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Sidney Rigdon, Appeal to the American People, 1840

Page 73

Source Note

[], An Appeal to the American People: Being an Account of the Persecutions of the Church of Latter Day Saints; and of the Barbarities Inflicted on Them by the Inhabitants of the State of Missouri; 1–84 pp.; Cincinnati, OH: Glezen and Shepard, stereotypers and printers, 1840. The copy used herein is held at Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University.

Historical Introduction

While incarcerated at , Missouri, in March 1839, JS addressed a letter to the church “at Illinois and scattered abroad and to in particular,” instructing the Saints to gather up “a knoledge of all the facts and sufferings and abuses put upon them by the people of this .” Edward Partridge responded with an account that became the three opening installments of “A History, of the Persecution, of the Church of Jesus Christ, of Latter Day Saints in Missouri,” an eleven-part series published in the church’s newspaper, Times and Seasons, between December 1839 and October 1840. “A History, of the Persecution” receives comprehensive treatment in volume 2 of the Histories series of The Joseph Smith Papers and is available on this website.
may have intended to tell the entire story himself, but he fell ill shortly after publication of “A History, of the Persecution” began and died on 27 May 1840. Prompted by Partridge’s illness and subsequent death, the editors of the Times and Seasons, and , sought elsewhere for source materials to continue the series. It is probable that they composed the fourth installment to provide a brief transition from Partridge’s account, which ends in 1836, and the conflicts in and adjoining counties in 1838. The fifth and seventh installments reprinted passages from ’s History of the Late Persecutions Inflicted by the State of Missouri upon the Mormons (Detroit: Dawson and Bates, 1839). In May 1840, the sixth installment reprinted passages from ’s eighty-four page pamphlet, An Appeal to the American People: Being an Account of the Persecutions of the Church of Latter Day Saints; and of the Barbarities Inflicted on Them by the Inhabitants of the State of Missouri (Cincinnati: Glezan and Shepard, 1840). More of Rigdon’s work was reprinted in the eighth through tenth installments, published from July to September 1840. The series concluded with an eleventh installment in the October 1840 issue, featuring General ’s callous speech to the Saints after their surrender at , Missouri, in November 1838.
A manuscript version of ’s Appeal to the American People, referred to as the “petition draft” titled “To the Publick” and endorsed by JS, Rigdon, and , was read to a conference of Saints in , Illinois, on 1 November 1839. The conference voted to approve its publication in the name of the church. and then collaborated to arrange for publication of the text in late 1839 and early 1840. Though no author is named on the title page, Rigdon was acknowledged as author when the pamphlet was advertised in the Times and Seasons in 1840 and 1841. JS and Elias Higbee had some expectation that funds from the sale of the publication would help defray costs of their trip to in late 1839. In July 1840, a second edition was printed by Shepard & Stearns in to raise funds for Orson Hyde and ’s mission to .
Although many of the events reported in ’s pamphlet can be corroborated from other sources, his chronology is often inaccurate. (Consult the annotation in Histories, Volume 2 for correction to portions published as part of “A History, of the Persecutions.”) However, his account contains the text of several significant documents. Among these are JS’s 5 September 1838 affidavit concerning the 7 August 1838 visit to and those of and and regarding the massacre. Consequently, though in many respects Rigdon’s document is more advocacy than history, it offers access to some material not readily found elsewhere.

Footnotes

  1. [1]

    Letter to the Church and Edward Partridge, 20 March 1839 [D&C 123:1, 6].

  2. [2]

    Crawley, Descriptive Bibliography, 103–104, 124.

    Crawley, Peter. A Descriptive Bibliography of the Mormon Church. 3 vols. Provo, UT: Religious Studies Center, Brigham Young University, 1997–2012.

Asterisk (*) denotes a "featured" version, which includes an introduction and annotation. *Statement, circa 1 November 1839–B *Affidavit, 5 September 1838 [ State of Missouri v. JS et al. for Riot ]

Page 20

saints left the ground and went home: few if any of them having voted.
Having in possession several affidavits concerning the election in , we here insert them.
State of ,) ss.
County of .)
Before me, , one of the Justices of the County Court, within and for the County of aforesaid, personally appeared , who, being duly sworn, deposeth and saith: That on the 6th day of August, in the year of our Lord, one thousand eight hundred and thirty eight, in the town of , in the County of , and aforesaid, that at the election in the aforesaid, one did make a speech, at said election; in the which, he represented the heads of the Church of Latter Day Saints, as being liars, Counterfeiters, and scoundrels; and that the members of said Church, were dupes; and not too good to take a false oath, on any common occasion; that they would steal their property, and that their property he did not consider safe; and that he was opposed to their settling there, and ever would be: And sundry other things, which were calculated to inflame the minds of those present: from which time, there appeared to be much excitement against the saints, and some hard sayings. One Richard Weldon said that the saints were not allowed to vote, in , no more than the damned Negroes: and the said Weldon made an attempt to strike said deponent, who stepped out of the way: In the second attempt to strike, one , a Mormon, stept in, and prevented him, holding his arm; and immediately, about five or six of those excited against the Mormons, commenced holding and beating said , with clubs and boards, saying kill him, kill him, God damn him, kill him: immediately after which, the fight commenced on both sides, with, and without clubs. One of the Mormons, so called, by the name of [Jackson] Steward, received a cut with a knife or dirk. And further, the said deponent saith; there was, as he considered, no insult offered to said Weldon before he attempted to strike; and that the conversation immediately previous to his attempting to strike, was, that deponent said [p. 20]
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Editorial Title
Sidney Rigdon, Appeal to the American People, 1840
ID #
7830
Total Pages
84
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