Documents, Volume 13, Part 5 Introduction: December 1843
Part 5: December 1843
In December 1843, tensions between the
and their neighbors
in , Illinois,
came to a head, resulting in a period of significant anxiety for
JS and other church members. In November and early
December, threats of violence and vigilantism
materialized in the form of the kidnapping of a church member and
his son by opponents in and . JS was involved in the creation of dozens of
letters, legal documents, city ordinances, and military orders that
responded to the kidnappings and the threat they presented to the
Latter-day Saints.
In November 1843, Mark
Childs, the son of a church member living in ,
Iowa Territory, was accused of stealing a mare and a colt from in Clark County, Missouri. Childs
was subsequently arrested. In an effort to deflect blame from
himself, Childs accused Latter-day Saint and his son of stealing the
horses.
For several months, the Anti-Mormon Party in and surrounding
counties had claimed that it was willing to assist in any attempt to
extradite JS to or otherwise put a halt to supposed criminal
deeds by church members and that it would do so “at all hazards, and
under all circumstances.” After accusations were leveled
at Daniel
and Philander Avery, members of the Anti-Mormon Party apparently
decided to act on these earlier threats and take the men illegally
to Missouri.
Shortly after Childs gave his
testimony, , one of his
associates, went to to work with
Anti-Mormon Party members to orchestrate the kidnappings. On 12 November, Richardson persuaded
to accompany him to
the . When they arrived at
, Illinois, a
group of Missourians, including , seized
Avery and carried him across the river to Clark County, where Richardson
took out a Bowie knife and threatened him “with death or seven years
imprisonment” unless he confessed both his and his father’s
involvement in the theft. Although Avery was apparently not
a member of the church, his coerced affidavit, sworn before Clark
County justice of the peace John Dedman, stated
that church members , , and Jedediah Owens
had convinced him that it was not a crime to steal from Missourians
because of their earlier mistreatment of the Latter-day Saints.
Philander Avery’s affidavit also claimed that in July 1840, he and Turner each stole a
horse—as well as one of the horse’s colts—from McCoy and that he
later delivered the horse and colt that he stole to his father,
Daniel Avery, who sold them upriver at ,
Illinois. After certifying
Philander Avery’s confession, Justice Dedman sent him to prison to
await the next circuit court session, which was scheduled for late
December.
On 2 December, nearly three weeks
after ’s kidnapping, militia
colonel led an armed mob composed
of people from and to Vernon Doty’s mill in
southern Hancock County. There the men seized and forced him to cross the into Clark County, despite his
demands for a hearing or trial. Daniel Avery, like his son, was
subjected to a hearing before Dedman and
remanded to jail to await the next circuit court session.
, the wife
of and mother of , brought news of the
kidnappings to on 5 December. Over the next several
days, JS and others gained further
intelligence regarding how the Averys were taken and the potential
threat to other Latter-day Saints, including JS. A messenger from
reported that ’s governor was issuing a new
requisition for JS’s extradition. Although the rumor proved incorrect, JS
wrote to governor to inform him of these developments and
request instructions for how to respond. In the
meantime, JS and other civic leaders began preparing to protect and
defend JS and other Nauvoo residents. On 8 December, the Nauvoo City Council
passed an ordinance explicitly designed to protect JS from both
extralegal kidnapping and legal arrest. JS
also issued orders to mobilize a portion of the to defend the city’s residents. In the weeks that
followed, JS collected affidavits about the kidnappings and explored
additional means to defend the city and its residents. These
included the creation of a full-time municipal police force on 12 December and the passage of an
ordinance on 21 December that required all law
officers seeking to arrest or subpoena individuals in Nauvoo to
submit their legal process to JS as mayor for approval. JS’s actions during
these weeks
further enraged the Anti-Mormon Party in and increased
the tension in the region.
On 18 December, law officers from arrested , a participant in ’s kidnapping, and brought him to Nauvoo for
a hearing. JS also charged Elliott with
threatening JS’s life, but he ultimately forgave the offense during
the subsequent hearing. Elliott was bound over to answer the
kidnapping accusation at the next circuit court session. During the
hearings, additional evidence implicated in the kidnappings. A group of Nauvoo Legion
troops traveled south to arrest Williams that night. However, after
Elliott’s arrest, Williams had gathered a large mob to resist
arrest, and the Nauvoo posse abandoned its attempt rather than risk
bloodshed. JS again
mobilized a portion of the legion to defend the city from the mob
threat, counseling the Saints to “hold themselves in readiness at a
moments warning.” He also attempted to decrease tensions by noting
that “it was best not to [go] down again at present” to attempt to
arrest Williams or others. Instead, he advised the Saints to “let
the mob abide there for a public disgrace, and when the mob had
dispersed then our men could go down & bring Colonel Williams
without trouble.”
Meanwhile in , the legal case
against the Averys began to fall apart. When the circuit court met
in Clark County in late December,
a grand jury indicted for grand
larceny but did not pursue charges against , who had already
either escaped or been released. After the indictment, Daniel
Avery’s case was continued to the June 1844 circuit court session.
However, after the court’s term ended, Avery obtained a writ of from the Clark County court and was
discharged on 25 December 1843 after a hearing.
He arrived in the next day
at sundown. Avery’s return to
marked the end of the immediate threat of
kidnappings or extraditions to Missouri, but tensions in remained. As
the month closed, JS received reports that Williams
threatened to force the Latter-day Saints to leave their settlements
in southern Hancock County.
Beyond the fallout from the Avery kidnappings, JS and the Saints expanded their
efforts to appeal to the federal government for redress of their
losses and for additional protections throughout
the month. The Saints continued to gather signatures for the
memorial drafted by and
supported publicly by JS. In early December,
JS published his appeal addressed to the citizens of , in which he sought support for the Latter-day
Saints’ redress campaign, as a pamphlet. The City Council
also drafted a second memorial to Congress, requesting that be granted the
powers and rights of a federal territory to ensure the protection of
its citizens. In addition, JS
received two letters from potential presidential candidates and responding to his earlier request for information regarding their position on
redress for the Latter-day Saints.
JS also attended to church
business. A few believers and skeptics wrote to him requesting
favors or additional information about the church, including , who employed JS in 1825 in upstate and who participated
in some of the events connected to the translation of the Book of
Mormon. JS also granted a
request by church members in , Illinois, to make his uncle a . During the month, JS
attended seven prayer meetings in which he administered or
participated in religious planned for the
that
was still under construction.
On 29 December 1843, JS attended a swearing-in ceremony
for the newly created
police force and declared victory over his opponents. After claiming
that the “mob has been so repulsed they stand in fear,” JS stated
that he feared “pretended friends” or “a Brutus” living in Nauvoo
more than he feared his enemies abroad—remarks that set the stage
for renewed opposition to JS, this time from within the church and
the city, which erupted days later in January 1844.
Part five comprises thirty-three documents, including
correspondence, minutes, military orders, city ordinances, legal
documents, discourses, a pamphlet, and a memorial to Congress.