Footnotes
Robert D. Foster, “A Testimony of the Past,” True Latter Day Saints’ Herald, 15 Apr. 1875, 227.
Saints’ Herald. Independence, MO. 1860–.
The English-born Cookman immigrated to the United States in 1825 and in 1838 moved to Washington DC, where he led the congregation at Wesley Chapel. Seven days after Foster wrote this letter, the United States Senate appointed Cookman as its chaplain, a position he held until he perished at sea in March 1841. (Ridgaway, Life of the Rev. Alfred Cookman, 19–20, 31, 63, 65, 72–76, 81; Journal of the Senate of the United States, 26th Cong., 1st Sess., 31 Dec. 1839, 68.)
Ridgaway, Henry B. The Life of the Rev. Alfred Cookman; with Some Account of His Father, the Rev. George Grimston Cookman. London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1873.
Journal of the Senate of the United States of America, Being the First Session of the Twenty-Sixth Congress, Begun and Held at the City of Washington, December 2, 1839, and in the Sixty-Fourth Year of the Independence of the Said United States. Washington DC: Blair and Rives, 1839.
Coray, Autobiographical Sketch, 17, 19.
Coray, Howard. Autobiographical Sketch, after 1883. Howard Coray, Papers, ca. 1840–1941. Photocopy. CHL. MS 2043, fd. 1.
See Revelation, 27–28 Dec. 1832 [D&C 88:82].
The Potomac River, or possibly the Potomac River Valley.
President Martin Van Buren sent his annual message to Congress on 24 December 1839. The president’s message (after 1942 commonly referred to as the State of the Union Address) is mandated by article 2, section 3, of the United States Constitution. The church’s delegation to Washington DC was awaiting the publication of this message, which was delayed by a dispute in the House of Representatives. (Message from the President of the United States, Senate doc. no. 1, 26th Cong., 1st Sess. [1839]; Letter to Seymour Brunson and Nauvoo High Council, 7 Dec. 1839.)
Message from the President of the United States, to the Two Houses of Congress, at the Commencement of the First Session of the Twenty-Sixth Congress. December 24, 1839. Senate Doc. no. 1, 26th Cong., 1st Sess. (1839).
Wilber was a member of the church who served as clerk to a 10 July 1837 conference in Bath, New York. (“Conference,” Elders’ Journal, Oct. 1837, 15–16.)
According to a Washington DC newspaper, heavy snow had closed railroad lines from the nation’s capital to New England, resulting in a “complete interruption of the mails.” (News Item, Madisonian [Washington DC], 25 Dec. 1839, [3].)
The Madisonian. Washington DC. 1837–1841.