[], 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, second edition; i-vi, 7–60 pp.; Cincinnati, OH: Shepard and Stearns, 1840. The copy used herein is held at CHL.
A manuscript draft of this pamphlet, simply titled “To the Publick” was presented to a conference of church members at , Illinois, on 1 November 1839. The conference voted to approve the manuscript and authorized its publication on behalf of the church. The pamphlet, when published, carried the endorsement of JS, , and as “Presidents of said Church.”
and collaborated on the publication of the text, which was available in print by May 1840. Though no author is named on the title page, was acknowledged as author in an 1840 Times and Seasons newspaper article, and when the pamphlet was advertised in that church periodical in 1841. JS and held some expectation that funds from the sale of An Appeal would eventually help defray costs of their late-1839 trip to .
By July 1840, and had been authorized to produce a second, revised edition to be published by Shepard & Stearns in . Page related some of the circumstances surrounding its publication and circulation in a letter sent to JS, “. . . at [Ohio] we parted for a few days . . . Elder Hyde went to Cincinnati where in my absince he published a second Edition of the ‘Apeal to the American people’ (2000 copies)[.] when I arrived the work was about completed[.] after disposing of as many of them as posible and suplying the market about cincinnati and the adjacient country he left me with some fourteen or fifteen hundred on hand, to dispose of” (John E. Page, Philadelphia, PA, to JS et al., Nauvoo, IL, 1 Sept. 1841, JS Collection, CHL). Funds from this printing were to be for the express purpose of subsidizing Hyde and Page’s imminent mission to in Palestine.
The second edition was essentially a lightly edited reprint of the first, with a four-page “Publisher’s Preface” added. In the preface, and noted the purpose of the publication, explained the severe hardships imposed by the persecutions upon Page’s own family, provided a detailed account of a vision experienced by Hyde, and expressed enthusiasm about the prospects of the mission. The preface also contained a copy of an official letter of appointment and commendation for Hyde and Page from an April 1840 church conference at , Illinois, signed by JS, and a letter of reference from , governor of .
Although many of the events reported in both editions of ’s pamphlet can be corroborated from other sources, his chronology of events is often inaccurate. However, Rigdon’s account does contain the texts of several significant documents. Among these are JS’s September 1838 affidavit concerning the 7 August 1838 visit to and those of and regarding the massacre. Consequently, though in many respects Rigdon’s document from a historical perspective is more advocacy than history, it offers access to some important material not readily found elsewhere.
sacred honor of these Generals. We generally expect to find men of so high office, abide by their word, even at the risk of life, confessed, that the persons thus betrayed, were to be let return, the next morning. Let so much suffice for their word and their sacred honor.
The next day after they were betrayed into the camp, ordered all the persons in the County of , to give up their arms. After the arms were given up, the men were kept under guard; and all property holders, compelled to sign a Deed of Trust, signing away all their property, to defray the expenses of the war; and they were all commanded to leave the , under pain of extermination, between that and corn-planting the next spring.
At the time of giving up the arms, there again followed another scene of brutality. The troops ran from house to house, taking all the arms they could find, from old men, that never thought of going into the field of battle; but there must not be left a single gun in the ; so the troops ran as before described, like a parcel of ravenous wolves; but their great object, in the pursuit of guns, was, to find plunder. They wanted to get into the houses, to see if there was not something they could carry off. Thus they plundered until they got satisfied. To secreet their property from their ravages, the people had to go and hide it in the bushes, or any where they could find a place of concealment. The troops found some of the property that had been hid. This, produced another savage operation. Those wild creatures, tearing like mad men under hay-stacks, tearing up floors, hunting, pretendedly after arms; but the abundance of property plundered, testifes that they had another object in view.
While the troops were thus engaged, the officers were busi[l]y employed in forming some plan to dispose of those whom they had betrayed into their camp. Seventeen preachers and nineteen commissioned officers met with Generals and and held a court martial. The prisoners were never admitted into it at all—they were not allowed to plead, introduce evidence, or any thing else. Finally, the august body came to a decision; and that was, that at eight o’clock the next morning they should be taken into the public square, in the presence of their families, and shot. Who among the military characters of the day will not say that is fit to command an army, when he was at the head of such a court-martial as this?
At these high-handed and lawless measures demurred—he told them that there was not one of them in the least degree acquainted with the military law, and understood nothing about court-martials; and, for his part, if they were going to pursue that course his hand should be clear of it—and he forthwith ordered his brigade to prepare, and he marched them off. This deterred the others, seeing was the only lawyer in their number. We presume they would have carried their design into effect had it not been for ’s leaving them. We had this account from the lips of himself.
Our families had been apprised of their intentions, and were waiting in awful suspense, the arrival of the fatal hour. How [p. 37]