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“Church History,” 1 March 1842

Source Note

JS, “Church History,” in Times and Seasons, 1 Mar. 1842, vol. 3, no. 9, 706–710. For more complete source information, see the source note for Letter to Isaac Galland, 22 Mar. 1839.

Historical Introduction

In the 1 March issue of the Times and Seasons, JS published a narrative history that included a description of his early visions, of the organization, growth, and migrations of the , and of the persecution the Latter-day Saints endured; it also included a succinct summary of Latter-day Saint beliefs. The document states that , proprietor and editor of the weekly Chicago Democrat, solicited the history on behalf of , a attorney. Barstow was then working on a history of New Hampshire and apparently sought information about JS and the Latter-day Saints for possible inclusion in the book. While it is unclear whether Wentworth or Barstow ever received the information included in this narrative history, JS published the material in the Times and Seasons, the church newspaper printed in , Illinois.
Opportunities to treat the church or its doctrines favorably in publications unaffiliated with the church were rare, and some previous attempts were not entirely successful. On 4 January 1833 JS wrote a letter to , editor of the newspaper American Revivalist, and Rochester Observer. JS told Saxton that he wrote the letter “by the commandment of God” and asked the editor to publish it in its entirety, but Saxton published only an excerpt. JS wrote again on 12 February 1833 asking that the whole of his previous letter be “laid before the public,” but Saxton did not republish it. In 1836, in a volume titled The Religious Creeds and Statistics of Every Christian Denomination in the United States, editor John Hayward included a summary of the Book of Mormon and short excerpts from the Doctrine and Covenants as well as a statement of beliefs that church member furnished, but these materials were bracketed by negative statements from (JS’s father-in-law) and from a skeptical Hayward. In 1839 the editor of the St. Louis Gazette asked church for an article about the church but then declined to print it. Taylor later published the history himself in a tract titled A Short Account of the Murders, Roberies, Burnings, Thefts, and Other Outrages Committed by the Mob and Militia of the State of Missouri, upon the Latter Day Saints.
Though JS had previously produced texts that chronicled the origins and history of the church, the featured historical sketch and statements of belief represent the first time he published that information. Succinctly titled “Church History,” the document was published in the 1 March 1842 issue of the Times and Seasons. No manuscript copy has been located, and it is not known how much of the text JS originally wrote or dictated. In several places the historical narrative parallels other accounts JS produced between 1832 and 1838 or echoes wording from ’s 1840 tract A[n] Interesting Account of Several Remarkable Visions. To produce his thirteen doctrinal statements, JS may have drawn upon several different texts, including the “Articles and Covenants,” drafted when the church was organized in 1830; ’s “broad principles,” published in the October 1834 issue of the Latter Day Saints’ Messenger and Advocate; ’s “leading principles,” published in Hayward’s 1836 Religious Creeds; and Pratt’s Interesting Account, which drew upon a theological summary written by . In addition to consulting these texts, JS may have counseled with trusted associates to compose the document. Whatever his intellectual debt to Cowdery, Pratt, or others, JS took responsibility for “Church History” when it was published in the Times and Seasons. He introduced himself at the beginning of the article as “the founder,” and his name appears at the conclusion as the author. An editorial passage printed above his name further confirms his endorsement: “This paper commences my editorial career, I alone stand responsible for it, and shall do for all papers having my signature henceforward.”
In the featured text JS imparted what he characterized as a “sketch of the rise, progress, persecution, and faith of the Latter-Day Saints.” In this historical narrative, later referred to as the “Wentworth letter,” JS offered a synopsis of his first vision, the reception and production of the Book of Mormon, and the founding and expansion of the church. JS also used the featured text as a medium to describe “the injustice, the wrongs, the murders, the bloodshed, the theft, misery and woe” that Latter-day Saints endured in during the 1830s. Following his historical sketch, JS presented thirteen statements of belief that later became known as “The Articles of Faith.” As he had when he wrote nine years earlier, JS asked that “publish the account entire, ungarnished, and without misrepresentation.”
Following the historical narrative’s publication in the Times and Seasons, several other publications made brief, oblique references to it. The newspaper Quincy Whig noted JS’s historical sketch in conjunction with his new role as editor of the church’s periodical. In Mormonism and the Mormons, pastor Daniel Kidder remarked that JS’s 1842 autobiographical narratives were “nothing but the old story about the and the angel, with a few emendations to save appearances.”
JS’s overview of church history was reproduced in various publications in the succeeding decade. John Hayward incorporated excerpts from the sketch in his 1842 volume The Book of Religions, and church members and published a nearly verbatim copy of the text in an 1844 tract titled Correspondence between Joseph Smith, the Prophet, and Col. John Wentworth. Historian included an augmented version of “Church History”—published as “Latter Day Saints”—in his 1844 work He Pasa Ekklesia: An Original History of the Religious Denominations at Present Existing in the United States; it also appeared in the 1848 edition of the book, published by John Winebrenner and retitled History of All the Religious Denominations in the United States. Additionally, versions of JS’s thirteen doctrinal statements were featured in several missionary tracts or newspapers from 1844 to 1851, as well as in an 1851 history of the Latter-day Saints written by London journalist Henry Mayhew. While serving as president of the British mission in 1851, published the thirteen statements of belief, along with a few revelatory texts JS produced, in a collection titled The Pearl of Great Price—a revised version of which was canonized as church scripture in 1880.

Footnotes

  1. [1]

    George Barstow, History of New Hampshire from Its Discovery, in 1614, to the Passage of the Toleration Act, in 1819 (Concord, NH: I. S. Boyd, 1842). Barstow’s initial interest in the church may have been prompted by recent Latter-day Saint missionary activity and church growth in New Hampshire and Massachusetts. (See Letter from Eli Maginn, 22 Mar. 1842; and Williams, “Missionary Movements of the LDS Church in New England,” 128–133, 147–156.)

    Williams, Richard Shelton. “The Missionary Movements of the LDS Church in New England, 1830–1850.” Master’s thesis, Brigham Young University, 1969.

  2. [2]

    “Mormonism,” American Revivalist, and Rochester (NY) Observer, 2 Feb. 1833, [2]; Letter to Noah C. Saxton, 4 Jan. 1833; Letter to Noah C. Saxton, 12 Feb. 1833.

    American Revivalist, and Rochester Observer. Rochester, NY. 1827–1833.

  3. [3]

    Hayward, Religious Creeds and Statistics, 130–142.

    Hayward, John. The Religious Creeds and Statistics of Every Christian Denomination in the United States and British Provinces. With Some Account of the Religious Sentiments of the Jews, American Indians, Deist, Mahometans, &c. Boston: By the author, 1836.

  4. [4]

    Taylor, Short Account of the Murders, 8.

    Taylor, John. A Short Account of the Murders, Roberies, Burnings, Thefts, and Other Outrages Committed by the Mob and Militia of the State of Missouri, Upon the Latter Day Saints. Springfield, IL: By the author, 1839.

  5. [5]

    See, for example, History, ca. Summer 1832; and JS History, vol. A-1, 1–61.

  6. [6]

    The issue was likely published after 2 March, when JS read the proof sheets. Wilford Woodruff, who worked in the printing office, recorded that he spent the day of 4 March “at the [printing] Office making up the Mails or prepairing papers for it.” (JS, Journal, 2 Mar. 1842; Woodruff, Journal, 4 Mar. 1842.)

    Woodruff, Wilford. Journals, 1833–1898. Wilford Woodruff, Journals and Papers, 1828–1898. CHL. MS 1352.

  7. [7]

    History, ca. Summer 1832; Conversations with Robert Matthews, 9–11 Nov. 1835; JS History, vol. A-1, 1–7. For a comparison between Pratt’s Interesting Account and the featured text, see Orson Pratt, A[n] Interesting Account of Several Remarkable Visions, 1840.

  8. [8]

    Articles and Covenants, ca. Apr. 1830 [D&C 20:29–36]; Oliver Cowdery, “Address,” Messenger and Advocate, Oct. 1834, 1:1–2; Hayward, Religious Creeds and Statistics, 139–140; see also Pratt and Higbee, Address; compare Pratt, Late Persecution of the Church, iii–xiii.

    Latter Day Saints’ Messenger and Advocate. Kirtland, OH. Oct. 1834–Sept. 1837.

    Hayward, John. The Religious Creeds and Statistics of Every Christian Denomination in the United States and British Provinces. With Some Account of the Religious Sentiments of the Jews, American Indians, Deist, Mahometans, &c. Boston: By the author, 1836.

    Pratt, Parley P., and Elias Higbee. An Address by Judge Higbee and Parley P. Pratt, Ministers of the Gospel, of the Church of Jesus Christ of “Latter-day Saints,” to the Citizens of Washington, and to the Public in General. N.p., 1840.

  9. [9]

    During this period, John Taylor reportedly assisted JS with producing content for the Times and Seasons. (Woodruff, Journal, 19 Feb. 1842.)

    Woodruff, Wilford. Journals, 1833–1898. Wilford Woodruff, Journals and Papers, 1828–1898. CHL. MS 1352.

  10. [10]

    Times and Seasons, 1 Mar. 1842, 3:710. When the history was updated and sent to Israel Daniel Rupp for publication, JS was again named as author of the text. (Rupp, He Pasa Ekklesia, 404.)

  11. [11]

    Church historian Brigham H. Roberts was among the first to refer to the featured text as the “Wentworth letter.” Given its lack of a date, salutation, and valediction, the featured text is not a letter, though portions of the text may have been derived from one. (History of the Church, 4:535.)

    History of the Church / Smith, Joseph, et al. History of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Edited by B. H. Roberts. Salt Lake City: Deseret News, 1902–1912 (vols. 1–6), 1932 (vol. 7).

  12. [12]

    From early 1839 onward JS and other church leaders encouraged the Latter-day Saints to gather up “knowledge of all the facts and suffering and abuses put upon them by the people of this state [Missouri].” In late 1839 JS, Sidney Rigdon, and others traveled to Washington DC to seek redress from the federal government by presenting a lengthy memorial that described the violence Missouri vigilantes perpetrated against church members. These experiences and the possibility of redress were never far from JS’s mind during this period and beyond. (Letter to Edward Partridge and the Church, ca. 22 Mar. 1839; Memorial to the United States Senate and House of Representatives, ca. 30 Oct. 1839–27 Jan. 1840; Minutes and Discourse, 6 Mar. 1840; JS, Nauvoo, IL, to Henry Clay, 4 Nov. 1843, draft, JS Collection, CHL.)

  13. [13]

    From 1844 to 1851 these doctrinal statements appeared in various church-related tracts under different titles, including “Faith and Doctrine of the Latter Day Saints,” “L.D. Saints’ Faith,” “Latter Day Saint’s Faith,” and “Faith of the Latter-Day Saints.” The 1878 version of the Pearl of Great Price referred to the statements as “Articles of our Faith”; the 1902 version added numbers to the statements and referred to them as “The Articles of Faith Of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.” ([Gooch], Death of the Prophets Joseph and Hyram Smith, 9–10; Flanigan, Reply to a Sheet, 7–8; Orson Hyde, “Latter Day Saint’s Faith,” Frontier Guardian [Kanesville, IA], 20 Feb. 1850, [1]; [Mayhew], Mormons, 46–47; Pearl of Great Price, 1878 ed., 63; Pearl of Great Price, 1902 ed., 102–103, emphasis in original.)

    Death of the Prophets Joseph and Hyram Smith, Who Were Murdered while in Prison at Carthage, on the 27th Day of June, A. D. 1844. Boston: John Gooch, 1844.

    Flanigan, J. H. Reply to a Sheet Entitled, “The Result of Two Meetings between the L.D. Saints and Primitive Methodists,” at Gravely, Cambridgshire. Bedford, England, 1849.

    Frontier Guardian. Kanesville, IA. 1849–1852.

    [Mayhew, Henry]. The Mormons; or, Latter-Day Saints. With Memoirs of the Life and Death of Joseph Smith, the “American Mahomet.” London: Office of the National Illustrated Library, [1851].

    The Pearl of Great Price: Being a Choice Selection from the Revelations, Translations and Narrations of Joseph Smith, First Prophet, Seer, and Revelator to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Salt Lake City: Latter-day Saints’ Printing and Publishing Establishment, 1878.

    The Pearl of Great Price: A Selection from the Revelations, Translation, and Narrations of Joseph Smith First Prophet, Seer and Revelator to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Salt Lake City: Deseret News, 1902.

  14. [14]

    Editorial, Quincy (IL) Whig, 12 Mar. 1842, [2].

    Quincy Whig. Quincy, IL. 1838–1856.

  15. [15]

    Kidder, Mormonism and the Mormons, 334. Kidder may have been referring to both “Church History” and the more extensive “History of Joseph Smith” that JS began publishing serially in the 15 March 1842 issue of the Times and Seasons. (Times and Seasons, 15 Mar. 1842, 3:726.)

    Kidder, Daniel P. Mormonism and the Mormons: A Historical View of the Rise and Progress of the Sect Self-Styled Latter-Day Saints. New York: G. Lane and P. P. Sandford, 1842.

  16. [16]

    Hayward, Book of Religions, 260–266; Correspondence between Joseph Smith, the Prophet, and Col. John Wentworth, 3–6.

    Hayward, John. The Book of Religions; Comprising the Views Creeds, Sentiments, or Opinions, of All the Principal Religious Sects in the World, Particularly of All Christian Denominations in Europe and America; To Which Are Added Church and Missionary Statistics, Together with Biographical Sketches. Boston: John Hayward, 1842.

    Correspondence between Joseph Smith, the Prophet, and Col. John Wentworth, Editor of “The Chicago Democrat,” and Member of Congress from Illinois; Gen. James Arlington Bennet, of Arlington House, Long Island, and the Honorable John C. Calhoun, Senator from South Carolina. . . . New York: John E. Page and L. R. Foster, 1844.

  17. [17]

    Rupp, He Pasa Ekklesia, 404–410; Winebrenner, History of All the Religious Denominations in the United States, 344–349. In 1843, Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, publisher Clyde, Williams & Co. requested that JS submit an article on the Latter-day Saints for inclusion in a book; with the aid of scribe William W. Phelps, JS later supplied them with an expanded version of the historical sketch and doctrinal statements. After receiving a copy of the book, JS offered to furnish Rupp with “further information, at a proper time.” (Clyde, Williams & Co., Harrisburg, PA, to JS and Sidney Rigdon, Nauvoo, IL, ca. 15 July 1843; JS per William W. Phelps, Nauvoo, IL, to Clyde, Williams & Co., Harrisburg, PA, 1 Aug. 1843, copy, JS Collection, CHL; William W. Phelps, Historical Article, Sept. 1843, CHL; JS, Nauvoo, IL, to Israel Daniel Rupp, Lancaster, PA, 5 June 1844, JS Collection, CHL.)

    Winebrenner, John, comp. History of All the Religious Denominations in the United States: Containing Authentic Accounts of the Rise and Progress, Faith and Practice, Localities and Statistics, of the Different Persuasions: Written Expressly for the Work, by Fifty-Three Eminent Authors, Belonging to the Respective Denominations. 2nd ed. Harrisburg, PA: John Winebrenner, 1848.

  18. [18]

    See, for example, [Gooch], Death of the Prophets Joseph and Hyram Smith, 9–10; The Latter-Day Saints’ Belief (n.p., [1851?]), copy at CHL; Flanigan, Reply to a Sheet, 7–8; “Latter Day Saint’s Faith,” Frontier Guardian (Kanesville, IA), 20 Feb. 1850, [1]; and [Mayhew], Mormons, 46–47.

    Death of the Prophets Joseph and Hyram Smith, Who Were Murdered while in Prison at Carthage, on the 27th Day of June, A. D. 1844. Boston: John Gooch, 1844.

    The Latter-Day Saints’ Belief. N.p., [1851?]. Copy at CHL.

    Flanigan, J. H. Reply to a Sheet Entitled, “The Result of Two Meetings between the L.D. Saints and Primitive Methodists,” at Gravely, Cambridgshire. Bedford, England, 1849.

    Frontier Guardian. Kanesville, IA. 1849–1852.

    [Mayhew, Henry]. The Mormons; or, Latter-Day Saints. With Memoirs of the Life and Death of Joseph Smith, the “American Mahomet.” London: Office of the National Illustrated Library, [1851].

  19. [19]

    Pearl of Great Price, 1851 ed., 55; Pearl of Great Price, 1878 ed., 63; “Fiftieth Semi-annual Conference,” Deseret News (Salt Lake City), 13 Oct. 1880, 588.

    The Pearl of Great Price: Being a Choice Selection from the Revelations, Translations, and Narrations of Joseph Smith, First Prophet, Seer, and Revelator to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Liverpool: F. D. Richards, 1851.

    The Pearl of Great Price: Being a Choice Selection from the Revelations, Translations and Narrations of Joseph Smith, First Prophet, Seer, and Revelator to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Salt Lake City: Latter-day Saints’ Printing and Publishing Establishment, 1878.

    Deseret News. Salt Lake City. 1850–.

Asterisk (*) denotes a "featured" version, which includes an introduction and annotation. Additions to “Church History,” September 1843, Draft “Latter Day Saints,” 1844
*“Church History,” 1 March 1842
Times and Seasons, 1 March 1842 History, 1838–1856, volume C-1 [2 November 1838–31 July 1842] “History of Joseph Smith”

Page 706

CHURCH HISTORY.
At the request of Mr. , Editor, and Proprietor of the “Chicago Democrat,” I have written the following sketch of the rise, progress, persecution, and faith of the , of which I have the honor, under God, of being the founder. says, that he wishes to furnish , a friend of his, who is writing the history of New Hampshire, with this document. As has taken the proper steps to obtain correct information all that I shall ask at his hands, is, that he publish the account entire, ungarnished, and without misrepresentation.
I was born in the town of Windsor co., Vermont, on the 23d of December, A. D. 1805. When ten years old my parents removed to New York, where we resided about four years, and from thence we removed to the town of .
My was a farmer and taught me the art of husbandry. When about fourteen years of age I began to reflect upon the importance of being prepared for a future state, and upon enquiring the plan of salvation I found that there was a great clash in religious sentiment; if I went to one society they referred me to one plan, and another to another; each one pointing to his own particular creed as the summum bonum of perfection: considering that all could not be right, and that God could not be the author of so much confusion I determined to investigate the subject more fully, believing that if God had a church it would not be split up into factions, and that if he taught one society to worship one way, and administer in one set of ordinances, he would not teach another principles which were diametrically opposed. Believing the word of God I had confidence in the declaration of James; “If any man lack wisdom let him ask of God who giveth to all men liberally and upbraideth not and it shall be given him,” I retired to a secret place in a grove and began to call upon the Lord, while fervently engaged in supplication my mind was taken away from the objects with which I was surrounded, and I was enwrapped in a [p. 706]
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Editorial Title
“Church History,” 1 March 1842
ID #
778
Total Pages
5
Print Volume Location
JSP, H1:489–501
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Footnotes

  1. [1]

    Joseph Smith Sr. left Vermont in late summer or early fall 1816; the rest of the Smith family joined him in Palmyra village in early 1817, shortly after JS turned eleven. In 1818 or 1819 the family constructed a log cabin two miles south of Palmyra village near a one-hundred-acre tract of land located in the northern part of Farmington Township (later Manchester Township); the family contracted for the land from the heirs of Nicholas Evertson. (Palmyra, NY, Record of Highway Taxes, 1817, Copies of Old Village Records, 1793–1867, microfilm 812,869, U.S. and Canada Record Collection, FHL; Lucy Mack Smith, History, 1844–1845, bk. 3, pp. [3]–[6]; JS History, vol. A-1, 131–132; Bushman, Rough Stone Rolling, 32–33, 47.)

    U.S. and Canada Record Collection. FHL.

    Bushman, Richard Lyman. Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling. With the assistance of Jed Woodworth. New York: Knopf, 2005.

  2. [2]

    Some of the following language used to describe JS’s early visions quotes Orson Pratt’s Interesting Account.

  3. [3]

    Several Methodist revivals or camp meetings took place in the Palmyra area from 1818 to 1824 as part of a larger series of American religious revivals later referred to as the Second Great Awakening. Revivals during this period often led to sectarianism as Methodists, Presbyterians, Baptists, and other religious denominations competed for converts. (Hatch, Democratization of American Christianity, chap. 3; Cross, Burned-Over District, chap. 1; “Effects of Drunkenness,” Palmyra [NY] Register, 28 June 1820, [2]; “Plain Truth,” Palmyra Register, 5 July 1820, [2]; Staker, Hearken, O Ye People, 128–133.)

    Hatch, Nathan O. The Democratization of American Christianity. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1989.

    Cross, Whitney R. The Burned-Over District: The Social and Intellectual History of Enthusiastic Religion in Western New York, 1800–1850. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1950. Reprint, Ithaca, NY: Cornell Paperbacks, 1982.

    Palmyra Register. Palmyra, NY. 1817–1821.

    Staker, Mark L. Hearken, O Ye People: The Historical Setting of Joseph Smith’s Ohio Revelations. Salt Lake City: Greg Kofford Books, 2009.

  4. [4]

    See James 1:5.

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