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Letter to Edward Partridge, 5 December 1833

Source Note

JS, Letter, , Geauga Co., OH, to , , Clay Co., MO, 5 Dec. 1833. Retained copy, [ca. 5 Dec. 1833], in JS Letterbook 1, pp. 65–70; handwriting of ; JS Collection, CHL. For more complete source information, see the source note for JS Letterbook 1.

Historical Introduction

JS wrote this 5 December 1833 letter in response to the heartrending and sometimes conflicting reports he received about the violence against church members in , Missouri, that took place in early November 1833. The inconsistent reports were only the latest frustration for JS, who continued to agonize over the fate of friends and followers in , whose efforts to build a “” had stalled in the summer of 1833 because of persecution.
Following armed conflict on 4 November 1833, antagonistic residents and militia of forced members of the to vacate their properties and flee to , Missouri, and elsewhere over the next few weeks. In the midst of the violence, and left , Missouri, for , Ohio, on 6 November 1833 to report to JS on recent hostilities. While traveling from Independence to Boonville, Missouri, on the on board the steamboat Charleston, Hyde wrote at least two letters to newspaper editors in informing them of the violent events in : on 8 November he wrote to the editor of the Boonville Herald, and the following day he wrote to the editor of the Missouri Republican. Upon arriving in on 25 November, Hyde and Gould informed JS of “the melencholly intelegen [intelligence] of the riot in .”
On 6 November 1833, the same day that and left , began writing a letter to JS to inform him of the recent events in . The next day he completed his letter and reported that mobs had begun to force church members to leave their homes in Jackson County—information that Hyde and Gould may not have known. Although Phelps’s original letter no longer exists, according to the letter featured here, Phelps’s missive arrived in before 5 December 1833. The most complete known version of Phelps’s letter was published by in the December 1833 issue of The Evening and the Morning Star. The letter from JS featured here discusses information that appears to have been conveyed only through Phelps’s original letter—information that Cowdery, perhaps waiting for confirmation of the Mormon evacuation from Jackson County, did not include in the published version.
Some of the information conveyed in ’s letter apparently conflicted with the report sent to the editor of the Missouri Republican, to which JS by this time had access. Perhaps because the information he received was inconsistent, and possibly in an effort to document the violence against his followers, JS wrote this 5 December letter urging church leaders in to “collect every particular concerning the Mob from the begining and send us a correct statement of fact as they transpired.” Until then, he wrote, “it is difficult for us to advise.” Even without clarification, JS told the church leaders that if they had not yet been driven out they should fight to stay on their lands as long as they could: “You should maintain the ground as Long as there is a man Left. . . . it was right in the sight of God that you contend for it to the last.”
copied this 5 December letter into JS’s letterbook and concluded by inscribing “” on the final line, indicating that the original letter was most likely addressed to Edward Partridge. It is clear, however, that this letter was intended for church leaders in generally. Unfortunately, the original letter is no longer extant, and it is unknown if Partridge or any other church leader in Missouri ever received this correspondence.
Even though JS’s letter requested clarification and accurate information from church leaders in , , who was then in , was able to quickly respond to some of JS’s concerns. Hyde wrote another letter to , the editor of The Evening and the Morning Star, which corrected parts of his earlier missive to the editors of the Boonville Herald. Oliver Cowdery published Hyde’s second letter in the same December issue of the Star that published ’s 6–7 November letter and an extract of Hyde’s letter to the Boonville Herald. It is not known precisely when or why Hyde wrote his corrective letter, though he may have done so at the behest of JS or to alleviate JS’s concerns, expressed in the letter featured here, about the inconsistent information he had heard about events in Missouri. By 10 December 1833, JS received correspondence from Missouri that provided more information about the persecution and expulsion of church members in that place. Given that Hyde arrived in Kirtland in late November and that the first Kirtland issue of the Star was prepared for printing no sooner than 18 December, Hyde would have had sufficient time to consult these letters from Missouri that arrived in Kirtland by 10 December, consider his previous statements, and prepare an amended account for publication in the Star.

Footnotes

  1. [1]

    Letter from John Whitmer, 29 July 1833; Letter to Church Leaders in Jackson Co., MO, 10 Aug. 1833; Letter to Church Leaders in Jackson Co., MO, 18 Aug. 1833.

  2. [2]

    See Letter from William W. Phelps, 6–7 Nov. 1833.

  3. [3]

    “The Outrage in Jackson County, Missouri,” The Evening and the Morning Star, Dec. 1833, 118.

    The Evening and the Morning Star. Independence, MO, June 1832–July 1833; Kirtland, OH, Dec. 1833–Sept. 1834.

  4. [4]

    It is unknown whether a complete copy of Hyde’s published letter to the editor of the Boonville Herald still exists. However, Oliver Cowdery included at least a partial copy of the letter in The Evening and the Morning Star. (“The Outrage in Jackson County, Missouri,” The Evening and the Morning Star, Dec. 1833, 118; see also “Civil War in Jackson County!,” Missouri Republican [St. Louis], 12 Nov. 1833, [3].)

    The Evening and the Morning Star. Independence, MO, June 1832–July 1833; Kirtland, OH, Dec. 1833–Sept. 1834.

    Missouri Republican. St. Louis. 1822–1919.

  5. [5]

    JS, Journal, 25 Nov. 1833; see also “More Trouble in the Mormon Camp,” Painesville (OH) Telegraph, 29 Nov. 1833, [3].

    Painesville Telegraph. Painesville, OH. 1822–1986.

  6. [6]

    Letter from William W. Phelps, 6–7 Nov. 1833.

  7. [7]

    JS had earlier instructed church members in an 18 August 1833 letter to not sell their land in Jackson County. (Letter to Church Leaders in Jackson Co., MO, 18 Aug. 1833.)

  8. [8]

    Orson Hyde, Letter to the Editor, The Evening and the Morning Star, Dec. 1833, 120.

    The Evening and the Morning Star. Independence, MO, June 1832–July 1833; Kirtland, OH, Dec. 1833–Sept. 1834.

  9. [9]

    JS, Journal, 25 Nov. and 18 Dec. 1833.

  10. [10]

    See Letter from William W. Phelps, 6–7 Nov. 1833; Letter from William W. Phelps, 14 Nov. 1833; Letter from Edward Partridge, between 14 and 19 Nov. 1833; Letter from John Corrill, 17 Nov. 1833; and Letter to Edward Partridge et al., 10 Dec. 1833.

Asterisk (*) denotes a "featured" version, which includes an introduction and annotation. *Letter to Edward Partridge, 5 December 1833 Letterbook 1 History, 1838–1856, volume A-1 [23 December 1805–30 August 1834] “History of Joseph Smith”

Page 66

and being prepared <​they​> poured a dreadful deadly fire upon them, two of their number fell dead on the ground and a number mortally wounded among the former was [illegible] Tuesday morning there were a number of the Mob missing and could not be accounted for and while we was at on wensday a messenger rode up saying that he had Just came from the seat of war, and that the night before another battle was fought in which fell having three balls and some buck shot through his body and about twenty more shared a similar fate and also that one or two of our men were killed and as many wounded and he () heard the cannonading distinctly and also stated that the man who broke open the took , and one more for fals imprisonment and put them in prison and as near as he could Learn never to let them escape alive This statement of is some what different from that of who states that on friday night the brethren had mustered about 40 or 50 men armed and marched into the village took one prisoner and fired one gun and satturday fell upon our brethren above Blue, and one of [George] Manship sons mortally wounded. On monday about sun set a regular action was fought near s under the command of bro D we had four wounded, they had five killed wounded and two killed viz Linvil [Thomas Linville] and . From friday till tuesday our brethren were under arms 150 of our brethren came forth Like Moroni to battle, on tuesday morning the mob had 300 and before any [blood] [p. 66]
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Source Note

Document Transcript

Page 66

Document Information

Related Case Documents
Editorial Title
Letter to Edward Partridge, 5 December 1833
ID #
191
Total Pages
6
Print Volume Location
JSP, D3:366–374
Handwriting on This Page
  • Frederick G. Williams

Footnotes

  1. [4]

    Hyde’s account focused entirely on the battle that ensued around the Big Blue settlement during the late evening of 4 November 1833. Other accounts also depict these events. (See [Edward Partridge], “A History, of the Persecution,” Times and Seasons, Jan. 1840, 1:33–35; see also Pratt, History of the Late Persecution, 17–19; and Corrill, Brief History, 20.)

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

  2. [5]

    5 November 1833.

  3. [6]

    In 1833, Liberty landing was located on the north side of the Missouri River, approximately five miles south of Liberty in Clay County and due north of Independence. It was also known for a time as the Upper Liberty landing. (Parkin, “History of the Latter-day Saints in Clay County,” 39.)

    Parkin, Max H. “A History of the Latter-day Saints in Clay County, Missouri, from 1833 to 1837.” PhD diss., Brigham Young University, 1976.

  4. [7]

    6 November 1833.

  5. [8]

    No armed engagement took place in Jackson County on Tuesday, 5 November 1833. Church leaders decided to leave the county during the early morning hours of that day and surrendered their arms later in the afternoon. “I am happy to state,” Hyde later wrote, by way of correcting his earlier letter, “that I now believe that the report concerning the last engagement was without foundation.” Moreover, the cannonading he heard while on board the steamboat “was only an expression of the triumph and joy of the mob.” (“From Missouri,” The Evening and the Morning Star, Jan. 1834, 124–126; [Edward Partridge], “A History, of the Persecution,” Times and Seasons, Jan. 1840, 1:34–35; Orson Hyde, Letter to the Editor, The Evening and the Morning Star, Dec. 1833, 120, italics in original.)

    The Evening and the Morning Star. Independence, MO, June 1832–July 1833; Kirtland, OH, Dec. 1833–Sept. 1834.

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

  6. [9]

    Orson Hyde, Letter to the Editor, The Evening and the Morning Star, Dec. 1833, 120; see also Letter from William W. Phelps, 6–7 Nov. 1833; Letter from John Corrill, 17 Nov. 1833; and “From Missouri,” The Evening and the Morning Star, Jan. 1834, 124–126.

    The Evening and the Morning Star. Independence, MO, June 1832–July 1833; Kirtland, OH, Dec. 1833–Sept. 1834.

  7. [10]

    1 November 1833.

  8. [11]

    The details that JS summarized here were omitted from the published, and only extant, version of Phelps’s 6–7 November 1833 letter. (See Letter from William W. Phelps, 6–7 Nov. 1833.)

  9. [12]

    2 November 1833.

  10. [13]

    A mob attacked a settlement of church members near the Blue River, located approximately eight miles southwest of Independence, on Saturday, 2 November. One of the attackers of the settlement, a young man named Manship, was shot during the skirmish and may have died as a result of the attack.

  11. [14]

    4 November 1833.

  12. [15]

    See Letter from William W. Phelps, 6–7 Nov. 1833.

  13. [16]

    1–5 November 1833.

  14. [17]

    See Book of Mormon, 1830 ed., 340–407 [Alma chaps. 43–63].

  15. [18]

    5 November 1833.

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