This item is reproduced by permission of
Chicago
History Museum, Chicago, Illinois.
Footnotes
See Joseph Smith III, Plano, IL, to Albert D. Hagan, Chicago, IL, 22 Oct. 1880, microfilm, Chicago Historical Society, Collection of Mormon Materials, 1836–1886, CHL. In this letter to Hagan, Joseph Smith III discussed a piece of correspondence from his father to his mother that he found after his mother’s death and that he wanted to donate to the Chicago Historical Society. Although he did not identify the item as this 6 June letter, the JS and Emma Smith correspondence held at the Chicago Historical Society, together with subsequent correspondence between Smith and Hagan, suggests that the 6 June 1832 letter is the only possible letter to which he could be referring. An old typescript made by the Chicago Historical Society makes the same identification. (Joseph Smith III, Lamoni, IA, to Albert D. Hagan, Chicago, IL, 12 June 1885, microfilm, Chicago Historical Society, Collection of Mormon Materials, 1836–1886, CHL; JS, Greenville, IN, to Emma Smith, Kirtland, OH, 6 June 1832, typescript, Chicago Historical Society, Collection of Mormon Materials, 1836–1886, CHL.)
Chicago Historical Society, Collection of Mormon Materials, 1836–1886. Microfilm. CHL. MS 8136.
A note on an old transcript of the letter locates the source as “Autograph Letters vol. 16, pp. 33–36.” The recto pages of the letter still bear the visible marks of the now-erased graphite inscriptions of page numbers “33” and “35.” Volume 16 of the Autograph Letters collection at the Chicago History Museum is no longer extant. However, volumes 5 and 21 of that collection, which are still intact, provide examples of how loose documents were attached to a scrapbook. (JS, Greenville, IN, to Emma Smith, Kirtland, OH, 6 June 1832, typescript, Chicago Historical Society, Collection of Mormon Materials, 1836–1886, CHL.)
Chicago Historical Society, Collection of Mormon Materials, 1836–1886. Microfilm. CHL. MS 8136.
Footnotes
JS History, vol. A-1, 214. Mr. Porter’s brother was the doctor who took care of Whitney’s leg. Three Porter men (all apparently brothers) were in Greenville at this time: Daniel, James, and Julius. One source states that Daniel was a tavern keeper and postmaster and that James was a doctor. This same source explains that, at some point (no date is given), Julius succeeded his brother as tavern keeper and postmaster. Another source says that Daniel was a physician, not a tavern keeper. According to William Newnham Blaney, who visited Porter’s public house during the winter of 1822–1823, the tavern “was without exception the most clean and comfortable I had ever been in since I crossed the Alleghenies.” (1840 U.S. Census, Greenville, Floyd Co., IN, 299; History of the Ohio Falls Cities, 2:295–296; Wilson, “Pioneer Towns of Martin County,” 296; “Clan C,” 621.)
Census (U.S.) / U.S. Bureau of the Census. Population Schedules. Microfilm. FHL.
History of the Ohio Falls Cities and Their Counties, with Illustrations and Biographical Sketches. Vol. 2. Cleveland: L. A. Williams, 1882.
Wilson, George R., ed. “Hindostan, Greenwich, and Mt. Pleasant. The Pioneer Towns of Martin County.—Memoirs of Thomas Jefferson Brooks.” Indiana Magazine of History 16 (Dec. 1920): 285–302.
JS History, vol. A-1, 215.
JS departed with Whitney a few days after writing the letter, and by the end of the month they were back in Kirtland. In 1842, Rigdon recalled that JS and Whitney reached Kirtland “about 4 weeks after I arrived,” which was 26 May 1832. (JS History, vol. A-1, 215–216; Sidney Rigdon, Statement, ca. 1842, Historian’s Office, JS History Documents, ca. 1839–1856, CHL; Cahoon, Diary, 26 May 1832.)
Historian’s Office. Joseph Smith History Documents, 1839–1860. CHL. CR 100 396.
Cahoon, Reynolds. Diaries, 1831–1832. CHL. MS 1115.
Indiana Gazetteer, 79.
The Indiana Gazetteer, or Topographical Dictionary of the State of Indiana. 3rd ed. Indianapolis, IN: E. Chamberlain, 1850.
In 1831, Joseph Smith Sr. and Lucy Mack Smith moved into a home on a farm owned by Frederick G. Williams. (Lucy Mack Smith, History, 1844–1845, bk. 12, [6]; Historical Introduction to Revelation, 15 May 1831.)
Sophronia Smith Stoddard, who was married to Calvin Stoddard, gave birth to a daughter, Maria, on 12 April 1832. Calvin Stoddard then left on a mission with Jared Carter on 25 April. (Carter, Journal, 59.)
Carter, Gideon Hayden. Journal, Apr.–Dec. 1832. CHL. MS 1732.
Through a land exchange in the winter of 1829–1830, Frederick G. Williams purchased a farm in Kirtland, on which JS’s parents lived. Sometime around April 1832, Philo Dibble apparently sold some of his own property to raise enough money to pay off $400 that Williams owed on the farm. Williams received the deed for the farm in April 1832. As the bishop in Kirtland, responsible for overseeing temporal affairs there, Whitney was in a position to “arrange the business” of the Williams farm, whatever that business may have been. (Cuyahoga Co., OH, Deeds and Mortgages, 1815–1866, vol. N-13, pp. 89–90, 17 Apr. 1832, microfilm 1,994,223, U.S. and Canada Record Collection, FHL; Palmer, Bench and Bar of Illinois, 2:896; Historical Introduction to Revelation, 15 May 1831; Dibble, Reminiscences, [4]; Geauga Co., OH, Deed Records, 1795–1921, vol. 16, pp. 22–23, 20 Apr. 1832, microfilm 20,236, U.S. and Canada Record Collection, FHL.)
U.S. and Canada Record Collection. FHL.
Palmer, John M., ed. The Bench and Bar of Illinois. 2 vols. Chicago: Lewis Publishing, 1899.
Dibble, Philo. Reminiscences, no date. Typescript. CHL. MS 15447.
Newel K. and Elizabeth Ann Smith Whitney had four or five young children, and Elizabeth’s aunt Sarah Smith was also living in their home at this time. Newel’s parents were living nearby in one of his stores. (Staker, “Thou Art the Man,” 105–106.)
Staker, Mark L. “‘Thou Art the Man’: Newel K. Whitney in Ohio.” BYU Studies 42, no. 1 (2003): 75–138.
TEXT: Signed in large script, with flourish below.