John Taylor, Martyrdom Account

“Warsaw Signal” was filled with inflamatory articles & misrepresentations, in relation to us, and especially to this act of destroying the press. We were represented as a horde of lawless ruffians and brigands, Anti-American and Anti-Republican, steepeed in crime and iniquity; opposed to freedom of Speech and of <​the​> press, and all the rights and immunities of a free and enlightened people; that neither persons nor property were secure, that we had designs upon the Citizens of and of the ; and the people were called upon to rise en masse and put us down, drive us away or exterminate us, as a pest to society, and alike dangerous to our neighbors, the and commonwealth. These statements were extensively copied and circulated throughout the . A true statement of the facts in question was published by us <​both​> in the Times and Seasons and the Nauvoo Neighbor; but it was found impossible to circulate them <​repetition​> <​in the immediate Counties​> as they were destroyed at the Post Offices, or otherwise by the Agents of the Anti-Mormon<​s,​> party and, in order to get the Mail to go abroad, I had to send the papers a distance of thirty or forty miles from and sometimes to , (upwards of two hundred miles), to insure its proceeding on its route, and then and then one half or two thirds of the papers never reached their place of destination; being intercepted or destroyed by our enemies.