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Letter from Lester Brooks, 7 November 1842

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Letter from Lester Brooks, 7 November 1842

Source Note

, Letter, , Lake Co., OH, to JS, [, Hancock Co., IL], 7 Nov. 1842. Featured version published in Times and Seasons, 2 Jan. 1843, vol. 4, no. 64, 62–63. For more complete source information, see the source note for Letter to Isaac Galland, 22 Mar. 1839.

Historical Introduction

On 7 November 1842, leader wrote a letter to JS reporting on the outcome of a recent held in , Ohio. The conference was called by and his missionary companions and . Wight had left , Illinois, with his wife and children on 3 September 1842 on a mission to proselytize to some of his family and friends in , New York. Along the way, he held conferences and meetings to encourage Latter-day Saints to gather to Nauvoo and to publicly deny ’s published allegations against JS and the church. Badlam joined Wight on his mission near by early October, and Greene united with the two missionaries about a week later near Olive Green, Ohio. Together the three men held a series of conferences with church members and other interested parties on their way to Kirtland, the former headquarters of the church.
The three missionaries arrived in by 26 October and began holding daily meetings in the . Between 28 October and 1 November, Wight presided over another conference that lasted several days. His preaching appears to have ignited significant interest among church members in Kirtland. According to the minutes of the conference, attendance swelled from seventy-five members present in the morning of the first day to one hundred fifty by that afternoon. When the conference assembled for its second day, between five and seven hundred Saints were in attendance. A major objective of the conference was to persuade the remaining Saints in Kirtland, especially those who were disaffected, to recommit to the church. At least two mass baptismal services, in which more than two hundred individuals were or rebaptized, were held in connection with the conference. When the conference ended, the three missionaries remained in the area for about a week and continued their ministrations among church members living there.
Nearly a week after the close of the conference, wrote to JS to describe the ongoing effects of the conference in . He included information about prominent individuals who had been baptized and expressed his hope for continued success in the region. Brooks’s original letter is not extant. The Times and Seasons published a copy of his letter nearly two months after it was written. When printing the letter, the Times and Seasons attributed it to “Justin Brooks,” but there is no record of a Justin Brooks living in Kirtland nor does that name appear in church records. Lester Brooks, however, appears to have been serving as the president of the Kirtland at the time of the conference. Since the letter seems to be reporting on the affairs in Kirtland in some official capacity, it appears that the letter was written by Lester Brooks and that the Times and Seasons office misread the first name in his signature.

Footnotes

  1. [1]

    Lyman Wight, Mountain Valley, TX, to Wilford Woodruff, [Salt Lake City, Utah Territory], 24 Aug. 1857, pp. 11–12, Historian’s Office, Histories of the Twelve, 1856–1858, 1861, CHL; “Conference Minutes,” Times and Seasons, 15 Nov. 1842, 4:15.

    Historian’s Office. Histories of the Twelve, 1856–1858, 1861. CHL. CR 100 93.

    Times and Seasons. Commerce/Nauvoo, IL. Nov. 1839–Feb. 1846.

  2. [2]

    “Conference Minutes,” Times and Seasons, 15 Nov. 1842, 4:13–15; “Conference Minutes,” Times and Seasons, 15 Dec. 1842, 4:36–38.

    Times and Seasons. Commerce/Nauvoo, IL. Nov. 1839–Feb. 1846.

  3. [3]

    “Conference Minutes,” Times and Seasons, 15 Dec. 1842, 4:36–38. The exact dating of this conference is unclear. The missionaries’ report states that the conference met daily beginning 28 October and ending on 1 November, but the minutes account for only four of these five days.

    Times and Seasons. Commerce/Nauvoo, IL. Nov. 1839–Feb. 1846.

  4. [4]

    “Conference Minutes,” Times and Seasons, 15 Dec. 1842, 4:38–39. In his report, Wight said 203 people had been baptized, while a Cleveland newspaper said 206. (“Mormanism Revived,” Plain Dealer [Cleveland], 9 Nov. 1842, [2].)

    Times and Seasons. Commerce/Nauvoo, IL. Nov. 1839–Feb. 1846.

    Plain Dealer. Cleveland. Jan.–Dec. 1842.

  5. [5]

    “Conference Minutes,” Times and Seasons, 15 Dec. 1842, 4:39.

    Times and Seasons. Commerce/Nauvoo, IL. Nov. 1839–Feb. 1846.

  6. [6]

    Brooks became Almon Babbitt’s counselor at the reorganization of the Kirtland stake in 1841. After Babbitt was disfellowshipped later that year, Brooks assumed the role of acting president of the Saints in Kirtland. Sometime thereafter Brooks became the presiding elder of the Kirtland branch. The fall 1842 conference reiterated Brooks’s position as president of the branch, with John Youngs and Hiram Kellogg serving as his counselors. (“Minutes of a Conference,” Times and Seasons, 1 July 1841, 2:458; Letter from Lester Brooks and Others, 16 Nov. 1841; Phineas Young, Tiffin, OH, to Willard Richards and Brigham Young, Nauvoo, IL, 14 Dec. 1842, Brigham Young Office Files, CHL; “Conference Minutes,” Times and Seasons, 15 Dec. 1842, 4:39.)

    Times and Seasons. Commerce/Nauvoo, IL. Nov. 1839–Feb. 1846.

    Brigham Young Office Files, 1832–1878. CHL. CR 1234 1.

  7. [7]

    In extant records, elements of the “Lester” in Brooks’s signature bear some resemblance to “Justin.” Both are six-letter words with “st” as the middle characters of the word. Moreover, the slant of the L could easily be misread as a J and the terminal “er” could be misread as “in.” (See Letter from Lester Brooks and Others, 16 Nov. 1841.)

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Page 63

been manifest since the commencement of the .
The are going to leave us this morning with the prayers and fellowship of the brethren in this region of country. Those which have been the most hostile in their feelings are perfectly friendly with , and have all invited him to call upon them.
The labors of the elders seem to have effected a union of all parties; and if I must give my opinion I think upon the right principle.
Twelve persons were yesterday and information has just reached me that Brother has been baptized, and is now on his way home from the water I would further state that expects to administer baptism to several persons in , on his way east. He further wishes me to state that he will write in a short time. Give my respects to sister and to all enquiring friends.
Yours in the bonds of the gospel, and fellow laborer in the ,
[p. 63]
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Document Information

Related Case Documents
Editorial Title
Letter from Lester Brooks, 7 November 1842
ID #
945
Total Pages
2
Print Volume Location
JSP, D11:202–206
Handwriting on This Page
  • Printed text

Footnotes

  1. [10]

    According to the summaries of Wight’s remarks in Ohio, much of his preaching was directed toward bridging divides with potentially disaffected Latter-day Saints who had remained in the region. At Olive Green, Ohio, for example, Wight taught that “brotherly love and kindness should exist among” the Saints and that when one Saint suffered, others should be willing to put “forth the helping hand” and share in sufferings and prosperity alike. At Kirtland, Wight preached that the Saints should not “set in judgment upon each other; but rather cast the mantle of charity over, and extend the hand of friendship to all.” (“Conference Minutes,” Times and Seasons, 15 Dec. 1842, 4:36–39.)

    Times and Seasons. Commerce/Nauvoo, IL. Nov. 1839–Feb. 1846.

  2. [11]

    Harris was one of JS’s earliest supporters and one of the Three Witnesses of the gold plates of the Book of Mormon. During the widespread disaffection of church members at Kirtland in 1837, Harris was excommunicated. He had since had a mercurial relationship with the church. He was rebaptized by 1840, but the next year, though still active in the church in Kirtland, he reportedly claimed that JS had been “forsaken of the Lord.” Through his preaching in Ohio, Wight sought to convince men such as Harris to reaffirm JS’s leadership, and Wight solicited votes of confidence for JS among church members in Dayton, Olive Green, and Kirtland. (Marquardt, “Martin Harris,” 10–17; “Conference Minutes,” Times and Seasons, 15 Nov. 1842, 4:14; “Conference Minutes,” Times and Seasons, 15 Dec. 1842, 4:36–39.)

    Marquardt, H. Michael. “Martin Harris: The Kirtland Years, 1831–1870.” Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought 35, no. 3 (Fall 2002): 1–41.

    Times and Seasons. Commerce/Nauvoo, IL. Nov. 1839–Feb. 1846.

  3. [12]

    Following the conference in Kirtland, the missionaries reported that “people are preparing to come from Painesville, Cleveland, Chardon, and all the regions of country round about” to participate in their nightly meetings. Wight presumably had arranged to baptize some of the visitors from Painesville during some of these meetings. (“Conference Minutes,” Times and Seasons, 15 Dec. 1842, 4:39.)

    Times and Seasons. Commerce/Nauvoo, IL. Nov. 1839–Feb. 1846.

  4. [13]

    Cowles, the treasurer of the Female Relief Society of Nauvoo, was a member of JS’s household in Nauvoo, probably as a hired servant. (Platt, Nauvoo, 86; “Died,” Deseret News [Salt Lake City], 5 Apr. 1871, 98; Relief Society Minute Book, 17 Mar. 1842, 13, in Derr et al., First Fifty Years of Relief Society, 36.)

    Platt, Lyman De. Nauvoo: Early Mormon Records Series, 1839–1846. Vol. 1. Highland, UT, 1980.

    Deseret News. Salt Lake City. 1850–.

    Derr, Jill Mulvay, Carol Cornwall Madsen, Kate Holbrook, and Matthew J. Grow, eds. The First Fifty Years of Relief Society: Key Documents in Latter-day Saint Women’s History. Salt Lake City: Church Historian’s Press, 2016.

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