Docket Entry, 1–circa 6 July 1843 [Extradition of JS for Treason]
Source Note
Docket Entry, [, Hancock Co., IL, 1–ca. 6 July 1843], Extradition of JS for Treason (Nauvoo, IL, Municipal Court 1843); Nauvoo Municipal Court Docket Book, 55–87, 116–150; handwriting of and ; CHL.
yet such was the fact, that neither our friends or witnesses dared come into that to attend our trial, as they had been banished from the by the s order of extermination; executed to the very Letter by the principal officers of the civil & military. On these grounds & having had all these opportunities to know, I testify that neither Mr Smith, nor any other Mormon, has the least prospect for justice, or to receive a fair & impartial trial in the State of . If tried at all, they must be tried by authorities who have trampled all law under their feet & who have assisted in committing murder, robbery, treason, , rape, & felony, and who have made a law of banishment, contrary to the laws of all nature & executed this barbarous law, with the utmost rigour & severity Therefore Mr Smith & the mormons generally, have suffered the end of the law, of which they had no choice & therefore the State of has no further claims, whatever, upon any of them.
I furthermore testify that the authorities of other States who would assist , to wreak further vengeance upon any individual of the persecuted Mormons, are either ignorantly wilfully aiding & abetting in all these crimes.
Cross examined. He states that he was very intimate with Mr Smith all the time he resided in the State of , & was with him almost daily & that he knows possitively, that Mr Smith held no office, either civil or military, either real or pretended in that & that he never bore arms or did military duty not even in self defence, but that he was a peaceable, law abiding, & faithful citizen & a preacher of the gospel & exhorted all the citizens to be peaceable, long suffering & slow to act, even in self defence. He further stated that there was no fortress in , but a temporary fence made of rails, house logs, floor planks, wagons, carts &c &c, hastily thrown together, after being told by , that they were to be massacred, the following morning & the burned to ashes, without giving any information by what authority. And he further states that he only escaped himself from that by walking out of the Jail when the door was open to put in food & came out in obedience to the ’s order of banishment & to fulfill the same
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