Backenstos was accused of complicity in the killing of Franklin A. Worrell. On 16 September 1845 Backenstos had been accosted on the road by a party of anti-Mormons that included Worrell. The armed mob pursued Backenstos for nearly two miles before he came across Mormons Orrin Porter Rockwell and John Redden and requested their help. As the mob neared the sheriff and his new deputies and refused the sheriff’s command to halt, Rockwell fired a single shot that struck Worrell in the chest and killed him. Worrell’s death further incensed anti-Mormon passions. The Warsaw Signal proclaimed him “One of Our Best Men” and swore revenge, warning that “his death has kindled and will kindle a flame that can never be quenched until every Mormon has left the vicinity.” After Hardin arrived at Carthage on 28 September, Backenstos offered to surrender and face “an investigation of any & every thing that may be charged against me by any of the Mob or any one else.” As he anticipated in this note to Young, Backenstos was apparently taken to Quincy on 7 October to answer charges relating to Worrell’s death; he was eventually released on bail. He was later indicted by the Hancock County Circuit Court, but when the case came to trial on 27 October, Backenstos obtained a change of venue to Peoria County, where he was tried and acquitted. (Clayton, Journal, 16–17 Sept. 1845; Jacob B. Backenstos, Proclamation No. 2 [Nauvoo, IL: 16 Sept. 1845], copy at BYU; “Murder of One of Our Best Men,” Warsaw [IL] Signal, 17 Sept. 1845, [2], italics in original; Jacob B. Backenstos, Carthage, IL, to John J. Hardin, 29 Sept. 1845, Hardin Family Papers, Chicago History Museum; Joseph L. Heywood, Nauvoo, IL, to Serepta M. Blodgett Heywood, Quincy, IL, 6 Oct. 1845, Joseph L. Heywood Collection, CHL; Clayton, Journal, 12 and 27 Oct. 1845; 10 Dec. 1845; Hancock Co., IL, Circuit Court Records, 1829–1897, vol. D, pp. 369, 374, microfilm 947,496, U.S. and Canada Record Collection, FHL.)
Clayton, William. Journals, 1842–1845. CHL.
Backenstos, Jacob B. Proclamation No. 2. [Nauvoo, IL]: 16 Sept. 1845. Copy at BYU.
Warsaw Signal. Warsaw, IL. 1841–1853.
Hardin Family Papers, 1733–1943. Chicago History Museum.
Heywood, Joseph L. Collection, 1839–1912. CHL.
U.S. and Canada Record Collection. FHL.
The original copy of this letter is apparently not extant. The letter was later published twice by the Warsaw Signal—first as a broadside and again on 15 October—as well as by the Nauvoo Neighbor on 29 October 1845. (To the Anti-Mormon Citizens of Hancock and the Surrounding Counties [Warsaw, IL: Oct. 1845]; John J. Hardin et al., “Camp Carthage,” IL, to “the President and High Council,” 3 Oct. 1845, in Warsaw [IL] Signal, 15 Oct. 1845, [1]; and in Nauvoo Neighbor, 29 Oct. 1845, [1].)
To the Anti-Mormon Citizens of Hancock County and the Surrounding Counties. Warsaw, IL: Oct. 1845. Copy available in Warsaw Signal, microfilm (New York: New York Public Library, 1952), copy at CHL.
Warsaw Signal. Warsaw, IL. 1841–1853.
Nauvoo Neighbor. Nauvoo, IL. 1843–1845.
Following their interview with Young and other church leaders on 1 October, Hardin and his party requested that Young “submit the facts & intentions stated to us . . . to writing In order that we may lay them before the Governor & people of the State.” Young’s written response enclosed a copy of his 24 September statement to a committee from Quincy, Illinois, which declared the Saints’ intention “to leave this county next spring, for some point so remote, that there will not need to be a difficulty with the people and ourselves.” Young further reported to Hardin that since this earlier proclamation, arrangements had been made for at least ten companies of one hundred families each to leave in the spring; he also reiterated the Mormons’ objective to sell their property in Nauvoo and the surrounding area as soon as possible. “If all these testimonies are not sufficient to satisfy any people that we are in earnest,” Young closed, “we will soon give them a sign that cannot be mistaken, we will leave them!” (John J. Hardin et al. to “the First President and Council of the Church,” Nauvoo, IL, 1 Oct. 1845, Hardin Family Papers, Chicago History Museum; Whereas a council of the authorities [Nauvoo, IL: 24 Sept, 1845], copy at BYU; Brigham Young, Nauvoo, IL, to John J. Hardin et al., Hancock Co., IL, 1 Oct. 1845, Hardin Family Papers, Chicago History Museum, underlining in original.)
Hardin Family Papers, 1733–1943. Chicago History Museum.
Whereas a council of the authorities. Nauvoo, IL: 24 Sept. 1845. Copy at BYU.