the tempting bait was taken by scores of overworked farmers and hard-driven mechanics. When the Mormon settlement was made in Illinois Brigham Young had raised to a high rank in the church, and in 1844, on the death of Joseph Smith, he was chosen as president of the Mormon body. Before this, Smith's revelations had been so common that they excited no great interest among his followers. But shortly before his death he received his "revelation" justifying polygamy. This created a decided stir among the Latter Day Saints, and also among the Gentiles. Illinois became too hot to hold the Mormons. They journeyed to the farther west, and under the able management of Brigham Young they prospered after a fashion. In 1847 he led the emigration to the Great Salt Lake. He went far beyond the bounds of civilization into a region almost unknown to white men, and there he founded his colony. He sent his missionaries through all the countries of the old world and proselyted thousands of men, women and children. Among the ignorant, starving peasants of England, Germany and the Northern countries his agents found plenty of men and women who were captivated by the stories told of the New Land and New World, and they jumped at the chance to be transported gratuitously across the ocean to take up their abode with the faithful. They had been accustomed to tyranny in various forms, and they yielded without much murmuring to the despotic rule of Young....


Notes: (forthcoming)

HISTORICAL  SKETCHES,  NO. 102.
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BY  BENSON J. LOSSING.
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The Latter-Day Saints.
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"The saints shall in herit the earth," says God. Resolved, that we are "the Saints," therefore we "inherit the earth." By the logic of this curt syllogism the Mormons or "Latter-Day Saints," as they call themselves, claim the right of universal possession.

The Mormons are just now attracting an unusual share of public attention; and there are indications that the more gross and forbidding features of their religious and social system will soon disappear with the brutish men who have so long ruled over the earthly [--------] of that people in [an] arid continent, and that their territory, purged of its foulness, will soon take its place as a flourishing state of our Union.

The History of Mormonism is a marvellous tale among those which set forth the various theological systems which, from time to time, have ensnared the judgments of man. Its vitality has been remarkable. The reason for it may be found in the forces of credulity and lust.

The founder of Mormomism, Joseph Smith, was a bad scion of a bad stock. His family went from Vermont to Palmyra, in Wayne county, New York, when "Joe," as he is commonly called, was ten years of age. These Smiths were of the class such as figure in Thompson's Vermont story of "May Martin, or the Money Diggers," which the older readers of the "Poughkeepsie Telegraph" will well remember. The avoided honest labor; loved rum better than water, falsehood better than truth, immorality better than virtue, and were suspected of sheep-stealing and kindred crimes. Joseph was the worst of the family. Such was the united testimony of sixty of the respectable inhabitants of Wayne County, who knew the family well.

According to Joe's own story, when he was fifteen years of age he began to have supernatural visions. On the night of September 21, 1826, the angel Moroni appeared to him and announced that in the bosom of a certain hill he might find golden plates, upon which was written a record of the Ancient inhabitants of America and of God's dealings with them; and that with the plates would be found two transparent stones set in silver frames, like spectacles -- the veritable _Urim and Thummim_ of the Scriptures -- through which the record, written in the Ancient Egyptian language, would become plain to him. In 1827, the "angel of the Lord" put these plates and the means for their interpretation into the hands of the idle, vicious, drunken Joe Smith, then twenty-two years of age.

With mysterious movements, and with a young dupe or confederate, Oliver Cowdery, as a scribe, the shrewd Joe, it was said, made a pretended translation of the inscriptions on the plates. It was printed in 1830, in a volume of several hundred pages, with the title of "The Book of Mormon; an Account written by the Hand of Mormon, upon plates taken from the Plates of Nephi." It was simply a corrupt version of a religious romance concerning the lost tribes of Israek, called "The Manuscript Found," written by Solomon Spaulding in 1809, and left in manuscript by him. Smith soon found many believers, and when the truth of his statements were questioned, "Smith told me," said Peter Ingersoll, one of his intimate friends, "the whole affair was a hoax; that he had no such book, and did not believe there was such a book in existence; but, he said, 'As I have got the damned fools fixed, I shall carry out the fun.'"

In this "fun" others with more brains than Joe participated, for the sake of profit. Among these was Sidney Rigdon, a man whom Spaulding had employed twenty years before to copy his romance, and who retained a copy of it. Rigdon was Joe's shrewd associate in the wicked scheme.

Smith and Rigdon set themselves up as prophets, and pretended to have revelations from God. They made enough silly people believe that the "Book of Mormon" was "divine" to form a church, which was organized in Manchester, Monroe [sic] County, N. Y. in the spring of 1830. The next year Joe had a revelation that the whole body of the "Saints" must go to Kirtland, Ohio, and there found the "New Jerusalem." -- These converts rapidly multiplied, and put money into the purses of Smith and Rigdon, who went into Missouri and dedicated a new site for the New Jerusalem, to which the saints might repair at the end of five years. Meanwhile in Illinois, where they began building the city of Nauvoo, and a great temple.

In 1843, when the licentiousness of Smith became notoeious, he had a pretended revelation by which God authorised polygamy among the Mormons. The revelation was so scandalous that the church then publicly denied it; but in 1852 it was publicly avowed and commanded, and has ever since been the most conspicuous and shameful characteristic of the Mormon community.

Outrages committed by Smith and his followers, in Illinois, caused him and his brother to be lodged in jail, where they were both shot by a mob. Thus a strife for the Presidency of the community and headship of the church arose between Rigdon and Young. The latter was the successful competitor who consigned Rigdon to the Devil, to be "buffeted a thousand years." Soon after [sic], Smith and Rigdon set up a bank at Kirtland; defrauded the people; were dragged from their beds and tarred and feathered, and [lastly], in 1838, fled in the night to avoid arrest and imprisonment, and took refuge in Missouri.

In 1833, Brigham Young, another Vermonter, became a convert to Mormonism. -- A gross [sensualist], with much force of character, he soon became a shining light in the Mormon church and a successful missionary to the Eastern states. Other missionaries were sent to Europe. Thousands flocked to the church of the "Latter Day Saints," who emigrated to Missouri, where their offenses against society created a civil war that was suppressed by military force. The people charged the Mormons with all sorts of crimes. Dissentions arose among the "Saints" themselves, and Smith was openly charged by the Mormons with great crimes ] the whole body of the Mormons commenced their remarkable exodus and marvelous journey through the wilderness, to the Valley of the Great Salt Lake in the middle of our continent.

With Brigham Young at their head, the pioneers of the Mormon host, reached the Salt Lake in the summer of 1847. In the summer of the following year the main body of the Saints joined them. The organized an energetic emigration system, by which thousands of Europeans, chiefly of the laboring class, were induced to join them. In 1849, a convention held at Salt Lake city, adopted a political constitution and organized a state. The National government refused to organize the new state, but proceeded to establish the Territory of Utah. In 1850. President Fillmore appointed Brigham Young its Governor.

Young arrogantly set the National Government at defiance. The feeble administration of Pierce failed to assert the National authority. Incited by inflamatory sermons preached by Young, the Mormons finally drove the National officers out of Utah, by violence. Finally President Buchanan sent troops there in 1857, to enforce obedience, and in 1858, quiet was restored and submission promised. But from that time to this, that bold bad man who wields despotic power over his deluded followers, has kept a spirit of defiance alive in the Territory. -- In the face of the Christian world, and of our boastful civilization, and with the shamelessness of pagan Asiatics, he indulges in all their volumptuousness without any of their real virtues.

It is burning disgrace to our government and our Christianity that this moral plague spot should have been allowed so long to remain upon the Republic, and a man like Young permitted to be the Governor of a Territory. A refusal to admit the Territory of Utah, as a State of the Union, so long as its people practice polygamy, is the only rebuke of the foulness of that community, which our government has administered.

The Mormon community is governed by a Presidency and twelve Apostles, the latter being a traveling high council. The hierarchy consists of two other orders, the Melchisedec priesthood and the Aaronic priesthood. To the former, which is the highest, belong the offices of Apostle, Seventy, Patriarch, High Priest and Elder. To the latter, the offices of Bishop, Priest, Teacher and Deacon. Their theology teaches that there are many gods, and that eminent Saints become gods in Heaven, differing in celestial glory. That "eminent saint," Joe Smith, is regarded as the God of this generation. His superior god is Jesus, whose superior god is Adam, above whom is Jehovah, and above Jehovah is Elohim. These gods have many wives and children; and they are the fathers of souls upon the earth.

It is one of the strangest of moral phenomenas, that a system so gross should abide so long in the light of this portion of the 19th century, and in our enlightened country.


Notes: (forthcoming)

THE  MORMON  BIBLE -- ITS  ORIGIN.
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The somewhat accidental origin of the Mormon sect is a matter of history and pretty well known in this section of the country. Occasionally dome incident revives reminiscences of the event, and affords an opportunity to refer briefly to the old story for the benefit of the rising generation. A day or two since a notice appeared in an Elmira paper that Sidney Rigdon is the oldest man residing in Friendship, Alleghany county. The mere mention of his name calls up the subject referred to, and a contributor of the Elmira Advertiser presented a few facts which give, in a nutshell, the origin of the Mormon bible. He reminds the public that this somewhat remarkable production was written by a Presbyterian clergyman by the name of Spaulding residing in Ohio, as a kind of religious novelette founded upon the lost tribe of Israel which is reported as having wandered east. The manuscript (we quote from the version referred to) was taken by him to Cincinnati [sic] with a view to its publication and there he made the acquaintance of Sydney Rigdon, who had some connection with a printing office with whom it was left for perusal. Mr. Spaulding shortly after died and nothing was done with it until Mr. Rigdon fell in with Joe Smith, who borrowed the manuscript. He was a shrewd, credulous adventurer who needed everything and was as willing to impose upon others as he was to be imposed upon himself. He invented the story that the golden plates from which the book of Mormon were said to have been translated, were found in a bluff hill situated on the road between Shortsville and Palmyra, and that he was directed to dig for them in a certain place by revelation, and this is still pointed out where the excavation was made. His first material convert was a man by the name of Chamberlain, who lived near a place called Kingdom, between Seneca Falls and Waterloo. This man owned a good farm, and through his aid and others the Mormon bible was first published. Preaching now became easy. Any number of miracles were wrought, and when any particular want was felt, Joe Smith, like Mahomet, fell into a trance or dream and the command came from heaven. That the Book of Mormon is genuine is attested by a great number of signatures, whose writers testify that they have seen the golden plates from which it was translated from an unknown language by miraculous aid; but the plates, like the Ark of the Covenant, have been sedulously concealed from modern profane eyes. After this Joe Smith passed through his reported "trials and tribulations," and finally succeeded in forming a society in Ohio. After Joe Smith was killed Rigdon tried to become the head of the Church, but he was opposed by Brigham Young, then in the prime of life, who succeeded, and Mr. Rigdon left the community, either from disgust or fear of his life, and has since resided in Friendship with or near his son, who is a merchant there.


Note 1: On page 129 of the 1876 History of Seneca Co., Joseph Smith, Jr. is described as having once been "a day-laborer" who sometimes worked "for old Colonel Jacob Chamberlain, and occasionally for others, when not engaged with his mineral rods digging for gold in various places." According to Daniel S. Kendig, Joseph Smith started working for Jacob Chamberlain about 1820, when he was "an odd-looking boy, clad in tow frock and trousers, and barefooted. He hailed from Palmyra, Wayne County, and made a living by seeking hidden things" Jacob P. Chamberlain (1802-1878) was the owner of flour mills in the vicinity of Kingdom Lock, a junction on the road between Waterloo and Seneca Falls. After the Mormons had left that area, Chamberlain bought and ran the Lower Red Mills near Kingdom.

Note 2: Jacob P. Chamberlain was apparently still on good terms with Joseph Smith, Jr. during the winter of 1830-31, when some of the Joseph Smith Sr. family members were temporarily living at Kingdom, in the home of Chamberlain's neighbor, "Mr. Kellogg." A different "Jacob Chamberlain" (1779-aft.1859) is listed in the Kirtland Council Minute Book as having been an LDS Teacher who attended the June 13, 1831 Conference at Kirtland -- writer Michael Quinn confuses the two men. In Jan. 1834, at Kingdom, Jacob P. Chamberlain gave Elder Orson Hyde "one hundred dollars to be sent to Kirtland for the assistance of the brethren." Whatever his early interest in money-digging or Mormonism may have been, Chamberlain joined the Methodist Episcopal Church in Seneca Falls in 1841 and remained a member until his death on October 5, 1878. For Chamberlain's possible early dissatisfaction with the Mormons, see the letter of Mar. 12, 1831, (probably from Abner Cole in Palmyra) published in the Mar. 22, 1831 issue of the Painesville Telegraph. There the NY correspondent says: "Their [Mormons'] number may be 20 in this vicinity, and but two or three of them own any property to our knowledge. Near Waterloo there is said to be about 40, three or four being men of property. Chamberlain and Burrows, two of the principal ones, it is said, have refused to sell, or obey Jo any longer."

Joseph Smith -- His Early Attempts at Imposture.
To the Editor of the Syracuse Journal:

The earliest attempt of Joseph Smith to deceive the credulous and ignorant was by the aid of a stone, to which he professed to have been directed by a dream. It was an ordinary pebble of zone sandstone; and he concealed it by placing it in his hat and by then shading his face in the hat.

His first excursion from Ontario county, N. Y., where he had attained only a neighborhood notoriety, it was thought, was to the vicinity of Lanesborough, Susquehannah county, Pa. A tradition existed among the credulous that a large amount of silver coin had been melted into bars, and buried, a few miles from that place by a band of Spanish adventurers, early in the history of our country, and that the ghost of one of the band who had been murdered was guarding the treasure. The ghost, it had been ascertained in some way, would strike the man dead whose instrument should first reach the treasure, his spell would then be broken and possession could then be taken without any further danger. In confident expectation that one of their number would fall a victim to the spectre's blow, they were pale with apprehension, but strongly resolved to brave the danger for the silver. The most cruel of men are often the most superstitious, and it is a matter of tradition, perhaps of history, that the piratical buccaneers of the seventeenth century were accustomed to kill some one, of less value to their enterprise, and bury him with their treasure, believing that his spirit would haunt the spot and leep away intruders. Instances of such tradition are often met.

The men engaged in this enterprise were men of some means and of ordinary respectability; some of them of a religious character. Wheb visited by my informant, Smith was sitting in the shade, with hat and stone, a lubberly fellow of some twenty or twenty-two years of age. He frequently told them that they were within a few feet of their coveted treasure, and from time to time told them that the ghost had removed the bars, and finally informed them that the bars were spirited away to a distance that made it useless to pursue the matter farther.

Some short-lived efforts were afterwards made under the directions of Smith in search of precious metals near Windsor, Broome county, in this State. He was afterward in the employment of one of his former dupes, a few miles north of Windsor, where from his ignorance, awakwardness and vulgarity, he was the subject of much raillery. One instance of this was related to us many years ago in the neighborhood of its occurrence. Returning from a neighboring grist mill, with a number of bags of flour upon a naked reach and axel of his wagon, one of them was lost. Some boys who saw it fall, secreted it in the straw of a barn, beside the road. When the incipient prophet made persistent inquiry and repeated search, they bade him look in his hat to consult his divining stone. It was some weeks before the Deacon and his man obtained their property.

After this he lived some time in Bainbridge, and was taken up as a vagrant. A mock trial of some three or four days' continuance was held for the amusement of a company of equally idle men and boys. A young doctor not overtasked with business at the time, now residing in Greene, Chenango, county, took copious notes of the trial. It was he who described the divining stone to the writer. It was a fine-grained, reddish sandstone, curiously striped, originally hardened from a sandy sediment, broken into a fragment and rounded by natural attrition. He said upon the trial that its power arose from the fact that its layers, or stripes, corresponded with the number of weeks in the year.

After this, Smith returned to his Lanesborough haunts and married Emma Hale, since then the elect Lady of Mormonism. A cousin of his informed the writer, that for some months after they were married, Emma and Joe were closeted and secretly writing out something which they said would make them and their friends independent. Smith made proposals to an uncle of his wife to co-operate in his plans and share the spoils. The old man was an original character, sagacious and pious, and an owner of Clarke's Commentary. Joe said he had found a pair of spectacles or transparencies of some kind, by which he could read all the languages of earth. The old man offered to test him with the Greek, Hebrew, Arabic, &c., of his Commentary, and the result was that Smith said no more on that subject.

We knew the family of Emma Hale. She was regarded as a tolerably well meaning, but rather stupid girl. Her father was eccentric, the old lady pious, Emma stupid, -- all tolerably well to do, and respectable.

The whole is not without its humiliating lesson. How such a blundering blockhead, could have found adherents in this land of schools and Bibles, will be the wonder of the ages.

SYRACUSE, N. Y., Nov. 30, 1875.                         E. G. B.

Note: See Chenango Union of May 27, 1877 for the "Historical Reminiscences" of the "young doctor... residing in Greene, Chenango, county."

Something  about  the  Mormons.
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However much most people hear about this religious sect, it comes mostly of vague reports which now and then appear in the newspapers, growing out of troubles which have been increased since the Pacific railroad opened up a highway into their hitberto almost inaccessible country, where the Institution of Mormonism has flourished for nearly 30 years. Of course all know that the followers of Joseph Smith, who, with Orson Pratt, and another, originated the thing, is based mainly on "Polygamy." That is to say, not only tolerating, but enjoining polygamous marriages, as a "divine revelation." It is a strange fact, that, in this enlightened State of New York, and not far from its centre, has originated, 1st, the impostor Jemima Wilkinson and her infatuated followors -- she pretending to be a prophetess and able to work a miracles, so as to be able to walk upon the water -- if her believers had faith; 2d, the sect called Spiritualists, or more properly spiritist -- beginning with the notorious Fox family, and spreading far and wide till numbering, it is said, millions; and 3d, the Mormons.

At the time when Smith and others pretended to have found the plates of the Mormon Bible, in a hill in Wayne county, (I think,) Brigham Young, the present head of "the Mormon Chureh of Latter-day Saints," as they call it, was not with them. I heard him say that he was born in the State of Vermont, and he lived in Auburn about 1828. He labored, he said, as a mason, on the stone building known as the Theological Seminary; and also on the brick residence of Judge Miller, so long the residence of the late Secretary Seward. A relative also mentioned the fact that he labored in 1812, in an iron manufactory on the Owasco creek, owned by Mr. Wadsworth. The Book of Mormon, it is claimed, was written by a clergyman in Pennsylvania, as a literary romance, or queer attempt at strange fiction. The few persons who originated the idea of banding together in a community of goods, and a plurality of wives -- were compelled to remove to the banks of the Mississippi, in Illinois, and there, under their leader, Joseph Smith, the prophet, began building a stone temple, the ruins of which I saw several years ago, in the city called "Nauvoo."

Their principles became so obnoxious to the surrounding inhabitants, that they were forcibly driven away by an armed body of Illinois militia. Fleeing into Missouri, they had a brief respite, and again had to fly before an outraged community. They set their faces toward California, not knowing exactly where they would go and be safe from a people who would never tolerate their anti-Christian practices.

---

On visiting the city of Salt Lake, in 1870, in company with some members ef Congress and leading gentlemen from Eastern cities, and at an interview with Brigham Young, we learned much about the Mormons. He invited freedom of conversation, and for about an hour it went on. He claimed, that, as they went to Deseret at the time it was Mexican Territory, and outside of the United States, the general Government had no right to meddle or interfere with them. He said fhey were now receiving revelations from heaven. I was curious to know whether he claimed "a revelation" for guiding them to the fruitful land they possessed. -- I said, "please tell me how you came here?" "Well," said he, "we were journeying this way, and sending a party ahead to prospect, and we learned from returned miners from California, and others, that this was a fruitful soil, and so we came on and took possession." Sunday morning, we attended their tabernacle service, after I had held service in the hotel there, (and preached at Camp Douglass in the afternoon), at which service they had a communion, the elements being (bread and water. Young preached some strange doctrines, but his discourse was egotistical, somewhat political, and showed a mind uncultivated, and, of course, bigoted and full of assumptions of importance as the favored people of Jehovah.

A Methodist minister, who happened to be travelling to California, (though not of oar party), created a little confusion in the interview on the day previous, by asking if all the wives got along in perfect harmony? The reply was, "No." "Of course, all wanted a husband apiece, but the smartest one ruled the roost."

The clergyman (Episcopal) who was with me, declined an inclination to preach in the tabernacle, in the afternoon; but, just before, a Methodist Bishop accepted the offer, and was foolish to de so, because Young's policy is to make a show of liberality -- at the same time reserving to himself the privilege of saying a few words at the close, or else, on next occasion, turning the matter into ridicule, as he did at the time referred to.

Bishop King, while making a tour of observation 'round the world, accepted Young's invitation to hold forth. This matter was thus related to us by Young, and by others. The text was, "The Kingdom of God is not meat and drink; but righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost." Rom. xiv:17.

The Bishop said, at the close, "Now, my friends, I want to say that all who love the Lord Jesus when they come to die -- if they have faith in Christ, will be welcomed with joy, and carried by angels to Abraham's bosom." Brigham got up and said: "I agree with all our brother has said, only he don't go far enough; but we have revelations and know more about these things, and you see he says a good word for us, because polygamy is right, and Abraham was the greatest polygamist the world ever saw." This, of course, wasn't true; it was a whoppor, but it served his purpose as an argument ad hominem.

Young's power is as absolute as that of the great Mogul, or the Emperor of Russia, and he is a tyrant. Just before our arrival, Dr. Robinson, who owned a valuable sulphur spring and bathing establishment, because he refused to sell it to the church, was called out one night, under pretence of visiting a patient, and a crowd of several Danites standing near his residence shot him dead. These Danites, or destroying angels, are a secret body who do all such things at Young's behest.

The land is very fruitful, as the water for irrigating is never-failing. It flows down from the snow covered mountains some ten miles distant, into large reservoirs, and is carried out to the fields by officers duly appointed.

The Salt Lake, in sight of the city, of course, gives the name to the stronghold of Mormonism.

The stores and marts of trade are nearly all under the control of the church, and if a Mormon is tempted to enter a Gentile's store where better bargains are offered, a spy is pretty sure to enter and compel the person to drop the goods and walk out.

The sigas over all Mormon stores reads thus:

ZION'S CO-OPERATIVE UNION.
HOLINESS TO THE LORD.
With the All-Seeing-Eye in the centre.

The Chief Justice of the Territory has quite recently charged the Grand Jury in such language as cannot fail to bring about some action, He said the people of the United States have declared by law their abhorrence of polygamy, and the difficulty has been to find juries who will see that the laws were executed. But now the time had come, be the consequences what they may, that the laws shall be enforced. This means business. It may be that force will have to be used at first, but a government which cannot enforce its laws, has sunk into deserved contempt in the eyes of its own people, and has become a by-word among the nations of tho earth. The subject is full of interest, but I have time only to show that the army is competent to deal with disloyalty.

Col. Connor, a man of pluck, was ordered to Salt Lake, with a battery, before the war of the rebelion. As he approached the city, Brigham sent word to the colonel to halt, and by no means to enter the city. At once the company marched through the streets and passed on three miles to a plateau, and there encamped, and there, ever since, has been Camp Douglas with a regiment of soldiers.

After the war broke out, Mr. Chase devised the greenback currency, and it was a legal tender for all dues, except customs, &c.

As gold and silver had been the only circulating medium in Utah, Brigham set his face against this new device to maintain the nation's credit.

Rising in the tabernacle one Sunday morning, he said he had a revelation from the Lord, that the Saints were not to take "greenbacks as money, but only gold and silver."

This reached Col. Connor's ears, and he sent a Lieutenant with a note demanding him to take back such a atatenweat, as it was disloyal to the United States Government. Young refused to comply with the order. Then the Colonel sent in a note, in the evening, stating that he had his guns trained on the Mormon temple, and he would give him just 30 minutes to revoke his commands, and, if not done, he would shell the tabernacle. Brigham got up and told his people that he had received another revelation from the Lord, "that he was to take greenbacks." E. B. T.


Notes: (forthcoming)

Death  of  Sidney  Rigdon.
________

Sidney Rigdon, who died last Friday, came to our village about the year 1847, where he has resided without interruption ever since. He was born in Allegheny Co., Pa. in 1793, before he had reached the ripe age of 83 years, thirty of which he passed in comparative retirement in our village, and of course was a very familiar figure to our citizens and a person of interest to all who became acquainted with him only in the latest years of his life, when the disabilities of old age were strong upon him, and we judge that some of the intellectual fire of manhood had abated, but still he gave the impression as being of no ordinary character. His temperament was that of a thoughtful, nervous man, communing much with himself, and when warmed up in controversy exhibited a fluency and discissiveness, which, had it been tempered with the exact knowledge of the schools, would have given him preeminence in any profession, but especially in that of teacher, minister, lawyer or public speaker. As it was, without any advantage of training and apparently without any ideas except such as were acquired by observation and not from books, he was always ready to discourse upon a variety of topics at any length, and never failed to obtain interested hearers.

Of course the connection of Mr. Rigdon with the rise of Mormonism made him an historic character, and many pilgrimages have been made to obtain from him further information concerning the origin of the Book of Mormon, but without success except in the coroboration of the prevailing notions of the early Mormons on the subject. Mr. Rigdon held language of the utmost scorn and contempt for the writers who charged him with conscious imposture, and there was nothing in his character revealed to his neighbors during thirty years to lend support to the theory that he was capable of perpetrating the deliberate imposition charged in the common accounts of the origin of the Book of Mormon. Of course we speak without definite knowledge, but we venture to say to those who still entertain the hope that there is among Mr. Rigdon's papers any authentication of these accounts, that this is entirely unfounded, and that a true theory of his agency in Mormon history must leave his honesty unimpugned. In fact we have long been of the opinion that the current statements of bold imposture on the part of Smith, Young, and other leaders are conceived in gross error or require great modification.

Mr. Rigdon leaves a large and respected family. Many of our citizens followed him to his grave and the Masonic order conducted the obsequies. Of this order Mr. Rigdon was long an active and conspicuous member.

The following, which is especially interesting at this time, is from the pen of one who has long known Mr. R., and we doubt not the statements are correct and reliable:

DEATH  OF  SIDNEY  RIGDON.

This name is known throughout our community, as well as in foreign lands. It is remembered in connection with the rise and progress of the Mormon Church under the Supremacy of the Prophet Joe Smith. The public generally insisting that he was the author of the Book of Mormon, or otherwise known as the Mormon Bible. His shrewdness together with a most masterly eloquence rarely equalled and never excelled, enabled him to masterfully aid in the establishment of the Church upon a basis that promised well for its future greatness and which might have been a mighty instrument in augmenting our yearly immigration from the old world, and beautifying many a desert spot in our Western Wilds. He had already acquired a celebrity as a most remarkable preacher. First, in the Baptist Church at Pittsburgh, Pa., and subsequently in company with Alexander Campbell in the establishment of the church and faith, now known as the Christian Church -- or Campbellite faith.

In the immediate vicinity of Campbell, they were known as Campbellites, and in the vicinity of Rigdon (Northern Ohio) they were denominated Rigdonites. About the year 1830, while still residing in Mentor, Geauga County, Ohio, Mr. Rigdon was visited by three men. who were proselytes of the Prophet Joe Smith, viz: Parley P. Pratt, Oliver Cowdery and Ziba Peterson, who presented to him the Book of Mormon or Mormon Bible. It was then a printed and bound volume, and was the first printed copy he ever saw of that work. The assertions of the American Encyclopedia to the contrary notwithstanding.

Mr. Rigdon never pretended to have seen the golden plates, from which that book is said to have been translated. But he read the copy presented to him carefully through several times, and soon announced himself as a believer, and thus commenced his career as a co-laborer with the Prophet Smith. His eloquence as a preacher soon gathered great numbers as proselytes of the new faith, and gave to him a power and influence, not even excelled by Smith himself. The Prophet seemed to rely implicitly on Rigdon, and hence kept himself within proper limits as a christian, and his church as a christian community, until an evil hour overtook him at Nauvoo, Illinois, where he (perhaps too willingly) acquiesced and secretly promulgated that curse to all communities -- Spiritual Wifery -- which caused the death of Smith, and is to-day the deadly poison to the Mormon Church, and the accursed curse to Brigham Young, who upon the death of Smith, seized the reins of government, the better to perpetuate and promulgate this curse to the human race. The death of Smith, and coup de etat of Brigham Young forever severed the connection between the Church and Rigdon, and for nearly thirty years now past, the community in which Mr. Rigdon lived, and formed intimate associations, knew nothing of his religious belief, or professed faith. His lips were sealed from the time of the two great events happening as related above. This, community, in the midst of whom he has lived so long, knew him as a social being, of a very active and busy brain, devouring eagerly the current news of the times, discussing freely all topics of the day, and freely expressing his opinions on all occasions. If in his closing years of a life of near four score and four, he may have seemed harsh, unreasonable, or positively unfriendly to many who remembered him only in his better days and with kindness, let all such cover him with the mantle of charity and remember that he too was like all of us, human.

---

Masonic

At a regular communication of Alleghany Lodge, No. 225, F. &. A, M., held July 15th, 1876, the following resolutions were unanimously adopted:

Whereas, It has pleased the All-Wise Father of the Universe to remove, by the hand of death, our venerable and beloved brother, Sidney Rigdon, Sr.; and

Whereas, Brother Rigdon's ripe old age, scholarly attainments, kindly sympathies and historic life have endeared him to a large circle of relatives and friends; therefore.

Resolved, That while we bow in humble submission to the will of the Great Architect who rules over all, we deplore the loss of our brother as one of the oldest and most venerable members of our fraternity, whose counsel and advice always challenged our respect, and whose pure life was a practical exemplification of the principles we profess.

Resolved, That we extend our warmest sympathies to the bereaved widow and relatives, and earnestly commend them to that kind and beneficent Father who tempers the wind from the shorn lamb, and will absolutely administer consolation to all who seek Him in an abiding faith.

Resolved, That a copy of these resolutions be presented to the bereaved family of our brother, and spread upon the minutes of this Lodge and published in the Friendship Register.

Resolved, That our Lodge room be draped in mourning for the next thirty days.

W. D. Renwick, }
F. M. Alvord, }  Com.
R. A. Scott. } E. J. Cannon, Secretary.


Note: Sidney Rigdon died at Friendship, NY, on Friday, July 14, 1876. Additional obituaries of Sidney Rigdon appeared in the Friendship Standard, (where he is remembered as "a compound of ability, versatility, honesty, duplicity, and mystery"), in the July 18th issue of the Pittsburgh Telegraph, (where he is accused of having taken a Spalding mansucript in his youth), in the July 24th issue of the New York Times, which merely reprints the Telegraph, the Aug 5th and Aug 12th issues of the Christian Standard, where he was made responsible "for much of the trouble in Missouri" experienced by the Mormons, and in the Aug. 15th Saints Herald, which says very little, having reviewed Rigdon's life in an earlier issue.

Death  of  Sidney  Rigdon.
the Founder of Mormonism.

(not from the Standard after all; see notes below)

This notable religionist, once the champion of the Faith as delivered to the Saints by Palmyra Joseph, died at the residence of his son-in-law, Karl Wingate, July 14th, in the eighty-fourth year of his age, and was buried in the village grave-yard, Friendship, Alleghany County, New York. The funeral ceremonies were conducted by the Masonic Order, Alleghany Lodge. Master Wm. H. King, assisted by Don McClure, Rev. H. M. Rigley, and others.

SIDNEY RIGDON was born in the year 1793 near the city of Pittsburg. He was fond of books and book-men, and at an early age showed his predilections for religious studies and an ambition in the direction of pulpit oratory. Controlled by this ambition he applied himself to Scripture study, never failing to improve his opportunities to accept invitations which would give him the chance to achieve a reputation as a speaker. In 1819 he visited Ohio, where by a Presbytery consisting of Revs. Clark, West, Bentley and Otis, he was ordained as a preacher of the Gospel. Soon after, in 1822-3, Mr. Rigdon became pastor of a Baptist Church in Pittsburg, from which in a few months, he was removed on account of his advocating certain principles held to be incompatible with membership in that denomination. About this time Alexander Campbell was attracting public notice by his endeavors to annihilate sectarianism and return to the plan and procedure of the Apostolic age. Campbell was a reformer. Rigdon wished to be regarded as such, and, making the acquaintance of Campbell, struck hands with him in the plea for the original Gospel, and went to Ohio, where, in company with Walter Scott, and others of like faith, he labored earnestly under the direction of the Mahoning Association. Here Mr. Rigdon's ambition discovered itself -- he wished to be a leader; his delight was in oratory, and he longed for the time and place when admiring multitudes should confess to his overpowering grandeur, shout high acclaim to the music of his rhetoric, and dying, confess their soul's salvation in the name of Sidney Rigdon. For reasons not given in the records of the Western Reserve Associations, Walter Scott received an appointment which could not but displease the ambitious, oratorical Rigdon. In 1827-8 he appears as the preacher for a congregation in Lake County, where, in his return to Apostolic Christianity, we find him advocating the [ecstasies?] of religious supernaturalism, spiritual gifts, miracles and the necessity of daily revelations from on high! Under the preceptorship of Mr. Rigdon, at this place, Mentor, Parley P. Pratt comes partially into public notice. Pratt was, in later years, the husband of six women at one time, and through some unfortunacy, was killed for seducing the seventh, Eleanor McLean.

It may also be remarked, in this connection, that the standard Mormon books, "Doctrine and Covenants" and "[Warning] Voice," were written by Rigdon and Pratt. Between the years 1827 and '30 it is asserted by Tucker and others that Rigdon was the "mysterious stranger" occasionally seen at the residence of Joe Smith, who was during those years, giving out that he had discovered a golden Bible, which in due time, would be given to the world. Be this, however, as it may, when the Joe Smith Bible came out, in 1830, at Palmyra, Parley Pratt was at once upon the ground, accepted a copy, shook hands with Smith, and embraced the everlasting Gospel! Pratt's quick conversion to such an evident imposture, his hurrying back to Mentor, the instantaneous conversion of Rigdon, his visit to the Smiths, his sermon at Palmyra, his determined advocacy of a religion and a book which he could not possibly have examined, are sufficient items of proof to establish the previous connection of himself and Pratt in the Joe Smith imposture. It is certain that the first third of the Mormon Bible is a rehash of the SPAULDING Story concerning the aborigines of America; it is equally certain that the Spaulding manuscript was within Rigdon's reach between the years 1812-19; also that the same was in picking up distance of Smith between the years of 1819-26! When the Mormon Bible came out in 1830, its contents were recognized by Wright, Miller, Spaulding, and others; the original manuscript was at once inquired after -- the trunks searched, when lo! the Spaulding Story was gone! The names, incidents, and thread of the Spaulding Story are found in the first part of the Mormon Bible! We do not say that Rigdon wrote the Mormon Bible; nor that Pratt did it -- nor Joe Smith; we only suggest -- and go on. In Ohio, Smith and Rigdon built a Mormon Temple, swindled the people, were tarred and feathered, and chased away -- to Independence, Missouri. Here Mr. Rigdon immortalized himself as an incendiary, political religionist; he was jailed, whipped -- chased out into Illinois. Here, at Nauvoo, he disagreed with Smith concerning the delicacies of Polygamy, but became eminently known as a social philosopher, attorney, theologian, and Fourth of July orator! In 1844 Smith was killed for indulging in the woman business: Rigdon was next in order, according to a revelation he had received from the Lord, but Brigham Young, being in high favor with the women, handed Rigdon over to the devil -- in a Church Bull -- took charge of the Nauvoo theocracy and made the exodus overland to Utah. Rigdon, left in disgrace, returned to Pittsburg; thence, in 1847, to Friendship, New York, where he resided until his death. For thirty years he has said nothing on the subject of his former faith and Mormon adventures. Time and again the interested historian and persistent reporter have tried to interview him with reference to the manufacture of the Mormon Bible, but nothing was ever obtained to satisfy the hungry seeker after curious knowledge. Mr. Rigdon had no library, kept no diary, left no manuscripts. For thirty years he kept his lips together, and now the hush of the grave has closed forever upon the secrets of his inner life. The relatives of Mr. Rigdon are all reputable, beloved members of their respective communities; and, forgetting momentarily the early years of his strange life, we cheerfully record that Sidney Rigdon lived his last years as a law-abiding, reputable citizen, and will be kindly remembered by many to whom he had endeared himself by his cheery friendship and social virtues.


Note 1: This undated clipping, containing an obituary of Sidney Rigdon, was previously posted at this web-site as coming from the Friendship Standard, of July 18, 1876. Further investigation of the text has shown that it DID NOT come from that paper, but probably was clipped from a newspaper published in late July 1876. The same article may be found in Charles L. Woodward's "First Half Century of Mormonism," in the New York Public Library, where a handwritten entry attributes the text to "Thomas B.? Dill."

Note 2: The article will remain at this spot on this web-page until a proper source and date can be identified. The it will be replaced with the actual Rigdon obituary from the Friendship Standard, once the latter text has been located and transcribed.

Death of Founder of Mormonism.
_____

The fact of the death of the venerable Sidney Rigdon, an event of no little interest in western New York, seems to have been overlooked hereabouts. This well-known character died in Friendship, Allegany County on the 14th inst., at the age of eighty-three. We reproduce the following sketch of his life and the nefarious work of founding a vile religious heresy in which he has the reputation of having played an important part, published in the Troy Times of yesterday:

The death of Sidney Rigdon recalls to mind the prominent part he once took in that stupendous deception whereby the church of the "Latter Day Saints" was foisted upon the world. He was not the apparently moving spirit of the imposture, but came in about the second hour, to give its voice and an oratorical respectability that it did not have before his appearance. He was born in Pennsylvania in 1793. At first a Baptist preacher in Pittsburgh, he afterwards drifted to the side of Alexander Campbell, the founder of the organization now known as the Christian church. In the meantime the extraordinary career of Joseph Smith, Jr., had begun near Palmyra, in the western part of the State. Smith came of a low family that immigrated from Vermont, noted more for illiteracy, whisky drinking and shiftlessness than for any cardinal virtues. Of such a [-----] was to spring the prophet and principal founder of Mormonism. He was indolent, with a vagabond turn, but developed a taste for scriptural studies and disputes on religious subjects. In [182?] a curious stone was found by a neighbor when digging a well on his farm. It fell into the hands of Smith, and from that event his career of vulgar jugglery and deception dates. He soon gave out that the stone possessed wonderful properties, with which he was enabled to reveal things existent and things to come. By its aid he pretended to discover the whereabouts of deposits of gold and silver in earthen pots and iron chests, buried in the earth. It was not long before he had a company of [fools] digging at midnight hours for the hidden treasures. Nothing was ever found, but the ingenious impostor contrived to satisfy his [dupes] that some sinister "condition" battled their efforts, and thus maintained his [necromantic] reputation intact. Soon after followed his spiritual visions: "the angel of the Lord appeared to him," denounced all the religious denominations as believers in false doctrines and promised to reveal to him at some future time the "fullness of the gospel." Several visitations from this divine messenger [succeeded] and soon after Smith announced that obeying the instructions of the "angel," he had taken out of the hill a metallic book of great antiquity, which was a record, in mystic letters, of characters of the long lost tribes of Israel, who, he said, formerly inhabited this country. Smith related marvelous stories of a [celestial pyrotechnical display] he witnessed on that occasion. The good angel stood upon one side, encouraging him, while upon the other myriads of [denizens] from the pit strove in vain to deter him from unearthing the book. The utmost pains were taken to keep the precious prize from "gentile" eyes, and after much tribulation, chiefly for lack of funds, a copy of the new revelation was printed.

The manuscript was found to be a wretched imitation of scripture [exposition?] containing extensive plagiarisms from the Bible, especially from Isaiah, Jeremiah and Matthew. Christ's sermon on the mount was incorporated almost without an alteration. The grammar of this [distasteful?] work was in utter [defiance of rules]. A more contemptible insult to common sense was never before offered under the guise of inspirational writings. [But it] found credulous believers among the most ignorant and superstitious class of the community. The Mormon Bible, or "Book of Mormon" as it was called, was printed at Palmyra in 1830. The origin of this manuscript has been traced to its source. It was the work of [one Rev.] Solomon Spaulding of Ashtabula county, Ohio, who wrote the work to [elucidate] the theory that the American continent had been [settled] by a colony of the ancient Israelites. [This vision?] of [his] brain he submitted to a printer in Pittsburgh, Pa. The latter engaged to print it, but the contract was never carried out. Soon after the clergyman died. The manuscript fell into the hands of Sidney Rigdon, who gave it to Smith, and then followed the [concoction?] of the scheme to found a new religious sect. Soon after the appearance of the romance as the Mormon bible, Rigdon went to Palmyra and entered upon the [scheme?] of propagating the new doctrines. He was [clearly?] possessed of a considerable degree of eloquence, together with a peculiarly magnetic personality, which crowned his efforts with much [success] among the classes [whence] Mormonism has ever drawn its support. He never pretended to have seen the mysterious plates Smith dug out of the hill, but there is little question that the imposture was the joint production of Smith and Rigdon, even while the latter was a "preacher of righteousness," but it must be said a very eccentric one, even then. The leaders of Mormonism next moved to Kirtland, Ohio, had a brief career there, and then the "church" went further west. At Nauvoo, Ill., as is well known, Smith first proclaimed the doctrine of spiritual wifehood and polygamy, which has become the principal characteristic of Mormonism. As a candidate for the seat of the murdered Smith, who was shot by a mob, Rigdon was defeated by Brigham Young and expelled from the church. He returned to this State and spent his last days in the place where he died. He ceased to be an active champion of Mormonism, and was generally respected by his neighbors and acquaintances.

We believe that it was only after he had himself voluntarily withdrawn from the "church" that he was formally expelled. Those who adhered to his views came in conflict with the rest of the Saints on the question of polygamy. The bold innovation prevailed and Rigdon abandoned the movement. It is difficult, however, to understand why a man who could conscientiously lend his aid to the propagation of a wicked religious imposture, should find himself unable to agree with the majority on adding polygamy to the scheme.


Notes: (forthcoming)

Weekly  News  and  Democrat.

Vol. V.                           Auburn, N. Y., Thurs., Aug. 8, 1876.                          No. 31.

==> Sidney Rigdon, the original founder of Mormonism, died at Friendship, Allegany county, a few days since, at the age of 83 years. He was ousted by Brigham Young, formerly of Port Byron, in this county, from the position of leader of the Mormons, and retired from the church, many years ago.


Notes: (forthcoming)

MORMON  JOE  SMITH.
_____

HIS  FORMER  HOME  NEAR  SUSQUEHANNA.
_____

Mrs. Doolittle, mother-in-law of Chief of Police Johnson, who has been stopping in this city for a few days, has some personal recollections of the early career of Joe Smith, the founder of Mormonism.

Mrs. Doolittle is now seventy-five years old, and when she was seventeen years of age she was personally acquainted with Miss Emma Hale, who a short time afterward married the Mormon prophet. Emma was the daughter of Isaac Hale, who resided about a mile and a half this side of the present borough of Susquehanna, Mrs. Doolittle remembers her as a very pretty and amiable young lady, with fine accomplishments for that period of our inland history.

Mrs. Doolittle is the granddaughter of Benjamin McKune, another patrlochlal settler in Mr. Hale's neighborhood. Her parents resided, in Sullivan county, and she came to Susquehanna occasionally to visit her grand parents. That was long before the days of the Erie Railway, and before any well kept system of wagon roads or saddle paths, and people acquainted with the make-up of the country between Susquehanna and Sullivan county can well suppose that pleasure trips were not made frequently. Mrs. Doolittle was at Susquehanna sufficiently to become well acquainted with Miss Hale, but her marriage to the Mormon, the Mormon excitement and conversions in the neighborhood, and the emigration of the Prophet and his saints westward, she knows about only from the neighborhood legends.

The story is that Joe Smith came to the neighborhood to dig for money, and made several large excavations down into the ground. It was never known that his labors in that direction were rewarded. But while he was thus employed he became acquainted with Miss Hale. Her parents opposed the proposed marriage, and the young couple eloped to Windsor to be married.

They returned and settled down upon a farm adjoining the lands of Mr. Hale and Mr. McKune. There was already a small house upon the farm, a story and a half frame building, and Joe put on a small addition. The farm and house is now the property of Benjamin McKune, a grandson of Joseph McKune. This same McKune farm is again becoming somewhat famous in consequence of preparations to bore into it for oil a short distance from, the prophet's first domicile.

While Joe was upon his farm he had the Mormon Bible. Whether he professed to find it before or after his marriage Mrs. Doolittle does not remember. Her grandfather was once privileged to take in his hands a pillow-case in which the supposed saintly treasure was wrapped, and to feel through the cloth that it had leaves. From the size and weight of the book. Mr. McKune supposed that in dimensions it closely resembled an ordinary Bible in the print of those days.

Further up the river they have also reminiscences of Joe Smith, which continue Mrs. Doollttle's narrative. In the town of Afton, not far from the Broome county line, is a small lake nestled in the hills, and a portion of it is in sight of the Albany & Susquehanna Railroad. It is said that Joe Smith baptised his first Mormon converts there; and it is claimed that the Mormon Church was really begun there, instead of being founded at Manchester, Ontario county, the home of the Smith family, and where the first printed copies of the Mormon or Golden Bible were distributed about ten or twelve years after the prophet's first appearance in Susquehanna county to dig for money.


Note: The above report first appeared in the daily Binghampton Republican of March 29th. See its partial reprint in the Chenango Union of Apr. 12th for comments.

The  Mormon  Bible.
_______

The Lyons (Wayne county) Democratic Press in its last issue gives some interesting reminiscences concerning the printing of Joe Smith's famous "Gold bible," or the Book of Mormon. The book was printed at the office of the Wayne Sentinel, in Palmyra, owned by Egbert B. Grandin, and was completed in March, 1830. The job of printing it was paid for by a deluded follower of Joe Smith, Martin Harris by name, who lived on a farm, about one mile north of the village, in the town of Palmyra, which he owned and which he mortgaged for the sum of $3,000 to Mr. Grandin, to defray the expense of printing an edition of 5,000 gold bibles.

The press work was performed by J. H. Burtlee, and "Tom" McCauley the former doing the "pulling," and the latter the "beating." The work was done on a hand press, on paper manufactured at Shortsville, by Case & Brown -- size 22x32. At that time inking rollers were unknown, and the ink was applied to the forms by the dexterous use of "balls." Major Gilbert set the type for the work, from the manuscript of Lyman [sic - Oliver?] Cowdery, who acted as amanuensis to Joe Smith in its translation from the hieroglyphics inscribed upon the plates of gold -- whence the term "gold bible" originated. These characters baffled the skill of the most learned men of America (so said Smith, Harris & Co.), to whom samples were sent for translation; and could only be deciphered by the chosen prophet, Joe Smith, by the aid of a pecular stone found with the plates. This stone was placed in a hat, and the hat placed close before the face of the prophet, and on a table before him the mysterious golden plates.

The editor of the Democratic Press, Mr. Wm. Van Camp, was one of the "boys" in the office when the bible was printed, and he relates these facts from his own knowledge. He adds that while Harris was completely infatuated, and deluded into the belief of the Divinity of of the "lost history," his wife, Lucy, took no stock in it; and when her husband mortgaged his farm, she withheld her name from the obligation. She was a woman of good sense, and felt deeply humiliated at the conduct of her husband.


Notes: (forthcoming)

EARLY  DAYS  OF  MORMONISM.
________

The Binghamton Republican publishes some personal recollections of Mrs. Doolittle, a lady seventy-five years old, who is now visiting with her son-in-law, Chief of Police Johnson of that city. She was personally acquainted with the first wife of Joseph Smith, the Mormon prophet, Miss Emma Hale, whom he married near Susquehanna, Pa.

From her statement it appears that Joe came to the neighborhood of Susquehanna to dig for gold, and made several excavations for that purpose, but it never was known that his labors in that direction were rewarded. While thus employed he became acquainted with Miss Hale, whose parents opposed the proposed marriage, and the young people eloped to Windsor, where they were married.

They returned and settled down upon a farm adjoining the lands of Mr. Hale and Mr. McKune. There was already a small house upon the farm, a story and a half frame building, and Joe put on a small addition. The farm and the house is now the property of Benjamin McKune, a grandson of Joseph McKune. This same McKune farm is again becoming somewhat famous in consequence of preparations to bore into it for oil a short distance from the prophet's first domicile.

While Joe was upon his farm he had the Mormon Bible. Whether he professed to find it before or after marriage Mrs. Doolittle does not remember. Her grandfather was once privileged to take in his hands a pillowcase in which the supposed saintly treasure was wrapped, and to feel through the cloth that it had leaves. From the size and the weight of the book, Mr. McKune supposed that in dimensions it closely resembled an ordinary Bible in the print of those days.

Further up the river they have also reminiscences of Joe Smith, which continue Mrs. Doolittle's narrative. In the town Afton, Chenango County, not far from the Broome County line, is a small lake nestled in the hills, and a portion of it is in sight of the Albany and Susquehanna Railroad. It is said that Joe Smith baptized his first Mormon converts there; and it is claimed that the Mormon Church was really begun there, instead of being founded at Manchester, Ontario County, the home of the Smith family, and where the first printed copies of the Mormon or Golden Bible were distributed about ten or twelve years after the prophet's first apearance in Susquehanna County to dig for money.


Note: In the second edition of the first volume of his A New Witness for Christ, Francis W. Kirkham reproduces the Mehetable Doolittle recollections on pages 474-75, adding these comments: "One article of particular interest follows. It was written by Mrs. Doolittle, a lady seventy-five years old who claims to have been acquainted with Emma Hale, the wife of Joseph Smith. No mention is made of a trial of Joseph Smith.... Apparently the first printed account in New York state of an alleged trial of Joseph Smith before the "Book of Mormon" was printed is the article by W. D. Purple in 1877. As already noted, Oliver Cowdery states that Joseph Smith was arrested but mentions no trial." Kirkham thus attempts to use the 1877 Doolittle account as evidence supporting the Mormon contention that Joseph Smith was not brought before Justice Albert Neeley for a hearing in March of 1826. This sort of "evidence" is pratically useless, and its attempted application by Kirkham ignores totally the 1831 A. W. Benton letter and other relevent sources.

Joseph  Smith  The  Originator  of  Mormonism.
________

Historical  Reminiscences  of  the  town  of  Afton.
________

BY  W. D. PURPLE.
________

More than fifty years since, at the commencement of his professional career, the writer spent a year in the present village of Afton, in this County. It was then called South Bainbridge, and was in striking contrast with the present village at the same place. It was a mere hamlet, with one store and one tavern. The scenes and incidents of that early day are vividly engraven upon his memory, by reason of his having written them when they occurred, and by reason of his public and private rehearsals of them in later years. He will now present them as historical reminiscences of old Chenango, and as a precursor of the advent of that wonder of the age, Mormonism.

In the year 1825 we often saw in that quiet hamlet, Joseph Smith, Jr., the author of the Golden Bible, or the Books of Mormon. He was an inmate of the family of Deacon Isaiah [sic] Stowell, who resided some two miles below the village, on the Susquehanna. Mr. Stowell was a man of much force of character, of indomitable will, and well fitted as a pioneer in the unbroken wilderness that this country possessed at the close of the last century. He was one of the Vermont sufferers, who for defective titles, consequent on the forming a new State from a part of Massachusetts, in 1791, received wild lands in Bainbridge. He had been educated in the spirit of orthodox puritanism, and was officially connected with the first Presbyterian church of the town, organized by Rev. Mr. Chapin. He was a very industrious, exemplary man, and by severe labor and frugality had acquired surroundings that excited the envy of many of his loss fortunate neighbors. He had at this time grown up sons and daughters to share his prosperity and the honors of his name.

About this time he took upon himself a monomaniacal impression to seek for hidden treasures that he believed were buried in the earth. He hired help and repaired to Northern Pennsylvania, in the vicinity of Lanesboro, to prosecute his search for untold wealth, which he believed to be buried there. Whether it was the

"Ninety bare of gold
"And dollars many fold"

that Capt. Robert Kidd, the pirate of a preceding century, had despoiled the commerce of the world, we are not able to say, but that he took his help and provisions from home, and camped out on the black hills of that region for weeks at a time, was freely admitted by himself and family.

What success, if any, attended these excursions, is unknown, but his hallucination adhered to him like the fabled shirt of Nessus, and had entire control over his mental character. The admonition of his neighbors, the members of his church, and the importunities of his family, had no impression on his wayward spirit.

There had lived a few years previous to this date, in the vicinity of Great Bend, a poor man named Joseph Smith, who, with his family, had removed to the western part of the State, and lived in squalid poverty near Palmyra, in Ontario County. Mr. Stowell, while at Lanesboro, heard of the fame of one of his sons, named Joseph, who, by the aid of a magic stone had become a famous seer of lost or hidden treasures. These stories were fully received into his credulous mind, and kindled into a blaze his cherished hallucination. Visions of untold wealth appeared through this instrumentality, to his longing eyes. He harnessed his team, and filled his wagon with provisions for "man and beast," and started for the residence of the Smith family. In due time he arrived at the humble log-cabin, midway between Canandaigua and Palmyra, and found the sought for treasure in the person of Joseph Smith, Jr., a lad of some eighteen years of age. He, with the magic stone, was at once transferred from his humble abode to the more pretentious mansion of Deacon Stowell. Here, in the estimation of the Deacon, he confirmed his conceded powers as a seer, by means of the stone which he placed in his hat, and by excluding the light from all other terrestrial things, could see whatever he wished, even in the depths of the earth. This omniscient attribute he firmly claimed. Deacon Stowell and others, as firmly believed it. Mr., Stowell, with his ward and two hired men, who were, or professed to be, believers, spent much time in mining near the State line on the Susquehanna and many other places, I myself have seen the evidences of their nocturnal depredations on the face of Mother Earth, on the Deacon's farm, with what success "this deponent saith not."

In February 1826, the sons of Mr. Stowell, who lived with their father, were greatly incensed against Smith, as they plainly saw their father squandering his property in the fruitless search for hidden treasures, and saw that the youthful seer had unlimited control over the illusions of their sire. They made up their minds that "patience had ceased to a virtue," and resolved to rid themselves and their family from this incubus, who, as they believed, was eating up their substance, and depriving them of their anticipated patrimony. They caused the arrest of Smith as a vagrant, without visible means of livelihood. The trial came on in the above mentioned month, before Albert Neeley, Esq., the father of Bishop Neeley, of the State of Maine. I was an intimate friend of the Justice, and was invited to take notes of the trial, which I did. There was a large collection of persons in attendance, and the proceedings attracted much attention.

The affidavits of the sons were read, and Mr. Smith was fully examined by the Court. It elicited little but a history of his life from early boyhood, but this is so unique in character, and so much of a key-note to his subsequent career in the world, I am tempted to give it somewhat in entenso. He said when he was a lad, he heard of a neighboring girl some three miles from him, who could look into a glass and see anything however hidden from others; that he was seized with a strong desire to see her and her glass; that after much effort he induced his parents to let him visit her. He did so, and was permitted to look in the glass, which was placed in a hat to exclude the light. He was greatly surprised to see but one thing, which was a small stone, a great way off. It soon became luminous, and dazzled his eyes, and after a short time it became as intense as the mid-day sun. He said that the stone was under the roots of a tree or shrub as large as his arm, situated about a mile up a small stream that puts in on the South side of Lake Erie, not far from the Now York and Pennsylvania line. He often had an opportunity to look in the glass, and with the same result. The luminous stone alone attracted his attention. This singular circumstance occupied his mind for some years, when he left his father's house, and with his youthful zeal traveled west in search of this luminous stone.

He took a few shillings in money and some provisions with him. He stopped on the road with a farmer, and worked three days, and replenished his means of support. After traveling some one hundred and fifty miles he found himself at the mouth of the creek. He did not have the glass with him, but he knew its exact location. He borrowed an old ax and a hoe, and repaired to the tree. With some labor and exertion he found the stone, carried it to the creek, washed and wiped it dry, sat down on the bank, placed it in his hat, and discovered that time, place and distance were annihilated; that all intervening obstacles were removed, and that he possessed one of the attributes of Deity, an All-Seeing-Eye. He arose with a thankful heart, carried his tools to their owner, turned his feet towards the rising sun, and sought with weary limbs his long deserted home.

On the request of the Court, he exhibited the stone. It was about the size of a small hen' a egg, in the shape of a high-instepped shoe. It was composed of layers of different colors passing diagonally through it. It was very hard and smooth, perhaps by being carried in the pocket.

Joseph Smith, Sr., was present, and sworn as a witness. He confirmed, at great length all that his son had said in his examination. He delineated his characteristics in his youthful days -- his vision of the luminous stone in the glass -- his visit to Lake Erie in search of the stone -- and his wonderful triumphs as a seer. He described very many instances of his finding hidden and stolen goods. He swore that both he and his son were mortified that this wonderful power which God had so miraculously given him should be used only in search of filthy lucre, or its equivalent in earthly treasures, and with a long-faced, "sanctimonious seeming," he said his constant prayer to his Heavenly Father was to manifest His will concerning this marvelous power. He trusted that the Son of Righteousness would some day illumine the heart of the boy, and enable him to see His will concerning him. These words have ever had a strong impression on my mind. They seemed to contain a prophetic vision of the future history of that mighty delusion of the present century, Mormonism. The "old man eloquent," with his lank and haggard vissage -- his form very poorly clad -- indicating a wandering vagabond rather than an oracle of future events, has, in view of those events, excited my wonder, if not my admiration.

The next witness called was Deacon Isaiah Stowell. He confirmed all that is said above in relation to himself, and delineated many other circumstances not necessary to record. He swore that the prisoner possessed all the power he claimed, and declared he could see things fifty feet below the surface of the earth, as plain as the witness could see what was on the Justices' table, and described very many circumstances to confirm his words. Justice Neeley soberly looked at the witness, and in a solemn, dignified voice said: "Deacon Stowell, do I understand you as swearing before God, under the solemn oath you have taken, that you believe the prisoner can see by the aid of the stone fifty feet below the surface of the earth; as plainly as you can see what is on my table?" "Do I believe it?" says Deacon Stowell; "do I believe it? No, it is not a matter of belief: I positively know it to be true."

Mr. Thompson, an employee of Mr. Stowell, was the next witness. He and another man were employed in digging for treasure, and always attended the Deacon and Smith in their nocturnal labors. He could not assert that anything of value was ever obtained by them. The following scene was described by this witness, and carefully noted: Smith had told the Deacon that very many years before a band of robbers had buried on his flat a box of treasure, and as it was very valuable they had by a sacrifice placed a charm over it to protect it, so that it could not be obtained except by faith, accompanied by certain talismanic influences. So, after arming themselves with fasting and prayer, they sallied forth to the spot designated by Smith. Digging was commenced with fear and trembling, in the presence of this imaginary charm. In a few feet from the surface the box of treasure was struck by the shovel. on which they redoubled their energies, but it gradually receded from their grasp. One of the men placed his hand upon the box, but it gradually sunk from his reach, After some five feet in depth had been attained without success, a council of war, against this spirit of darkness was called, and they resolved that the lack of faith, or of some untoward mental emotions was the cause of their failure.

In this emergency the fruitful mind of Smith was called on to devise a way to obtain the prize. Mr. Stowell went to his flock and selected a fine vigorous lamb, and resolved to sacrifice it to the demon spirit who guarded the coveted treasure. Shortly after the venerable Deacon might be seen on his knees at prayer near the pit, while Smith, with a lantern in one hand to dispel the midnight darkness, might be seen making a circuit around the spot, sprinkling the flowing blood from the lamb upon the ground, as a propitiation to the spirit that thwarted them. They then descended the excavation, but the treasure still receded from their grasp, and it was never obtained.

What a picture for the pencil of a Hogarth! How difficult to believe it could have been enacted in the nineteenth century of the Christian era! It could have been done only by the hallucination of diseased minds, that drew all their philosophy from the Arabian nights and other kindred literature of that period! But as it was declared under oaths in a Court of Justice, by one of the actors in the scene, and not disputed by his co-laborers it is worthy of recital as evincing the spirit of delusion that characterized those who originated that prince of humbugs, Mormonism.

These scenes occurred some four years before Smith, by the aid of his luminous stone, found the Golden Bible, or the Book of Mormon. The writer may at some subsequent day give your readers a chapter on its discovery, and a synopsis of its contents. It is hardly necessary to say that, as the testimony of Deacon Stowell could not be impeached, the prisoner was discharged, and in a few weeks left the town.

Greene, April 28, 1877.


Note: William D. Purple (1803-1886) was the son of Edward V. Purple (1769-1834) and Lydia (Conway) Cowdery (1757-1856). Lydia was the daughter of Thomas Cowdery and Mary Anderson. William D. Purple's grandfather, Nathaniel Cowdery, was also the grandfather of William Cowdery, Jr., the father of Oliver Cowdery. Several related members of the Cowdery family lived in the Colesville area of Chenango Co., NY when William D. Purple resided there. He later moved a few miles west to Greene, in the same county. see more notes here

THE  DECAY  OF  MORMONISM.
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The death of Brigham Young occurs at a time and under circumstances almost certain to precipitate a crisis among the Mormons, They are not naturally a harmonious or homogeneous body, and there is much in their peculiar faith and practices whose natural tendency is towards disintegration. Their whole history, up to the last fifteen years, was a remarkable and unbroken series of fraud, rapacity, internal and external dissension, defiance of civil and moral law, a perpetual scandal to the denomination itself, and to the communities which tolerated its presence. In its past we may read its immediate future. There is likely to be one marked distinction, however, between the past and the future of Mormonism. In its early days the State governments of Illinois and Missouri on the one hand, and the national government on the other, dealt with Mormon crimes and Mormon pretensions in a pusilanimous, temporizing and altogether disgraceful way. The sect flourished, spritually and temporally, upon the imbecility of a government which tolerated its crimes and left its leaders unpunished. It is not likely to have any more such nutriment.

Joseph Smith, Jr., the founder of the Church of the Latter Day Saints, was an impostor, a knave, a sensualist, and a grossly ignorant man withal. He had read of Mahomet, and set out to imitate him. Lacking the genius of Mahmet, he stole the "Book of Mormon" from the manuscript of a man who attempted by an acknowledged fiction, to trace the American Indians to a Hebrew origin. The fraud was too clumsy to be concealed for an hour; but the history of the whole world is proof that no fraud is too glaring for religious fanatics, when engineered by skillful rogues. After Smith's exploits in fraudulent banking, after he was tarred and feathered by his indignant victims, after another fraudulent bank had failed, and its founder had fled from justice, to find it at length at the hands of another mob, Joseph Smith was made the "God of this generation" of the Mormons, and his immediate superior in their spiritual calender is Christ. No more accomolished villain ever lived in this country; and the catalogue of the crimes that have been had at his door embraces them all.

The late Brigham Young was well qualified to become the successor of such a man as Smith. His death would discover some virtue in him, if there were any there. Young was as ignorant as Smith and as audacious and soulless. But he was more skillful, both in the management of men and affairs. Smith was continually beset by "schisms" as he called them, that is to say, by quarrels with his "apostles" over the division of the spoils and the direction of affairs. Time after time he was pronounced an arrant fraud and criminal, by affidavits of his chosen saints. He had the energy necessary to conquer them all. Young, in addition to equal energy, has had the adroitness, yoked with the force and individuality, to suppress insubordination, and to rule his church with the iron hand of a despot. He is but one of three, who together, under the system of Mormon government, constitute the presidency. Young's companions have been George A. Smith and Daniel H. Wells, but they have shared his authority only in name. After them has come a long hierarchy of apostles, patriarchs, priests and elders modeled somewhat after the Hebrew forms. Thus the discordant and unorganized mass which in 1846 fled from Illinois... obeying one head, responsive to one will, kept under by a religious fanaticism strangely akin to worldly avarice and phenomenonally nursed by the man who is now dead.

It is twenty-eight years since President Fillmore committed his great error in judgment and made Brigham Young the first Governor of the newly erected Territory of Utah. It is twenty years since President Buchanan sent a new Governor and new judges, backed by an army of United States troops, to assert the authority of the federal government in the territory and bring the defiant Brigham Toung to terms. Then was the time for the government to have dealt summarily with Mormonism. It was a case of rebellion, pure and simple. Young was guilty of treason, and it was the most flagrant case the country had known since the foundation of the government. The Buchanan administration, [----ing] the imbecility which became more conspicous when a greater rebellion broke out, compromised with the rebels, hobnobbed with the heads of the church, and Mormonism, by surrendering the shadow of civil power in the territory, retained its substance, and has continued to retain it until recently....

We shall now learn what twenty years of absolute supremacy of this remarkable man has been able to do for Mormonism. He has not lifted it above the grossness with which Joseph Smith invested it; that we know. Whether he has been able to make its religion any more real, its creeds any less depraved, its regard for authority any more complete, we shall know. But to give to Mormonism a self perpetuating cohesiveness, was not in the power of Brigham Young, or of any human being. For the basis of his church is a crime and a fraud, and its superstructure is honeycombed with weaknesses and wickedness. It will perish from the face of the earth; and men will soon marvel that such a monstrosity was able to call itself a religion and to be the companion of our civilization.


Note: The writer is mistaken in saying that, "After Smith's exploits in fraudulent banking, after he was tarred and feathered by his indignant victims...", which give the reader the impression that Joseph Smith was tarred and feathered by "indignant victims" of the 1837 Kirtland bank failure, or some other "fraudulent banking" episode in early Mormon history. The 1832 tarring and feathering at Hiram, Ohio, was not related to any unfortunate "banking" schemes.

THE  MORMON  BIBLE.

The Origin of Mormonism.

Remarkable local testimony has been discovered by the Republican sustaining the charge that the religion of Joe Smith and Brigham Young had its origin in a romance written by Rev. Solomon Spaulding of Ohio of half a century or more ago. the story is furnished by Mr. J. A. McKinstry of Longmeadow, a son of the late Dr. McKinstry of Monson, and grandson of Rev. Mr. Spaulding. Mr. McKinstry is employed in the Main street store of Newsdealer Brace. Rev. Mr. Spaulding's widow, who afterward became Mrs. Davison, came east from Ohio to live with her daughter at Monson many years ago, bringing the manuscript of his romance with her. She died some twenty-five years ago, but before her death a plausible young man from Boston came to Monson to see and get the Spaulding writing. It was a time of considerable excitement concerning the Mormons, and he claimed to represent some Christian people who wanted to expose Mormonism, He therefore begged the loan of the manuscript for publication. Much against the wishes of Mrs. Dr. McKinstry, Mrs. Davison consented to let her husband's unpublished romance go. Nothing was ever heard from it again, and the family have always considered that the bland young gentleman was an agent of Brigham Young's to destroy the convicting evidence that Joe Smith's Mormon Bible was of earthly origin.

The story of how Rev. Mr. Spaulding came to prepare his romance, which Mr. McKinstry remembers as a child to have seen, is fresh and interesting. He was out of the active ministry in Ohio -- the name of the place Mr. McKinstry does not recollect, but it was near Palmyra, we believe -- running a small iron foundry, and being a man of literary tastes, employed his leisure moments in weaving a romance. It was a time when the work of the mound-builders was creating wild interest, the implements of cookery and war being unearthed showing the existence of a forgotten race. This furnished the inspiration for the chronicles of the story-writer. He entitled his production "Manuscript Found," the idea being that the romance woven by the ex-preacher was dug up out of one of the mounds in the region. It was a history of ancient America, not all written at once, but as leisure spells and the fancy fell to him Mr. Spaulding would add to it. His writing was no secret in the neighborhood. In that then frontier region, with few opportunities for literary enjoyment. Rev. Mr. Spaulding was prevailed upon to read his production to his neighbors as it progressed. It was written in Bible phraseology, and made as quaintly olden as possible, so as to carry out the conceit of its alleged mound origin. Among the attentive listeners at these readings were Joe Smith and Sidney Rigdon, the same who founded Mormonism. Not only did Smith hear the manuscript read, but on one occasion, as Mrs. Davison frequently testified before her death, he borrowed it for a week or so, giving as a reason that he wanted to read it to his family, who had been unable to attend on Mr. Spaulding's readings. Not long afterward it will be remembered, Smith claimed that an angel had revealed to him the existence of a buried history of aboriginal America, the plates of which it is alleged were dug up, and the book of Mormon made as a translation of their inscriptions. the widow of Mr. Spaulding and her daughter, Mrs. Dr. McKinstry of Monson, compared the Smith Bible with the parson's romance, and they were essentially the same. The similarity was so overwhelming as to leave no doubt that Smith copied in full Rev. Mr. Spaulding's writing, and made out of it bodily his divine "revelation."   Springfield (Mass.) Republican.

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BRIGHAM  YOUNG.
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Full Description or the Mormon Prophet's Funeral.
_______

His Directions Strictly Carried Out.
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No Mourning to be Bought or Tears Shed....
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BRIGHAM YOUNG'S  FUNERAL.

A dispatch from Salt Lake City, Utah, says that the funeral of Brigham Young on Sunday was an impressive demonstration. Nearly 19,000 persons saw the corpse while it was lying in state. It was arrayed in endowment robes. The coffin was of California red wood without ornament, and the lining of white satin. The corpse rested on a wool mattress.

ARRANGEMENTS  PRESCRIBED  BY  HIMSELF.

The arrangements were all in accordance with written instructions given by Brigham Young in 1873, which instructions were read at the funeral.

He desired that the body should be made clean and kept from one to four days; that the coffin be of red wood, two inches longer than the body and three inches wider, with a canopy top giving the appearance of his being able to turn over if he desired; that he rest on a cotton bed and be dressed in his tomplo robes; that the females of the family buy no black to wear at the funeral, but they could wear such if they had it, and that the males wear no crape; that the services consist of singing and prayer, and if friends desired to speak a few words they be at liberty to do so; that the body be carried on a bier to the southeast corner of his private burying ground, on a hill east of the Lion House, and deposited in a cut stone vault covered with slabs and earth, then roofed over, and there he desired to rest until the resurrection.

He desired no obe to cry or exhibit signs of grief.

If he lived until the saints went to Jackson county, Missouri, he wished to go with them and be burled there; otherwise as above. These instructions were signed and ordered read at the funeral.

THE  CEREMONIES.

From 9 o'clock the organ had been playing "The Dead March in Saul," Mendelssohn's funeral march and a march composed for the occasion by a Mormon. Geo. Q. Cannon was master of ceremonies, and at noon announced the hymn "Hark from Afar," which was sung by the Tabernacle choir of two hundred and twenty voices. The opening prayer was by Apostlo Richards, a hymn was then sung and brief addresses were made by David H. Wells, Apostles Woodruff, Snow, Cannon and Taylor.

IN  THE  TABERNACLE.

Ten tiers of seats in front of the stand in the Tabernacle were occupied by the family and relatives of the deceased. John W. Young, Daniel H. Wells, Brigham Young, Jr., and George Q. Cannon were in the upper stand. The ten apostles were next below, aud the high council still lower. Not less than twelve thousand persons were in the building.

THE  ADDRESSES.

The speakers confined themselves to laudations of Brigham Young and exhortations to the saints to remember and obey his counsels to proceed with the erection of the Temple, the foundation for which has been laid. A hymn composed for the occasion and the benediction by Orson Hyde, closed the ceremonies.

THE  FAM1LY.

At [1:30] o'clock the family gazed for the last time on the corpse. All the wives and children, with a few exceptions, were present, and many scores of grandchildren and relatives more distant. The demonstrations of grief were few though all seemed sad.

THE  PROCESSION.

The procession then formed and marched to the cemotery, half a mile distant. Forty thousand persons were in line with uncovered heads.

AT  THE  GRAVE.

The ceremonies at the grave were brief, there being only hymns and prayers. Brigbam's first wife stood by the grave some time, leaning on the arm of Amelia, the favorite. Spectators were allowed to pass the tomb, after which it was closed and sealed.

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BRIGHAM'S  APOSTATE  SON.
______

John W. Young Reclaimed to the Mormon Faith.

John W. Young, Brigham's apostate son, who renounced polygamy several years ago along with two wives to marry a handsome Philadelphia widow, has been lured back into the polygamist fold once more by the charms of one of his brother's widows, a daughter of Mrs. Stenhouse, who is now lecturing against Mormonism. Clara Stenhouse is the only member of her family that still clings to that religion, and she is so bigoted and fanatical that for a long time after her parents, apostatized she refused to even speak to them, and treated them with the utmost contempt. John Young is the youngest child of the prophet's legal wife, and is the smartest and has seen more of the outside world than any other of Brigham's children. He is a shrewd business man, a railroad magnate in a small way; and has been a very frequent operator in Wall Street. Ula contact with the Gentiles in his long and frequent visits to the large eastern cities has not tended to increase his faith in Mormontom, and it has long been well known that be only remainsin the church for the emoluments which his father's position afforded him. Of course, tbcae privileges, including the handling of church tithing, were very convenient, but otherwise he had no belief in the doctrines of this gigantic religious fraud. Like the majority of prominent Mormons, John W. embraced polygamy, but for several years he been been a monogamist. His first wife was from Philadelphia, and it was while on a visit to her relatives that he met the woman for whom he discarded both first and second wives. He was a handsome, attractive man, and she a dashing young widow, and it seems it was a desperate case of love at first sight. She knew very well about his matrimonial entanglements, at his first wife was her own cousin. but that did not prevent her accompanying him to Utah under promise to marry him after their arrival if he would discard the other wives, which he accordingly did. This new marriage of course puts out of joint the nose of the monopolising Philadelphia wife, but the popular verdict is that it served her right, as she came out to Utah with the calm determination of betraying her own cousin by defrauding her of her husband, and carried her point with dogged pertinacity. She was an Eastern born and educated girl, had already been once married, and could not find shelter under the excuse that she was rained in Mormonlam and had been taught that polygamy was right. She may, perhaps, have loved John W., but most people believe that her course was actuated by pure selfishness.


Note: See the New Haven Palladium of Sept. 3, 1877 for notes on a lengthier version of the McKinstry item.

DEATH  OF  BRIGHAM  YOUNG.

This great disgrace to modern civilisation died on Wednesday afternoon at Salt Lake City. He was born at Whittingham, Vermont June 1st, 1801, and was, therefore, a trifle over 76 years of age. His early calling was that of a painter and glazier. In 1832 he went to Ohio and joined the Mormons at Kirtland, on the shore of Lake Erie, a few miles west of Cleveland.

The vicissitudes of the Mormons up to that date had been of a peculiar nature. Joseph Smith, the founder, was the junior by several years of Brigham Young, the great developer and final chief of the sect. Smith was born in Vermont; but moved in early childhood to Palmyra, Wayne county, in this state. The family avoided honest labor and were addicted to drunkenness and the visionary pursuit of hidden treasure -- and Joseph was the worst of the tribe. When he was about 15 he was taken with a sudden attack of "visions," and during one of these spells of lunacy he claimed the discovery of the "Book of Mormon," which he dictated from behind a curtain, while others wrote the precious words as they fell from his lips.

The "Book of Mormon," we may remark en passant, was based upon -- and to a great degree copied from -- a romance written by Solomon Spaulding, who was born in Ashford, Conn., in 1761; graduated at Dartmouth College; preached for a number of years and then became engaged in mercantile pursuits in Cherry Valley, N. Y.; removed to Conneaut Ohio, thence to Pittsburg, and from that city to Amity, Pennsylvania, where he died in 1816. His romance was based upon a theory, then quite prevalent, that the Indians are the descendants of the Lost Tribes ot Israel. In 1812 Spaulding left this manuscript at a printing office in Pittsburg for publication. Sidney Rigdon was connected with the office and copied the manuscript. Rigdon then left the office and commenced to preach his peculiar doctrines. In 1829 he met Joseph Smith and the two proceeded to adapt and alter Spaulding's manuscript so that it became the Mormon Bible. Spaulding [sic! - Mrs. Spalding?] recognised his manuscript after the Bible was published.

Rigdon and Smith commenced their partnership by announcing that the millennium was at hand and that the Saints were about to assemble at some place in the interior of the continent to be known as the "New Jerusalem." Other doctrines of the Mormon Bible were shaped to conform with some of the doctrinal questions which were agitating the villages of Western New York about that date (1830). Infant baptism and polygamy were condemned. Freemasonry was denounced; although Smith and his leading followers afterwards became Freemasons and organised their Church in imitation of the system of degrees of that order.

A few of Rigdon's [sic - Smith's?] previous followers from Manchester and Fayelte, N. Y., joined the Mormons at Kirtland in 1831. Brigham Young came as a convert in 1832. His Yankee shrewdness made him so prominent that in 1885, he was ordained one of the new order of "The Twelve Apostles" and was sent to the east to proselyte. Smith and Rigdon were tarred and feathered in 1832 and were obliged to flee to Missouri in 1838 on account of irregnlarities in business transactions. In Missouri they found a number of lawless Mormons and so dangerous to safety were they oonsidered, that the militia was called out against them. A compromise was effected by the agreement of the Mormons to leave Missouri.

We next hear of Smith and his followers at Nanvoo, Illinois. The Legialatare of that State gave them unlimited privileges which they were not slow to use to their own advantage. A military colony was organized and the Mormons might have remained in that locality to this day had not Smith -- on the 12th of July, 1843 -- received a revelation authorising polygamy. This so incensed some of his followers that they withdrew and started a paper -- The Expositor -- for the sake of exposing both himself and Rigdon. A party of Mormons under Smith attacked the Expositor office and destroyed it. Warrants were issued for the arrest of Smith and others. The Mormons drove the constable out of Nauvoo and civil war became imminent. Smith was persuaded to stand a trial, but a mob broke Into the jail and he was shot on the 27th of June, 1844.

Rigdon aspired to be the successor of Smith; but Young was elected to that office, and Rigdon being contumacious, was cut oft from fellowship. The charter of the [city of] Nauvoo having been repealed by the Legislature of Illinois, it became as necessary for the Mormons to move once more. In 1846 they gathered at Council Bluffs, Iowa, having been driven from Nauvoo at the cannon's mouth. Then commenced a two years' migration over the plains to Salt Lake City -- a State having been organised under the name of "Deseret."

Of Brigham Young's subsequent acts and his conflicts with the United States government, it is not necessary to speak. On the 29th of August, 1852, he introduced polygamy as a divine institution. From that time his hold upon the Mormons became more and more grasping. He was a man of indomitable will, and was gifted with a most impressive eloquence. His talents for organization and for business shrewdness were of the most decided character. With his death the power of Mormonism becomes broken; and although the prophet not long since sought to perpetuate his name and dynasty by the appointment of his son as his succceror, yet the indications are that the hetrogenuous elements of the organisation will soon fly in pieces. Such a consummation is devoutly to be wished by all who believe that slavery and Polygamy are the twin relics of barbarism.


Notes: (forthcoming)

==> Sidney Rigdon, whom Brigham Young unceremoniously deposed from the Presidency of the Mormons at Nauvoo, after Jo Smith was killed in 1844, has since resided in a very unpretending manner at Friendship, Allegheny County, in this State. A tall, erect old gentleman, verging upon eighty, and very dignified, he could have been seen but a few years ago, on pleasant days slowly and thoughtfully moving about the streets of that village. When drawn into conversation he was found both intelligent and interesting. Those who have heard him in his younger days say that his natural gifts of oratory were of the first order. He established the society of Mormons at Kirtland, in Ohio, and stood next in power to Smith at the time of the latter's death. He died about two years ago.


Notes: (forthcoming)

The Springfield, Mass. Republican narrates a story concerning the origin of the "Book of Mormon," on which the huge imposture of Mormonism was founded. It professes to have found evidence that the "Book of Mormon" was founded on a romance written by the Rev. Mr. Spaulding, of Palmyra [sic], about ancient America, which he entitled "Manuscript Found." Joe Smith and Sidney Rigdon borrowed the manuscript story, and from it constructed the Mormon Scriptures, pretended to be found inscribed on plates of gold. The Cleveland Herald says the story told by the Springfield Republican was published at much greater length in a volume by Mr. Howe, issued at Painesville, O., forty years ago under the name of "Mormonism Unveiled," the evidence of the fraud perpetrated by Smith and Rigdon being conclusive.

---

The new Mormon President and Prophet, John Taylor, is an Englishman. He has been one of the twelve Mormon Apostles for some years. Formerly he was the editor of The Mormon, in New York City, which prospered until immigration fell off. He was always a favorite of Brigham Young. When Joe Smith was killed at Nauvoo, Taylor was severely wounded by a gun shot.


Note: The Spalding article also appeared in the Oswego Daily Times of Sept 14th and the Cleveland, NY, Lakeside Press of the 22nd.

Arrest  of  a  Mormon  Murderer.

The Herald's Salt Lake despatch reports the indictment and arrest of Orin Porter Rockwell, the notorious Mormon murderer and chief the Danites, for participation in the Aiken Massacre in 1858. Rockwell was the ready tool of the Mormon leaders. He was accused in 1840 of tho attempted assassination of Gov. Lilburn W. Boggs, of Missouri. It is believed that Rockwell and associates murdered Secretary Almon W. Babbitt and companions on the plains in 1857. The massacre of a party of apostate Mormons is also laid to his charge. Several additional murders are imputed to him. He promises to make a confession.


Notes: (forthcoming)

The Book of Mormon.
______

BY REV. TRYON EDWARDS, D. D.
PHILADELPHIA.

(read original article from Boston paper)

Notes: (forthcoming)

Deacon Stowell's Gold.
_____

Hunting for Hidden, Treasures with Joe Smith in Anti-Mormon Days --
The Sinful Rites into which a Good Presbyterian Farmer was
Led by Thirst for Riches.
_____

From the New York World.

Half a century ago there lived on a farm in Afton, Chenango county, then called South Bainbridge, a good settler named Isaiah [sic - Josiah?] Stowell. He was strait and strong in dogma, and filled the responsible position of Deacon in the Presbyterian Church to the edification of all people. By hard work and frugality Deacon Stowell accumulated a moderate competency, and his large family of broad-shouldered sons and rosy-cheeked daughters were the envy of the neighborhood. But like many other good men the Deacon had his little weakness, and would make haste to get rich. There was no Stock Exchange in those days or he might have "gone broke" on Jersey Central. As it was he contented himself with the faith (and practice) that untold sums of gold had been hidden the earth by extinct tribes of Indians or highwaymen or something of the sort, that it was to be his especial good luck to find all this gold. Northern Pennsylvania, near Lanesboro and Susquehanna, was believed by him to be the gold-bearing region, and with assistants and proper tools he made frequent journeys to the wild country about Starrucca Creek and spent weeks in delving in the rocky mountain sides at the rise of the Blue Ridge range. During his searches Deacon Stowell and his party camped put in the woods, living upon the provisions he brought from home in the fertile Chenango Valley and the game that filled the region in abundance. The concealed wealth that occupied his sleeping and waking thoughts he never found, but his constant failure and fresh outlays of money did not dampen his ardor. His family and the members of his church remonstrated with him, to no purpose.

It was during one of his digging excursions near Lanesboro that Deacon Stowell heard of the remarkable powers which Joseph Smith, a young fellow who had lived near Great Bend, about twenty miles south on the Susquehanna river, was reputed to possess. Smith, it was said, could see objects which lay fifty feet below the surface of the earth with entire distinctness. At this time, however, his father, a poverty-stricken man, had removed with his family from Great Bend to the neighborhood of Palmyra, N.Y., and left only the fame of the son behind. But the stories told by the country folks were enough to fire the imagination of crazy Deacon Stowell, and he was determined to have the assistance of young Smith at all odds. Stocking a wagon, with enough provisions to last him for the journey, the Deacon harnessed a team and started for Palmyra. Young Joe Smith, who afterwards became the Mormon Prophet, was at this time about twenty years old, the neighbors looked upon him as ungodly and to be avoided. His spare moments were occupied in meditation, and he very rarely joined his boyish acquaintances in their, rustic sports. He pretended to possess the power of second sight, and had hesitation in saying that he had been brought into the world by God to work out certain plans of the Almighty on earth. It is said that he was regular at his meals, however arduous his solitary wrestlings in spirit, and his pre-occupation probably had a good deal to do with his father's property.

Crazy Deacon Stowell became Smith's disciple at once, and Smith told him the story of a wonderful stone he had found. According to this story Smith, when quite a boy, heard of a young girl living within few miles of his father's house, who possessed a magic glass, by looking into which she could see objects that were invisible to others. Young Joe was seized with an irresistable desire to see this wonderful glass, and obtained that boon. The glass was put into a hat to exclude the light, and the boy gazed. For a long time he saw nothing, but finally a speck appeared which assumed the proportions of a small stone, seemingly a long way off. The stone grew brighter and brighter, until it finally glowed, like a calcium light or -- since this was 1820 -- like the sun at noon-day. At last the glass showed him that the stone was hidden under the roots of a small tree near a small stream on the south side of Lake Erie, not far from the boundary line between New York and Pennsylvania. Often afterwards Smith looked in the glass, seeing only the same sight, and, after thinking and pondering on the subject for several years, determined to find the stone. Equipped with a few shillings in cash and a bundle of provisions, he started on foot towards the West. When money and food gave out he supported himself by working at farmers' houses on the way until he was able to renew his travels. After walking one hundred and fifty miles he found himself at the month of a creek which he remembered seeing in the glass. A farmer lent him a pick and shovel, and he soon found the tree and the magic stone. The latter he carried to the creek, washed the dirt from its smooth surface and gazed "into" it. To his great joy he found that he was possessed of an all-seeing eye, whose vision penetrated water and annihilated space. The stone was of the size of a hen's egg, curved in the same shape of a high instepped shoe, and was composed of layers of different colors, passing diagonally; through it. Joseph returned his borrowed tools, and with glad heart turned towards the rising sun and walked home.

The good Deacon used his powers of entreaty so well that young Smith agreed to return with him and aid in the search for gold. Meantime Deacon Stowell purchased a farm at Susquehanna and moved his family there from Afton. The young prophet was installed therein not exactly to the satisfaction of the other members of the family. Smith, by the aid of the magic stone, ascertained that many years before, a band of robbers had buried a box of treasure in certain flat lands on the Deacon's farm. To protect this treasure, Smith said the robbers had by sacrifice laid a charm upon it, so that it could not be recovered except by faith and certain talismanic influences. The diggers prepared themselves for work by fasting and prayer for several days. Smith assured the Deacon that it was utterly useless for him to begin digging without an absolute faith that the labor would be successful. When the Deacon had banished all doubts the party went to work with awe in the presence of the charm. A few feet from the surface a shovel in the hands of the Deacon touched a hard substance, and hastily throwing back the dirt he discovered the top of a square wooden chest, bound with hoops of iron. But while Smith, Stowell, and his assistant, one Thompson, were gazing with awe and wonder on the sight, the box gradually sank in the ground and was soon gone. They dug and uncovered it again, and it disappeared again. This was kept up till it ceased to be amusing, and Smith was called upon to dispel the charm. He gave Deacon Stowell some instructions. The latter, sending his Presbyterian training to the winds, went to his stock yard and selected an ewe lamb, the finest in the fold, with pure white skin and fleece. It was washed until it was perfectly spotless. Meantime darkness had settled down over the Susquehanna Valley and the rites for the propitiation of the demon who guarded the treasure were carried on by the light of a single lantern. The lamb was brought to the edge of the pit, and a bowl placed in readiness to catch its blood. The Deacon got upon his knees and prayed, probably to the demon, while Smith drew the sacrificial butcher-knife across the lamb's throat, and then moved in circles about the pit, sprinkling the blood around it. Then the party resumed their picks and shovels, but couldn't even find the top of the box any more.

Deacon Stowell and Joe Smith kept up this circus in various promising places for a while, but the Deacon never got any hidden treasure, and slowly but surely was spending the competence he had amassed. His sons became very much incensed against Smith, alleging, that ho had unlimited control over the actions of their father and caused him to foolishly squander his property. In February, 1826, the sons caused Joe's arrest as a vagrant, and the trial occurred before Albert Neely, Esq., father of Bishop Neely, of Maine. The country folks for miles around attended the trial. The affidavits of the sons were read, and the prophet was put upon the stand. He testified to but little concerning the charge on which he was arrested, but gave the history of his youthful days, told about the finding of the magic stone, and claimed to possess all the powers which the infatuated Deacon believed to reside in him. The magic stone was exhibited in court. Joseph Smith, Sr., the father of the prophet, who is described as having been a most disreputable [looking] person, testified in his son's behalf, describing his wonderful success as a seer. Deacon Stowell also testified in the prophet's behalf, and gave many circumstances corroborative of the supernatural powers possessed by the young man. Young Smith, he said, could, see things fifty feet below the surface of the ground as plainly as he could see the articles on the Judge's table.

"Deacon Stowell, do understand you as swearing before God, under the solemn oath you have taken, that you believe that?"

"Do I believe it" was the reply. "Do I believe it? No; it is not a matter of belief, I positively know it is true."

Thompson, one of the employees of Deacon Stowell, related the story of the mysterious sinking, of the box told above. Smith was discharged mainly on the testimony of Deacon Stowell, and he continued to reside in the neighborhood. About four years after, it is said, Smith, by the aid of his magic stone, found" the Book of Mormon. This Elder Pratt, of the Mormon Church, says was when he was but fourteen years old, but the people of Susquehanna say he was nearer twenty-five.


Note: The greater part of the above account is simply a paraphrase of W. D. Purple's May, 1877 article, published in the Norwich Chenango Union. The journalist at the New York World adds a few words of embellishment to Purple's story, but nothing so substantial, as to indicate reference to any independent source (such as A. W. Benton's 1831 letter or the hearing transcript published in the Feb. 1873 issue of Fraser's Magazine).

A  DEFENSE  OF  THE  MORMON  BIBLE.

BOOK  OF  MORMON.
______

The Aged Man Who Printed its First Copy Tells
Story of Interest.

Major J. H. Gilbert, of Palmyra, N. Y., is in the city on a visit to his son, Charles T. Gilbert, of Nevia & Mills. He is a printer; was formerly proprietor of the Wayne Sentinel, and is the man who set up the Mormon Bible from the original manuscript. It was the custom of the printers, as the sheets were run through iho press, to take one of each form for preservation. Major Gilbert did this, and now has with him in this city the unbound sheets of the Mormon Bible, as he then took them from the press. These he cheerfully exhibits to any person who has a curiosity to look at them. The book was a quarto of 580 pages. The coutents were subdivided into chapters, broken into frequent paragraphs, but the verses were not numbered as they are in later editions. Upon tho title page appears tho name of Joseph Smith as "Author and Proprietor." In all subsequent editions he appears simply us "Translator." This change was rendered necessary to carry out the theory arferward adopted that Smith dug up those writings and translated them from "reformed Egyptian" by means of a pair of supernatural spectacles. A reporter of the Post and Tribune met Maj. Gilbert on Saturday, and had a very pleasant chat with him about the early days of Mormondom in Wayne county, N. Y., in which the modern religion started. He found the veteran printer 75 years of age.

One pleasant day in the summer of 1829, Hiram Smith, Joe's brother, came to the office to negotiate, for the priming of a book. The arrangements were completed. Five thousand copies of the book were to be printed for $3,000. A well-to do farmer named Martin Harris, living in the neighborhood, agreed to become security for the payment of the money, and the work was at once put in hand. Maj. Gilbert set up all the type of the book, except some 20 or 30 pages, and did nearly all the press work. It was all worked off on a hand press.

The copy was brought to the office by Hiram Smith. It was written on foolscap paper in a good, clear hand. The handwritimg was Oliver Cowdery's. There was not a punctuation mark in the whole manuscript. The sentences were all run in without capitals, or other marks to designate where one left off and another began, and it was no easy tusk to straighten out the stuff. Maj. Gilbert, perceiving that large portions were stolen verbatim from the Bible, used to have a copy of that book on his case to aid him in deciphering the manuscript and putting in the proper punctuation marks.

At first Smith used to come to the office every morniug with Just enough manuscript to last through tho day. But it was so much bother to put in the punctuation that Gilbert said; "Bring me around a quantity copy at a time, and I can go through it and fix it up evenings, and so get along faster with it." Smith replied: "This is pretty important business young man, and I don't know as we can trust this manuscript in your possession." Finally his scruples were overcome, and he consented to this arrangement. Then he would bring around a quire of paper, or forty-sight pages, at a time, and this would last several days. When the matter had been set all the copy was carefully taken away again by Smith. It took eight months to set up the book and run it through the press. Maj. Gilbert was not much interested in the book, thought it rather dry and prosy, and to this day has never thought it worth his while to read it a second time.

There were nine children in the Smith family. Joe was then about twenty-three years of age. He was a lazy, good for-nothing lout, chiefly noted for his capacity to hang around a corner grocery and punish poor whisky.

It is now pretty well established that the "Book of Mormon" was written in 1812 by the Rev. Solomon Spalding. of Ohio, as a popular romance. He could not find anyone to print it. The manuscript was sent to Pittsburg, where it lay in a printing-office several years. Spalding was never able to raise the money to secure the prlntiug of the story, and. after his death in 1824 [sic - 1816?] it was returned to his wife. By some means, exactly how is not known, it fell Into the hand of one Sidney Rigdon, who, with Joe Smith, concocted the scheme by which it was subsequently brought out as the work of Smith. The dealings with the outside world in respect to it were manipulated by Hiram Smith, an elder brother of Joe. Maj. Gilbert's recollection of all those persons is fresh and vivid, and he has a fund of antecdote and incident relating to them.


Notes: (forthcoming)

THE  BIRTH  OF  MORMONISM.
______

EARLY  LIFE  AND  ADVENTURES  OF
THE  PROPHET  JOE  SMITH.
______

AN IGNORANT AND THRIFTLESS WANDERER IN SUSQUEHANNA COUNTY
-- HIS EFFORTS TO LIVE WITHOUT LABOR -- DELUDED
MONEY-DIGGERS -- A FARMER 'TAKEN IN.'
From the Philadelphia Times.

MONTROSE, Pa., July 28. -- The name of Brigham Young has been so intimately associated with the history of the Mormons by the present generation that the first so-called prophet and founder of the sect is almost forgotten. Even here in Susquehanna county, where Mormonism had its birth, the story of Joe Smith is familiar to few of the present day, and it is referred to, when thought of at all, as one of the fading romances that linger among the traditions of the early settlers of the Northern wilderness. But the strange history of the origin of the Mormon delusion, that has since convulsed two states and finally created an empire of its; own in the heart of the far Western mountains, is well preserved in Susquehanna county, and little or nothing is left to conjecture as to the manner of the man who was its author.

Some time about the year 1830 an indolent and ignorant adventurer, known as Joe Smith,made his advent into what is now Oakland; one of the extreme northern townships of this county. It borders on the New York state line and is divided by the Susquehanna river as it forms its great bend, from which a thrifty village on the Erie railway takes its name. Railroads were then unknown, and what is now Oakland district was then one of the most primitive of the forest settlements.

THE GIFT OF "PEEPING."

A high order of intelligence is not one of the common characteristics of pioneers, and the scattered population among whom Joe Smith made his first, appearance as the possessor of supernatural powers were no exceptions to the rule, but they furnished few believers as stars for his crown. He had made a precarious living for some years as a lazy lumberman. He was without culture, and beyond a streak of low cunning, that served a most useful purpose in his petty frauds in "peeping," he possessed no qualities which marked him as anything else than a thriftless adventurer, ready for anything that promised him bread without earning it. Many of the early settlers accepted, to a greater orless degree, the superstitions of the Indians, and "peeping?" or "seeing" was a profession by which some one esteemed wiser than his fellows would tell where water or minerals might be found. What was called "a seeing stone" was in the custody of one of the residents, and it was claimed that lost valuables and even a lost child had been found through the deliverances of the little dumb oracle, a stone described of about the size of a goose egg, green in color, with brown irregular spots on it. Some dusky soothsayer of the forest had probably invested the stone with its astounding virtues, and there was enough of ignorance and superstition prevalent in the neighborhood to make even the doubting cherish a secret reverence for it.

JOE SMITH AND HIS MAGIC STONE.

Joe Smith was then an idler in the community with an unconquerable aversion to labor and without the intelligence or ingenuity to live by his wits. He finally became the possessor of the magic stone, and devoted himself to "peeping" for water and minerals. Finding a people about him ready to deal in tha marvelous, he extended his "peeping" for the ordinary wants of Settlers to "seeing" hidden treasures, and so forth. A tradition of buried treasure somewhere on the upper Susquehanna was seized upon by Smith as his first venture in the line of the miraculous. By his magic stone he located the treasure on Turkey Hill and deluded a well-to-do farmer named Harper residing across the New York line, to furnish the capital for unearthing the hidden money. On the farm of Mr. Skinner, near the northern line of this county, are yet visible the diggings made by the victims of Smith from 1822 to 1825. One pit is 20 feet deep and fifty in diameter and several smaller pits are yet traceable in the fields. When several thousand dollars had been expended by Harper without the discovery of the treasure, he refused to proceed further, his faith having perished with his fortune, but for several years thereafter there was more or less digging by various parties who half believed in Smith's power of "seeing" derived from his magic stone. At times the digging would be done only at night, showing that there were victims of Smith's pretentions who were unwilling to confess themselves to their neighbers. When a party wearied of the work and abandoned it, Smith would give out that the Almighty was displeased with some of them and call for the blood of an entirely white dog as a mediation. Finally, having exhausted the credulity and contributions of treasure-seekers, Smith decided to turn to profit the religious superstition that he found largely diffused among his neighbors, and the speculation of an ignorant and thriftless impostor led to the founding of the Mormon Church or the sect of the Latte-Day Saints.

ELOPING  WITH  A  RUSTIC  MAIDEN.

In 1825, while engaged in money digging, Smith had made the acquaintance Isaac Hale, one ot the early settlers of Oakland, then Harmony township, Susquehanua county. He is described by Mr. Hale, in a statement made in 1834 over his signature and attested by the Justice and Postmaster, as "a careless young man, not very well educated and very saucy and insolent to his father." Referring to the "Book of Mormon," Mr. Hale says, in the same statement, that he had a good opportunity to know Smith and his associates and that the so-called Mormoia Bible "is a silly fabrication of falsehood and wickedness, gotten up for speculation and with the design to dupe the credulous and unwary, and in order that its fabricators might live upon the spoils of those who swallowed the deception." But the want of respect for Smith manifested by Hale did not extend throughout his entire family, as he discovered in 1825, after money-digging delusions had vanished, when Smith asked Mr. Hale's consent to his marriage with Emma Hale, the daughter of the incredulous farmer. The father refused his consent because of the general worthlessness of the suitor, but the daughter seems to have had more faith in the pretentious adventurer, and in February, 1826, Emma ran off with the future prophet to New York and married him. She was a simple-minded rustic maiden, and the strata of superstition that she honestly inherited or absorbed from surroundings, made her readily dream of success for the sorcerer who sought her hand mainly for the sake of a home, as the sequel proved.

SMITH'S  MYSTERIOUS  BOX.

After struggling with poverty at Palmyra, New York, for a while, both Smith and Emma came repentant to Mr. Hale, asked to be allowed to return to the Hale homestead, Smith declaring that he "was willing to work hard for a living." They were brought home by [Alva] Hale, but if any "hard work" was done for their living, it was done by Emma, for Smith brought with his scanty household stores a sealed box about the size of a common window-glass box, and surrounded it with the mystery that so readily deludes the ignorant by declaring that none but the appointed one could look into it and live. The practical father-in-law notified Smith that he proposed to look into every box kept about the premises, regardless of sanctity with which they might be invested, and Smith secreted the box in woods rather than permit Hale to inspect its contents. Smith claimed that the hieroglyphic plates of the new revelation were contained in that box. None were alllowed to see the plates. Even the two scribes, Martin Harris und Oliver Cowdry, who wrote out the Book of Mormon as Smith interpreted the distant and hidden plates by gazing at the magic stone, never were allowed to see the contents of the box. Smith declared that only his first-born child, which was to be a son, could look into the box and live; but as the first-born of Joseph and Emma was a girl [sic] the chapter of Mormon history recording the first inspection of the plates is a lost link in the story of the new religion. One Martin Harris, whose history is lost in the obscurity of his previous and subsequent life, was Smith's first scribe. A man of his name and alike unknown to the people this region, broke jail at Wilkeabarre some 20 years before, and the Mormon scribe is believed by some to have been tbe escaped convict, but it cannot be asserted as a fact.

Mr. Hale tells how Smith interpreted the plates: "The manner in which he pretended to read and interpret was the same as when he looked for the money-diggers, with the stone in his hat and his hat over his face, while tbe book of plates was at the same time hid in the woods." Harris disappeared, no one seemed to know whither, before the work was done, and Oliver Cowdry, whose name has since been prominently associated with the Mormons, became scribe. He continued until the interpretation was complete, and the Mormon Bible was thus invented because of the failure of the "peeping" profession to furnish Smith a living. The only analogy between the Mormon prophet and the ancient prophets was in the failure of Smith to command honor as a religionist in his own country. He seems to have had no followers in the region where he was best acquainted and where the history of the pretended revelation on the mysterious plates was known. In 1831-2 the local papers of the county make note of "two or three wretched zealots of Mormonism" creating some excitement, but this field was speedily abandoned, and Smith and a few followers located the "promised land" near Painesville, Ohio, whither they departed, leaving only the rude pits on the Skinner farm as monuments of the work of Joseph Smith, the Mormon prophet, in Susquehanna county.

SMITH OUT WEST.

There are other stories about the origin of the Book of Mormon, but the circumstantial statement of Isaac Hale, father-in-law of Smith, written as early as 1834 to D. P. Hurlburt of Ohio, in answer to inquiries about Smith and the Mormons, is doubtless correct, as Smith and his wife lived with Hale at tbe time and he spoke from personal observation and knowledge. The hlstory of Smith after he located in Ohio is familiar to all. He and his followers were driven from Ohio to the Mississippi and thence they fled the jurisdiction of the country after Smith had been murdered in his own temple [sic] at Nauvoo. Brigham Young soon after usurped the rulership of the Mormons, deposing Sidney Rigdon by trickery. He gave to his followers the special revelation commanding the adoption of polygamy, and the "Josephites," the followers of Smith, who refused to accept polygamy, were driven from the fold in Utah and now have their home at Malada, in Idaho. Smith's widow yet lives, I believe, among the followers of her husband, and he has sons who uphold his faith away in the Northwestern Territory. A. K. M.


Note: See also Emily C. Blackman's 1873 book, History of Susquehanna Co, from which some of the above article was paraphrased.

THE  BOOK  OF  MORMON.
______

EVIDENCE  THAT IT WAS  PIRATED
FROM A  PREACHER'S ROMANCE.

The Original of the Mormon Bible a Romance by Rev. Solomon Spaulding Entitled "Manuscript Found" -- How the Prophet Joseph Smith May Have Become Possessed of it -- Interesting Statements.

Mrs. ELLEN E. DICKINSON, who is known to many readers of The Journal as having been the New York correspondent of this paper for some years, contributes a paper to Scribner's Monthly for August, on the Book of Mormon, in which she accounts for the origin of that work in a manuscript written by her great-uncle, Rev. SOLOMON SPAULDING, in the form of a novel, which, with a few slight changes, was appropriated by Joseph Smith and his associates. The narrative is interesting, and being well authenticated as to its principal details, will doubtless be accepted as accounting for that singular production, called the Mormon Bible, which was the accepted doctrine of those strange people, the Mormons, who after several unsuccessful attempts to establish a community in the United States, at last gained possession of the Territory of Utah and still hold it, largely in defiance of the laws of God and of the Government of the United States,

THE AUTHOR OF "MANUSCRIPT FOUND."

Mrs. DICKINSON states that Mr. SPAULDING was born at Ashford, Conn., in 1761, graduated at Dartmouth in 1788, studied divinity, preached a few years and then, from ill health, gave up the ministry...

[This remainer of this middle section of the text merely paraphrases Dickinson's Aug. 1880 article in Scribner's Monthly and reprints the statements of Thurlow Weed and Matilda Spalding McKinstry, from that same article.]

WHAT IS KNOWN TO BE TRUE.

Mrs. DICKINSON concludes her article in Scribner's with the statement that about forty years ago, affidavits were made by John Spaulding, the brother, and Mr. Lake, the partner of Solomon Spaulding, and published, which asserted that they had heard the author read "Manuscript Found" in 1812, and that there was a striking similarity between it and the Book of Mormon; and with the remark: "It is evident that Smith had access to the manuscript, since both stories are alike -- the peculiar names occur nowhere else but in these two books, -- and that Mr. Spaulding's romance had been read by a number of people in 1812, while the Mormon Bible was not published until 1830, and not heard of earlier than 1823. Out of the curious old romance of Solomon Spaulding, and the ridiculous 'seer-stone' of Joseph Smith, has grown this monstrous Mormon State, which presents a problem that the wisest politician has failed to solve, and whose outcome lies in the mystery of the future."


Notes: (forthcoming)

THE  EARLY  MORMONS.
_____

JOE  SMITH  OPERATES  AT  SUSQUEHANNA.
_____

His Advent Among the First Settlers -- He Marries a Daughter of a Pioneer --
Digging in the Hills for Treasure -- Professing Miracles and
Winning Converts at Harpersville.

Scribner's Magazine for August contains an interesting reminisence of early Mormonism from the pen of Ellen E. Dickinson, the grand-niece of Rev. Solomon Spaulding who is believed to have prepared the manuscripts for the Mormon Bible while engaged in a very unsuccessful attempt to write a popular book of religious fiction. In this Miss Dickinson substantiates very well what has been often said of the origin of the Book of Mormon,

The Scribner Magazine article is noticed elsewhero in the Republican. For the purposes of this article it will not be necessary to go into the earlier or the later history of Joe Smith, for the sketch is purely local, and relates to his operations in Broome and Susquehanna counties.

There are very trustworthy living witnesses by whom to prove that some of the earlier years of Joe Smith's prophetic career were spent in Susquehanna county, Pennsylvania, where, in fact his prophesy with the "peek-stone" began. It was here that the Prophet married his wife, and it was here, on a corner of her ancestral estate, that the spiritual pair, the originator of the Latter Day Saints and the "Daughter of God" settled down to the material occupation of housekeeping. It was here that the first male child in the line of chief of the house of Latter Day Saints was born; and it is here the first born of the Father of Latter Day Saints and the "Electa Cyria" is buried. The prophesy went forth from Joseph that this son was to be a worker of miracles, who should open the golden bible while in his swaddling bands, and interpret the hieroglyphics "which no fellah could find out." The young prophet was stillborn, In other words he drove through time to that "undiscovered country" without stopping to feed in this sublunary sphere. He never had any swaddling bands; he never had any colic that his father knew of; he never had any milk roil on his stomach, and what gives more relief when contemplating the ills of human nature, he never cut teeth. Truly the wise die young. The early death of this prophet shows that he was too wise to go into the book publishing business on a limited capital, as a member of the firm of Joe Smith & Son, "peepers," and jobbers in new religion.

Recently a reporter of the Republican visited Susquehanna and other towns on the Susquehanna river for the purpose of authenticating rumors of Mormon history, and interviewed several of the oldest inhabitants. It was a very pleasant work, as they were mostly intelligent and time-wise. The July sun was scalding hot, which suggested that it might have been hot in Joe Smith's days, and turned the prophet's fertile mind to thoughts of "a land that is hotter than this." To our readers who have not seen Susquehanna -- there are even some old people in that county who have not seen Susquehanna, and never rode on a railroad -- a sketch of a few words descriptive of the country as it was and as it is may not be uninteresting in this connection. Then it was pretty much a dense wilderness, and the primeval pines and hemlocks which grew out of the rocky hills and reached their long shady arms over the narrow, deep valleys, must have made Susquehanna the "Black Hills" of the East. Now the pines, except some left for specimens, are gone. And the woodsman doesn't spare the tree any more, even though it be hemlock. All the tillable land, and quite a good deal more, is cleared up. Rattlesnakes always seemed to be a natural production of the hill soil, and for that reason, perhaps, the Indians never regretted that they had to give up the country.

The river, when it cut a channel through the mountain, was economical of its strength, and like an Irishman who ditches a swamp by the yard, it made a cut only just wide enough to stand in. Whatever else undertakes to get in the valley must either hang on the sides or swim.

But notwithstanding the natural drawbacks, a busy humming, and thriving village has grown there. The houses hang in clusters on the sides of the mountain, suggestive of swallow houses under the eaves. By the natural laws of adaptation, it is probable that in future ages children in Susquehanna will be born with wings; and there is no reason why they will not stand as good a chance there as people generally do to all be angels some day. The great railroad shops made the town, and they occupy all the level ground there is in it. Even their sites had to be leveled artificially,

Joe Smith came into this country on a divine mission, at a time when the first few settlers were struggling with the wilds. They always struggle with the wilds here, as has been suggested, but at the time of the advent of the Mormon father Indians and not engines went screeching through the valley. His first mission here was to get a wife. The Lord sent him after one -- so he said -- and told him he would know her when he saw her; that is, he would know this particular Mrs. Smith in prospect from any other coming Mrs. Smith. It was to be a courtship like Cain's in which the usual long drawn out sweets of juvenile spooning were cut short for the necessities of the case -- a succession to the house of Joseph.

The exact time of his advent here is chronicled only in legends, and legend never kept a diary. However, the inscription upon the tomb of the little prophet, when considered in connection with the urgency before mentioned, would indicate that the Abraham of the Latter Day Saints tramped here in the summer or fall of 1827. The little prophet was buried June 15, 1828.

The tramp stopped at the house of Isaac Hale, a farmer living about a mile and a half below the present borough of Susquehanna, on the north side of the river/ Mr. Hale had three daughters; two of them were married; but Emma, the second daughter, was single, and Joseph "knew his wife." He told her what he knew about it, and in the language of the boys, she "tumbled." But her "old man" didn't. He said "not for Joe." He did not believe in Latter Day Saints; he was not much of a man for saints, anyhow; he did not believe in any species of tramps -- in those days there were no lightning rod peddlers nor book agents -- and told Joe he did not want any son-in-law of his stamp, even though the Lord had sent him. Joe persuaded Emma to elope; they crossed the State line into Windsor, and were married. The "oldest inhabitant" fails to remember who performed the ceremony. The "Lady of the Lord" is understood to be still alive, at Nauvoo, and it seems to be quite important that she should produce her marriage certificate and settle the question so that no doubtful questions will ever hover about the illustrious name of Smith.

There were certain things which Joe could not do till he had a wife. He reported that the Lord had told him so. There was money buried at Palmyra, he said, which he had tried to get, but had been driven away by a headless Spaniard. Almost anybody would leave when a warrior came around who was proof against braining; and Joe did not want to toe the scratch against a man who had that advantage. However, in this case it was only an imaginary advantage, for Joe couldn't be brained either. It wasn't in his head, even though he had his head on. But he left. Then the Lord told him he did not need money as much as a man who had millinery and dry goods to buy; but if he had such things to purchase he should have the hidden treasure. Prophetic visions are never fulfilled in a day, and when good Elijah prayed for rain the storm appeared a great way off, and no bigger than a man's hand. The necessity of taking one step at a time was evident enough.

A live saint must have pork and beans and cabbages, etc., and the first woman saint to the House of Mormon brought with her a small piece of ground -- the amount is stated at six to thirteen acres; probably six is correct. Down here the valley is wide enough so that an industrious man, if he has a farm paid for, can get most of his living without stealing from the railroad. There was no railroad company to steal from then, and it appeared as though Smith would have to earn his own living when he could not live off his father-in-law.

The house he procured, and in which the monkery of translating the characters on the golden plates was gone through with, is still standing, and is part of the farmhouse of Benjamin McKune, the Sheriff of Susquehanna county. It is the one-story portion of the building, and is 26 feet front, 18 feet deep, and 14 feet posts. The Saint did not build it, but purchased it partly finished, and moved it upon his wife's six acres. This little piece of land had been set off the Isaac Hale farm for a son, who disposed of it to his sainted sister. The house was never finished entirely, notwithstanding that since the ownership of the Saint it has been owned and occupied by persons of means. The Saint put a stovepipe up through the roof, and that is the style of chimney it sports today. It is doubtful however, if it still retains the original stovepipe run up by Joe. After Smith left the country Martin Harris -- the Frank Moulton of Mormonism, because he was for a long time the chief witness -- came back to settle up the Saint's estate, and sold the real estate to Joseph McKune, father of Sheriff McKune. The elder McKune constructed the upright portion from a shed he purchased of another farmer. The structure has had no paint outside to this day, and the only thing cheering about it is a well of cold water in front, with a Dutch sweep and an "old oaken bucket."

For some reason the future ruler of Zion did not start immediately after commencing to suffer the hardships of marriage to claim the purse promised by the Lord whose prophet he was, but used his "peek-stone" to discover a greater treasure nearer home. On a wilderness hill about half a mile north of his house, and now a part of the farm of Jacob I. Skinner, he discovered a ton of silver bars, hid deep in the bowels of the earth. This treasure was placed there by weary Spaniards as they trudged up the Susquehanna river, and became unequal to the task of hauling so much luggage. Just what band of Spanish adventurers they were does not appear, and profane history throws no light upon the mystery. Neither do we ascertain what they were doing with a ton of silver bars several hundred miles from any silver producing country before the advent of Goodenough, the Osborn Hollow and Ross Park mines. No matter how it got there, there can be no doubt that a ton of silver bars was buried in the hill, for the Prophet saw it through his "peek-stone."

Before proceeding further with this narrative we will give a description of the Prophet as it was given to the reporter by several aged persons who saw him. He was six feet or a trifle over in height; stout built but wiry; light complexion; light hair and light blue eyes. One aged lady said "he didn't look as though he knowed enough to fool people so." He wore a tall white stovepipe hat. Now imagine this athletic form kneeling down and burying his face in his white stovepipe hat in which was placed the "peek-stone," and you have in your mind's eye a view of the first Latter Day Saint discovering the treasures in the earth which no other fellow ever discovered. It was just like looking into water, he said; he could not tell just how deep it was any more than a man can who looks down into a lake; and the deflection of light sometimes took him out of the right course a few inches. Then, too, the "rock-ribbed hills" -- and the hills about here are "rock-ribbed" with a vengeance -- were so insecure, and treasure so unstable that things in the bowels of the earth were liable to get mixed up every day. When his party would dig almost to a great treasure the enchantment would move it sometimes several rods out of the way. That sort of enchantment must have "tried the patience of a saint," and all the saints of Mormondom.

As soon as he could collect followers enough about him to do the work -- the Latter Day Saint, unlike St. Paul, did not labor with his own hands -- an excavation was commenced to recover the lost Spanish silver bars. The followers had to strengthen their faith, the visible certainty that if there was anything in that immediate vicinity worth working for it must be under ground. And in this line of reasoning there was no objection to believing it was pretty deep. Still they were not despondent. Their greatest excavation was about thirty feet broad on top, and about thirty-five feet deep. The ground was wet, and it was necessary also to dig a drain to this immense hole in order to let off the water. As the hole was on the crown of a hill a drain was opened by digging a few rods to the south.

The excavation, as the work progressed, was covered with a wooden structure to hide it from the eyes of the profane and scoffers. Down, down they went, the distance being measured by slow shovelfuls and tedious blasts in the rocks until they were just ready, or would be the next day, to stoop down and pick up the ton of silver bullion. "Hocus, pocus, presto, change." The "charm" moved the silver away three hundred feet to the north-east. It was an uphill job, but the charm was sufficient for the task. This was terribly hard on the new church, but the ambitious Saint was not to be cheated in that way. He got down on his marrow bones with his peek-stone and tracked it to its exact hiding place. It was not so far under ground this time -- only about twenty feet. The faithful went for it again with sleeves rolled up. It was a case of necessity. While they had been digging the large hole they had boarded around. Considerable of the prophetic hash had been furnished by Mr. Hale, the Saint' s father-in-law, who was a stiff old Methodist, and by force of circumstances was taking altogether more stock in this Big Bonanza than was agreeable to his judgment of matters of business. It became necessary, therefore, to get to that silver in the shortest possible time, Goodenough might have pinned it with a drill, but; the saints who had no steam engine had to dig with pick and shovel.

At it they went again, with a will known only to those who work with a religious zeal or a worldly hope of a "bar'l of money." Hush, it's here: pick it up! No, it's gone again. Not a rumble nor a jar marked its going, but it went like riches on wings. Softly and silently it flitted away, and lighted fifty feet beyond the big hole. The Saint and faithful followers were exasperated, and fully determined to capture it if they had to take the hill to pieces and shake it through a sieve.

But just mark the valuable services of the Saint's "peek-stone." Every time it got track of the treasure, and enabled the faithful to dig toward it. The third hole was sunk about fifteen feet, when the treasure waltzed around on the other side of the big hole. Now the Saint had a vision; blood must be shed; it must be the blood of a black sheep, sprinkled all around the diggings. The faithful were mighty glad to hear of this, for they were tired of trying to catch a ton of silver which went like a nimble sixpence, and had so much the advantage of them in dodging about. There was a charm about it, for the Prophet said so, but ten prophets could not make them believe there was a charm about the work. That wasn't the kind of men they were, and the Mormons have never been that kind of men.

In all the country around Susquehanna there was not a black sheep. The nearest thing to a black sheep was a black dog, and the Prophet thought that might answer. The dog was killed, and its blood sprinkled about the ground where the silver was. The silver never went away any great distance after that, but it waltzed around the big hole in a manner to defy the dexterity of pick and shovel. Frequent drifts were struck out from the big hole, but the silver couldn't be coaxed with the blood of a black dog, nor cornered by tunneling. The Prophet decided that some man must be slaughtered and become a sacrifice to appease the charm that had the silver under its arm and was playing hide and seek with them. Until that was done the prize would escape them, and there was no use of digging against fate. He called for a volunteer, but none of the faithful could spare themselves for that purpose. For the simple reason that no Marcus Curtius could be found to throw his manhood into the breech, to step forward and have his head cut off for the great benefit of those who were left, this magnificent enterprise was abandoned, and all the silver there ever was in that mountain lies there until this day. When we reflect upon the great number of people who sacrifice themselves for wealth, it seems strange that the founder of Mormonism could find no sacrifice except a black dog which was little better than nothing in its operations. And it is not likely that he obtained the consent of the dog.

Oliver Harper, one of the number employed in the digging, and who furnished some of the sinews of war, was soon afterward shot by Jason Treadwell, near Joe Smith's house, while returning from a rafting expedition down the Susquehanna. The Saint thought this would answer for a sacrifice, and rallied the faithful to dig some more; but the charm remained stubborn, and would not come within sight of anybody with the silver, except the Prophet with his "peek-stone," and the "peek-stone" business was pretty nearly played out in this neighborhood. There was too much hard work and perspiration about it to be cleverly connected with a day of miracles.

The Prophet turned his attention again toward Palmyra, and the hidden treasure in that neighborhood, but was supposed by Mr. Hale and his family to be in pursuit of furniture for housekeeping. He was accompanied by his wife's brother Alvah, who officiated as teamster. When they returned to Susquehanna it was learned that the Saint had brought with him the wonderful golden plates. It is recorded in the Book of Mormon that after the prize was won and delivered to the Prophet by angels, his eyes were opened and he saw legions of devils contending against a celestial host to keep the golden Bible hid. What the devils wanted to keep it hid for is hard to understand. Such conduct certainly showed great shortsightedness in them, and they are not supposed to be a superficial race. The Book of Mormon does not record all. It does not tell where the Prophet went immediately after the golden plates were won and delivered to him.

He returned to Susquehanna with his head heavily bandaged, and reported that he had had a personal encounter with the chief devil, and that he (the Prophet) was severely wounded by a blow struck right from the shoulder. The Book of Mormon does not record this magnificent fisticuff. One could easily wish that the devil had prevailed for once, instead of wounding and then meeting with defeat, though this is not equal to wish the devil success. The fact was established, however, that the devil is a hard-hitter, and when one says he "is not afraid of the devil" he does not know just what he is talking about. Joe Smith found out.

The golden plates were brought from the West secreted in a barrel of beans. They were brought to Joe Smith's house, but were not to be seen nor opened until a prophet should come who would be sufficient for the task. This prophet was sadly laid away in his little earthly cradle, as has been stated, and his infantile mouth was never opened to interpret golden plates. Then the father was miraculously helped out of a great difficulty by finding a pair of spectacles -- perhaps they were presented to him by angels -- which would cause the hieroglyphics to appear written in a language the Latter Day Saint could understand. Joe's language, as nearly as can be ascertained at the present day, was a compound of bad English and Mohawk Dutch. These spectacles were supposed to be something entirely new in the line of spectacles, for at that time it was not well understood that translators and commentators generally use glasses constructed on similar principles. There is a slightly different shade of coloring to different denominational spectacles, but the principle of being cut on the bias, and tinted to order is about the same in all of them.

Joe Smith would write the translation from his plates upon a slate, or dictate what to write, and others would copy upon paper. His assistants were witness Martin Harris, and brother-in-law Reuben Hale. The translating and writing were done in the little low chamber of Joe Smith's house. The Prophet and his precious trust were screened even from the sight of his clerks by blankets nailed to the walls. The nails remained for many years just as they were driven by the Prophet, and it was not until some repairing was done a short time ago that they were drawn out. Neighbors were free to call at the house as much as they pleased while the bible was concocting, and the matter of the golden bible would be talked over. Some persons were permitted to lift the pillow case in which it was kept, and feel the thickness of the volume the plates made, but no one was permitted to see them.

A very important accident occurred at his house while the translation was going on, which materially abridged the Book of Mormon. Witness Harris was a man of moderate means, but he had become the Mormon treasurer, using his own funds for a treasury. His wife became thoroughly alarmed about the manner in which their property was wasting away, and came on from the West to arrest their destruction and reclaim her husband if possible. The husband, infatuated more with Joe Smith than with her, sought to persuade her to hold her peace, by showing her the sacred writings they had made, and which were now nearly completed. She hid the manuscript, and when she was asked to give it up, said Joe Smith might peek for it. Joe brought his "peek-stone" into use, and pointed to several places, but the roll was not found where he directed his attendants to search. He accused her of being unfair, and of removing the manuscript every time, just before the attendant reached it. In other words the bible disappeared just as the silver had done under the influence of an evil charm. After a while Mrs. Harris surrendered part of the manuscript which she took from her straw bed, just to show the Prophet she knew he was a fraud. But a portion was never given up. The Mormons say she retained it. Joe Smith never undertook to use his spectacles for a second translation of the matter on the missing sheets, as he feared Mrs. Harris would produce a different bible consisting of his first translation of the golden plates. The woman, however, was not so shrewd as they suspected she was, and instead of setting the cunning trap they feared she spitefully burned the manuscript, hoping that if it could not be found the religious partnership between her husband and Joe Smith would be dissolved.

The clap-trap of Smith and Harris failed to make any favorable impression at Susquehanna, in Smith's own neighborhood, proving again that "a prophet is not without honor, save in his own land." The scene of his ministry was changed to Harpersville, where one of Mrs. Smith's sisters, Mrs. Wasson, resided, and to Nineveh and Afton. Harpersville is about twenty miles above Susquehanna; Nineveh is about two miles further up the river, and Afton is about three miles above Nineveh, and lies just in the edge of Chenango county. When the country was new, and traversed by narrow and muddy roads through the dense forests, people who lived twenty miles apart seldom met, and when Smith went to Harpersville to operate he had left his country, substantially, and went to a distant one.

Brother-in-law Benjamin Wasson, of Harpersville, was a cabinet-maker, and made a box in which to carry the golden bible after it was deemed to be unsafe in the pillow-case. Neither Mr. Wasson nor his wife inclined toward Mormonism, but one of their sons joined the Mormons and became a Mormon preacher.

In the days of Joe Smith's early operations people were often found who were actuated by a desire to become suddenly rich. He operated largely upon their cupidity. There are no such people now, consequently adventurers who hold out promises of sudden great wealth never deceive anybody, not even by mining and stock operations, patent wagon-tongue lifters and the like. But Joe Smith was able, by the using of his "peek-stone," to gather around him a band at Harpersville. He procured the following of Joseph Knight, who possessed a small farm, a grist mill, and a carding mill, situated upon a small stream from Perch Pond to the Susquehanna, directly across the river from the present village of Harpersville. Having enlisted Knight's pocket-book, the Latter Day Saint had something to operate with. Knight's two sons, William and Newell, also joined the fortunes of the "peek-stone" man. William Hale, uncle of the "Electa Cyria," or Daughter of God, as Joe's wife was called, joined the band. Among other converts here -- about sixty finally emigrated from the neighborhood -- were William Stringham and wife, men named Blowers and Culver, and Josiah Stowell. Stowell was a man of some means when he became a Mormon.

This point on the river is north of the Apalachin mountains, and widens from a narrow cut to a broad and open plane, now divided into as fine and productive farms as the sun shines upon. The place was originally settled by emigrants from Vermont, who were known as "Vermont sufferers." The appellation did not attach to them because they suffered privations on the Susquehanna, but because they had settled on a strip of land off Washington county, on grants from New York State, when the land was subsequently proved to belong to Vermont. As compensation for this loss they were given homes at Nineveh. The antecedents of these settlers is mentioned here because it is a noticeable fact that Vermonters of the poorer class were peculiarly susceptible to the influence of bugaboo religions.

The "peek-stone" discovered a salt spring in a marsh on the plane opposite Center Village, and brawny hands and sinewey arms were found to take up shovels and picks and dig for it. This portion of the plane was then owned by Bostwick Badger. It is now owned by George Collington, one of the very substantial farmers of Broome county Mr. Collington was then a lad about sixteen years old, and one evening about twilight he discovered Joe Smith, the elder and the younger Knights, Stringham and Culver and Blowers dodging through the woods with digging implements on their shoulders. He followed them, keeping under cover of the brush until they stopped and held a council. They decided to commence digging the next day. Young Collington saw that Mr. Badger had felled an oak tree near the place a few days before, and had drawn out the timber. He went and got Mr. Badger's permission to cut the top for wood, and the next day, soon after the Prophet and followers began to dig, Collington's ax began in the tree top. In a few moments the lad walked out and inquired what they were doing. They were cross to him, and told him he had better be off about his business. As Mr. Collington now expresses it, he was "pretty spry boy, and did not care much for the Mormon scowls and scolds." He published them about the neighborhood, and every day the salt diggings had unwelcome visitors. They dug the hole down almost thirty-five feet. It was necessary to pump out water by hand to keep the mine from flooding, and operations were very laborious. Frederick Davenport furnished young Collington with half a bushel of salt, which was deposited in the hole one night. There was sufficient water at the bottom to dissolve the salt, and in the morning the Mormons discovered a briny flavor. As many bottles as they could muster were filled with the water and exhibited about the neighborhood. This was the first success of the famous "peek-stone." But the salt well speculation came to grief one night by caving in and burying the picks, crowbars, shovels, etc., which were never taken out. Since Mr. Collington has owned the farm some of his own and his neighbors' cattle were drowned in it, and to avoid further losses of the kind he filled the hole to nearly level with the surrounding plane.

The "peek-stone" discovered an extensive and rich silver mine on the farm of Abraham Cornell, at Bettsburgh, nearly opposite Nineveh, and a hole was dug there to the depth of over thirty feet, but no silver was found except what was contributed by Josiah Stowell to provide for the expenses of the diggers. Mr. Stowell is represented as being not a very bright man, but he had saved considerable money for those times, and Joe Smith managed to get and spend about the whole of it. Searches were made in other places about the neighborhood for treasure. It is not necessary to state with what success.

But now we come to a stage in these early reminiscences of Mormonism when Joe Smith was more successful. Already it has been noticed that he was successful in getting the wife the Lord sent him to find, and the golden bible, which was a sort of sequel to the marriage. These he got at Susquehanna and Palmyra, the only two neighborhoods where he had operated extensively before he squatted at Harpersville. At Harpersville he made his first successful efforts to found a church. A large barn, 30 by 40 feet -- which was standing until very recently -- on Joseph Knight's farm, was the first Mormon tabernacle. Joe Smith tried to preach there, but is described as not a very great success at preaching. But Sidney Rigdon was sent for, and did better. The excitement ran high; there was a semblance of persecution on the part of the Gentiles, principally among the lads and young men, and converts came in until a church was formed which must have been a great deal more numerous than any other church in that neighborhood. A dam was constructed in the stream upon which Knight's mills were situated, and in this the Mormon converts were baptized by immersion. The young Gentiles often tore the dam away, but the faithful rebuilt it as often as they needed it for baptismal purposes.

The numerical size and character of the new church was such that other people were exceedingly glad when they shook the dust of Harpersville from their feet and emigrated westward. The train as they departed consisted of eleven passenger wagons and three baggage wagons. There were sixty passengers, some of them were led by a desire for travel and adventure -- polygamy had not yet been introduced into the church -- but others were so much in earnest that they pooled their property, what there was of it, and determined to follow their Prophet at least to the end of his earthly kingdom. Possibly some believed in his heavenly kingdom. His followers were people who would embrace any creed which had for its object the tearing down of other creeds. They were about such people as the communists, and the rank and file of spiritualists of to-day. They were of the class described by Dr. Holmes, "Whose hair's in the mortar of every new zion," but who are ready to believe anything but the Bible.

There are several stories told in the neighborhoods of Susquehanna and Harpersville about miracles performed by Joe Smith. Joe was in the habit of drinking liquor too freely for the founder of a religion, and perhaps he often mistook a hilarious condition for a very spiritual condition, and undertook to perform on a grand scale very much as other drunken men do without realizing the magnitude of his task and his own utter inability to perform it. He got pretty drunk at one time while out with a party who fished the river with a drag net. The catch was very good, but unlike the fishermen of Galilee, the men were able to pull in all the fish.

One night when a heavy frost was expected, Joe Smith volunteered to go into the cornfield of Michael Morse, his brother-in-law, and pray the frost away. The cornfield was on the hill south of the Susquehanna depot, and fairly exposed to north and west atmospheric influences. Joe went and prayed, but he was not equal to the emergency. The frost came and destroyed the corn. He couldn't warm up equal to the occasion.

At Nineveh the Prophet announced that on a certain evening, at twilight, he would walk upon the water. The place where he was to walk was watched by the Gentiles, and one of the followers was seen to come there and construct a bridge just under the water. When the bridge builder left, congratulating himself that he had done a good job for his Prophet, the boys -- it is the boys always who do such things -- slyly removed a portion of the planks. At twilight that evening the Prophet came out to walk upon the water, and before starting he exhorted his followers to have faith, as faith on their part was absolutely indispensable to enable him to perform a miracle. For a few steps he had a sort of "go as you please," then he didn't go as he pleased, but plunged down and had to swim as he pleased for shore. "Woe unto you of little faith!" was his salutation to his followers as he reached terra firma; "your faith would not hold me up!"

He was sent for to come to Harpersville and bring to life an old Mormon convert named John Morse, who died. He had professed to be able to raise the dead, and his followers wanted an exhibition of his skill in that direction. But when he saw how old the man was he argued that it would be a pity to bring him to life and cause him to suffer death again in a short time, for old age had already rendered him helpless. He was happy in heaven, and it would be cruel to bring him back to struggle with rheumatism and poverty in this world. The argument prevailed and the old man was not prayed back to life with Mormon prayers.

The Prophet found it necessary, however, to pray for the return to life of a deceased shoemaker at Greene. The shoemaker had joined the new church, and was expected to put all his property, consisting of a few hundred dollars, into the Joe Smith treasury, and prepare for the exodus toward the western Zion. The widow would not turn over the property until prayers had been offered for the return of her husband. If the shoemaker was in heaven he preferred staying there to being brought back by Joe Smith. His executors afterwards sought to recover the shoemaker's property, and Judge Thomas A. Johnson, afterwards of Corning, but then a law student in Greene, was sent to Harpersville to get possession of it.

The saints were encamped in Knight's barn, and threatened to shoot Mr. Johnson. By the advice of friends he compromised after they surrendered a valuable horse, prized in those cheap times at $200.

Perhaps the most remarkable miracle ever performed by Joe Smith, and which proved beyond a doubt that he was all he professed to be, was casting the devil out of elder Knight. Knight solemnly declared the devil was cast out of him in the form of a black cat, and when he was cast out he ran into a brush heap. It is not recorded that he ever returned to Knight, and entered his former habitation, but those who knew Knight are of the opinion that the premises were not a great while without a tenant like the one who had vacated.

The Mormon exodus from Harpersville was by the way of the old State road north of Binghamton to Ithaca, and from there they journeyed toward Palmyra by water on Cayuga Lake.

THE  SOURCES  OF  INFORMATION.

The strictly narrative portion of the foregoing account of early Mormonism, as has been stated, was gathered from very creditable eye witnesses, who are now among the aged, and honored, and trusted of their townships. They were among the youth at the time of Joe Smith's earlier adventures and personally pried into every undertaking and watched every movement.

MRS. METHETABLE DOOLITTLE, who is now living alone on a little place in Susquehanna borough, lived in Wurtsboro, Sullivan county, and visited at the house of Isaac Hale, Joe Smith's father-in-law, when she was seventeen years old. She remembers Emma, afterwards the wife of the Prophet, as a handsome and attractive girl, about her own age. She says Emma was decoyed away for a ride, and married in Windsor, very much against the wishes of her parents.

MRS. SALLIE McKUNE, widow of Joseph McKune and mother of Sheriff McKune, is now eighty years old. She was between twenty-five and thirty years old when Joe Smith was performing about Susquehanna, and lived upon a farm adjoining Joe Smith's lot and the Isaac Hale farm, and in sight of the place where they dug for the ton of silver on Jacob I. Skinner's farm. Smith's residence was between the residence of Joseph McKune and Isaac Hale. Her husband bought the Smith place, built an addition to the house, and Mrs. McKune lived in the house about forty years. She remembers the arrangement of the nails used for hooks to hang blankets on during the translation of the golden bible. The anecdotes of the Spaniard without a head; of Smith's being sent out to find his wife; the charm that moved the silver; the human sacrifice asked for; the relations of Robert Harper with the silver hunt, and his tragic death; the circumstances of bringing the golden plates home; and of the translation by the aid of miraculous spectacles and the trick of Mrs. Harris, are related by her with great clearness. Smith and his conspirators gave out that the Book of Mormon would make them and the Hale family rich. She understands that the Joe Smith place consisted of only six acres. Mrs. McKune told the story of the miracle in the corn field; of Joe Smith's getting drunk; and of the young prophet who failed to connect with time. She says her husband strongly suspected that Joe Smith and his gang were counterfeiters.

MRS. ELIZABETH SQUIRES, who is about seventy years old, was present at the interview with Mrs. McKune. She always lived in that neighborhood, and thoroughly corroborated Mrs. McKune in all her statements, and often prompted her in her recollections of fifty years ago. The interview occurred at Mrs. Squires' residence, where Mrs. McKune chanced to be visiting. They unite in saying that Joe Smith never made a convert at Susquehanna, and also that his father-in-law became so incensed by his conduct that he threatened to shoot him if he ever returned. Isaac Hale is represented as a sturdy but somewhat eccentric man, who would have been likely to fulfill his promise toward his unpromising son-in-law. As an instance of his unyielding disposition it is stated that he never forgave the trustees of the neighborhood cemetery with whom he had a dispute, and that in his will he made it obligatory upon his executors to bury him on his farm instead of placing him in the family plot in the cemetery where the remains of his wife, and the young prophet, and other descendants repose.

JACOB I. SKINNER, who now owns and occupies the farm where Smith end his followers dug for silver, was then about sixteen years old. He has been engaged for years in dumping stones into the holes to fill them up, because they were dangerous traps for his cattle. The smaller hole, which is in the edge of a wood, is still used by the boys in wet weather for a swimming pond. Mr. Skinner is sure that the Prophet claimed to have found the golden bible in the big hole on his farm, but in that he is not corroborated by another witness. Yet he has the hole to show in support of his claim, and that must be regarded as a big thing when he comes in controversy with a man who has less proof. Mr. Skinner is clear in his statements about the manner of digging; of going down in the big hole, then going to a hole in the woods, and then coming back to sink shafts and run drifts along the big hole. He is authority saying the big hole was covered by a rough board house; also for the story of the black dog; and that Mr. Hale threatened to shoot his son-in-law if he ever came back. He described Joe Smith's appearance, and his manner of searching for hidden treasure.

He was not aware that Joe ever performed any other miracles, or attempted any. He remembers how the Prophet's residence was built, and thinks that his place consisted of thirteen acres. His opinion is that the place was worth about $500 to $600, but doubts if anything was paid on it. Mr. Skinner was present at the net fishing excursion when Joe Smith got drunk. The Prophet carried a bottle of whiskey in his pocket. His good father-in-law also imbibed more tanglefoot than was compatible with patriarchical dignity and good example, and he and Joe had a good natural rough and tumble.

SAMUEL BRUSH, a smart old gentleman about seventy-five years of age, who is now running a large farm and lumber-mill about three miles southwest of Susquehanna, lived in the Hale neighborhood in the time of Joe Smith's exploits there. While the translation of the bible was going on he called often to see Reuben Hale, the scribe. Reuben would always quit work and come down stairs; and sometimes would go away from home with him. Old Mr. Hale gave Joe Smith the sobriquet of "Peeker." Mr. Brush understood that it was a ton of Spanish silver, and not the golden bible they were digging for on the hill. Martin Harris was a believer in second sight, (which accounts, to a very great extent, for his connection with Joe Smith, for spending his money, and for his testimony to the genuineness of the Mormon revelation.) His faith in second sight was badly shaken when he never got the second sight of his money placed in Joe Smith's hands. Reuben Hale explained to Mr. Brush why the Prophet could not tell the precise location of an object he could see through his "peek-stone" on the supposition of deflected light. Miss Blackman, author of a history of Susquehanna county, gives Joe Smith the reputation of being tricky. That Mr. Brush claims is a mistake. Mr. Brush was not catechized as to what, in his opinion, constitutes a tricky man. He says Joe Smith was a good, kind, neighbor; and that is the testimony of Mrs. McKune, Mrs. Squires and Mr. Skinner.

GEORGE COLLINGION, ESQ., gave a pretty full account of the Mormon transactions about Harpersville. He told the story of the salt well; and of the first Mormon meetings in Knight's barn; of the baptismal ponds, etc. Mr. Collington was very careful not to appear to know overmuch about the Mormons, and said he was not present when Joe Smith tried to walk upon the water. But others accuse Mr. Collington of taking up the Prophet's bridge and letting him souse into the river, and of playing various other tricks with him. If this accusation is correct, young Collington's absence from the water-walking scene is easily explained. He could see just as well a little further off when the Mormons' dander was certain to come up.

SMITH BAKER, about eighty years old (Mr. Baker died since the interview), and the owner of a handsome property on the plains, had a rich font of early Mormon incidents. He was one of the teamsters who assisted the Mormon exodus from Harpersville. He imparted the information about the shaft sunk at Bettsburgh, opposite Nineveh, for silver, at the expense of Josiah Stowell. He heard Sidney Rigdon preach, and said he was a decent speaker as preachers averaged in those days. He related incidents of Mormon baptisms in the stream from the Perch Pond, and how the boys tore out the dam until the Mormons found it necessary to rebuild it in the night and watch it every time they had a baptism rite to perform. According to Mr. Baker, Josiah Stowell once sent the Prophet to mill and he lost a bag of wheat through a hole in the wagon box. Col. Stow, a prominent settler, saw it fall and picked it up and carried it to his house. The Prophet resorted to his "peek-stone" and saw a man come out of the woods, seize the bag, and make off with it. The robbery was noised about thoroughly for several days, when Col. Stow confessed the part he had played and surrendered the wheat to the great confusion of Stowell and Smith. Mr. Baker was authority for saying that Joseph was sent to pray John Morse back to life, but discouraged the scheme on the ground that the deceased was an old man and had better remain dead. Mr. Baker said that the widow of Benjamin Peck, of Afton, who took her two children and went off with the Mormons, placing in the hands of Joe Smith considerable money, repented in great agony of mind while on the road to Ithaca, but the Mormons would not restore her property, and she was forced to remain with them,

MRS. HARRIET MARSH, an estimable lady of Harpersville, now about eighty years of age, and wonderfully well preserved in bodily and mental vigor, remembers much of Joe Smith's career, though she only saw him once. She was traveling with her husband toward Susquehanna, and stopped at Waller's tavern where the Prophet and "Electa Cyria" were stopping for a meal. Joe had his head wound in thick bandages and Mrs. Marsh was told by landlord Waller the story of the Prophet's great fight with the devil. This was about two weeks after Smith returned from Palmyra with the golden plates, and he was then on his way to brother-in-law Wasson's to get a box made for it. She thought the "Electa Cyria" below the ordinary grade of intellect for women. Mrs. Marsh told the story of the shoemaker at Greene, whom the Prophet failed to bring to life. Judge Johnson, who recovered the horse for the shoemaker's executors, was Mrs. Marsh's brother. The Mormon exodus went past her house. She saw Josiah Stowell and his daughter after they returned from the Mormons, and thinks that Mrs. Stowell, who died while West, was poisoned. Mrs. Marsh remembers the attempt of Joe Smith to walk on water. She also remembers that the Knights, while working for her husband in haying, said that Joe Smith could perform miracles, and Joseph, the elder of the Knights, said that Joe Smith had cast the devil out of him; that he was in the shape and style of a black cat, and ran into a brush heap.

MRS. REBECCA NURSE, an elderly lady now residing in Binghamton, lived near Nineveh at the time of the Mormon doings there, and remembers that the Prophet set a day to sink Nineveh after the manner of the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. But after a great deal of coaxing he was persuaded to withdraw his curse, or at least to postpone it, otherwise the Albany and Susquehanna railroad would now have to ferry across a Dead Sea.

In a little briar and fern grown cemetery, on a knell a few rods above the place where they bored for oil on the McKune farm, by the side of the Erie Railway, a few years ago, is the legend of the prophet which was to be and wasn't. It is engraved upon a little rude headstone of black sand-stone, and reads: "In memory of an infant son of Joseph and Emma Smith, June 15, 1828. The lettering is rude, in the style of the manuscripts of those days, and the figures' 8's look like a cross between a $ character and the letter S bent the wrong way. They bring to mind visions of an old-fashioned school-master. The embryo prophet is buried in a row with the Hale family, and around him are the McKunes and other pioneers who have passed away, leaving honorable names and honorable descendants.

---

THE ORIGIN OF THE MORMON BIBLE.

The current "midsummer" number of Scribner contains a contribution from Mrs. Ellen E. Dickinson, in regard to the origin of the Mormon Bible, which, it is claimed, was taken from the manuscript of a romance written by her great uncle, Rev. Solomon Spaulding, but never put in type by its author. From the facts related, which seem to be well authenticated, the claim appears to have some foundation. It appears that Mr. Spaulding, a graduate of Dartmouth College and a retired minister of scholarly attainments, while residing in Ohio, in 1812, was led to examine some earth mounds near his house. In these he discovered portions of skeletons and other relics. Among them some hieroglyphic characters were found, which, though perfectly unintelligible suggested the idea of a biblical romance. This, it is claimed, was written and purported to bo a history of the peopling of America by the lost tribes of Israel, the prominent characters in the work being given peculiar names, among them Mormon, Moroni, Lamenite, Nephi, and the title of "Manuscript Found," given to the romance. The author, who had already written several romances, read this work to friends and finally applied to a Pittsburg printer to have it published, but it was declined, after having remained in the hands of the printer some time. At that time, Sidney Rigdon, who figured as a preacher among the Saints some twenty years later, was employed in the Pittsburg office.

Subsequently, in 1823, one Joseph Smith, who is described as "a disreputable fellow wandering about the country professing to discover gold and silver and lost articles, by means of a 'seer stone,'" claimed to have been directed in a vision to a hill near Palmyra, N. Y., where he had discovered gold plates, curiously inscribed. In 1825 [sic] Smith called upon Mr. Thurlow Weed, who was then publisher of the Rochester Telegraph, at Rochester, N. Y., and asked him to print a manuscript. Mr. Weed, in a letter under date of April 12, 1880, relates the circumstances of Smuth'a interview with him, and says Smith repeated the story of the vision, the golden plates, etc., and produced from his hat, a tablet from which he proceeded to read the first chapter of the "Book of Mormon." Mr. Weed says he "listened until wearied, with what seemed to me an incomprehensible jargon," and then referred Smith to a book publisher in Palmyra. Five years later, 1830, the Mormon Bible was printed at Palmyra, and two years later the nucleus of a Mormon settlement was formed in Ohio.

When the "Mormon Bible" was first given to the public and was read in Ohio, its striking shnilisrity to the manuscript read three years before by Mr. Spaulding, was remarked by some who had heard the latter read by its author. Smith had evidently closely followed Mr, Spaulding's story! even to the professed finding of the plates in an earth mound, and the use of the same peculiar personal names, but he had added the marriage tenets to conform the new religion to his own ideas and purposes.

But where or how Smith procured the Spaulding manuscript is still unexplained. Some light, however, is thrown upon this point by a statement made aud verified April 3d, 1880, by Mrs. M. S. McKinstry, the only child of Mr. Spaulding. This lady, at present a resident of Washington, D. C;, and mother-in-law of Chief Clerk Seaton, of the Census Bureau, is now in her seventy-fifth year, though her-memory is said to be clear in regard to the events of her earlier years. In her affidavit Mrs. McKinstry refers to the death of her father, and recalls the circumstances of a trunk containing his papers, which her mother brought with them to this State, and among the contents of which she distinctly remembers having seen the manuscript of "Manuscript Found." After the death of Mr. Spaulding, Mrs. Spaulding and her daughter (Mrs. McKinstry) visited William H. Sabine, a brother of Mrs, Spaulding and then residing at Onondaga Valley. Here the old unlocked trunk containing Mr. Spauldicg's papers was left for some years, and it is understood that during the time it was so left Joe Smith was employed by Mr. Sabine as a farm hand. This would have afforded ample opportunity for him to copy the manuscript and, peculiar adventurer that he was, it would not have been a singular thing for him to do and to afterwards make use of it in the manner which seems to have been done. Again, it is possible that while the manuscript was in the hands of the Pittsburg printer it may have been copied and have fallen into Smith's hands through Rigdon, who afterwards figured so prominently in Mormon affairs. At all events, the fasts as given by Mrs. Dickinson are exceedingly interesting, and there is every indication that, as she says: "Out of the curious old romance of Solomon Spaulding and the ridiculous 'seerstone' of Joseph Smith, has grown this monstrous Mormon State," -- the darkest blot on our National escutcheon.


Note 1: The information compiled by Frederic G. Mather for the first article above saw near simultaneous publication, as the "Early Days of Mormonism," in the pages of Lippincott's Magazine for Aug. 1880. Details Mather provided in these two respective sources do not always match perfectly, although the basic story they tell is the same. It appears likely that the editors of both publications emmended Mather's account to some degree. The Lippincott's proof-reader evidently pared down Mather's extended prose somewhat. The account given in the Binghamton Republican probably more closely reflects Mather's own chatty style of writing. And, although both articles relate essentially the same narrative, the Lippincott's version may prove to be slightly more reliable in its concise wording.

Note 2: For more on the same general subject, see the Aug. 25, 1870 issue of the Athens Gleaner, as well as another article by Mather, in the Feb. 26, 1888 issue of the New York Times.

The  Mormon  Bible.

A Pittsburg special says: The [proposed] celebration in Washington county in memory of the Rev. Solomon Spaulding, author of the "Book of Mormon," is [exciting] considerable comment in religious circles here. It has for many years been announced that the Rev. Mr. Spaulding was the original author of the "Mormon Bible," which is more commonly known as the "Book of Mormon," but now comes a Latter-Day Saint, or Mormon preacher, T. W. Smith by name, who for some time past has been preaching in a hall on Fourth avenue in this city. Mr. Smith says that the Rev. Mr. Spaulding was not the author of the "Book of Mormon," and adds: "Mrs. McKinstry, a daughter of the Rev. Mr. Spaulding, and wife of Dr. A. McKinstry of Monson, Mass., states that her father died in Amity, Pa. in 1816; that directly after, with her mother, she went to visit an uncle named Sabine in Onondaga county. N. Y.; that she saw a manuscript about an inch thick, closely written, tied with some [stories] my father had written for me: on the outside of the manuscript were written the words, "Manuscript Found;" that in 1834 a Mr. Hurlbert came to her mother who in [1820] married a Mr. Davidson and from her, by an order of Jerome Clark, with whom she had placed the maanuscript, he obtained the same. This Hurlbert was an excommunicated Mormon, and, in retaliation for his expulsion, sought to destroy the Book of Mormon, thinking, from what he had heard, that the manuscript found was the basis of the Book of Mormon, the latter being the same work with slight alterations. Mr. Smith now claims that Hurlbert never returned the MS. to Mrs. Davidson; that he still possesses it and that it can be obtained by law.


Notes: (forthcoming)

The  Founder  of  Mormonism.

Joe Smith was born in Rutland [sic], Vt. about the time that Wingate, the combined forger and religious charlatan, made such a sensation there. He removed, when a youth, to Palmyra, N. Y., and there Rigdon found him. Smith was full of magnetism, full of warm blood, a hearty, generous fellow -- from the description an original, untutored Jim Fisk. After proper training, Smith became the prophet and Rigdon the inspiration behind him, putting cunning words in the mouth of the boor. At last Smith, finding how pleasant it was to play prophet, and flattered by the devotion paid him, drew away from the cold Rigdon. For one of his sensual nature, it was but natural to conclude that if celestial plural marriages were good, it was a grevous waste of time to wait for death to sanctify them; that real women were greatly to be preferred to doubtful and unsubstantial ghosts, and that the right thing was to be sealed to those in the flesh. So he had a revelation; polygamy became a part of the Mormon religion, and Joe Smith a little Mohammed. Followers began to flock rapidly around Smith. Probably without being conscious of the fact, he had made animalism the key stone in the arch of his creed, and given to his church all the adhesiveness which cements Christian creeds, and in addition all the fascination which, to sensual nature, clings to Mohammedanism. Thenceforth the institution thrived until it became so much of a nuisance, and took on attributes of such menace to free government, that in a paroxysm of rage the mob killed Smith. Though his life had been full of irregularities, in the hearts of his followers his death made him a martyred prophet who had died for his people, and ever since he has been held by them, as one to be reverenced next to the Nazarene. -- North American Review.


Note 1: The above excerpt was taken from page 280 of the North American Review for March of 1881. The preceeding paragraph in C. C. Goodwin's article in that issue reads thusly: "How has this [Mormon] power waxed so strong? To answer the question a brief review is necessary. There is no doubt that the original Mormon creed was evolved from the crafty brain of Sidney Rigdon. Rigdon was born and reared in the region of the Whisky Insurrection in Pennsylvania. The first shot in that early rebellion was fired but a few rods from Rigdon’s father’s house. The man who was afterward Rigdon’s pastor was a leader with Mike Fink and his brother outlaws, and was taken to Philadelphia in irons. Rigdon was expelled from the First Baptist Church in Pittsburgh, in 1823, for heresy. He was then teaching “Common Stock” (communism), and afterward drifted naturally into Mormonism, for he was steeped with incendiarism before he was born. Greedy of power, with a subtle knowledge of lower human nature, he rightly judged that the best way to attain the object of his ambition was to place a chain of superstition around the necks of men. So he worked out the details of a new church. Among other things which his new religious code contained was the provision for sealing to the dead for eternity, that lost souls might still be saved through the grace of celestial marriage with those yet in the flesh who had been saved through conversion to the Mormon faith. But Rigdon had little magnetism; moreover, he had some education; for him to state in scholarly language what purported to be a revelation from on high would be to defeat his own purpose. He required an assistant, and searched until he found the subject that he required in a hoodlum and tramp who was going around the country with a “peep” stone, telling fortunes. This was Joe Smith...."

Note 2: See also the Quincy, Illinois Daily Herald of July 26, 1881 The writer's linking of Sidney Rigdon's "pastor" (Rev. John Clark) with Mike Fink in the 1791-94 "Whiskey Rebellion" (centered in Washington Co., Pennsylvania) appears to be fanciful and was perhaps drawn from some fictional account penned by a member of General John Neville's family. Neville was a Pennsylvania inspector of the federal excise tax on whiskey-making at the time -- who served also as a commander of troops charged with putting down the rebellion. His grandson, Morgan Neville, was the early 1820s editor of the Pittsburg Gazette, as well as the author of the 1829 folklore account "Mike Fink, the Last of the Boatmen." For Rev. John Clark's role in the turmoil surrounding the rebellion, see Henry C. McCook's The Latimers: A Tale of the Western Insurrection of 1794 (Philadelphia: 1897).

The  Book  of  Mormon.
_____

ITS PLACE OF ORIGIN IN WESTERN NEW YORK -- JOSEPH SMITH
AND BRIGHAM YOUNG -- "THE MANUSCRIPT FOUND" --
THE THREE WITNESSES TO THE GOLD PLATES.

Rochester Democrat.
_____

Ridiculous as are the claims of the faithful regarding the origin of the "Book of Mormon," and worthless as are the contents of the volume, the people of Western New York have always felt considerable interest in the book and in the sect whose Bible it became, because both orginated in their midst. Joseph Smith, the founder of Mormonism, and Brigham Young, its greatest prophet, were born in Vermont, and both emigrated into this part of the Empire State, at an early age. The former spent the years of a disreputable youth and early manhood at Palmyra, Wayne county; and the latter engaged in the useful though not very exalted profession of glacier and painter -- some say cooper -- at Auburn, Cayuga county. About two miles from Palmyra the alleged golden tablets were found by Smith, and at that village they were translated and published in the winter of 1829-30; from Western New York came also tha first converts to the new faith.

Notwithstanding the book of "Mormonism Unveiled," edited by one E. D. Howe, and, other expositions of the fraud that soon followed, the first Mormons succeeded in veiling the origin and circumstances attending the production of the "Book of Mormon" in some mystery.

The mysterious is always a powerful adjunct in the establishment and spread of a new religion among the ignorant, and this in part accounts for the success which followed. The well known version of the production of the book given by the followers of Smith is as follows: A celestial personage pointed out to Smith a place on the hill Cumorah, where a stone casket was hidden containing a volume of thin gold plates, eight inches long, seven inches wide and six inches thick, fastened together. These plates were covered with hieroglyphics in a language no longer extant. In the same box was also found a pair of magic spectacles which Smith called Urim and Thummim. These placed over the strange characters inscribed on the plates would convert them into English which Smith dictated to an amanuensis, Oliver Cowdrey. Unbelivers say that Smith with his tablets sat behind a curtain which screened him from too observant eyes. This process of translation lasted about six months. The book was published soon after and created considerable excitement.

The volume consists of nearly a score books, the first of which professes to have been written by, one Nephi, who lived in Jerusalem about 600 B. C. The work is supposed to have been continued by others until about 420 A. D. This wonderful literary production pretends to give a history of America up to the fifth century of our era; the first settlement of the country after the tower of Babel failure: the second settlement in the sixth century B. C., by Lehi and his sons wbo came direct from Jerusalem; the origin of the Indians from the unfaithful Jews; the advent and preachings of Christ in America, the final destruction of the faithfu1, etc. etc. The contents of the book and its marvelous contents were believed by many, but ruthless unbelievers appeared who sought to destroy the claims for the authenticity. In his "Mormonism Unveiled," E. D. Howe sought to prove that this supplement to the Bible was based on a sort of historical romance, written by one Samuel [sic] Spaulding, a clergyman residing at Conneaut, Ashtabula County, Ohio, in 1812, whose imagination had evidently been fired by a peculiar mound in the neighborhood, and from which Indian relics have since been exhumed.

This romance was entitled, "The Manuscript Found," and was read by its author to his neighbors for amusement, as he was unable to get it printed. Afterwards, several witnesses who testified to the truth of Joe Smith's story, quarreled with that libertine and stated that the whole affair was a hoax.

But this manuscript upon which the "Book of Mormon" is said to be founded, has never been found since it left the hands of Mr. Spaulding and his wife. It has been traced, but what has become of it is only known to the Mormons themselves. They recognized the necessity of keeping it from profane eyes, and have very successfully done so. In the August number of Scribner's for 1880, Mrs. E. E. Dickinson publishes an article showing that the claim that Spaulding's novel was the original of the "Book of Mormon," was true, substantiating her statement in part with evidence furnished by Mrs. McKinstry, a daughter of Spaulding. She also stated that the manuscript was, in 1834, delivered to one D. P. Hurlbut, of Gibbonsburg, Ohio.

In the October number of this year Mrs. Dickinson has another article, in which Hurlbert denies that he ever received the manuscript in question. She traces the "Manuscript Found" in other directions, however, still claiming that Hurlbut at one time had the genuine manuscript in his possession, from certain admissions which he made to her. Mrs. Redfield, of Syracuse, writes to her that the original "Manuscript Found" was in existence at Onondaga Valley, N. Y., in 1818. In 1831, Mrs. Davison, widow of Samuel Spauiding, had it in her possession at Hartwick, N. Y.

Mrs. Dickinson publishes a statement from one Hiram Lake, of Conneaut, Ashtabula county, Ohio, in which be says that his father heard the "Manuscript Found" read or read it himself, telling his son, who was then twenty-three years old, that the Mormon book was undoubtedly founded on it. Mrs. Dickinson had an interview with the late President Garfield at Mentor, whose farm, by the way, was purchased from a Mormon.

From her conversation with him and Mrs. Garfield, she gathered that they believed Sidney Rigdon was the prime author of the Book of Mormon, and that Smith was his tool. Rigdon was a young printer at the time, and was known to have seen the manuscript.

Recently a correspondent of the Chicago Times published an interview which he had with David Whitmer, one of the three witnesses who testided to the reality of the gold plates found by Joseph Smith. He is now a very old man living at Richmond, Ray county, Mo. It was at his father's house that the plates were translated and the book completed. He still professes to believe in the divine origin ot the golden plates, and describes minutely how they were fastened together. He also has in his posession the original manuscript written by Cowdry, thumbed and marked by printers, and cut up into "takes."

This old gentleman not only saw the tablet, but the celestial visitor who superitended its discovery and heard him say, "Blessed is the Lord and he that keeps his commandments;" also, "What you see is true, testify to the same." This same spirit appeared a few days after to Martin Harris, who defrayed the publication. The two and Cowdry were the three witnesses to the genuiness of the plates and book. Mr. Whitmer emphatically asserts that he has heard Sidney Rigdon, in the pulpit and in private conversations declare that the Spaulding story, that he had used "The Manuscript Found" for the purpose of preparing the "Book of Mormon," was as false as were many other charges that were then being made against the infant church, and he asserts that the story is as untruthtul as it is ridiculous. Concerning Joseph Smith, Mr. Whitmer says that he was quite illiterate, knew nothing of grammar or composition, but obtained quite a good education after he went west; was a man of great magnetism, made friends easily, was liberal and noble in his impulses, tall, finely formed and full of animal life, but sprung from the most humble circumstances. The first good suit of clothes he had ever worn was presented to him by Christian Whitmer, brother of David.


Notes: (forthcoming)

"LAND  OF  HONEY-BEES.
______

LIEUTENANT  LONG'S  IMPRESSIONS  OF
MORMONS  AND  MORMONDOM.
______

An Officer of the Regular Army on the Creed of Joe Smith and
Brigham Young -- Authentic History and Interesting Recital.
______

Lieutenant Oscar F. Long, U. S. A., of General Miles's command, was recently in Salt Lake City en route to Fort Vancouver, Washington Territory. He has made a careful study of the Mormons and some of his views are reflected in the following letter, the first of a serial which we shall have the pleasure of giving to the readers of the Sunday Herald. Lieutenant Long dates his communication: "Deseret; the land of the honey bee":

While en route to the Pacific coarst I branched off at Ogden southward for Salt Lake City. A brief sojourn in that delectable locality enabled me to glean facts regarding Utah and the institution of Mormonism, which, collated, it is hoped, may not prove uninteresting. The tendency of legislation now seems to be in favor of settling, without further procrastination, the vexed problem of polygamy, which has disturbed every administration from the time of Fillmore to the present day. Utah is divided into two parts by the Wahsatch mtuntains. Its surface presents a pleasant interchange of hill and vallfy. In the two mountain ranges between which the Jordan river flows -- the Wahsatch on the east and the Oqairrah on the west -- valuable deposits of precious metals occur. Gold, silver and copper ores are abundant; Iron exists in immense quantities, and coal of excellent quality is found; besides, bismuth, cinnabar, granite and marble are met with here, and these and sulphur are plentiful. The enormous mineral wealth of the Territory is but little understood by the general public, for it has not been the policy of the Mormons to invite prospectors, much less to encourage immigration. The Danites, or Destroying Angels of the Church, by their secret assassinations drive the few daring prospectors and miners from the mountains. The first mines opened in Utah were only opened under a guard of United States soldiers. During our centennial year Utah stood third among the bullion producing States and Territories, and it is asserted that the amount of precious ore taken from its mines during the present year will aggregate $10,000,000.

The beautiful, meadowlike valleys lie from 4,000 to 6,000 feet above the level of the see, and much of the soil possesses the elements of fertflity. There is a prevalent impression that the Great Sait Lake of Utah is below the level of the sea, and the inference has gained credence that at one time the lake formed part of the Gulf of California. This is erroneous. In the valleys the climate is generally mild and healthful, and but little snow is s een. The days are warm in summer, but thr nights are alwajs refreshingly cool.

SALT  LAKE  CITY

is situated on the River Jordan, and not far distant is seen the mirrored surface of the Great Salt late. Syracusans will be interested in knowing that the saline deposits of this late would supply the world with salt. Its valley in early years was known as the Valley of the Sacramento. The outline of the lake is irregular and there is no outlet; its altitude is 4,900 feet above the level of the sea, and in extent it is some seventy-flve miles long by thirty in breadth. Its shallow waters possess a specific gravity of 117 and form one of the most concentrated brines known. In it no living thing exists. To swim there is difficult, but in its buoyant waters man may float, if he exercisES care, for there is a tendency of the lower extremities to rise above the surface and the head to sink, and the water in the mouth or nostrils quickly [p---- in] strangulation,

Let us glance back half a century and mark the inception of this excresence -- this morbid outgrowth of our civilization, whose fungusllke development has increased to such an extent as to number at present some 200,000 souls. Of this number 130,000 are in Utah; and the remainder are distributed through Idaho, Arizona, Nebraska and New Mexico. Two hundred thousand Mormons! and each "one by his oath is the sworn enemy of the nation within whose borders he dwells. The act of development by which the germ of Mormonism was evolved is simple. It was conceived in ignorance and born of superstltion. Mormonism is the result of a diseased imagination to which was subsidized truth and conscience. Its legends are as fanciful as those of the beautiful Rhine. Joseph was inspired by his mother, who came from the Green Mountain State into Wayne county, New York, and there Settled. In 1823, while watching his father digging a well, he discovered a curious stone, the famous "seer" or "peek stone" and immediately began to have visions. He laid claim to miraculous power; he could tell where hidden wealth was to be found -- caskets of gold, coffers of gems and all the "wealth of Ormus and; of Ind," which had remained hidden for centuries. By the aid of this wonderful stone, these priceless treasures were to see the light of day. Solemn ceremonies and incantations always prefaced the work; and the credulous were only too eager to follow this self-constituted seer. Under [cover] of darkness and in entire silence the work progressed, but, it is needless to say, no treasure was found. The "spell" always was broken and the riches "spirited away. Smith was lamentabjy ignorant, but guided by the cunning of a serpent, allied'to himself a back-sliding clergyman; Rigdon by name, unprincipled as himself, but shrewd, and of versatile gifts. Soon afterward an angel appeared to him with the information that tnere was work for him to do, and that a record, written upon gold plates, was to be deposited in a particular place in'the earth, and with the record was to be found two transparent stones, through which the records would beccme intelligible. In 1827 these plates were found, engraved in hieroglyphics in a language not then known. From these tablets Smith read the Golden Bible or Book of Mormon. This book was printed, and with it a statement of three witnesses, who averred that an angel came down and laid it before their eyes, and that they beheld and saw the plates and engravings thereon. In this Book of Mormon it is affirmed that about the year 600 B. G. Lehi and his famfly, who dwelt at Jerusalem in the days of King Zedekiah, went into the wilderness, and, wandering for several years, arrived at the ocean, where he built a ship and set out in search of a promised land.

ARRIVING  IN  AMERICA,

dissensions arose, and Laman and Lemuel and [their] offspring, as a punishment for havirg rebelled against Nephi, who had been, appointed a ruler over them, were cursed by the Lord, and condemned to Have dark skins and to "become an idle people, full of mischief and subtlety, which did seek in the wilderness for beasts of prey." This was the origin of the American Indians, who, according to the Book of Mormon, are descended from the lost tribes of Israel. The fact has been fully established that this book was written by a graduate of Dartmouth college, Rev. Solomon Spaldlng, who, leaving the church, afterward diverted himself by writing peculiar romances. He became interested in mounds in Ohio, which at that time were attracting much attention, and said those mounds were evidence of the existence of an extinct race. He wrote a book in biblical phraseology, portraying the wanderings and exploits of the primeval people who built the mounds, amd this book never went to press. Rigdon, who was a journeyman printer in the office to which this manuscript was sent for publication, probably secured it by theft, for it is without doubt, the golden bible of the latter day saints.

Mormonism thus gained a foothold on superstitious ignorance. Smith prophesied and Rigdon secured converts by preaching. Smith's family and a few of his and Rigdon's associates were soon numerous enough to establish the Mormon church, as it is generally styled, or "the Church of the Latter Day Saints."

In 1830, the church was instituted at Manchester, N. Y. with about thirty believers, and the following year directed, as was said, by a revelation; the whole body was led to Kirtland, Ohio, which was to be the seat of the new Jerusalem. Shortly afterw«rd, in consequence of doubtful business transactions, both Smith and Rigdon were dragged from their beds by a mob and tarred and feathered. Truly they were inpired agents of a prescient deity, in 1832,

BRIGHAM  YOUNG

became a convert, was ordained an elder, and began to preach. His shrewdness gave him the prominence ha coveted; he was made one of the Twelve Apostles and preached the new doctrine throughout the eastern states, gaining many converts. In 1838, to escape the righteous indignation of an outraged people, the Mormon leaders fled to the town of Far West, in Missouri, whence their converts soon followed. Internal dissensions arose among them. Smith was accused of desiring to be a second Mahomet to this generation, and about this time the Danites were organized and took an oath to support the heads of the church in all things, whether right or wrong. In 1838 the conflict between the Mormons and Missourians assumed such proportions that the militia of the State was called out. The Mormons defied the officers ot the law, and Smith and Rigdon were arrested, charged with treason, murder and other high Crimes. Acompromise was effected and the Mormons moved over into Illinois, where Smith escaping, afterward joined them. They settled on land given them, and built a city which they called Nauvoo. The legislature granted a charter for the city and conferred extraordinary civil and military powers on Smith. He was permitted by the charter to organize the Nauvoo legion, with the rack of Lieutenant General.

In 1843 he received a revelation authorizing polygamy, but it created so much scandai that it was deemed best to put forth a public denial. It was not until 1852 that polygamy was boldly avowed. In 1844, Smith, while soliciting spiritual wives, caused an uproar which culminated in his arrest. He was committed to prison, but a mob attacked the jail, and on the night of June 27th, while attempting to escape through a window, Smith was shot dead.

In the eyes of his people such a death covered him with the glory of martyrdom. As a consequence, much confusion resulted from his sudden and very mortal-like demise. A leader was not wanting. The shrewd and cunning Brigham Young secured the ascendancy and was chosen president. In 1845 their charter was repealed by the Legislature. In September of the following year the city o£ Nauvoo was again in trouble, and cannonaded for three days. The Mormons were driven out at the point of the bayonet, and in 1847, from Council Bluffs their prairie schooners were sailing onward for the land of promise -- the Salt Lake valley of Utah. When the the Mormons entered the valley it belonged to Mexico, but a few montos later was ceded to the United States by the treaty o£ "Gaudaloupe Hidalgo." Passing througn "Emigration canyon" they soon reached the Mecca of their pilgrimage. They were poor and isolated and endured all the hardships of their poverty and isolation, but immediately going to work, brought under cultivation large tracts of land, erected buildings and far away from civilizion endeavored to live in the enjoyment of their mystery of iniquity. In 1849 the State of Deseret, the "Land of the Honey-bee," was organized. Besides Utah, within the limits of the territory claimed, by the prophet, were Idaho, Nevada, Arizona and California. Congress refused to recognize the State, but in 1850 the Territory of Utah was formed and Brigham Young appointed Governor by President Fillmore. Moreover he was ex officio commander of the military and assumed to be also vice regent of the Almighty. The following year the federal judges, having been forced by threats to leave the territory, Brigham Young was superseded as Governor by Col. Steptoe of the United States army. In August, 1854, Col. Steptoe arrived at Salt Lake City with a battalion of soldiers, but such was the state of affairs that it was not deemed advisable to assume his office, and after wintering in Salt Lake City, he formally resigned his civil appointment and moved onward with his troops to California. It was

IN  THE  TABERNACLE,

shortly after this event, that Brigham Young said, "I am and will be Governor and no man can hinder it" -- an open defiance to the authority of the United States. From this time dates the conflict between theocratic despotism and republican Ideas. From this time the Mormon leaders have been diligently engaged in sowing the seeds of disloyalty to the government and hatred to the nation. Soon after all the United States officials were compelled to leave the territory, and it was decided at Washington to supercede Brigbam Young as Governor and to send to the Territory a military force sufficient to protect the fedtral officers and sustain the dignity of the general government. In 1857 a force of 2,50O United States troops, consisting of the 5th, 7th and 10th regiments of infantry, the 2d dragoons, mounted rifles and three batteries of artillery, were sent to Utah to protect the Governor and support him in the discharge of his functions. Young denounced the army as a mob and forbade it to enter the Territory, and called the people of Utah to arms to repel its advance.

Late in the fall the troops arrived near Fort Bridger and, having been informed that Emigrant canyon (the only pass leading to Salt Lake City) had been strongly fortified by the Mormons, were under the necessity of making a detour to reach the valley. CoL A. S. Johnston had assumed command. Only four days out from Bridger, they were overtaken by the snows of winter, and loss of animals and severe storms compelled them to turn back. About the middle of November they went into winter quarters at Black's Fork, near Fort Bridger. The Mormons destroyed several supply trains, and cutting off eight hundred head of oxern, drove them to Salt Lake City. In the spring of 1858, Col. Kane, who had gone from Washington to Salt Lake City by the way of California as a commissioner, brought about an understanding between the Mormon leaders and the new Governor, and shortly afterward the troops entered Salt Lake valley and went into camp on the western side of Lake Utah, about forty miles from Salt Lake City, where they remained until May, 1860, when they were withdrawn to New Mexico and elsewhere. In the council with the commissioners, the representative of the government, the Mormons exhibited much venom.


Notes: (forthcoming)

Origin  of  the  Mormon Bible.
_____

The real author of the Book of Mormon was Rev. Solomon Spaulding, a graduate of Dartmouth College in 1785. His health failing, he engaged in business, and, in 1800 was living at Conneaut, Ohio, where there are numerous Indian mounds. He then wrote a romance, setting forth the not new theory that the North American Indians were representatives of the lost tribes of Israel. Mr. Spaulding took advantage of his surroundings, and connected his story with the relics which were found in the mounds. In a fictitious introduction to his novel which he entitled "The Manuscript Found," he speaks of the book as one of the exhumed relics of a past age. He makes use of the Scripture style of expression. He tells of the departure from Palestine of a Jewish father, Lehi, and his four sons, Laman, Samuel, Lemuel and Nephi, of the various journies and their voyage to this Western Continent. Dissension and division are frequent. The descendants of the brothers develop into hostile tribes. Then come quarrels and wars, and finally a decisive battle, and in short, the substance of all that is found in the "Golden Bible" of Joseph Smith. Indeed the Book of Mormon seems to be only a modified but mutilated edition of Rev. Mr. Spaulding's "Manuscript Found." There is abundant internal evidence that the later is a reproduction of the earlier work.

Spaulding used to read the chapters of his story to his neighbors, who were deeply interested in its progress, and were greatly entertained by the ingenuity of the author. He worked upon it three years, or until 1812, when he moved to Pittsburg, Pa. There he put his manuscript into the hands of a printer by the name of Patterson. He expected to publish the book, and it was announced in the papers in 1813 as forthcoming. It never was published, however, probably because Spaulding had not the money to pay the bills. Spaulding died in 1816. The original copy was returned to his widow, who kept it until the Book of Mormon was published, and then she produced it in proof of her assertion that Joseph's pretended revelation was a fraud. In the Boston Journal, of May 18, 1839, she told the story of the Manuscript.

The evidence is complete that Smith discovered only what he and some associate had hidden in a box of their own making, in a hole of their own digging. Smith came into possession of a copy of the work of Spaulding, by Sidney Rigdon, a working-man in Patterson's printing office. Rigdon confessed the fact afterward when he was cut off from the Mormon Church by Brigham Young. The three witnesses also quarreled with Joseph and Rigdon, and confessed to having sworn falsely. Rigdon, on leaving the work of printing, became a preacher of peculiar doctrines. Smith had quite a large following in certain views peculiarly his, and these two religious Ishmaelites coming together, set to work to give the world a new Bible. Smith, adding what was suited to his purpose, dictated Spaulding's story to Oliver Cowdrey from behind a screen, and the work was done, "and palmed off upon a company of poor deluded fanatics an divine."

The new prophet seems to have had but vague notions of what doctrines the new church should hold. Rigdon held to some doctrines which Smith did not. But they both agreed on the question of the second Advent, then exciting their section of country. They made that doctrine prominent in their Bible. The idea was "the end is at hand; the Indians are to be speedily converted; America is the final gathering place of the saints, who were to assemble as near the centre of the continent as possible." This was a doctrine, and this they preached, and this chiefly at first. It may be said in brief, that the religious teachings of the Book of Mormon relate to very modern questions. The discussions of 1830 and thereabouts, seem to furnish the new leaders with themes. Millenarianism is the main question. Infant Baptism, however, quite an ancient institution, is denounced; and wonderful to relate, polygamy, a much more ancient and for this country a very modern institution, is emphatically and repeatedly condemned. Polygamy as a duty was proclaimed by a revelation, much later in the prophet's life. -- Saturday Afternoon.


Notes: (forthcoming)

JO SMITH  THE  MORMON.
_____

The Birth and Early Surroundings of the Boy.
_____

In a droll, comfortable, conversational way. Prof. Brewer, of the Sheffield Scientific School, related in the mechanic's course of lectures, his personal experience with the founders of Mormonism and their disciples. Elder Strang, the apostate, was a near neighbor of the Professor, whose early childhood was spent in Western New York near where Jo. Smith started Mormonism. In 1853 Prof. Brewer was appointed to a point on the Gunnison expedition, of whom all except four were killed by the Mormons. He did not go, but stayed at home and taught in an academy in Western New York, where one teacher was related to a prominent Mormon.

Mormons, he said, are a body of religious fanatics. Where they now live was formerly a great fresh water lake 600 feet deep. Their valleys and mountains are concave; ours here are convex. This accounts, together with the clear air, for the great distance a beholder can see distinctly. Not one-fifth of Utah is fit to live on; all fertile land is made by irrigation. A great resemblance exists both in names and topography, between Utah and Palestine.

The founder of Mormonism had no Christian name. Joseph Smith he was called by his relatives; Jo by everybody else. His family were low, filthy, ill-bred Vermonters. Their principal wealth was children, of whom there were nine. Jo was No. 4. Jo's character was not highly estimated by the surrounding community. Neighbors learned to keep a sharp look-out on their hen-roosts when a Smith was near. Joe was a prevaricating youth, indeed a hand employed on my father's farm was accustomed to call him a "lying whelp." Brigham Young said "he was of bad birth, evil, gambled, lied and swore, but this all shows only out of what vile instrument true doctrine may come. When 15 years old he got a small stone, the shape of a child's foot. This he was accustomed to put to his eye and say that he saw visions. Sometimes he would put it in his hat and would then behold diverse and huge visions. Yes, what runs in the head of such a boy no one can tell.

Jo became more and more inspired, and finally an angel led him out to the side of a hill. He dug, and amidst daring pyrotechnic displays, the gold plates and accompanying spectacles came to light. According to believers illiterate Jo became head priest of the high order of Melchisedeck. These records purported to be from the lost tribes of Israel to the saints of the Lord in New Jerusalem. J. Smith Melchisedeck did everything by revelation. The spelling in the book was frequently wrong and often inconsistent. For instance, Hiram was spelled Hyrum. But "the Lord has commanded it must be so spelt." And spelt it is :Hyrum" in Utah this day.

The whole Bible was stolen from an historical novel by Solomon Spaulding, a Presbyterian minister, who was ill and wrote to while away tiresome hours of retirement.


Notes: (forthcoming)

Authorship of the Book of Mormon.

The Presbyterian Observer throws some light on the authorship of the Book of Mormon. The book, it says, has commonly been credited to the Rev. Solomon Spalding, a Presbyterian minister -- a romance purporting to give the origin and history of the American Indians. He sought to find a publisher for his story in Pittsburg, but was unsuccessful. The author died a few years later. The manuscript of this story unaccountably disappeared, though it was generally believed that one Sidney Rigdon, a printer, afterward a Mormon Bishop, got possession of the same, altered and added to it, and, thus altered and amended, was sent forth to the world as the Mormon Bible. This point is explained by the following letter from Mr. James Jeffries of Harford county, Maryland, whose boyhood was spent a few miles from Pittsburg.

He says: "I know more about the Mormons than any man east of the Alleghenies, although I have given no attention to the matter for twenty-five years. I did not know I was in possession of any informatlon concerning the origin of the Book of Mormon unknown to others. I supposed that as Rigdon was so open with me be had told others the same things. Forty years ago I was In business in St. Louis. The Mormons then had their temple in Nauvoo, Illinois. I had business transactions with them. Sidney Rigdon knew them very well. He was general manager of the affairs of the Mormons. Rigdon, in course of conversation, told me a number of times that there was in the printing office, with which he was connected in Ohio, a manuscript of Rev. Spalding's, tracing the origin of the Indian race from the lost tribes of Israel; that this manuscript was in the office for several years; that he was familiar with it; that Spalding had wanted it printed, but had not had the means to pay for the printing; that he (Rigdon) and Joe Smith used to look over manuscript and read, it over on Sundays. Rigdon and Smith took the manuscript and said "I'll print it," and went off to Palmyra, N. Y. I never knew this information was of any importance; thought others were aware of these facts. I do not now think the matter is of any importance. It will not injure Mormonism. That is an 'ism,' and chimes in with the wishes of certain classes of people. Nothing will put it down but the strong arm of the law."


Note: The same piece was also reprinted in the Sodus, NY Wayne Co. Alliance. The reprints contain several typographical errors -- see the Presbyterian Banner of Feb. 13, '84 for the full text.

AS  JOSEPH  SMITH  LEFT  IT.

Mormons Looking up the Original Manuscript of Their Bible.

In the Hands of a Man who Heard the Message From Heaven --
The Book Revised by Latter Day Saints in Missouri.

From the New York Sun.

RICHMOND, Mo., July 18. -- Several prominent members of tho Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints are now in the city on a curious errand. David Whitmer, the only living witness of the alleged miracle by which the Book of Mormon was given to the world, is a resident of this town. He is a very old man, but he retains his vigor in a marvelous degree, and his memory is still good. He has a fine old home here, where he has lived for many years, respected by all. No man in the state stands higher in the estimation of his neighbors. He is eminently pious and loves his religion. Mr. Whitmer's posession of the original manuscript of the Book of Mormon has long been known to members of the church, but he has steadliy refused to part with it, though often solicited to do so. The polygamous Mormons have made several efforts to gain possession of the coveted papers, but Whitmer has declined to listen to any proposition they might make. The gentlemen here are the prominent officials of the organization in Missouri, Iowa, Ohio, and New York. Many errors have crept into the numorous editions of the book during the last twenty years, and it was thought desirable to compare the present version with the original next before the death of Mr. Whitmer, who holds most tenaciously to the manuscript. This examination is still in progress. Several verbal errors have been discovered, and in a few instances entire sentences have been found to have been perverted. The original contains no authorization of polygamy, as the version in use in Utah does, and these gentlemen denounce the Mormons of that Territory in the severest terms.

Mr. Whitmer's faith in what he claims to have seen is remarkable. He recited his experience at the time of the revelation to his visitors as follows: "In 1828, when I lived In Ontario County, N. V., there was great excitement over the discovery by Joseph Smith, a farmer in our neighborhood, of a great treasure. Nothing was known of it in a definite way by my family until the next year, In June, when Smith visited my father's house. While there he was busily engaged in the translation of the book, which I learned he had found, in the form of gold plates, in the hill Cumorah, about two miles from Palmyra. I saw the plates frequently in Smith's hands, but as the characters inscribed thereon were something like Egyptian hieroglyphics, I could make nothing out of them. Smith, however, had no difficulty in deciphering them, and as he dictated Oliver Cowdrey wrote. I asked Smith once how he came to find the plates, and he told me that the place on the hill was pointed out to him by an angel in dazzling apparel. They were in a stone casket, and purported to be the history of the Nephites, a nation that had passed away. The plates, as I saw them, were fastened with three rings, About half of them were loose and movable, but the others were solid, as if sealed. Smith said In explanation of this that the angel had told him very impressively that the loose plates alone were to be used, and that the sealed portion was not to be tampered with.

"I became interested in the matter, as Smith was a man of good repute. After the plates had been translated, six months having been passed in the work, the same heavenly visitant appeared to Smith and reclaimed the tablets, informing Smith that he would replace them with other records of the lost tribes that had been brought with them from Asia, and that they would all be forthcoming when the world was ready to receive them. I saw this apparition myself, gazed with awe on the celestial messenger and heard him say: 'Blessed is the Lord and he that keeps His commandments.' Then, as he held the plates and turned them over with his hands so that we could see them plainly, a voice that seemed to fill all space was heard, saying: 'What you see is true. Testify to the same.' Oliver Cowdry and I, standing there, felt, as the white garments of the angel faded from view, that we had received a message from God, and we have so recorded it. Two or three days after the same angel appeared to Martin Harris while he was in company with Smith, and placed the same injunction upon him. He described the sight and his sensations to me, and they correspond exactly with what I had seen and heard. In his translation of the tablets Smith used a small oval or kidney-shaped stone, which seemed endowed with the marvelous power of converting the characters on the plates, when used by Smith, into English. He would then dictate and Cowdrey would write. Frequently one character would make two lines of manuscript, while others made but a word or two. I can assert emphatically, as did Cowdrey, that while Smith was dictating he had no manuscript, notes, or other means of knowledge, save the seer stone and the characters as shown on the plates.

As an evidence of our belief in the divine origin of the book, I can say that Martin Harris, one of the witnesses, mortgaged his farm for $3,500 for the purpose of having it printed, and we all contributed time and money for the purpose of circulating it. A few years ago Orson Pratt and Joseph F. Smith, who had been sent from Utah to secure the original manuscript, came here, and after a careful examination Elder Pratt assured those present that the writing was in the hand of Oliver Cowdrey. He declared that the archives at Salt Lake were incomplete without it, and he offered me any reasonable sum for it, but I refused to part with it, as regarded it as a sacred trust.

Mr. Whitmer's beliefs have undergone no change. He had refused to affiliate with any of the various branches of the church that have sprung up through false teachings, and he rests his hopes of the future "on the teachings of Christ, the apostles, and the prophets, and the morals and principles inculcated in the Scriptures." He also declares that the Book of Mormon is but the testimony of another nation concerning the truth and divinity of Christ and the Bible, and that that is his rock, his gospel, and his salvation. Having been misrepresented by various branches of the church, he recently had the following proclamation printed, and, having many copies of it in his possession, he gives them to all of his callers:

Unto all nations, kindred tongues and people unto whom these presents shall come: It having been represented by one John Murphy, of Polo, Caldwell County, Mo., that I, in a conversation with him last summer denied my testimony as one of the three witnesses to the Book of Mormon:

To the end, therefore, that he may understand me now, if he did not then, and that the world may know the truth, I wish now, standing as it were, in the very sunset of life, and in the fear of God, once for all to make this public statement: That I have never at any time denied that testimony or any part thereof, which has so long since been published with that book as one of the three witnesses. Those who know me best well know that I have always adhered to that testimony. And that no man may be misled or doubt my present views in regard to the same, I do again affirm the truth of all of my statements as then made and published. "He that hath an ear to hear, let him hear." It was no delusion. What is written is written, and he that readeth let him understand.

And, that no one may be deceived or misled by this statement, I wish here to state that I do not endorse polygamy or spiritual wlfeism, It is a great evil, shocking to tho moral sense, and the more so because practiced in the name of religion. It is of man and not of God, and is especially forbidden in tho Book of Mormon itself.

I do not endorse the change of the name of the church, for as the wife takes the name of her husband, so should the church of the Lamb of God take the name of its head, even Christ himself. It is the church of Christ. As to the high priesthood, Jesus Christ himself is the last great high priest. This, too, after the order of Melchisedec, as I understand the holy scriptures.

Finally, I do not endorse any of the teachings of the so-called Mormons, or Latter Day Saints, which are in conflict with the gospel of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, as taught in the Bible and Book of Mormon, for the same gospel is plainly taught in both of these books as I understand the Word of God.

And if any man doubt, should he not carefully and honestly read and understand the same before presuming to sit in judgment and condemning the light which shineth in darkness and showeth the way of eternal life as pointed out by the unerring hand of God?

In the spirit of Christ, who hath said, "Follow thou me, for I am the life, the light, and the way," I submit this statement to the world, God, in whom I trust, being my judge as to the sincerity of my motives and the faith and hope that is in me of eternal life.

My sincere desire is that the world may be benefited by this plain and simple statement of the truth.

And all the honor be to the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, which is one God.  DAVID WHITMER.

Appended to the above are the signatures of many of the most prominent citizens of Missouri, all bearing testimony to Mr. Whitmer's probity and purity of life.

It is not known what disposition he will make of the manuscripts in his possession. The papers have been cut up into printers' "takes," and are soiled to some extent, but tho handwriting is very plain, and not a word is missing. The non-polygamous Mormons in this section are increasing in numbers, principally by reason of the profound respect for the faith which Mr. Whitmer's blameless life has inculcated.


Note: See also this similar 1881 report.

Early History of Hanover.
_______

AND BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES OF EARLY SETTLERS -- RESUMED.
_______

We mentioned in a previous chapter that Mr. Jacob Bump had charge of the erection of the Store, and soon afterwards the Silver Creek House for Oliver Lee. He was a practical bricklayer, a first-class mechanic, who understood his business to perfection. He was an extremely rapid workman and when he was once placed in charge of a job of work, the owner could feel assured that it would be well and quickly done. But he, like many other first-class mechanics, had one pernicious habit. He would have his periodical spells of intoxication. During these sprees all business was neglected, and he gave his whole time to spreeing and debauching....

[After a frightening experience] he came to realize the narrow chance he ran of losing his life, he then resolved in earnest that he would never drink anything more that would intoxicate. It is unclear, however, whether he would have kept that resolve or not had not other circumstances occurred to assist him in doing so, Not long after this event, the great Mormon revival of 1833 set in here. Bump was one of the first converts, and from the first took a prominent and active part in all their meetings. Early in the spring of 1832 he disposed of his property and with his family, and several other families, started for Kirtland, [Geauga] Co., Ohio, then the great Mormon Mecca.

Bump and his colony from Chaut. Co., were among the early Mormon settlers there, and he had managed to gain the confidence of a majority of the community, and he at once evinced disposition to make good use, in his own behalf, of that confidence. Then it was arranged and settled to erect the great Mormon Temple at Kirtland. Jacob Bump was chosen master builder. Also when it was decided to establish the Mormon Bank of Kirtland, he was chosen President and his oldest son Cashier. The Bank, however, had but a short existence. If reports were correct, about all the capital they ever had was the money they paid for having their paper printed in New York. They had a large amount of bills representing a million or so of money struck off, succeeded in getting several thousand dollars into circulation, principally through the West, before the bubble burst, and it was found there was not a dollar to redeem the paper with.

After four or five years we believe dissensions sprang up among the Mormons at Kirtland, and a part of them went farther west to some point in Missouri, but if our memory is correct, Bump remained at Kirtland and died there a few years after the rupture. There is no doubt but it was his connection with the Mormons that caused Bump to refrain from drinking to excess. If so, Mormonism, in its early stages, was the cause of promoting a little good...


Notes: (forthcoming)

MRS.  JOE  SMITH.
_______

An Interview With the Widow of
the Noted Mormon Leader.
(Lippincott's Magazine.)

Many people believe that the man in whose crafty mind the mighty system of Mormonism had its origin, was also the husband of at least three wives, and in consequence the possessor of a duplex mother-in-law. All the living members of Joseph Smith's family strenuously deny this statement; and the writer of this sketch had an opportunity to discover that it would have required some temerity to make such an assertion in the presence of the "original and only" Mrs. Joseph.

In the summer of 1854 I went with a friend to the town of Nauvoo, from which the Mormons had removed a few years earlier. Soon after that a colony of French socialists had taken possession of their homes; but the widow of Joseph Smith, who was now Mrs. Biddison [sic], still lived in the house she had occupied when her first husband was killed. Mrs. Biddison was the hostess of the Nauvoo Arms, the only hotel in the town, and she had occupied the same position during the days when Nauvoo was the headquarters of Mormondom.

She was about 45 years old, of medium height, and rather stout, but quick and active in her movements. Her complexion was clear, though somewhat sunburnt. Her features were good and regular, her eyes very black and piercing, and her hair of the same color, slightly turned grey. She had married Joseph Smith in the state of New York, some years before he announced his discovery of the Mormon Bible. She accompanied her husband in all his subsequent movements, and they had three children -- two boys and one girl.

Mrs. Biddison acquired a good deal of property in Nauvoo during the lifetime of her first husband, and, as she had never [sic] been a member of the Mormon church, she did not leave the town after his death.

Mrs. Biddison expressed herself very freely and openly about the members of the Mormon church, and spoke in a contemptuous manner of their profession of faith,

After dinner Mrs. Biddison conducted us through the house, and showed us the portrait of Joseph Smith, painted by one of the most skillful artists in Europe. It represented him as a commonplace, ordinary person and we found it hard to believe that such a man could have acquired absolute power over a large body of people.

My companion had the boldness to mention to Mrs. Biddison the report that Joseph Smith had set his followers the example of polygamy.

The mere mention of such a rumor made her very indignant. "No sir!" she exclaimed. "Joe Smith had but one wife, and I was that one. It wouldn't have been well for any other woman to assert any claim to him in my presence. If other women chose to do such things it was none of my business. Joe Smith knew very well that he couldn't have another wife, here or anywhere else. No, sir! Joe Smith had but one wife. He ruled the Mormons, and I ruled him." As Mrs. Biddison spoke, her eyes flashed, her nostrils expanded, and her whole form shook with passion. We were thoroughly satisfied that Mrs. Biddison had the ability to keep Joseph Smith, or any other man to whom she might have a claim, straight in the narrow road of morality and decency.


Notes: (forthcoming)

A  Venerable  Typo.

President Fairchild, of Oberlin College, recently visited Honolulu, in the Sandwich Islands, for the purpose of having an interview with Mr. Lewis L. Rice relative to a manuscript book in his possession, which has erroneously been supposed to be the origin of the Book of Mormon, the Bible of the Utah saints. Over sixty-four years ago Mr. Rice founded the Madison Observer at Cazenovia, afterwards removing to Madison. Subsequently he removed to Columbus, Ohio, where he was State Superintendent of Public Printing. He now, if living, must be nearly a centenarian.


Notes: (forthcoming)

New Light on Book of Mormon.

To the Editor of the Post-Standard:

Inasmuch as the citizens of your community have recently been greatly interested in the "Mormon question" it seems to me that the following information will be received with a certain attention. The facts which have recently come into my possession should set at rest forever the claims and contentions on which the Mormons ground their faith.

Every religion must have a creed or book, a person or a dogma which is authoritative and secure from the attacks which a reasonable science and a modern knowledge are sure to make. Mormonism has no such authority.

"The Manuscript Found" from which the "Book of Mormon" was formulated has been very conclusively proved to be the work of Rev. Solomon Spaulding.

Mr. Spaulding was a graduate of Dartmouth College and a clergyman of some literary ability. At any rate, while living in Conneaut, Ohio, he became interested in vertain earth mounds which were in close proximity to his home and caused an examination of them to be made, As a result of this investigation he wrote his manuscript, which was filled with ideas and figures quite unusual and out of proportion to the thought of the ordinary mortal.

The manuscript was taken at his death, with other personal effects, to Onondaga Valley (called "Hollow" at the time) to the residence of William H. Sabine. Mr. Sabine was a lawyer of distinction, and a personal friend of Judge Conkling of Itica and of other prominent men in this part of the State. The manuscript was kept in a trunk filled with other writings, letters, novels anf the like.

Mrs. Anna T. Redfield, who in 1832 was a resident of Syracuse, remembered the manuscript distinctly when she was 84 years of age. She, and others, read the "Book of Mormon" and remarked upon the remarkable similarity which it bore to this writing of Mr. Spaulding.

The reason soon became apparent. Joseph Smith had been a teamster and out-of-door workman for Mr. Sabine after he had been released from the Onondaga County jail in 1817. An examination of the records will prove this assertion. Smith heard the tales reported concerning this remarkable manuscript and in all probability conceived his plan and purpose, which resulted in a book which is fallacious and deceptive in its origin, purpose and persuasion.

No wonder that Thurlow Weed wrote of him in 1882: "With my knowledge of Joseph Smith it has been for more than half a century the occasion of surprise and regret that such a vulgar impostor should have obtained a following which is even now drawing proselytes from Europe."

This new information may be explored in "New Light on Mormonism" by Mrs. Ellen E. Dickinson.   G. C. RICHMOND.


Notes: (forthcoming)

ITS  END  OUGHT  TO  COME.

Twenty-four years ago this year the slave power fired on the emblem of national authority at Charleston. Saturday, the Fourth of July, the national day, the Mormon power insulted the American flag at Salt Lake City. Tremendous indignation was created by the Fort Sumter Incident; but the indignation of patriotic citizens over the act of the Salt Lake officials ought to be nearly as great -- not moderated at all by the inferior physical power of the Utah rebels as compared with the strength of the interests that produced the acts of succession. The weakness of the Salt Lake traitors only emphasizes their audacity and their hatred of our institutions. The pretense that these men, bred in hate of the national authority by an unrepublican hierarchy, have any loyal feeling toward the United States government is dispelled by their own traitorous act. The indignities offered on Independence day to the stars and stripes should spur President Cleveland as it would spur President Lincoln, the XLIXth Congress as it would the XXXVIIth, the American people of to-day as the American people of twenty-four years ago, vigorously to respond to the challenge. There should be no yielding of purpose until the Mormon rebellion is utterly crushed and its fires are extinguished.

The children of the present generation will marvel that an offense so rank as Mormonism should so long have been endured by the American people. Indeed, we ourselves must wondor when we reflect that during the lifetime of the generation that handled the business of a great rebellion, this scourge should go unswept from the face of the land. No one defends the lawless institution which has so long flourished in Utah; there is, in fact, a grain of philosophy in the remark made lately by an American of prominence, that if there could be developed among citizens in the states of the Union, a sentiment in favor of the dogmas of the Mormon churoh, then sentiment would be quickened, the issue would be made and the power intrenched at Salt Lake City crushed. Americans know how baneful is the influence operating in Utah, but confidence in their ability to destroy it appears constantly to postpone the day of reokoning. An institution that is worth condemning in the high-sounding words that have been uttered against Mormonism in national party platforms, ought to receive all the attention which is required for a war of utter extermination.

---

An  Exodus  of  Mormons.

From the New York Mail.

Brigham Young, jr., and Bishop Snow, of Salt Lake City, are on the way to Mexico to negotiate for large tracts of land in that republic for colonies of Mormons. Can it be that the Mormons of Utah have decided to leave the country? Fifty-four years ago Joseph Smith, who had "discovered" the Book of Mormon four years earlier in this state, rode out of Kirtland, Ohio -- a village near Mentor to which he had removed in 1830 -- on a rail and in a coat of tar and feathers, and the seat of the new sect was soon transferred to the Mississippi river.

Not quite forty years ago Brigham Young, who, on the death of Smith two years before, had succeeded to the Mormon presidency, began a long march from Nauvoo across the plains to Great Salt Lake, and thirty-eight years ago he founded Salt Lakt City, assuring his followers that they had reached the promised land. In 1852 he announced the "celestial law of marriage," which he said had been revealed to Joseph Smith in 1843, and to that announcement can be traced the trouble which threatens to expel the Mormons from their homes once more.

Mexico has less than twice the population of New York, but an area fifteen times as great as that or our state, and its fertility of soil is remarkable. As a home for the Mormons it would possess many advantages, and although a long journey for so vast a multitude as the Mormon population of Utah would be difficult, it would be well for the Mormons to make it, unless they resolve to abandon polygamy, Let the authorities press them to a decision, forcing upon them the alternative of obedience to the laws of the United States or flight. Perhaps when the order to go is given by the Mormon rulers non-polygamous Mormons will conclude to remain, and then Utah may be purged of her infamy without the loss of the greater part of her population.


Notes: (forthcoming)

MATTER  OF  FACT  PEOPLE.

The dull and serious portion of the human family find the rest of the people in this world a very hard set to get along with, and their firm belief in the omnipresence of a personal devil is not to be wondered at. No yarn which is told in a semblance of serioueness is too ridiculous to be believed, by them, and their unaccountable credulity has been made a commodity of profitable merchandise by another class endowed with not a high order of ability but possessed of considerable cunning.

Thus the three-card monte men manage to get a very comfortable living by fleecing persons who have never seen the little game before, but are confident that it is too easy. The men who go through passenger trains, to get small advances on big checks, to enable them to pay little freight bills, but will settle at the end the road, manage to live, very well on the credence of serious travelers; The personator who can mimic the solemnity of a parson, finds a rich field for the exercise, of his abilities among the benevolent, matter of fact people....

Our free schools have not had the desired effect of educating the masses sufficiently to enable them too keep out of the traps and humbugs. The spiritualist medium still gives his dark cabinet seances, the patent machine man still goes around taking notes of the farmers; lottery tickets are still a mania with the poorest people ofevery community; people flock westward to join the New Zion of Mormons... There are too many matter of people who swallow everything from pretensious of false prophets to the farcical points of newspaper paragraphers. It is a well established historical fact that Mormonism had its origin in the attempt of an old newspaper editor to write a fuuny novel. He made such serious work of it that Joe Smith seized upon the manuscipt for a new bible. A serio-comic writer can never tell the effect his imagination of fabulous things will have opon matter of fact people. They may found a new religion, lead to revolution, create denunciations, but seldom laughter. The laugh comes among brighter people who can tell a joke from a gravestone, even if an epitaph contains [no] joke, as many of them do when they describe extravagant perfections.


Notes: (forthcoming)

THE  FOUNDER  OF  MORMONISM.

How the Spaulding Manuscript Became the Mormon Bible --
A Former Resident of Allegany County.
_______

The New York Times of Sunday is furnished the following interesting narrative by a Cleveland correspondent:

(View original article from NYC paper)

Notes: (forthcoming)

"THE  BOOK  OF  MORMON."

New Light Thrown on its Alleged Divine Origin.

In a book recently published, entitled "New Light on Mormonism," by Mrs. Ellen E. Dickinson, are presented some facts of special interest in this part of the State. The aim of the author is to show the fraudulent character of the "Book of Mormon" and that it was furnished from a romance called, "The Romance [sic] Found," written by the Rev. Solomon Spaulding. Mr. Spaulding was the uncle, by marriage, of the author's mother and the romance was for a long time in the house of the author's grandfather, William H. Sabine, near Syracuse. The romance contained no suggestion of polygamy, and the story of how it was obtained and perverted to suit the purposes of the Mormon leaders is an interesting one.

The facts as told by Mrs. Dickinson are as follows: The Rev. Solomon Spaulding, a graduate of Dartmouth college, was, at the time of the war of 1812, living in a little town in Ohio called Conneaut. He had retired from the ministry and devoted a good deal of time to writing. Some earth mounds near his home attracted his attention, and an examination of one of these mounds discovered evidence of a civilized pre-historic race. This reinforced his theory that the country had been once peopled by a race now extinct, and he set to work at a new romance. In style of composition he imitated that of the Bible. Mr. Spaulding conceived the idea that among the relics found were some golden plates covered with hieroglyphics, and that these he deciphered and translated. As his novel professed to be the written history of the lost race, and found in an earth mound, he called it "The Manuscript Found." It purported to be an account of the peopling of America by the lost tribes of Israel and contained such names as Mormon, Moroni, Lemuel and Nephi. Mr. Spaulding [contacted] a publisher, a Mr. Patterson of Pittsburgh, with regard to publishing the work. In the publisher's printing office was a young man by the name of Sidney Rigdon who had ample opportunity for the copying of Mr. Spaulding's manuscript, and Mr. S. charged him with the act. The work, however, was never pobiUked. The Spaulding family then moved to Amity, Pa. Mr. Spaulding was in the habit of reading what he wrote to his friends, and Mr. Miller writes a letter saying that he had often heard Mr. Spaulding read from "The Lost Manuscript Found," and that when in after years the "Book of Mormon" came out he compared the two and found the historical part of the latter to be identical with Mr. Spaulding's manuscript. After Mr. Spaulding's death his widow and daughter removed to the house of William H. Sabine at Onondaga Hollow. He was a well-known man and lawyer. The manuscript of the romance was taken with them and was read from to friends. Mrs. Ana T. Redfield, then principal of the academy at the Valley, made a statement in 1880 that she had frequently heard Mrs. Spaulding tell about "The Manuscript Found," though not reading it herself. Years afterward when the Mormon Bible was published she procured a copy and at once reconized the resemblance between it and "The Manuscript Found." A number of other letters go to show that the Mormon Bible is taken from the Spaulding romance.

Mrs. Dickinson then tells how the manuscript was supposed to have been obtained by the founders of Mormonism. "Joe" Smith, the chief founder, is said to have been in the employ of Mr. Sabine about the time that Mrs. Spaulding was atying there. When a young man he claimed to have miraculous powers and to be able to trace stolen property, strayed cattle, discover buried treasures, etc. His name also appears in the criminal records of Onondaga and Chenango counties. Some suppose that he stole the Spaulding manuscript when it was at the Sabine house, but the author gives evidence that this is not so, but that Rigdon copied the original when it was in the Pittsburgh printing office. Smith, Rigdon and Pratt came together, exactly when it is not known, and determined upon the Mormon scheme. The theories aboat the peopling of America were then a common topic of conversation; Rigdon said that he had a copy of the Spaulding manuscript in biblical language explaining these theories in a quaint fashion, and the three men determined on their scheme. Our auther then gives an interesting account of how the great humbug was finally hatched, the jargon used to impose upon the credulous, and the first Mormon sermon that was preached in Palmyra in 1830, and the printing of the "Book of Mormon* at the same place. The narrative then takes up the hegira to the West, as the people in this vicinity were so familiar with the Spaulding manuscript as to be constantly discussing the difference between it aad the alleged "Joe" Smith revelation.

Another corroboration of the claim that the "Book of Mormon" was manufactured from "The Manuscript Found" is given by Mrs. Dickinson in an account of a Mormon meeting held in Conneaut, Ohio, in 1833. It will be remembered that Mr. Spaulding was living in this place in 1816, when he wrote his romance that he read to acquaintances. At this meeting a woman preacher made copious extracts from the "Book of Mormon." Many persons present recognized them as what they heard years before in Mr. Spaulding's story. As a result the Mormons determined to obtain the original of the Spaulding manuscript. A Dr. D. P. Hurlburt was the agent selected to obtain the coveted manuscript from a daughfer, Mrs. McKinstry, of Mr. Spaulding. The manuscript was given to to Hurlburt on his statement that he desired to expose the plagiarisms of the Mormon book and upon his promise that he would return the manuscript. It was never seen since by its rightful owners....

The book is published by Funk & Wagnalls and contains much of interest beyond the points to which we have alluded.


Notes: (forthcoming)

MINOR  FACTS  AND  FANCIES.
________

In November, 1830, Joseph Smith, the founder of the Mormon church with jis brother Hiram, and Oliver Coudry, passed through this town on a lecturing tour, giving an evening's discourse in the old Dickinson school house, which then stood at the North end of the creek bridge and is now a part of the tenement standing there. Mr. Dayton Peck, our townsman, is the only one living who heard the discourse of those early apostles of Mormonism, which did not make a very favorable impression on the audience of level-headed and intelligent early settlers of that neighborhood. Since then the enormous growth of this heresay has become a matter of serious political and moral import to our country. -- Whitney's Point Reporter.


Note: Mr. Dayton Peck's memory must have been a little faded, when he gave his recollection of the 1830 Mormon lecture. According to Ezra Booth, in the Ohio Star of Dec. 8, 1831, Oliver Cowdery was in Manchester, New York on Oct. 17, 1830, preparing for a missionary journey to the west. Cowdery arrived in Painesville, Ohio on or about Oct. 26th -- precluding a November 1830 appearance in Whitney's Point, Broome Co., New York. Either Cowdery was not on the Smith brothers' "lecturing tour," or the tour was conducted before November of that year.

Reminiscence  of  Joe Smith.
______

One of the  Founders  of Mormonism.

MR. EDITOR: -- An incident of his recollections as a school-master in his younger years, is related, with some humor by Enos Coleman, once of Sodus, but now an octogenarian resident of Missouri. The incident should be recorded for the benefit of any who may be inclined to favor, or palliate the monstrous pretensions of Mormonism; or even bestow the boon of charity upon its deluded devotees.

It was in the [----], he was employed to teach a [Winter] school in the town of Marion, Wayne Co. At the period, there was a general religious frenzy, every where prevailing among the scarcely populated settlements. The [-----sion], the [poverty], the discomforts of pioneer life, [from] the mutual sympathy they engendered, found solace in evening gatherings, that in time grew into religious meetings. So great became the interest in the "conference meetings," as they were termed, usually held in private houses, that no obstacles would deter attendance from long distances away. So, at an evening "conference" in the neighborhood, no surprise was manifested by the presence of an unknown religious enthusiast. As was [------] at such gatherings, the stranger gave vent to his pious ardor in his own way. His harangue consisted mostly of predictions of great events that were to happen in the near future -- events of which he had no definite conception; but was impressed with the magnitude of their importance. His prophecies, so far from meeting with dissent, rather harmonized with a general impression that the "great awakening" presaged a greater event: possibly the second coming of the Messiah. Of course, hospitality prompted an invitation to the stranger to stay till the morning. It so happened the invitation was accepted at the family where the school-master chanced to be boarding; (school teachers "boarded round" in those days) and as sleeping accomodations were limited, the prophet and the pedagogue were directed to occupy the same bed. Sometime during the night all were awakened by a sharp rap at the door. Who is there, and what is wanted? enquired the host. "Is a man here by the name of Joseph Smith?" was the responding enquiry. Joe Smith, subsequently the founder of Mormonism, and the pretended medium of a divine revelation to man, recognizing the voice of a Palmyra officer, leaped out of bed, seized his clothes and made his escape by a back door, through the snow, carrying his nether garment in his hand.

The officer's explanation was, he had a warrant to arrest "Joe" for stealing sheep. The culprit was finally caught.


Note: Enos Coleman (1805-c.1890) was the son of Seth and Elizabeth Coleman, early settlers in Sodus, New York. He was a lieutenant in the 242nd Infantry during the 1830s. In 1861 he moved to Hannibal, Marion Co., Missouri.

One of the Founders of Mormonism.

(Special Correspondence.)

RICHMOND, Mo., Dec. 29. -- Your correspondent called at the house of David Whitmer and obtained the portrait sent herewith. Mr. Whitmer was the associate of Joseph Smith in bringing into existence the Book of Mormon, and retained the original manuscript from which the book was printed. The origin of the Mormon church is a matter of history, but it might be well to recall here a portion of it, in order to explain the part of Mr. Whitmer took in it. David Whitmer was born in Pennsylvania in 1805. While an infant he was carried to Ontario county, near Watkins Glen, N. Y. His father was a strict Presbyterian, and David was brought up rigidly, though he possessed a natural inclination to contemplation on religious affairs. In 1829 David [sic] Cowdery, the village schoolmaster, who was a brother-in-law of Whitmer, heard that a man named Joseph Smith had discovered a valuable golden treasure near Manchester.

After considerable entreaty Cowdery was permitted to see the treasure, which consisted of a number of golden plates, about eight inches long and seven wide, about as thick as ordinary sheet-tin, and bound together in the form of a volume by three gold rings. A large portion of the volume was securely sealed, but on the loose pages were engraved hieroglyphics expressive of some language at that time unknown to any of the persons mentioned. Together with the golden tablets were a pair of spectacles, set in silver bows. Smith told how he had received the plates from two angels who commanded [him] to have them translated in the presence of three witnesses. In accordance with this command, Smith, Cowdery and Whitmer proceeded to the latter's home, accompanied by Smith's wife, and bearing with them the precious plates and spectacles.

The work of translating the tablets consumed about eight months, Smith acting as the seer and Oliver Cowdery, Smith's wife, and Christian Whitmer, brother of David, performing the duties of amanuenses. By the aid of the spectacles found with the plates Smith was enabled to decipher the characters.

The Book of Mormon was given to the world in 1830 and a church organized. The following year the disciples moved to Ohio and built a temple at Kirtland.

Mr. Whitmer, who always adhered to the teachings of Mormon, left Kirtland and journeyed into the wilds of Missouri, establishing the settlement of Jackson county, Missouri. It was here that the Ohio Mormons found refuge when driven away from Kirtland after Smith and Rigdon had been tarred and feathered for fraudulent banking [sic].

As a citizen of Richmond he stands deservedly high, having filled the office of mayor and councilman. Of those who took part in the original translation, Joseph Smith was shot by a mob in 1844. Oliver Cowdery died in this county thirty years ago, leaving a wife and daughter, both of whom are yet living in Silver City, Mo. John Whitmer, a prosperous farmer, died at Far West in 1878, leaving children and grandchildren. Jacob Whitmer passed away many years ago, and his son, Jogn C., a white haired elder of the Church of Christ, continues to preach the religion of his father in and about Richmond.

Mr. Whitmer adhered faithfully to the Mormon creed, with the exception of what he termed the "viper polygamy," which is strictly forbidden by the Book of Mormon. Though he split off from the church when Brigham Young joined it, he always held that Joseph Smith was an upright, god-fearing man. The Mormon church offered him once $100,000 for the original manuscript of the Book of Mormon, which he refused, and it is interesting to know now what will become of it.   Francis J. Leland.


Notes: (forthcoming)

The determined spirit of Mormonism glares out through the missionary labor it conducts even while it wages an unyielding fight with the Federal courts. Here and there in the darkest corners of the South, as well as in Northern Europe, Mormon missionaries are preaching their doctrine of delusion and immorality, strengthening the hideous system which they inherit from Joe Smith, Sidney Rigdon and Brigham Young with fresh converts. Their newest prize is fifty hoodwinked victims netted near Walhalla, South Carolina. If the Government wishes to crush Mormonism in the near future, it must take a bigger club in its fist and batter the concern in a vital spot.

---

The  Lepers  Should  Consolidate.

From the Rochester Herald:

The scheme of Mormon emigration to the Sandwich Islands may not be carried out, but it should be encouraged. That would bring about a union between polygamy and leprosy, two terrible evils which should be quarantined together.


Notes: (forthcoming)

VISIT  TO  MINER'S  HILL.
______

ONE OF THE PLACES CELEBRATED IN
THE HISTORY OF MORMONISM.
______

Joe Smith and His Bible -- Dictating to an Amanuensis -- One of
the Dupes -- Cave on Miner's Hill -- Bringing Out the Book.

On returning to the village of Palmyra we visited another hill which is celebrated in the annals of Mormon history. In order that the reader may understand the significance of this hill we must go back to Joe Smith and his bible. The book, which, by the way, no one ever saw, was said to consist of metal plates, pierced on one edge, and fastened together by rings which passed through the holes. With the book was also found, or so pretended, a huge pair of spectacles, too large for any mortal eyes, which had the remarkable quality of turning the hieroglyphics on the metal plates into plain English.

Smith's scheme required the publication of his bible. How was he to accomplish this? No one was allowed to see the metal plates, and yet Smith could not write a legible hand. An accomplice was necessary. But Smith was equal to the occasion. He engaged one Oliver Cowdery a school-teacher, to be his scribe, promising him part of the proceeds of the book. The Smiths were then living in a little, one-story log house. There were only two rooms on the ground floor, with a pointed garret in the roof. Across one corner of this garret Smith had a blanket-screen stretched. Behind this screen he ensconced himself with his magic spectacles and his golden book (or, as Hussey affirms, his tile brick). Cowdery sat on the other side of the blanket and wrote from Smith's dictation.

ONE  OF  THE  DUPES.

Martin Harris, a wealthy farmer, was induced to bear the expense of printing the manuscript. But Harris' wife was a woman of too much good sense to be Smith's dupe. So in the absence of her husband she pat the manuscript in the stove and burnt it up. Here was a check in the proceeding, and one, too, that filled Smith with dismay. He and Harris were morally certain that Mrs. Harris had taken the manuscript, but they did not know it was burned. Smith was unable to reproduce the book exactly, and he feared that the first manuscript would be produced to confound him. However, it wasn't a time to give up. He and his friends repaired to Miner's hill by night, and there dug a sort of cave on the east side of the hill. The dimensions of this cave were forty feet deep, sixteen feet wide, and seven feet high. The entrance was secured by a substantial door of two-inch oak plank. In this dark cave Smith set about producing a new manuscript, Cowdery still acting as an amanuensis. This copy was more securely guarded; it is that from which the Mormon bible was printed in 1829.

Miner's hill is about two and a half miles south of Palmyra. In appearance it is similar to Mormon hill, and like it runs off to the south in a ridge. In the days of Smith it was heavily wooded. When we visited the hill the timber had been cut down, and the whole was a slashing filled with stumps, briers and burrs. We had little difficulty in finding what used to be the cave. It is situated just below the brow of the hill. Fifty-six years, however, have left their ravages. Instead of a cave we found quite a depression where the earth had given way and fallen in. The door had long since disappeared. The door-frame, however, still stands there, buried more than half the way up in the earth. The frame is roughly made, the sides not being mortised into the top, but simply secured by three large spikes driven through each end of the top piece. We took our knife and cut off a piece of the wood. It was as sound as when the frame was first made. Hundreds of people, we were told, annually visit Mormon hill; but few ever wend their way through the burrs and briers of Miner's hill.

PRINTED  AT  LAST.

After a good deal of demurring Mr. Egbert B. Grandin, the publisher of The Wayne Sentinel, contracted to do the printing. An edition of 5,000 copies was ordered. The price agreed upon was $8,000. Harris pledging himself to pay the money. It happened that at that time the leading compositor in Mr. Grandin's office was Mr. John H. Gilbert. Mr. Gilbert, or, as he is now called, Maj. Gilbert, is to-day a hale man of 85 years. It was our good fortune to meet him and have a long talk about the early days of Mormonism. He had the chief operative trust of the typesetting and presswork. He got out the first form. There were in all 568 pages of the bible, and of these Gilbert set up with his own hands over 500. The original instructions were that no alterations whatever from the copy were to be made. But UDder Gilbert's earnest protestations these instructions were rescinded. Cowdery, though a tolerable penman, was poor in syntax, orthography, punctuation. etc. The copy furnished him, Mr. Gilbert assured us, was a solid mass. There was no punctuation, very few capitals, no paragraphs.

Joe Smith kept in the background. Gilbert only saw him twice -- once in the office for a few minutes and once on the street. Hyrum Smith, his brother, brought the copv to the office every morning, in installments of twenty-four pages, buttoned up in his vest, and came for them at night. But after much friendly expostulation Smith in about ten days relaxed his vigilance, and permitted Gilbert to take the manuscript home to correct and punctuate. This was on Gilbert's word that he would be responsible for the copy. Grandin read most of the proof; Gilbert read the rest. The contract price of the printing was faithfully paid by Harris. David Whitmer, who now lives in Richmond, Mo., has the original manuscript. A man living in Williamson, Wayne county, N. Y., has the press on which the book was printed. The book was seveu months in printing— that is, from August, 1829, to March, 1830.

Mr. Gilbert has one copy of the original edition of the Mormon Bible. It has never been bound, but is in [loose] leaves. He has been offered $100 for it, but wants $500. He thinks it ought to be procured for the library at Washington. In the Mormon Bibles now published Joe Smith is styled the "Translator." But the first edition bore on the title page, "By Joseph Smith, Jr., author and proprietor." -- F. W. Morton in Chicago Times.


Notes: (forthcoming)

Mormonism -- The  Mormons
in  Ohio  and  Missouri.
_____

In 1831 the Mormons set out for Kirtland, Ohio. Up to this time there had been no whisper of polygamy. Indeed, among the first "revelations" was one to the purport, that each man should be the husband of one wife. In the year 1832 Smith professed to have had one hundred and seventy five revelations. In this same year Brigham Young, a native of Vermont, joined the Mormons at Kirtland. In 1837 a "wild cat" bank which Smith, and Rigdon, one of the early apostles of Mormonism, had originated at Kirtland, failed, causing much loss of money and suffering. Smith and Rigdon were tarred and feathered, and fled to Missouri and established themselves at Independence as a fit locality for the "New Jerusalem," and the Mormons were made to believe that such it would be to them. In 1838 the prophet organized a military command, a body guard, a fearful band, destroying angels, called Danites, who were sworn to put out of sight all persons obnoxious to the saints, and many peaceful citizens disappeared, "slipped their breath," to use a favorite expression of the band. The horrible deeds of this band, together with the boasted pretensions of Smith, led to the expulsion of the Mormons from Missouri. These pretensions of Smith and the [aim] and animus of Mormonism were made clear at this time by an affidavit of two Mormon apostles, Thomas B. [Marsh] and Orson [Hyde]. They say in this affidavit the mormons have a company among them calling themselves "Danites," who have taken an oath to support the head of the church in all things, whether right or wrong; that the design of Smith is to take this state, and he professes to his people his intention of taking the United States, and ultimately the whole world; that this is the belief the prophet inculcates, and every true Mormon believes Smith's prophecies superior to the law of the land. Such sentiments as these, together with their lawless deeds, could not be tolerated in Missouri, and they were forcibly expelled.

The Mormon problem is confessedly a difficult one. The above extract of the affidavit of these early apostles throws some light on the present situation. We note two points: 1. It was and is the intention of the Mormon leaders "to take the United States," and that not in any ecclesiastical sense. In the Mormon system the church is the state and the state is the church. The two are inseparable. 2. "Every true Mormon believes Smith's prophecies superior to the law of the land." Hence, Mormonism from center to circumference is disloyal, regards the Gentile government of the United States as hostile, and is working with all its might to overthrow it, and unless heroically treated soon, civil war must be the inevitable result.


Note: The writer is mistaken, in saying: "In 1837 a "wild cat" bank... failed, causing much loss of money and suffering. Smith and Rigdon were tarred and feathered, and fled to Missouri." The 1832 tarring and feathering incident at Hiram, Ohio was unrelated to the 1837 Kirtland bank failure.

THE  BOOK  OF  MORMON.

A FAC-SIMILE PAGE OF THE ORIGINAL DOCUMENT.
_____

Its Declaration in Reference to Polygamy -- The Original Manuscript Not
in the Possession of the Present Mormons. Their Anxiety to Obtain it.
_____

In the town of Richmond, Mo., is still living at the age of 83 years David Whitmer, the only living witness to the "divine authenticity of the Book of Mormon." He is also the possessor of the original manuscript of this book, or "Mormon Bible," as it is sometimes called. The truth of this Book of Mormon depends on its divine origin, and if the Mormons believe this book to be a divine revelation on which their religion is founded, then are they protected by the constitution in the "free exercise" of their religion. But there has long been a suspicion that their creed has been "doctored" to meet the desires of the "Latter Day Saints." This fact seems to be conclusively proved from a recent interview with Mr. Whitmer. The old gentleman still clings ferociously to his faith in the inspiration of the original Book of Mormon, though he will seldom speak on the subject to those who are possibly sjeptics. To those who are intimate with him, he describes the circumstances of the "vision" in which the "gold plates, held together by three rings and inscribed with strange characters, were delivered by an angel to Joseph Smith in the presence of Oliver Cowdery, Martin Harris and myself." He also describes the transparent stone spectacles called "Urim" and "Thummim," through the aid of which the characters on the gold plates were deciphered and the transcript produced which he holds of the Book of Mormon. Mr. Whitmer, Cowdery, Martin Harris and others left the church, or, as they claim, the church left them in 1838. He retained the manuscript, which has been since much sought after by the church. The gold plates were lost or stolen, so that the only credentials the Mormon church possesses is this manuscript of their bible. They have tried in every way to get it out of Mr. Whitmer's hands.

In 1879 two of the Mormon apostles, Orson Pratt and Joseph F. Smith, visited Mr. Whitmer for the express purpose of obtaining these, to them, precious sheets. Apostle Pratt said: "Father Whitmer, we desire to purchase the manuscript, and we are authorized to say that you may name your price, and (with a patronizing air) be sure you put the price high enough, for the church has plenty of money in the treasury, you know." Mr. Whitmer replied, with quiet emphasis: "Elder Pratt, there isn't gold enough in the world to buy it." Before leaving Richmond Orson Pratt told the hotel proprietor that they would willingly have paid Mr. Whitmer $100,000 for the manuscript. One reason why the Mormon church was so anxious about this document is shown in the accompanying fac-simile reproduction of a portion of one of its pages. Mr. Whitmer kindly permitted and accurate tracing to be made, from which or engraving is reproduced. It is taken from the second book of [illegible lines in clipping] ...

Mr. Whitmer relates this as an instance: "One night there was quite a little party of brethren and sisters assembled at Smith's house. Some of the men were excessive chowers of the filthy weed, and their disgusting slobbering and spitting caused Mrs. Smith (who, Mr. Whitmer insists, was a lasy of predisposed refinement) to make the ironical remark that it would be a good thing if a revelation could be had declaring the use of tobacco a sin, and commanding its suppression. The matter was taken up and joked about, one of the brethren suggesting that the revelation should also provide for a total abstinence from tea and coffee drinking, intending this as a counter 'dig' at the sisters. Sure enough the subject was afterward taken up in dead earnest, and the 'Word of Wisdom' advising against the use of tobacco, tea and coffee was the result."

That Mr. Whitmer was imposed on originally by Joseph Smith as the Mormon Bible being a divine revelation in 1823 is no longer questioned by those outside of the Mormon church. Forty-six years ago there were wonderous affidavits published to the effect that the origin of the Book of Mormon was written in 1812 by a writer of romances, the Rev. Samuel [sic] Spaulding. He called it a "translation from some hieroglyphical writing exhumed from a mound in Ohio." Mr. Spaulding sent his manuscript to a printer named Patterson, in Pittsburg, Pa. In the office worked Sydney Rigdon, afterward an advisor of Joseph Smith. Patterson declined to publish Mr. Spaulding's romance, and returned it to him after a time. It remained then for a number of years in an unlocked trunk in Mr. Spaulding's brother-in-law's house. Joseph Smith worked on this farm, and, it is supposed, copied the romance and published it as a "revelation" in 1830.


Notes: (forthcoming)

KIRTLAND  MORMONS.

How They Are Reviving the Faith of Prophet Joe Smith.
(Special Correspondence.)

Twenty-three miles east of the city of Cleveland and about seven miles south from the slope of Lake Erie, was driven, in the year 1831, the first stake of Zion. Fifty-six years ago it was not so evident as it now is where the large cities and towns of the lake region would be. It then seemed an assured fact that Kirtland would be larger than either Cleveland or Buffalo.

In the latter part of the winter and early spring of 1831 there was the most wonderful ingathering of people on Kirtland Flats that had ever been seen in this part of the world. It was impossible to build houses fast enough to accomodate those that came. Rude shanties were extemporized. Many people continued to reside, like gypsies, in the Conestoga wagons and ox carts in which they came. The sound of the hammer was heard incessantly. Houses and shops grew as if by magic. It was a busy mart. To supply the wants of this multitude was no small task. There were men, women and children of many grades, but the rude, squalid and poor seemed to be the prevailing type. Hon. A. G. Riddle, of Washington, then a young man residing in the vicinity, who visited the Flats at this time, says that one could see in their faces evidences of the wild fanaticism that had brought this assemblage of odds and ends together.

This was a season of religious agitation in all portions of the country. Alexander Campbell and his father, Scotch Presbyterians, had recently begun to preach some new doctrines in regard to the proper interpretation of the Scriptures. They had made a decided sensation in various quarters and had organized many churches. Those who accepted the preaching of the Campbells were called "Campbellites," and some people were disposed to persecute the new denomination. This only added strength and coherence to the new sect, and it grew rapidly. Among the ambitious preachers who had come from the Baptists and accepted the views of the Campbells was a fluent and somewhat brilliant young man named Sidney Rigdon. He often complained to his friends that the Campbells were obtaining more credit than they deserved. It was not long after that Rigdon and Joseph Smith, Jr., were preaching Mormonism. Rigdon was the principal orator of the new dispensation. But again he was disappointed, for Smith was the prophet and founder.

The prophet and Rigdon soon decided that it would be convenient to have a bank. They had no capital to speak of, except faith, but the bank was organized. It was called "The Kirtland Saving [sic] society." Smith was made cashier and Rigdon president, and the faithful were advised to deposit their funds with the concern. An unlimited amount of paper was issued, and for a time money was plentiful in the community.

Under direction from the Lord, Smith set about the construction of a temple. It was made two stories high, with dormer windows in the roof, which utilized the garret as a third story. The walls were made of stone and covered on the outside with a cement that has stood the ravages of fifty-five years, and is still as perfect as the day it was put on. This cement was made by an Englishman (one of the faithful), who alone knew the secret of its composition. It has often been examined by expert builders, who would be willing to pay a large sum for the recipe from which it was made, but all in vain. Its ingredients and their proportions are as much a mystery as the manner in which the pyramids of Egypt were constructed. The fact that the temple stood intact for more than half a century is cited by believers as certain proof that the Lord was its architect.

Smith and Rigdon added to their bank and temple a mill and a store. The prophet by this time also had a comfortable house of his own, well furnished considering the times. Things thus went on very well for a time, but finally the natural results of "wild cat" banking began to be felt. There was no redeming basis for the bank circulation, and depositors who had put in "hard money" did not feel contented to take out irredeemable paper. One thing followed another, and the crash at length came all at once. Smith disposed of his earthly effects as hastily as possible, and, in company with Rigdon, fled in January, 1838, to Independence [sic - Far West?], Mo. They did not get away, however, until they had been arrested on charges of swindling. The suit was instituted by citizens who were incensed over the losses they had sustained. They were joined by disaffected and apostate Mormons. The prisoners escaped from the sheriff.

Before leaving Kirtland the saints encountered many schisms and dissensions among themselves. These troublous elements were transpored to Missouri and Illinois.

Only one family, that of Mr. and Mrs. Stratton, remained in Kirtland. They still believed in the prophet, but not to the extent of fleeing with him to Missouri. They held the key of the temple and claimed to have the title to it.

After the trouble at Nauvoo, Ills. and the death of the prophet,the leaders split up and separated. There was much dissatisfaction with the sudden prominence and leadership of Brigham Young. That worthy, however, took the larger part of the people with him and made the wonderful hegira to Salt Lake. For more than thirty years the world heard very little of any Mormons except those in Utah. Brigham Young had shown himself to be of great strength as a leader. He kept down schism by the force of his iron will. But the scattered leaders kept the fires of faith alive on their hearthstones. With the lapse of time the halo around the life and work of the prophet who had been murdered grew, and at length there was a gathering and an organization of the fragments into a body called the "Reorganized Church of Latter Day Saints." This new body is aggressive, dogmatical [and] earnest. Its missionaries go forth into all regions and preach the gospel to the lowly. They returned four years ago and laid claim to the old deserted temple here; Mrs. Electa Stratton still held the key. A few dollars spent in renovating made the old building a presentable structure, as good or better than the ordinary country church. The "Reorganized" branch laid claim to the property and have obtained at length a clear title to it. Kirtland, which for fifty years has been stranded away from the beaten routes of travel, is again having a "boom." It is the Mecca of a church. It is the center of a conference, and here resides one of the principal bishops.

The conference which has just closed its sessions here is the largest ever held by the church denomination. Its deliberations were participated in by all the prominent men of the church, and near its close Joseph Smith III, the son and heir of the prophet, on whom the prophetic mantle fell, delivered an important revelation from the spirit. These anti-polygamous Mormons are growing in the estimation of the public. Barring their alleged fanaticism and their faithful belief in Joseph Smith as a prophet, they do not differ materially from other Christian sects. They very strenuously oppose the use of liquor or tobacco, and are particular about the observance [of] ordinances of the New Testament as they understand them. They are certain to take no mean place, so far as membership goes, in the denominations of the world. George A. Robertson.


Note: Albert G. Riddle's 1874 book, The Portrait, was obviously the source for much of the first paragraphs of the above article. Although Riddle was an eye witness to the advent of Mormonism in Ohio, his book was written as a semi-fictional novel. The remainder of the piece ties in the story of the RLDS to the Kirtland area -- where their spring 1887 annual conference drew the attention of both the local and national press. See also the Frederick, MD Daily News of Apr. 21, '87, where the Robertson letter is dated "Kirtland, April 18."

KIRTLAND  MORMONS.
_____

How They Are Reviving the Faith of Prophet Joe Smith.
(Special Correspondence.)

Twenty-three miles east of the city Of Cleveland and about seven miles south from the shore of Lake Erie was driven, in 1831, the first stake of Zion. Fifty-six years ago it was not so evident as it is now is, where the large cities and towns of the lake region would be. It then seemed an assured fact that Kirtland would be larger than either Cleveland or Buffalo.

In the latter part of the winter and early spring of 1831 there was the most wonderful ingathering of people on Kirtland Flats that had ever been seen in this part of the world. It was impossible to build houses fast enough to accommodate those who came. Rude shanties were extemporized. Many people continued to reside, like gypsies, in the Conestoga wagons and ox carts in which they came. The sound of the hammer was heard incessantly. Houses and shops grew as if by magic. It was a busy mart. To supply the wants of this multitude was no small task. There were men, women and children of many grades, but the rude, squalid and poor seemed to be the prevailing type. Hon. A. G. Riddle, of Washington, then a young man residing in the vicinity, who visited the Flats at this time, says that one could see in their faces evidences of the wild fanaticism that had brought this assemblage of odds and ends together.

This was a season of religious agitation in all portions of the country. Alexander Campbell and his father, Scotch Presbyterians, had recently begun to preach some new doctrines in regard to the proper interpretation of the Scriptures. They had made a decided sensation in various quarters and had organized many churches. Those who accepted the preaching of the Campbells were called "Campbellites," and some people were disposed to persecute the new denomination. This only added strength and coherence to the new sect, and it grew rapidly. Among the ambitious preachers who had come from the Baptists and accepted the views of the Campbells was a fluent and somewhat brilliant young man named Sidney Rigdon. He often complained to his friends that the Campbells were obtaining more credit than they deserved. It was not long after that Rigdon and Joseph Smith, Jr., were preaching Mormonism. Rigdon was the principla orator of the new dispensation. But again he was disappointed, for Smith was the prophet and founder.

The prophet and Rigdon soon decided that it would be convenient to have a bank. They had no capital to speak of, except faith, but the bank was organized. It was called "The Kirtland Saving [sic] society." Smith was made cashier and Rigdon president, and the faithful were advised to deposit their funds with the concern. An unlimited amount of paper was issued, and for a time money was plentiful in the community.

Under the direction of the Lord, Smith set about the construction of a temple. It was made two stories high, with dormer windows in the roof, which utilized the garret as a third story. The walls were made of stone and covered on the outside with a cement that has stood the ravages of fifty-five years, and is still as perfect as the day it was put on. This cement was made by an Englishman (one of the faithful), who alone knew the secret of its composition. It has often been examined by expert builders, who would be willing to pay a large sum for the recipe from which it was made, but all in vain. Its ingredients and their proportions are as much a mystery as the manner in which the pyramids of Egypt were constructed. The fact that the temple stood intact for more than half a century is cited by believers as certain proof that the Lord was its architect.

Smith and Rigdon added to their bank and temple a mill and a store. The prophet by this time also had a comfortable house of his own, well furnished considering the times. Things thus went on very well for a time, but finally the natural results of "wild cat" banking began to be felt. There was no redeming basis for the bank circulation, and depositors who had put in "hard money" did not feel contented to take out irredeemable paper. One thing followed another, and the crash at length came all at once. Smith disposed of his earthly effects as hastily as possible, and, in company with Rigdon, fled in January, 1838, to Independence [sic - Far West?], Mo. They did not get away, however, until they had been arrested on charges of swindling. The suit was instituted by citizens who were incensed over the losses they had sustained. They were joined by disaffected and apostate Mormons. The prisoners excaped from the sheriff.

Before leaving Kirtland the saints encountered many schisms and dissensions among themselves. These troublous elements were transpored to Missouri and Illinois.

Only one family, that of Mr. and Mrs. Stratton, remained in Kirtland. They still believed in the prophet, but not to the extent of fleeing with him to Missouri. They held the key of the temple and claimed to have the title to it.

After the trouble at Nauvoo, Ills. and the death of the prophet,the leades split up and separated. There was much dissatisfaction with the sudden prominence and leadership of Brigham Young. That worthy, however, took the larger part of the people with him and made the wonderful hegira to Salt Lake. For more than thirty years the world heard very little of any Mormons except those in Utah. Brigham Young had shown himself to be of great strength as a leader. He kept down schism by the force of his iron will. But the scattered leaders kept the fires of faith alive on their hearthstones. With the lapse of time halo around the life and work of the prophet who had been murdered grew, and at length there was a gathering and an organization of the fragments into a body called the "Reorganized Church of Latter Day Saints." This new body is aggressive, dogmatical [and] earnest. Its missionaries go forth into all regions and preach the gospel to the lowly. They returned four years ago and laid claim to the old deserted temple here; Mrs. Electa Stratton still held the key. A few dollars spent in renovating made the old building a presentable structure, as good or better than the ordinary country church. The "Reorganized" branch laid claim to the property and have obtained at length a clear title to it. Kirtland, which for fifty years has been stranded away from the beaten routes of travel, is again having a "boom." It is the Mecca of a church. It is the center of a conference, and here resides one of the principal bishops.

The conference which has just closed its sessions here is the largest ever held by the church denomination. Its deliberations were participated in by all the prominent men of the church, and near its close Joseph Smith III, the son and heir of the prophet, on whom the prophetic mantel fell, delivered an important revelation from the spirit. These anti-polygamous Mormons are growing in the estimation of the public. Barring their alleged fanaticism and their faithful belief in Joseph Smith as a prophet, they do not differ materially from other Christian sects. They very strenuously oppose the use of liquor or tobacco, and are particular about the observance [of] ordinances of the New Testament as they understand them. They are certain to take no mean place, so far as membership goes, in the denominations of the world.   George A. Robertson.


Note: Albert G. Riddle's 1874 book, The Portrait, was obviously the source for much of the first paragraphs of the above article. Although Riddle was an eye witness to the advent of Mormonism in Ohio, his book was written as a semi-fictional novel. The remainder of the piece ties in the story of the RLDS to the Kirtland area -- where their spring 1887 annual conference drew the attention of both the local and national press. See also the Apr. 21. 1887 issue of the Frederick, MD Daily News.

WHAT  MORMONISM  IS.

A Moral Mosaic of Social Odds and Ends.
(Special Correspondence.)

In a former letter I told you what Mormonism was not -- that it was not aggressive, not growing and not in conditiou to outlast fifty years, even if the government let it entirely alone. I will now vary the proceedings a little by telling you what it is. It is a moral mosaic, a composite concern made up socially of the odds and ends of humanity, and doctrinally of all the odd sophistries and worn out isms of 2,000 years. There is not a volume extant giving the church statement of faith, but it is flatly contradicted in some other volume or revelation of equal authority. For instance, the "Book of Mormon" says that David and Solomon "committed abomination" in having many wives and concubines: while the "Revelation on Celestial Marriage," first' published in 1852, but written out by Joe Smith's clerk in 1843, opens with these words: "Verily, thus saith the Lord , * * * that, whereas you have inquired wherein I, the Lord, justified my servants, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, as also David and Moses and Solomon my servants in the matter of their havjng many wives and concubines," etc. Here are Isaac and Moses classed with Solomon as having many wives and concubines, while, in fact they had none of the latter and but one at a time of the former; while the revelation says God "justified" David and Solomon in that which the booK calls an "abomination." I observe, by the way, that the sons of Joe Smith have lately had a little sputter at Kirtland, and the papers accept their statement that their father was not a polygamist. Well, if he wasn't there are some mighty clever liars among the old women of Utah; for several of them solemnly swear that they were "sealed to him" in Nauvoo. Mrs. Orson; Pratt was a life long witness that Joe Smith preached the doctrine to her, and no one who knew her would dispute her word.

Mormonism began in New York as a "Golden "Bible" speculation. It is clearly proved that at the start the schemers expected nothing but to make some money by the sale of their miraculous book; but when they found people ready for a new religion they went on to get up a church. The next phase was a real estate speculation, with mill, store and bank at Kirtland; that burst in 1837, and the principal men fled t o Missouri, "just a little ahead of the sheriff" for the first 100 miles or so. The third stage was as a fanatical brood of pillagers in Missouri, operating on the line of this revelation:

"Behold it is said or written in my laws, Thou shalt not get in debt to thine enemies; but, behold, it is not said at any time that the Lord should not take when He please and pay as seemeth to Him good, wherefore, as ye are the Lord's servants ye are on the Lord's errand."

This part of the Lord's business was so well attended to that there was a small war, and the Mormons Were driven to Illinois, where the fourth phase was developed: A speculation in real estate and politics. This, with minor rogueries, brought on the Illinois war of 1844-45, and the Mormons went to Utah. At that time this ceased to be an American church. From 1845S to 1873 ninety-nine hundredths of the Mormon converts were from foreign lands, so the apostles and elders were able to establish a complete theocracy. From 1850 to 1870 especially the despotism Was awful. -- Then the United States took a hand. The Mormon courts were deprived of their plenary jurisdiction and the United States courts did the business, a great gain to the Gentiles and apostates. Then the Mormon militia was disbanded, the penitentiary put into the hands of the United States marshal and many other things of like nature; so all the administration was taken from the church and its power to hurt reduced to a trifling minimum. The theocracy weakened fast after losing the temporal power, and now the theocrats are on the defensive. All they ask is to be let alone -- to enjoy what little power is left them and to take an extra wife occasionally when the market is favorable. And it is really a pity, from an aesthetic standpoint, that national self respect will not permit our government to allow them this last privilege, for the women they bring here from Europe and the backwoods of the south couldn't be worsted by polygamy; Of course there is occasionally a woman of refinement and beauty imported by these saints... But general rules will bear hard on particular cases; the United States has a character to maintain and must bring these people to the line. ROBERT O. BARCLAY.


Notes: (forthcoming)

JOE  SMITH'S  REVELATION.
The Book of Mormon Partly the Work of a Puritan Minister.
From the Cleveland Plain Dealer.

(see original article from Ohio paper)

Notes: (forthcoming)

Weekly  News  and  Democrat.

Vol. XXXVII.                           Auburn, N. Y., Thurs., June 9, 1887.                          No. 40.

THE  MORMON  TEMPLE.
_______

At Kirtland, O., Repaired and Reconstructed
_______

Bits of Mormon History.

The old Mormon temple at Kirtland, O., stands as a reminder of one of the queerest, if not the very queerest, episodes in American history. Now that the non-polygamous followers of the present Joseph Smith -- the "Young Joeites," as the Utah Mormons derisively call them -- have refitted the old temple and are trying to revive interest in that abandoned "stake of Zion," it may interest the public to learn a few of the facts connected with the temple, of which a cut is given. [graphic not reproduced]

THE KIRTLAND TEMPLE.

It is not now in the power of man to invent a new religion. All he can do is to select parts of the old and piece them together. So when Joseph Smith produced his "Golden Bible" in Wayne county, N. Y., in 1830, he simply preached a reform of the modern church with renewal of the gifts exercised by the ancient apostles, such as prophesying, healing, speaking in unknown tongues, etc. Almost every year from that date till Brigham Young's death has witnessed the addition of some new doctrine, "spiritual wifery" in 1840-42, polygamy in 1843 (kept secret till 1853), blood atonement in 1854, and so on. Now the sons of the original prophet, namely, Joseph, William [sic] and David Hyrum Smith, repudiate all that was done after 1844, the year their father was killed, deny that he ever taught or practiced polygamy and propose to restore the church to what it was in the beginning, namely, an improved Christian church, with a few extra frills of an apostolic nature. Unfortunately for this scheme, no two men could be more unlike than "Old Joe" and "Young Joe." The former was painfully prolific of revelations. "Young Joe," on the other hand, has never "revelated," and the Utah Mormons call him the "dumb prophet."

Now, while the prophet was organizing his church in New York, Sidney Rigdon, an apostate Baptist preacher, had collected, near Mentor, O., a queer band of semi-lunatics, who condemned all the churches and held that the Lord was about to reveal himself anew. Rigdon visited Smith and accepted his leadership, the two squads were united, and so a community of about 100 families was organized, which formed the settlement at Kirtland, Lake county, O., about five miles from the home of the late President Garfield. Early in 1831 the town was begun; in 1832 it was quits a place. That year also Brigham Young was converted and located there; in 1833 this temple was begun, and in 1836 it was completed and consecrated with frantic performances of various kinds. In the meantime the Mormons had made a settlement in Jackson county, Missouri, where they had a small war with the Gentiles, and whence they were driven into the northwest corner of that state. At Kirtland they set up a community mill, store and bank; the goods from the store were sold on credit or given in payment for work on the temple, and the notes of the bank were put out so industriously that in the panic of 1837 they sank to six cents on the dollar. Soon after all the principal Mormons fled to Missouri, the bank notes became worthless and only a few of the original Rigdonites remained about Kirtland.

Kirtland sank into a quiet country village, Mentor became noted as a seat of learning and the abode of quiet and cultured people. The temple stood unoccupied for years, then it was long used as a wheat warehouse, and for a short time as a pork packing house. But it was a remarkably well built structure and took no harm from these profane uses. Finally, when the Mormon episode was almost forgotten, an agent of the "Young Joeites" quietly bought the building and adjacent lots, and about 1875 the concern was thoroughly cleansed and rather handsomely finished inside; a few of the old visionaries came back, a few new converts, and now there are Mormons enough about Kirtland to maintain a good congregation and "guard the sacred fires," as it were. The style of the building does not follow any order of architecture fully, but nevertheless the temple presents a bold and attractive appearance; the stranger, uninformed of its history, would pause to admire it as an interesting specimen of the quaint' and old fashioned country academy. The brick and stone are of the very best quality, and there is no reason, natural convulsions aside, why it should not stand a thousand years.


Notes: (forthcoming)

SOME  MORMON  RELICS.

A Brief Sketch of Mormonism In Hancock County, Ill. -- The Old
Stone Jail at Carthage -- The Temple at Nauvoo.

Carthage, Ill., contains a pet relic of Mormonism in the old jail where Joseph and Hiram Smith, Mormon prophets, were slain by a mob June 27, 1844. Many strangers still come to visit the old building which is in a good state of preservation. The cause of the Smiths' arrest, and the account of their assassination are of never falling interest. The Smiths, Joseph and Hiram, in company with two other dignitaries of the Mormon church had boon arrested at Nauvoo for the destruction of a newspaper called the Nauvoo Expositor, which was exposing them and their unlawful acts. They were brought to jail at Carthage and placed in in the debtor's room of that building, to await trial. The Mormons, by some of their acts, had aroused a bitter feeling against them in the breasts of many people in the county, and this feeling gave vent to open avowals of vengeance. Public meetings were held, companies were organized, and matters began to assume a warlike appearance. Governor Ford was called to Hancock County to keep the peace, if possible, and, on June 27, 1844, had gone to Nauvoo for the purpose of making some peace treaty with the Mormons. About four o'clock on that day a large body of armed men, disguised in many ways, emerged from a strip of timber neartown, and made a rush for the Jail. They quickly overpowered the guards and rushed up the stairway loading to the room where the prisoners were. Breaking open the door, they quickly began firing at Joseph and Hiram Smith, killing them instantly, and badly wounding Dr. [sic] Taylor, now a prominent member of the Mormon Church at Salt Lake City, Utah. The mob then dispersed, and the bodies of the two Smiths were cared for by a kind-hearted citizen. The next day he conveyed them to Nauvoo in his farm wagon, and delivered them to the sorrowing people of that city.

The people of Carthage, fearing swift vengeance at the hands of the Mormons, fled from Carthago in terror, leaving their stores and dwellings open. The village was deserted for several days. Visitors to the old jail can see the marks of bullets in the stone walls and in the casing of the heavy oaken door, which has never been removed. On the atone floor of the room can yet be seen a dark, black stain -- the blood of the martyred prophets.

The history of Mormonism in Hancock County is a strange and eventful one. It has never been fully given to the world. The father of Mormonism was Joseph Smith. He was born at Sharon, Windsor County, Vt., on December 28, 1805. His youth was devoted to idleness and roaming the woods. Later on in life he fell in with one Sidney Rigdon, who had become possessed of a religious romance written by Rev. Mr. Spalding, a Presbyterian clergyman, then dead. Smith and Rigdon conceived the idea of establishing a now religion. They devised a story that some golden plates had been discovered buried in the earth which contained a record inscribed upon them in unknown characters. Smith, being a prophet of the Lord, deciphered these curious characters by the power of inspiration, and the result was the Book of Mormon, which is thought to be nothing more than the religions romance, referred to above.

Smith and Rigdon now founded a church, and having secured a large following, in 1833 came west to Missouri and Ohio. Here they established the town of Independence in the former place and built a temple at the latter. They were driven out of these States, however, and In 1839-40 came to Illinois, settling at Nauvoo, on the Mississippi river, in Hancock County. The church grew and flourished and Nauvoo at one time contained a population of over 20,000 souls. A magnificent temple was erected, many other buildings were raised, and the city of Nauvoo was known far and wide for its thrift and industry. The State Legislature granted to the Mormons several charters which gave them power to govern themselves and establish their own laws. This they did, and in defiance of the laws of State and country. Their abuse of the writ of habeas corpus was one of their most flagrant acts of defiance to our laws.

It was the violation of constitutional and municipal laws that caused Smith's arrest, and led to his subsequent death.

Soon after the death of their prophet the Mormons left Nauvoo, many going to Utah and many establishing a colony at Lamoni, Ia., which is now presided over by Joseph Smith, Jr., son of the prophet. The final hegira occurred in 1846 after a short war between the Gentiles and the Mormons. Soon after the Mormons had left Nauvoo, some miscreant set fire to tbe beautiful temple and it was destroyed. The structure had cost one million dollars.

There is no well-founded charge that polygamy existed among the Mormons in Hancock County, although Smith was known to have openly promulgated the "spiritual wife doctrine." As a rule the Mormon people were quiet, honest, and industrious; those of that faith still residing in this county bear that reputation.

But the interest in this strange class of people yet brings to Carthage and to Nauvoo many curious strangers who wish to gaze upon the relics of Mormonism. Few of the buildings at Nauvoo still remain. The inhabitants of that city are mostly foreigners who know little of the history of the place. The old jail at Carthage is still in a fair state of preservation, and the excellent family whose house it is, never tire of throwing open its doors to those who may wish to pay an hour, of homage, or to gratify curiosity, at the shrine of the martyred prophets. GAY DAVIDSON.


Notes: (forthcoming)

THE  BOOK  OF  MORMON.

DEATH  OF  A  MAN  WHO  BELIEVED  IN  IT.

David Whitmer, a Former Resident of Ontarlo County, Dies of
Old Age at His House in Missouri.
______

St. Louis. Jan. 31 -- The death of David Whitmer, "the only living witness of the divine authenticity of the book of Mormon," which took place at his home in Richmond, Mo., on Wednesday, has already been announced but some additional facts in connection with his history may be interesting. He was the possessor of the original manuscript of the Mormon Bible, to faith in the inspired origin of which the old gentleman persistently clung, although as long ago as 1838 he had cut loose from the Mormon church. He could not accept the interpolated doctrine of polygamy.

In 1879 two of the Mormon apostles, Orson Pratt and Joseph F. Smith, visited Mr. Whitmer for the express purpose of obtaining these, to them, precious shoots. Apostle Pratt said: "Father Whitmer, we desire to purchase the manuscript, and we are authorized to say that you may name your price, and (with a patronising air) be sure you put the price high enough, for the Church has plenty of money in the treasury, you know." Mr. Whitmer replied, with quiet emphasis: "Elder Pratt, there isn't gold enough in the world to buy it." Before leaving Richmond Orson Pratt told the hotel proprietor that they would willingly have paid Mr. Whitmer $100,000 for the manuscript. One reason why the Mormon church was so anxious to possess this document is shown in the accompanying extract, which emphatically declares against polygamy:

Behold David and Solomon truly had many wives and concubines, which thing was abominable before Me, saith the Lord. Wherefore, thus saith the Lord, I have led this people forth out of the land of Jerusalem, by the power of mine arm, that I might raise up unto me a righteous branch from the fruit of the loins of Joseph. Wherefore I, the Lord God, will not suffer that this people shall do like unto those of old. Wherefore, my brethren, hear Me and hearken to the word of the Lord, for there shall not a man among you have save it be one wife, and concubines he shall have none, for I, the Lord God. deligbteth in the chastity of women.

The interpolation of polygamy into the doctrines of the Mormon church came from the habit the apostles contracted of having relations "to fit" any of their designs. Mr. Whitmer used to relate this as an instance: "One night there was quite a little party of brethren and sisters assembled at Smith's house. Some of the men were excessive chewers of the filthy weed, and their disgusting slobbering and spitting caused Mrs. Smith (who, Mr. Whitmer insisted, was a lady of predisposed refinement) to make the ironical remark that 'it would be a good thing if a revelation could be had declaring the use of tobacco a sin, and commanding its suppression.' The matter was taken up and joked about, one of the brethren suggesting that the revelation should also provide for a total abstinence from tea and coffee drinking, intending this as a counter 'dig' at the sisters. Sure enough the subject was afterward taken up in dead earnest, and the 'Word of Wisdom' advising against the use of tobacco, tea and coffee was the result."

Mr. Whitmer's narrative of the discovery of the Mormon Bible and the origin of the Mormon church was to the following effect: "In 1828, when I lived in Ontario couuty, N. Y., there was great excitement over the discovery by Joseph Smith, a farmer in our neighborhood, of a great treasure. Nothing was known of it in a definite way by my family until the next year, in June, when he was busily engaged in the translation of the book, which I learned he had found, in the form of gold plates, on the hill Cumorah, about two miles from Palmyra. I saw the plates frequently in Smith's hands, but as the characters inscribed thereon were something like Egyptian hieroglyphics, I could make nothing of them. Smith, however, had no difficulty in deciphering them, and as he dictated Oliver Cowdrey wrote. I asked Smith once how be came to find the plates, and he told me that the place on the hill was pointed out to him by an angel in dazzling apparel. They were in a stone casket, and purported to be a history of the Nephites, a nation that had passed away. The plates, as I saw them, were fastened with three rings. About half of them were loose and movable, but the others were solid, as if sealed. Smith said in explanation of this that the angel had told him very impressively that the loose plates alone were to be used, and that the sealed portion was not to be tampered with.

"I became interested in the matter, as Smith was a man of good repute. After the plates had beeu translated, six months having been passed in the work, the same heavenly visitant appeared to Smith and reclaimed the tablets, informing Smith that he would replace them with other records ot the lost tribes that had been brought with tbem from Asia, and that they would all be forthcoming when the world was ready to receive them. I saw this apparation myself, gazed with awe on the celestial messenger and heard him say: 'Blessed is the Lord, and he that keeps his commandments.' Then, as he held the plates and turned them over with his hands so that he could see them plainly, a voice that seemed to fill all space was heard saving, 'What you see is true. Testify to the same.' Oliver Cowdrey and I, standing there, felt, as the white garments of the angel faded from view, that we had received a message from God, and we have so recorded it. Two or three days later the same angel appeared to Martin Harris while he was in company with Smith, and placed the same injunction upon him. He described the sight and his sensations to me, and they corresponded exactly with what I had seen and heard. In his translation of the tablets Smith used a small oval or kidney-shaped stone, which seemed endowed with the marvellous power of converting the characters on the plates, when used by Smith, into English, He would then dictate and Cowdrey would write. Frequently one character would make two lines of manuscript, while others made but a word or two. I can assert emphatically, as did Cowdrey, that while Smith was dictating he bad no manuscript, notes or other means of knowledge, save the seer stone and the characters as shown on the plates.

"As an evidence of our belief in the divine origin of tne book, I can say that Martin Harris, one of the witnesses, mortgaged his farm for $1,500 for the purpose of having.it printed, and we all contributed time and money for the purpose of circulating it. A few years ago Orson Pratt and Joseph F. Smith, who had been sent from Utah to secure the original manuscript, came here, and. after a careful examination, Elder Pratt assured those present that the writing was in the hand of Oliver Cowdrey. He declared that tbe archives at Salt Lake were incomplete without it, and he offered me any reasonable sum for it, but I refused to part with it, as I regarded it as a sacred trust."

That Mr. Whitmer was imposed on by Joseph Smith as to the Mormon Bible being a divine revelation is no longer questioned by those outside of the Mormon church. Forty-six years ago there were numerous affidavits published to the effect that the Original Book of Mormon was written in 1812 by the Rev. Samuel [sic] Spaulding, a writer of romances. He called it a "translation from some hieroglyphical writing exhumed from a mound in Ohio." Mr. Spaulding sent his manuscript to a printer named Patterson, in Pittsburgh, Pa. In this office worked Sydney Rigdon, afterward an adviser of Joseph Smith. Patterson declined to publish Mr. Spaulding's romance, and returned it to a him after a time. It remained then for a number of years in an unlocked trunk, in Mr. Spaulding's brother-in-law's house. Joseph Smith worked for the latter, and, it is supposed, copied the romance and published it as a "revelation" in 1830.


Notes: (forthcoming)

In excavating for the purpose of widening the yard of the Erie Railroad company at Susquehanna, Pennsylvania, a few days ago, it became necessary to disturb a grave containing the remains of Isaac Hale, the first settler in that region. His name has come down to history in connection with "Joe" Smith, the founder of the Mormon religion. The great leader of Nauvoo saints married the daughter of Hale, in an old farmhouse still standing near the grave where Isaac Hale has slept for half a century. In this house Smith laid his plans for becoming the head of the Mormon church and for the discovery of the Bible which he afterward dug out of a hill in Wayne county in this State. Whether his father-in-law embraced "Joe" Smith's peculiar views is not known, but as he remained on his farm at Susquehanna instead of migrating to the West with his saintly son-in-law, it is to be inferred that the old gentleman took no stock in tho Mormon doctrine -- perhaps because he was only too well enlightened as to its origin.


Notes: (forthcoming)

THE  BOOK  OF  MORMON.

A Work Bearing Internal Evidence of Its Being a Fabrication.

The argument that the "Book of Mormon" was derived from a story written by Rev. Solomon Spalding, called the "Manuscript Found," you can obtain by referring to the American Cyclopedia, vol. xi, article "Mormons." The Josephite Mormons at Lamoni, Iowa, claim to have obtained the original manuscript of Spalding's story, which they have published in pamphlet form. Whether it is Spalding's or not, we do not know. To our view, the "Bible of Mormon" was probably written by Smith, aided probably by Sidney Rigdon and others. It bears internal evidence of being a fabrication. It is a clumsy piece of work, modeled on the Biblical style, written by one who had no knowledge of languages. Its pretended history is clearly false, for a people as numerous and as civilized as the race whose history it purports to give, would have left traces of their habitations, their implements, etc. The claim of the book that the Indians are descended from them will not stand for an instant against the simple fact that the traditions of the Indians show no trace of such descent, nor does their rude religion show descent from Christianity, as it assuredly would. Religious traditions are remarkable for preserving their form for ages, even among the rudest savages; and as the Book of Mormon brings its pretended history down A. D. 384, the time would be short to bridge over by tradition. The fire-worshipers of Persia have a religion that has come down for at least four thousand years. At the time Smith produced the Book of Mormon the West was full of religious discussion and ferment, and the topics then debated among the people are conspicuous in the Book of Mormon, showing its modern origin conclusively. No man of any learning has ever examined the book but pronounces it an impudent forgery. Smith once gave a paper, purporting to be an exact copy of the inscriptions on one of the golden plates he pretended to have found (but which nobody ever saw), to a friend, who took it to Prof. Anthon, of New York, one of the best linguistic scholars of the time, who, under date of February 17, 1834, said the characters "consisted of all kinds of crooked characters, disposed in columns and had evidently been prepared by some person who had before him at the time a book containing various alphabets. Greek and Hebrew letters, crosses and flourishes, Roman letters inverted and placed sideways, were arranged in perpendicular columns." The authenticity of the Book of Mormon is disproved by itself, and the Spalding manuscript matter is of little consequence, in reality. It is certain the Book of Mormon is a fraud, and it matters little how the fraud was perpetrated. -- Toledo Blade.

---

A  WATER  FINDER.

The Wonderful and Mysterious Gift of an Englishman Named Mullens.

He has been employed here several times to find water, after much expense had been incurred with engineers and others, and has always been successful, although at first most of doubted his powers. I havo tested him in every possible way, and he has never failed. No one hereabouts doubts his powors. The vicar was perhaps the most incredulous, until he had tested the man thoroughly, what convinced him most being that when Mullens was asked to find water in his flower garden he set out accurately the running sewer from his house for a long distance -- not a trace of which was discernible above ground, and which no one knew but the vicar. He did other work of the same kind at the mansion here, finding an old disused sewer, the existence of which was suspected, but although searched for could not be found.

He has been employed, I bolieve, on similar duties by the London authorities. He discovered our water mains and branches here wherever he crossed them in the course of his journeys, greatly to the surprise of an engineer from Shefield who constructed our reservoirs, and who followed John "afar off for several days. The same engineer afterward confessed to the writer that he was puzzled; but he admitted the man's powers. Mullens used the hazel and thorn "twig" only. No member of his family has the "gift;" hence every thing has to be done by himself. He asks no assistance save a "twig," cut close by, and a lad to follow behind and put a peg in where he makes a mark with his heel. He charges his fare and a modost fee, and is willing to submit to any reasonable test. He does not profess to explain his power, knows little or nothing about science and is rathor illiterate. Not a few large breweries and manufactories owe their water supply to him. He does not profoss to find still water; it must be running. In the case of the water mains here the "twig" turned up above the pipe in the field, woods and highways, where no sign of the ground having been disturbed appeared, the pipes having been long down, and no one knowing any thing about their whereabouts but the waterman, who depends on the map when he looks.

Mullen says a "twig" from a variety of trees will do, but the hawthorn and hazel are the most active; and the way the point whirls around in a moment above water is marvelous. The "twig" is Y-shaped; and the man, holding a leg firmly in each hand and the point downward, stops slowly forward, stooping. On one occasion I held one end of the "twig," where it projected through his hand, the vicar holding the other end, both firmly, Mullens simply holding it, but without the power to move it up or down, yet it whirled round as before, except where we held it, and consequently twisted the bark into wrinkles by the force it exercised. -- Chambers' Journal.


Notes: (forthcoming)

HISTORICAL.

Meeting of the Oneida Historical Society.
______

An Interesting Address on "The Three Witnesses
of the Book of Mormon."
______

... MR. KENNEDY'S ADDRESS.

The speaker of the evening, James Kennedy, author of "Early Days of Mormonism," (Charles Scribner, 1888.) and editor of the Magazine of Western History, was then introduced. His subject was "The Three Witnesses of the Book of Mormon. He began as follows:

"While the snows of the new year were blown onward in the fierce breath of the gale, and the darkness of night came down as if foretelling tbe deeper shadow of death that followed close behind, a white haired old man lay open tbe bed of a final sickness, ready to go; trusting in some strength that seemed beyond the earth; confirming in word and manner the steadfastness of his belief in all he had professed to believe for a half century of spiritual debate and question; suggesting only a simple faith that was true in that supreme hour, when all that is false and worldly and mean must fall into fragments beneath his feet.

"Knowing, then, that the end was come, the old man turned to those who loved him and said: "Be faithful in Christ, I want to say to you all, the Bible and the record of the Nephites is true; so you can say that you have heard me bear my testimony on my death bed. All be faithful in Christ, and your reward will be according to your works, God bless you all. My trust is in Christ forever, world without end. Amen."

"This old man who then reaffirmed his testimony with his faltering breath was David Whitmer, who died in Richmond, Mo., in the early days of 1888: David Whitmer, the last of the three witnesses to the divine authorship of the book of Mormon, and to the calling of Joseph Smith as the prophet, revelator and seer of the church of the latter day saints.

"Oliver Cowdfry, David Whitmer and Martin Harris were in truth three cornerstones of a huge edifice of religious fervor, sad delusion and cunning fraud, of which Joseph Smith was the fourth. If truth lay in the solemn declarations of these three, held to tenaciously all through the lives of at least two, and echoed solemnly from their beds of death, then the Mormon Church was a later gift from God; the golden plates sealed by the hand of Moroni and hidden away by the Lord in the hill Cumorah, were in truth divinely revealed to the well-digger's son; and the com mands in the book of doctrine and covenants are the declarations of the Most High. And to prove their testimony the echo of a fable or the shadow of a dream, we must appeal to the sober wisdom of mankind; to the inner and outer history of the Mormon Church; to the lives of the men who made it and extended it; to the inher ent falsity of a system that was planted in petty greed, and not to any authentic confession or retraction of these three. For the truth of Mormonism has been staked by its founders upon the single issue: Was the calling of Joseph Smith confirmed by a messenger from on high, who revealed himself and by presence and word pro claimed the new seer as divinely ap pointed, in the presence of three men, of western New York, a half century ago?"

The speaker followed for a time, the personal lives of tbe three, showing their importance in the church, the high honors heaped upon them at first, the dangers to which they were all exposed when their allegiance to Smith fell away before his tyranny and assumption of temporal as well as spiritual power, and at last their expulsion from the then rich aad powerful church. Quoting the declaration of Smith in the Elder's Journal (1837) when Martin Harris was expelled from the church, the speaker said:

"Vanity of vanities! The well-digger's son and peek-stone guide to hid den riches has indeed mounted to the top of the wheel of fortune, and has little need now of the dupes who made him. And so, bereft of property, the wife of his young manhood, his good name, and the ambition for better things, Harris lays aside his priesthood of the new dispensation, and for a generation we see him wandering about Kirtland, where the temple is given over to the Gentile, and the promised great mart of commerce drones again as a rustic village, making his living as best he can; while Smith goes upward to the almost kingly power of Nauvoo, where he rides for a time upon the high tide of success; fills for the allotted space his round of temporal and spir itual rule; sees his humble Church expand beyond the limits of his wildest dreams; drinks as he wishes of all the waters of pleasure of this world, and then sinks into the uttermost caverns of death, stripped of his power and riches -- face to face with that Judgment he has so often called upon the heads of his fellow men.

A like fate befell both Whitmer and Cowdery, who were compelled to flee from the Mormon settlement of Far West for their very lives. " The one witness is followed by the others; and when the Danite band is formed to execute the dread judgments of the now despotic and insolent Church, Oliver Cowdery and David Whitmer, with others, were told to begone or abide the results, and knowing what the consequences might be, they made haste to depart out of the borders of the Mormon Zion while there was yet time. With a final revelation, given at Nauvoo in 1841, where the 'gifts of the Priesthood that once were put upon him that was my servant, Oliver Cowdery,' are given to another, these three pass forever out of Joseph's love and of the history of the church they had helped to build. They went their ways, while the church passed on to the martyrdom of Joseph's death, the dark period of passage to the West, and the later splendors of Utah and Salt Lake."

The Speaker then briefly traced the personal history of the three, showing the measures employed bv Joseph Smith, the founder of the Mormon church, to lead them into a belief [in] himself and his mission. The need of evidence other than his own unsupported word, to prove the divine character of his mission, led the prophet to designate these three as his witnesses, and they were set aside by a special revelation, given in the year [1829]. Their testimony, and the alleged scene wherein the angel came from heaven and revealef the golden plaes were then described in full, as related by Smith and the obedient three, Mr. Kennedy did not attempt to explain these events, simply dismissing them in these words:

"This then, is the testimony upon which so much has been built; around which so much of wonder, or belief, or doubt has clustered. How much of truth: how much of falsehood and fraud, how much of willful deception and willing delusion; of overwrought imagination; of mesmeric influence; of the weaker minds rule by the strong, of spiritual vision put forward as representing the outward eye, there may be in this, each seeker after knowledge must discover for himself; for no man within Mormonism or without, can tell, and the four who best knew are gone into the shadows where the voice of the deceiver is hushed with that of the deceased, and from whence cometh no knowledge -- either of confirmation or confession."

Oliver Cowdery died in Missouri in 1850; Martin Harris in Utah in 1875; and David Whitmer in Missouri in 1888. Mr. Kennedy commented with some emphasis upon the fact that altho' there was evidence of an uncertain character to show that Cowdery and Harris had wavered at times in their declarations as to the angel that had appeared to them with the golden plates of the book of Mormon, they were substantially consistent to their proclamation in tbe book of Mormon to tbe very last; while all three were earnest witnesses for Mormonism. A letter was read from Harris' son, in Which he said of the father: "He bore his testimony to the truth and divinity of the book of Mormon a short time before he departed, and the last word he uttered when he could not speak the sentence was "Book! book! book!" Cowdery's final words, almost with his latest breath, were: "Brother David, be faithful to our testimony to the book of Mormon, for we know that it is of God and that it is verily true." Whitmer's death was thus described: David Whitmer died on tbe 25th of January, 1888, when three years beyond the four-score mark. A long illness had not shaken his belief as above expresed, and a few evenings before his death he called his family and physician to his bedside, and to tbe latter said: "Dr. Buchanan, I want you to say whether or not I am in my right mind, before giving my dying testimony."

The doctor answered "Yes, you are in your right mind."

Then, turning to those about him, the old man uttered the words you have already heard:

"I want to say to you all, the Bible and the record of the Nephites is true. * * * My trust is in Christ forever, world without end. Amen."

In conclusion. Mr. Kennedy said that he had followed the lives of the three with the instincts of the historian rather than those of the theologian. He confessed to an impression that perhaps had not yet been set into a belief, that Whitmer and Harris were dupes of deeper men; believing, perhaps, upon evidence and from motives that would have been scorned by stronger and more cultured men, but believing honestly and holding their faith to the end. Of Oliver Cowdery be could not say so much. No one could follow the history of the Mormon church -- whether it was under Joseph Smith, Brigham Young, John Taylor or Wilford Woodruff -- without regarding it as a phenomenal structure, built by a calculating imposition upon trusting ignorance, and infusing something of these twin elements into every change and turning of its devious career.

Mr. Kennedy is a pleasing speaker and he received close attention. Dr Bigg moved a vote of thanks for the address. -- He also remarked that it was a notable fact that two religions -- Mormonism and SpirituaLism -- had taken their rise from the little town of Palmyra. The vote of thanks was passed unanimously and cordial expressions of appreciation of the address were made....


Note: See also Magazine of Western History v. XI (Nov. 1889 to Apr. 1890) p. 448-449: "Bancroft's Utah and Mormonism," and p. 464-478: "The Three Witnesses of the Book of Mormon."

HISTORY  OF  UTAH ______

The Discovery of the Great Salt Lake.
Rise of Mormonism.

History of Utah by Hubert Howe Bancroft; San Francisco: The History Company.

Then will hardly be found a book more interesting than "Hubert H. Bancroft's "History of Utah." The impreesion thar the history of the settlement of the great Western states was made up of commonplace events is common in the East. Nothing shows how erroneous such an impression is as the story of Utah. As early as 1544 rumors of a great salt lake to the northward reached the ears of the venturesome Spanish discoverers and they made several expeditions in search of it but without success. So far as is known, the lake never was seen by the eyes of a white man until 1824, when it was discovered by a party of hunters and trappers. Two years later it was explored with boats. Tne almost incredible privations and hardships which were encountered by these carry explorers are intimated in the narratives of the leaders of some of the peltry-seeking expeditions.

But the history of Utah is really the history of the Mormons, and recognizing this fact, Mr. Bancroft has begun at the very beginning of this remarkable sect, and traced it step by step to its final resting place on the border of the western lake. His account includes the early youth of Joseph Smith, Jr., his visions and prophesying and the gradual formation of the new idea. A more unpromising spot for the cradle of a new faith than Western New York in 1827, and a more unpromising basis than that furnished by Smith and his associates, it would be hard to imagine. The idea that a portion of the inhabitants of Jerusalem could have escaped the destruction of that city to America, and have here founded kingdoms and led much' the same sort of a life as did the patriarchs of the Old Testament and have finally disappeared without leaving a trace of their presence except the few rude mounds of the Ohio region, appears too incredible to excite interest. But when resaonable persons are asked to believe further that a historian of these ancient peoples wrote out their history on plates of gold, that these plates were buried in the earth, that they were found by an ignorant country lad under the direction of an angel from heaven, and that he was able to read and translate their contents with the aid of two bright stones, and when reasonable people do believe these things, the rest of the world can only stand astonished. Yet this was the beginning of the powerful Mormon church. The truth is that the doctrines of the new belief gave an opportunity for an earnestness and fervor which, some of the earlier Mormons threw into their work with the result that they had no difficulty in making converts. An example of this is given in the following anecdote: Oliver Cowdery and Sidney Rigdon were among the earliest to preach the new faith. On "one occasion Cowdery preached, followed by Rigdon. After service they went to a river near by to baptise. Rigdon stood in the stream and poured forth his exhortations with such eloquence and fervor that one after another came forward until 80 had been baptised. Among others on the bank was a hard-hearted lawyer, Varnem G. Card, who, as he listened, grew pale with emotion, and seizing the arm of a friend, whispered, "Quick, take me away, or in a moment more I shall be in that water." In this one place a thousand converts were gathered into the fold.

It can readily be imagined that such preaching as that would have converted people to faith in a religion whose bible was Mother Goose. Another thing that helped the Mormons was the persecution which followed them constantly and which follows them even yet. In an enlightened age, in a land of entire religious freedom, people could not bear to see a new belief rise into competition with the old, and the established sects fought hard against the sect which was seeking to establish itself. Whatever may be said of Joseph Smith and some of the Mormon leaders, it cannot be denied that the vast majority of the founders and followers of the early Mormon church were actuated by a sincerity and an earnestness which far transcended the bounds of passive acquiescence in doctrines already established.

The hardships and perils of the young religion in Missouri, in Illinois, in the weary march across the plains and in the years which passed before the settlement on the shores of the great Salt Lake are given in several interesting chapters. The patience and courage of the little band is another evidence of its sincerity and the final success of the migration is proof of the ability of its leaders.

It is not to be doubted that the Mormons have suffered much through the false and sensational accounts of apostates, through the religious intolerance of church people who know little or nothing of the true doctrines of Mormonism and, most of all, through the idea that polygamy is one of the fundamental principles of the faith. As a matter of fact polygamy was not adopted until the settlement in Illinois neariy 10 years after the founding of the church. Mr. Bancroft sums up forcibly the arguement in favor, or at least in excuse of polygamy.

"It is not right to place the polygamist on a par with the bigamist," he says. "The one, without deception and in conformity with the proclaimed tenets of his faith, takes to wife the second, or third, or twentieth -- the more the better for all, it is -- said promising to her the same life-long care and protection as to the first: the bigamist breaks his contract with his first wife and deserts her for another woman. Neither can the polygamy be justly placed on a level with the adulterer. Mormons abhor everything of the kind. The sacred ceremony of marriage means far more with them than with those who mark the difference between morality and immorality by a few insignificant rites." The Mormons lay great stress on the fact that women so far outnumber men that under a system of monogamy it would be impossible for them all to obtain husbands even if all men were disposed to marry. "The right and wrong of the matter, as usually distinguished, are not right and wrong of nature and common sense, but of divine and human enactments variously interpreted and viewed from different standpoints. The Bible forbids prostitution but permits polygamy; the supporters of the Bible and its civilization forbid polygamy, but permit prostitution." How much these arguments are worth against those which stand in opposition to a plurality of wives -- the destruction of the true family circle and the imperiling of the stability of the home and consequently of society -- each individual must determine for himself. It is obviously not a question to be decided without thought, and it is certain that the Mormons have in the past suffered from blind and unreasoning prejudice. While the Mormons have [been] removed from other people the question could be left in abeyance; now that railways and the growth of population have brought them into contact with thousands who hold different ideas, it is probable polygamy will die a natural death. The leaders of the church are too shrewd to allow their religion to stand or fall with a tenet so repugnant to the vast the mass of people.

Taken together. Mr. Bancroft's history is an extremely interesting work. After reading it none can say that America is without incidents of the most picturesque and suggestive character.


Notes: (forthcoming)

SPIRITUAL  WIVES.
______

Their Career in Utah Is Ended at Last.
______

THE DECIDING "REVELATION."

Forty-seven Years of Actual Polygamy and Thirty-eight Years of Acknowledged
"Plurality" Ended by a Decree of the Mormon Hierarchy.

"Dost think because thou art virtuous there will be no more cakes and ale?" was the emphatic question put by one of Shakespeare's characters. The inference was, No! For thirty-eight years, to wit, since the autumn conference of 1852, the "Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints," as the Mormons call themselves, have been taunting the United States in the same way. They have all the time insisted that no monogamic people could be virtuous; that in "celestial marriage" only could humanity do its prettiest.

They have yielded at last. Swearing they would ne'er submit they submitted, and at the last semi-annual conference of the church, held in Salt Lake City in early October, the Tabernacle full of saints, 10,000 or more, unanimously voted to abandon polygamy, and "hereafter to obey in spirit and in letter the laws of the United States." It was a bitter pill, and to their credit be it said they did not attempt to disguise that fact. "It goes against the grain," said George Q. Cannon, one of the leaders, "but I bow in submission to the will of God. We cannot fight sixty millions of people," wherein this Cannon was very right, and the head of the same was well located.

It must be said that the Mormons have taken their own time in obeying the law. They first proclaimed polygamy as a part of their faith and practice in September, 1852. The United States judges in Utah condemned this action, and the Mormons ran them out of the territory. Col. Steptoe was sent there in 1854 by President Pierce, and was "tricked," as the phrase went. The next set of judges and officials were run out, and in 1857 the "Mormon war" began. In 1858 President Buchanan amnestied the Saints, and matters were allowed to drift till 1862, when congress passed the first law against polygamy. The Mormons tried the old trick of scaring away the officials, but Governor Stephen Harding and Judges Waite and Drake declined to run.

The jury system was then used by the Saints to defeat the law. Congress in 1874 passed an act to [secure] non-Mormon juries, but the Saints beat it. They had had forty years' experience in defeating the law, and hence could steer around the moat obstructive constitutional provisions and pierce the center of the most explicit statute. The federal courts were completely defeated as to polygamy, but they got after the Saints for the Mountain Meadow massacre and other bloody crimes of the old era of fanaticism -- to wit, from 1854 to 1866. They captured, convicted and shot John D. Lee; scared a hundred other murderers out of the territory; forced a confession from Bill Hickman, chief of the "Destroying Angels," and worried Brigham Young to death. Still the Saints clung to polygamy, declaring that God had commanded it and they would live up to it, "though every prison in the land be filled with the brethren, and hell should yawn beneath the tabernacle."

Finally Senator Edmunds brought in his truly drastic bill taking the whole government of Utah out of the hands of the Mormons, and giving courts, juries and everything else to Gentiles. Then the last long fight began. The Mormons stood up to it like heroes. Bad they may be, but they are "gritty rascals." Court after court sent them to the penitentiary, first singly and then by dozens, and still they stood out and protested and suffered. President John Taylor, who had succeeded Brigham, had to fly from home and died an exile. Apostle Wilford Woodruff succeeded him and advised the brethren to temporize. A case was carried to the supreme court of the United States and decided against the Saints, and this gave him his opportunity. In one of the "revelations" of Joseph Smith he found this passage:

"Now, brethren, as touching the ordinances, wherein is manifestad the forbearance of God the Father, thus saith the Lord: If so be that I command my people and your enemies come upon you that you be not able to do that which I commanded, then I the Lord will hold you guiltless. Nevertheless I the Lord will require it at the hands of your enemies."

That was his warrant. It had excused the saints from completing the temple at Nauvoo and from obeying the command to settle in Jackson county, Mo. It now excused them from obeying the revelation ordaining "celestial marriage."

"The brethren have suffered enough," said Brer Woodruff; "eight hundred of them have languished in prison and exile; we must now obey the law of the land. I have lately talked behind the veil with Joseph Smith and Brother Brigham, and they, with all the heavenly host, say that the United States government must now bear the guilt. When God shall come out of his hiding place and vex the nations in his fury, then will the United States beg us to intercede for them and to live our religion. Until then give place to wrath; and God's will be done."

George Q. Cannon, next in rank to President Woodruff, added his own revelation that this was the will of God. "Brother Woodruff has lately been in executive session with the Almighty. The sufferings of the Saints are recorded in heaven, and will appear as the brightest page in earthly history. I lived in polygamy because such was the will of God. I now give it up for the same reason." And so ends a social practice which for forty-seven years has been the one great anomaly among the religious sects of America.

July 12,1843, according to Joseph Smith, the voice of the Lord commanded him to write that famous revelation beginning:

"Verily thus saith the Lord unto you my servant Joseph, that inasmuch as you have inquired at my hand to know wherein I the Lord justified my servants Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, as also Moses and David and Solomon my servants, as touching the principle and practice of their having many wives and concubines, behold and lo, I am the Lord and will answer thee as touching this matter."

And when he got orders to spread the doctrine he was, he adds, so horrified that he mounted his horse and fled; but when he got on the hill east of Nauvoo a mighty angel stood in the way with a drawn sword and menaced his life. So he went back and was "sealed" to Olive Frost and Eliza Snow and the Widow Fuller and nobody knows how many more; but when he sought Nancy Rigdon and Martha Brotherton they "gave the whole snap dead away," and there was a row in the church. It was smoothed over, the Apostles were first converted, and Brigham Young took three extra wives as a starter. Then Joseph Smith tried to capture the wife of William Law, and there was another row; Smith was lodged in a Gentile jail, and there was murdered by a mob with his brother Hyrum on the 27th of June, 1844.

The Mormons then put forth a circular denying the existence of polygamy among them, and continued to repeat this denial for nine years after the revelation. All this time they were extending the practice. But when their envoys had convinced President Fillmore that there was no polygamy in Utah, and he had appointed Brigham Young governor, they came out with the truth in September, 1852. So polygamy among the Mormons has passed through four stages -- secret practice but open denial for nine years; open avowal and rapid progress from 1852 to about 1868; gradual decline from natural causes till 1882, and thereafter rapid extinction by force of the Federal government, to final abandonment in October, 1890. And let all the people say "Amen!" J. H. BEADLE.


Notes: (forthcoming)

BELCHER'S  LUCKY  STONE
______

GERM  OF  MORMONISM  SAID  TO  HAVE
ORIGINATED  IN  SYRACUSE.

If so, It is a Fact We are Not Particularly Proud to Acknowledge --
A Salt Teamster's Find.
______

It is a fact, of which we are not particularlu proud, that the germ of Mormonism originated in this city, although it was some years later before the evil developments began to accrue. About the year 1818 a teamster in the salt works by the name of Joseph Belcher found a peculiar stone, or a stone that, the owners claimed, contained great powers. Soon after the discovery of this "find," Belcher and family removed to Susquehanna county, Pa., where Joe Smith was at the time engaged in a variety of crazy freaks, such as a gold hunter, prophet, and treasure-hunter. Belcher called his find "a seeing stone." It was green, with brown irregular spots on it, and about the same shape and size as a goose egg. In those days the country was very wild and the people very superstitious, and strange stories were told of lost animals and children that were found by the aid of this stone. The modus operandi was to conceal the stone in a dark place, and Belcher's little boy could then see from its unnatural powers the exact location of any object he desired to find. Joe Smith heard of this miniature information bureau and soon sought out Belcher, secured the stone and renewed his researches.

In 1825 Joe had in his employ a set of men who were called "money-diggers," and his occupation was that of seeing or pretending to see, by means of this stone placed in his hat, and his hat closed over his face. In this way he claimed the power to discover minerals and hidden treasures. It is said he was insolent, poorly educated, and very careless in appearance. One story told of Smith is that a straggling Indian, who was passing up the Susquehanna river, had told of buried treasure. Joe hunted up the Indian and induced him to tell the place where it was buried. The Indian told him at a point a certain number of paces due north from a certain point on the river. Joe's exchequer was very low at this time, and so it became necessary to get a well-to-do farmer by the name of Harper to assist him in the scheme. It seems that farmers were "taken in" in the early days as well as now. They commenced digging on a farm near the river and continued as long as Harper's cash held out. Smith now declared to Harper that there was an enchantment about the place that was removing the treasure further off: that Harper must get a perfectly white dog and sprinkle his blood over the ground, and that would prevent the enchantment from removing the treasure. Search was made all over the country, but no perfectly white dog could be found. Joseph said he thought a white sheep would do as well. A sheep was killed and the blood sprinkled as directed. The digging was then resumed by Harper. After digging for several weeks more and an outlay of $2,000 more of the farmer's shekels, Harper refused to "come down" any further and the digging was abandoned. Joe now said that the enchantment had removed all the treasure: that the Almighty was displeased with them for trying to palm off on Him a white sheep for a white dog. He would sit for hours looking into the hat at the round stone, and tell of seeing things far away and supernatural. On one occasion a neighbor had a piece of corn planted rather late and on a moist piece of ground, and, feeling a little doubtful about its ripening, got Smith to bless it. It happened that it was the only piece of corn killed by the frost in the neighborhood. When the prophet's attention was called to the matter he got out of the difficulty by saying that he made a mistake and put a curse on the corn instead of a blessing.

About this time Smith procured a box of plates, which it is supposed he brought from Palmyra, N. Y., where he lived for a short time, which he kept carefully locked. They were alleged to contain a great quantity of characters and hieroglyphics, which no one but himself could interpret. From these plates Smith, with the assistance of Martin Harris and Oliver Cawdry, produced the manuscript for the Book of Mormon. The book was compiled in a small building on the Susquehanna River, about two miles from the side-hill village of Susquehanna, and was printed in 1830, the manuscript being taken to the printing office each morning, and, together with the proofs, &c., taken away each night. The first account we have of Joe and his followers trying to start a colony was in the year 1831, in a remote corner of Luzerne county, where the climate soon got too warm for them and they vacated. Their next colony was near Painesville, O.

The most prominent of Joe's diggings is on a farm near Susquehanna depot. The excavation was 150 feet in circumference and twenty feet deep, and although it has been under cultivation for several years now, it is easily discernible, and often visited by the curious. The old house where the manuscript was produced is still standing and is owned by one of the ex-officials of Susquehanna county.


Note: This article was first published in the Syracuse Journal, and from there was reprinted into the Louisville Commercial of Mar. 15, 1891 and the RLDS Saints' Herald of Apr 18, 1891. The story appears to have been taken almost exclusively from the pages of Miss. Emily C. Blackman's 1873 book, History of Susquehanna Co., Pennsylvania. The writer's faulty report of a Mormon colony in Luzerne Co., Pennsylvania perhaps comes from a misreading of Blackman's story of Isaac Hale (Smith's father-in-law) having made a pioneering move "from Wells, Rutland County, Vt., to Willingborough, Luzerne County, Pa."

Major John H. Gilbert, compositor and pressman of the Mormon Bible in is still living in good health at Palmyra. He kept; a pressman's copy of the book which was recently sold for [$ ----] The press on which it was printed was recently found at Rose, Wayne county.


Notes: (forthcoming)

Helped Print the First Gold Bible.

ADRIAN, Mich., Feb. 21. -- Rolin Robinson died here yesterday aged 83. When a boy he worked in the Wayne Sentinel office at Palmyra, N. Y., and assisted in printing the first edition of the Book of Mormon or Gold Bible for Prophet Joseph Smith, who was one of the original "Three Apostles." At one time Robinson owned a line of boats on the Erie canal. He had served in the state legislature.


Notes: (forthcoming)

OUR  LITERARY  WOMEN.
_____

The Work of  Mrs. Ellen E. Dickinson.
Another of Onondaga's Daughters.

Mrs. Ellen E. Dickinson, who has attained wide reputation as a newspaper writer, was born in Onondaga Valley, being the daughter of the late Royal Stewart, a former merchant of that place. Through her mother Mrs. Dickinson was connected with the families of William and Joseph Sablne, men who were prominent in the earlier history of this county. Mrs. Dickinson showed a tendency for literary work at an early age and her contributions have found place in journals like The Boston Herald and Transcript, the New York Tribune, Churchman, Evangelist, Wide Awake, Youth's Companion, Magazine of American History and Scribner's. Upon her marriage to William Dickinson, a prominent New York lawyer, Mrs. Dickinson made her home in the metropolis where her literary work found fuller scope. In 1885 at the suggestion of the late Dr. J. Q. Holland, then editor of Scribner's Magazine, Mrs. Dickinson undertook the compiling of a history of Mormonlsm, for which she spent two years collecting the materials, working for weeks in the Astor and Boston libraries, besides travelling extensively in the West for the same purpose. Mrs. Dickinson was particularly well fitted for this work, being familiar through family traditions with much valuable material that came down direct from a great uncle, the Rev. Solomon Spauiding, who was the author of the manuscript that formed the basis of the Mormon religion. So thoroughly and efficiently did Mrs. Dickinson perform her task that her book is considered a standard work of great importance. Soon after its publication the author visited England where she received much attention owing to the interest aroused by her book and the subject treated of. In 1888 "The King's Daughters," a dainty volume in purple and gold was brought out by Mrs. Dickinson, with the special view of calling the attention of wealthy women of leisure to the opportunities for Christian work that were lying all around them. The book which was a success from its publication, was first issued by the Hubbard Brothers of Philadelphia, and afterward brought out as a Christmas book by the Lovell Company of New York. In addition to the work already mentioned, Mrs. Dickinson has done much in the way of newspaper correspondence, and has written many poems which in rare bindings and delicate booklets are treasured as choice bits of literature. Mrs. Dickinson's acquaintance has brought her in contact with many interesting and distinguished people and her mind is stored with remlniscences that furnish rich material for her conversation. Unassuming in manner, she is very cordial and friendly to her less fortunate sisters, and what is more, is keenly interested in the success of other women who are striving to make names in literature.


Notes: (forthcoming)

CHRONICLINGS.
______

... the Chronicler started out to say something about slang phrases... Their roots lie deep and must be painfully dug for. Some, of them have grown old in obscurity before some accident has brought them into vogue. Among such is the phrase which describes a man whose statements are not to be implicitly accepted, as "talking through his hat," if the Chronicler's theory as to its origin is correct. He dates it back to the second decade of the present century and fixes its birthplace at Palmyra, in Wayne county, N. Y. It owes its origin to the founder of Mormonism who was the first of mortal men to "talk through his hat," if history is to be trusted. Joseph Smith was, in his youth, the possessor of a peculiarly shaped stone that resembled in its outlines a child's foot. It came to be famous as the "peek stone" and the "Palmyra seer stone." With it the embryo prophet fooled the credulous residents of that then sparsely-settled region. Placing the "peeker" in his white "stove-pipe hat" in which he buried his face, he was able to see very remarkable things, buried treasured, subterranean waters, property stolen and hidden, cattle lost and strayed, which, in accents muffled by his interposed head-gear, he revealed, as they appeared to him, to his awe-stricken listeners. He talked through his hat. The fame of his powers spread abroad. He who wanted a well located, he whose property had been stolen, or whose cattle had strayed, went to Joe Smith and besought him to "talk through his hat." Later, when the revelations proved misleading and credulity waned, the phrase came to be used satirically, in its present sense. But Joe Smith had gone from Palmyra, and was at the head of the growing Mormon hierarchy, still dealing in "revelations," still "talking through his hat." So there are whole volumes of commentary on the origin, progress and claims to respect of Mormonism in one brief slang saying, for him who searches out its origin. Who shall say that equally interesting results will not reward him who diligently traces the history of others like it?


Note: The above explanation for the phrase "talking through his hat" is an unlikely one. The expression only became popular in English during the 1880s (for example in the Sydney Bulletin of early 1880), by which time the popular memory of Joseph Smith, Jr. was nearly forgotten. Smith was not the first scryer to gaze into a seer stone, shaded within a hat; and, even if he had been, there is no evidence that he did much talking while engaged in that activity. His mouth probably was not contained within the hat at such times. The initial meaning of the term was "bluff and bluster" or "talking nonsense," which does not fit very well with Smith's later self-proclaimed role as a purposeful, divine oracle. A secondary meaning was, perhaps, to "tell lies;" which might more reasonably be applied by skeptics to Smith's boyhood words and actions.

SCHOOL  AND  CHURCH.
_____

... The old Cherry Valley academy, which was recently destroyed by fire, was nearly a hundred years old, and it was there that many of the most famous men and women in New York state received their early education. Dr. Eliphalet Nott, later president of Union college, was at one time principal of this academy, and its first head was Rev. Solomon Spaulding, afterwards the alleged author of the Book of Mormon. The building was a remarkably fine specimen of colonial architecture.


Notes: (forthcoming)

THE  BOOK  OF  MORMON.

PRESIDENT BOOTH OF THE SEMINARY GIVES
AN OUTLINE OF THE WORK.

And Tells How Joseph Smith Wrote it at
Palmyra and How He Came Into Possession of the
Ground Work of the Bible of the Latter Day Saints.

President Henry M. Booth of the Theological seminary read a very interesting paper before ihe Cayuga County Historical society last evening, on "The Book of Mormon."

In opening Mr. Booth thanked the society for selecting him to appear before them, saying that the society comprised all that was best in Cayuga county, and thus all that was best in New York State. In the limited time which he had, Mr. Booth said, that he could only give a brief outline of a book which was somewhat famous and yet not much known, the Book of Mormon. The recital might be judged somewhat pertinent as it had connection with a prominent man of our city. It would be interesting as it had some connection with the city in which we reside. The Book of Mormon was the sacred book of the Latter Day Saints or Mormons. The book is divided into 15 small books and each book bears the name of a man, said to be the author of each small book. The small books are divided into chapters and paragraphs and each chapter usually begins with a passage from the Bible. It was "written to Jew and Gentle," "written and sealed up and hid unto the Lord to come forth in due time," "to show what great things the Lord has done for their forefathers." The Mormons are not a people that could be called heathen as they believe in Jesus Christ. In the beginning of the book, is the testimony of 11 witnesses, taken under oath, who haye seen and handled the gold plates upon which was written the records of their people. Three of these witnesses say that they saw an angel of God, come down to earth in a cloud of light and give tbe gold plates to the Mormons. They say it is a history of America from the time wh n a people started from the tower of Babel and starting out to an unknown country settled in America. In the beginning, Lehi started out from the city of Jerusalem, accompanied by his family and taking with him only the necessaries of life, leaving behind his house, possessions and all his valuables of gold and silver. Nephi, a son of Lehi is the Joseph of the family and dreamed dreams in which the course of the journey was laid out and advice given how they should proceed. In one of his dreams, an angel appears to him from the Lord and tells him that he must go back to Jerusalem and get certain brass plate in the possession of Labon, a rich merchant of Jerusalem. Upon these plates are the records of their forefathers, and also instructions as to how they should proceed on their journey. Lehi and his other three sons laugh to scorn the dreams of Nephi, but after much persuasion Lehi consents and the four sons start for Jerusalem. Laman, one of the sons regards the journey as a big joke and thus treats it all through. When at the city they cast lots to see who shall go after the plates, and the lot falls upon Laman. Laman goes to the house of Laban and tries to get the plates by threats. Labon thinks that Luman is a robber and throws him out of his house and drives him and his three brothers out of the city. Nephi is not discouraged by this repulse, as an angel appears to him and tells him to try again, but this time it must be with a bribe of gold and other precious things. They returned to their father and told him of their trip. Then Nephi goes to his father's house in Jerusalem and secures gold with which to bribe the ararcious Labon. Labon plans to keep both the gold and the plates. On his way to Labon's house, Nephi met a man overcome with wine and lying in the road. He discovered that it was the greedy Labon and at this point an angel appears to him. Labon's sword was at his side, and " the handle thereof was of the most precious gold, and the blade thereof of the most costly metal." The dress of Labon was also of the most costly stuff. The angel directs Nephi to slay Labon. This Nephi did, cutting off Labon's head. Then by the direction of the angel, Nephi arrays himself in Labon's clothes and proceeds to the home of Labon. When he reached the home of Labon Nephi went to the treasurer and told him that he wanted the precious plates. The treasurer, completely deceived by Nfphi's appearance, gave up the plates and at the commend of Nephi went with him out of the city. When they were outside of the city Nephi overcame the servant and persuaded him to go away with him. The brothers were waiting a short distance from the city and when Nephi and the servant joined them, they all proceeded to their father. On investigation, the plates are found to contain an entire history of the Jews, and Nephi learns that he is a descendant of Jacob. Nephi again dreams and the dream tells him that he and his family must migrate. For seven years they travel, and at last reach the sea. Here they build a ship, and eight men with their wives and two little children embark for the unknown land.

As they are crossing the equator Laman and Lemuel bind Nephi according to a custom practiced by sailors. Nephi does not like this, neither does he like the boisterous ways of his brothers. His brothers find that they can not manage the ship without Nephi and they release him and he again takes command. They reached America on the Western coast of South America near Chili. Here they settled and planted all the seed that they brought with them from Jerusalem. Their crops comes forth in great abundance and prosperity comes to them. They journeyed in the wilderness and saw all manner of wild beasts, the wild horse, cow, sheep, mountain goat; and all animals adapted to the use of man. Tbey also find gold and silver ore, diamonds and other precious stones and all sorts of metals. After a time a part of the tribe became wicked and a separation takes place, the wicked ones following Laman and the rest go with Nephi. The followers of Laman, because of their wickedness, have dark skins, but those of Nephi, even under a tropical sun, retain their white skin. After a time battles occur and tens of thousands are slain on each side. This according to the Mormon belief will account for the mounds of earth found in America in which are human bones. The followers of Nephi migrated to the North and West and built buildings and... worked in brass and other ores and built a temple like Solomon's temple, but not built of such costly wood. Nephi lived [70?] years and at his death the plates went to his brother Jacob. Eleven years from the time when Lehi left Jerusalem another band landed in America. They at once degenerated, and were discovered by Nepni's followers and were educated by them. At this time another book containing 24 plates was discovered. This was a history of earliest times down to the time of the Tower of Babel. In this was the history of Jeredites. They started out on their voyage to America in boats "built like unto a dish." After a voyage of 344 days they landed in America. At first they prospered, then they degenerated and totally disappeared. There were constant wars tietween the two divisions.

The account of the conversion to Christianity is that a great storm came upon them and it thundered and [lightninged], and the earth rolled like a wave of the ocean. This lasted three hours and then three days of darkness covered the earth. After three day Christ appeared near the temple, coming down in a cloud and clad in a white robe. The people felt the holes in his hands and feet in order that they might know he was the true Christ. He healed the sick, raised a man from the dead and worked several other miracles.[...] At this point of the war, the Lamanites pushed the Nephites hard to the North. Mormon and his son Marone were left for dead on the field. The plates were hid in the hill of Cumorah, near this city, by, the Nephites and they wandered over the continent as Indians.

The doctrine of the Rook of Mormon is hard to decipher. There are in it 300 passages from the Bible in the language used in the translation of the Bible in 1611, and this coincidence in not explained. One of the beliefs of the Mormons is that of "constant revelations" and it is hard to tell what people will do who believe in this. The Mormons are an uneducated, oppressed people and their leaders can persuade them to do most anything.

Joseph Smith was, according to the Mormon belief, ordained a minister of God by John the Baptist and believed that Zion will be built up in America. They believe that God was once a man, became so intelligent that he became perfect and thus infinite, that he eats, drinks, sleeps and has his passions of love and hate of a human being. When this world is filled up, the Mormons think that [they] will build another. They believe in the personal reign of Jesus Christ for 1,000 years. About 600 years after the arrival in America, fevers broke out among the Nephites and the people died in large numbers. They relied on herb medicine and thus in come the Indian belief in herbs and incantations.

In a battle between the two tribes it tells how Coriantumr, one of the leaders, fought three days. Lib, another leader presses Coriantumr, and Coriantumr leaves htm dead on tbe field. In this battle over 2,000,000 warriors were slain on each side. Then Shiz, son of Lib, and Coriantumr meet in perso