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Letter from Halsey Cook, 20 March 1843

Source Note

, Letter, , Dutchess Co., NY, to JS, , Hancock Co., IL, 20 Mar. 1843; handwriting and signature presumably of ; two pages; JS Collection, CHL. Includes address, postal notation, postal stamp, and dockets.
Bifolium measuring 10 × 8 inches (25 × 20 cm). Each page is ruled with twenty-seven horizontal blue lines. The letter was written in blue ink on the first leaf and addressed on the verso of the second leaf. The recto of the second leaf is blank. The letter was trifolded twice in letter style, addressed, sealed with a red adhesive wafer, and postmarked. When the letter was opened, a hole was torn in the second leaf; some of the torn paper, including text, remains affixed to the wafer.
, who served as JS’s scribe from December 1841 until JS’s death in June 1844 and served as church historian from December 1842 until his own death in March 1854, docketed the letter. , who served as JS’s scribe from 1843 to 1844 and as clerk to the church historian and recorder from 1845 to 1865, inscribed another docket. The document was listed in an inventory that was produced by the Church Historian’s Office (later Church Historical Department) circa 1904. By 1973 the document had been included in the JS Collection at the Church Historical Department (now CHL). The document’s early dockets, its listing in a circa 1904 inventory, and its later inclusion in the JS Collection indicate continuous institutional custody.

Footnotes

  1. [1]

    JS, Journal, 13 Dec. 1841 and 21 Dec. 1842; Orson Spencer, “Death of Our Beloved Brother Willard Richards,” Deseret News (Salt Lake City), 16 Mar. 1854, [2].

    Deseret News. Salt Lake City. 1850–.

  2. [2]

    Jessee, “Writing of Joseph Smith’s History,” 456, 458; Woodruff, Journal, 22 Jan. 1865.

    Jessee, Dean C. “The Writing of Joseph Smith’s History.” BYU Studies 11 (Summer 1971): 439–473.

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

  3. [3]

    “Letters to and from the Prophet,” ca. 1904, [2], Historian’s Office, Catalogs and Inventories, 1846–1904, CHL.

    Historian’s Office. Catalogs and Inventories, 1846–1904. CHL. CR 100 130.

  4. [4]

    See the full bibliographic entry for JS Collection, 1827–1844, in the CHL catalog.

Historical Introduction

On 20 March 1843, wrote a letter from , New York, to JS in , Illinois, inquiring about the and the city of Nauvoo and requesting “a printed copy of your Revelation.” Cook was likely Jeremiah Halsey Cooke, who was born in Red Hook, New York, in 1824; little else is known about him. He apparently read about JS in newspapers, but he may have also encountered missionaries or other members of the church, since he was familiar with the church periodical Times and Seasons. Cook’s inquiries about Nauvoo were not unique; at least two other letters inquiring about the city and the church were written to JS in March 1843.
mailed the letter to JS from on 21 March. There is no known response from JS, but he apparently received the letter—probably sometime in early to mid-April—since his secretary docketed it.

Footnotes

  1. [1]

    Letter from John McKee, 7 Mar. 1843; Letter from Garret Bias, 7 Mar. 1843.

  2. [2]

    Mail generally traveled between New York and Nauvoo in two or three weeks. (See Letter from John M. Bernhisel, 12 July 1841; and Historical Introduction to Letter from James Arlington Bennet, 1 Sept. 1842.)

Page [1]

March 20, 1843
Rev Joseph Smith
Dr Sir
Being a lover of fareness and opposed to the reading and forming an opinion from one-cided and interested journals I have been enduced to address you,
First, I would like (if it can be easily sent by mail) a printed copy of your Revelation
Seckond, The number of your followers and the number of Priests explaning your doctrin.
Third, A discription of your citty , your lands the health of you[r] section, and the inducements to emergrate, I live in a part of whare their are many who if they could be induced to emergrate would prove valuable citizens, their are many to[o] who are not wealthy but are smart industrious active and enterprising citizens blessed by nature with excelent constitutions and who were they in a new country would clear every obstical and make their new home prosperous and happy and rich
If, as I believe, your Revelation is calculated to make the mass prosperous and happy, teaching good morals, honesty, virtue temperance love and good will towards man, then upon my being satisfied, I will use my endeavours to circulate and spread the truth, as it <​is​>, unbiased by party [p. [1]]
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Document Information

Related Case Documents
Editorial Title
Letter from Halsey Cook, 20 March 1843
ID #
1017
Total Pages
4
Print Volume Location
JSP, D12:81–83
Handwriting on This Page
  • Halsey Cook

Footnotes

  1. [1]

    Cook could have been referring here to either the Book of Mormon or the Doctrine and Covenants, a collection of JS’s revelations.

  2. [2]

    Based on the 1842 Nauvoo census, one scholar estimates the city’s population to have been around 4,000 people in that year. In 1845 the Times and Seasons reprinted an article from the Saint Louis Evening Gazette that counted the city’s population at 11,057, with “a third more” outside the city limits. Church members also lived in many other locations in the United States and in Great Britain, making it difficult to accurately estimate membership in 1843. It is also unclear how many missionaries were preaching at that time. (Nauvoo Stake, Ward Census, 1842, CHL; Black, “How Large Was the Population of Nauvoo?,” 92; “Mobocracy,” Times and Seasons, 15 Nov. 1845, 6:1031.)

    Nauvoo Stake. Ward Census, 1842. CHL.

    Black, Susan Easton. “How Large Was the Population of Nauvoo?” BYU Studies 35, no. 2 (1995): 91–94.

    Times and Seasons. Commerce/Nauvoo, IL. Nov. 1839–Feb. 1846.

  3. [3]

    A letter written by Willard Richards on JS’s behalf in 1843 described Nauvoo as “located on the east bench of the Mississippi River, in a fruitful county, best of soil all around, as healthy as any of the western country.” (Letter to John McKee, 28 Mar. 1843.)

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