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Letter to Church Leaders in Jackson County, Missouri, 10 August 1833

Source Note

, Letter with postscript by JS, , Kirtland Township, Geauga Co., OH, to , , , , , and , , Jackson Co., MO, 10 Aug. 1833; recipient’s copy, [ca. Sept. 1833]; handwriting of ; two pages; CHL. Includes docket.
Two leaves measuring 7⅞ × 6¼ inches (20 × 16 cm). used the second leaf as a wrapper and inscribed a docket on the wrapper: “Copy of a letter from & J. Smith Jr.” The document was folded multiple times. Edward Partridge Lyman, a great-grandson of , donated this document to the Church Historian’s Office in 1972.

Historical Introduction

The day before he wrote this letter, had arrived in , Ohio, with firsthand news of hostility against church members in and of an agreement to leave that church leaders there had signed under duress. Cowdery and apparently went into hiding during the hostility. McLellin later remembered that, when a mob could not find them, a bounty of eighty dollars was offered for their retrieval. Cowdery left , Missouri, likely between 23 and 25 July 1833, to report the events to JS and other church leaders in Kirtland. As stated in this letter, Cowdery was delayed for three days during his journey from Independence to Kirtland, where he arrived on 9 August 1833, completing his hurried trip in approximately two weeks.
In this letter, recommended that members in “look out another place to locate on,” and he praised his associates for “the agreement to remove” the church out of the county. Conversely, Cowdery also chastised some members of the church in . “This great tribulation,” he wrote, “would not have come upon had it not been for rebelion.” Here, Cowdery likely referred to the far-reaching “rebellion” of Missouri church leaders against JS and the leadership in 1832 and early 1833.
’s letter demonstrates particular concern for the loss of the that had operated. He directed Phelps to send him an account of the circumstances that prevented publication of The Evening and the Morning Star and a list of the newspaper’s subscribers so that Cowdery could print an extra edition of the Star in and mail it to regular readers. referred to these requests in a letter he wrote to church leaders two months later: “Oliver has writen to you for the names and residence of the subscriber[s] for the Star and if you have not sent them we wish you to send them immediately that there may be no delay in the papers going to subscribers as soon as they can be printed.” Because of continued turmoil in , Phelps was unable to send a list of the subscribers until 3 December 1833. The list did, however, arrive in time for the mailing of the first issue of the renewed periodical published in Kirtland in December. In February 1834, Cowdery finally published an extra that contained “a circular recently received from our friends in the West, which corroborates many items heretofore laid before the public,” and also an account of the “wicked and wanton manner, in which the printing office of the type, and books then publishing, the dwelling-house of said Phelps, and some furniture, were destroyed.”
rushed to complete this letter in order to post it on 10 August. In a postscript, JS added his own words of counsel, expressed sorrow and concern, and advised the recipients to be willing to “forsake all for Christ[’s] sake.” After this letter arrived in , made a copy of it, including the postscript from JS. It is unknown when Partridge made his copy, though it was probably made soon after the original letter, which has not been located, was received in September 1833.

Footnotes

  1. [1]

    William E. McLellin, Editorial, Ensign of Liberty, Jan. 1848, 60–62; Schaefer, William E. McLellin’s Lost Manuscript, 166.

    Ensign of Liberty. Kirtland, OH. Mar. 1847–Aug. 1849.

    Schaefer, Mitchell K., ed. William E. McLellin’s Lost Manuscript. Salt Lake City: Eborn Books, 2012.

  2. [2]

    For more information on Cowdery’s departure from Missouri, see the Historical Introduction to Letter from John Whitmer, 29 July 1833.

  3. [3]

    Frederick G. Williams, Kirtland, OH, to “Dear Brethren,” 10 Oct. 1833, in JS Letterbook 1, p. 58.

  4. [4]

    Oliver Cowdery, Kirtland, OH, to John Whitmer, Missouri, 1 Jan. 1834, in Cowdery, Letterbook, 14–17.

    Cowdery, Oliver. Letterbook, 1833–1838. Huntington Library, San Marino, CA.

  5. [5]

    A notice printed in The Evening and the Morning Star indicated that Cowdery had received W. W. Phelps & Co.’s mail book with the list of newspaper subscribers. Cowdery forwarded the December issue of the paper to those whose names were current in that book. (Notice, The Evening and the Morning Star, Jan. 1834, 128.)

    The Evening and the Morning Star. Independence, MO, June 1832–July 1833; Kirtland, OH, Dec. 1833–Sept. 1834.

  6. [6]

    “From Missouri,” The Evening and the Morning Star, Extra, Feb. 1834, [1]; Parley P. Pratt et al., “‘The Mormons’ So Called,” The Evening and the Morning Star, Extra, Feb. 1834, [1].

    The Evening and the Morning Star. Independence, MO, June 1832–July 1833; Kirtland, OH, Dec. 1833–Sept. 1834.

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Related Case Documents
Editorial Title
Letter to Church Leaders in Jackson County, Missouri, 10 August 1833
ID #
177
Total Pages
4
Print Volume Location
JSP, D3:238–243
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