Footnotes

1. [1]

   At this time, Emma Smith, JS’s first wife, was absent from Nauvoo. She had traveled to Quincy, Illinois, along with Eliza R. Snow and Amanda Barnes Smith, to present Illinois governor Thomas Carlin with a petition from the Female Relief Society of Nauvoo requesting that JS not be extradited to Missouri. (See Nauvoo Female Relief Society, Petition to Thomas Carlin, ca. 22 July 1842, in Derr et al., First Fifty Years of Relief Society, 136–141. For information on JS’s practice of plural marriage, see “Joseph Smith Documents from May through August 1842”.)  

   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.

2. [2]

   Elizabeth Ann Smith Whitney, “A Leaf from an Autobiography,” Woman’s Exponent, 15 Nov. 1878, 7:91.  

   Woman’s Exponent. Salt Lake City. 1872–1914.

3. [3]

   Helen Mar Kimball Whitney, “Scenes in Nauvoo after the Martyrdom,” Woman’s Exponent, 1 Mar. 1883, 11:146.  

   Woman’s Exponent. Salt Lake City. 1872–1914.

4. [4]

   The experience of Helen Mar Kimball, who was also sealed to JS, may be instructive. She later recounted that her father, Heber C. Kimball, introduced her to the practice of plural marriage; then JS visited their home and met with Helen and her parents to explain the principle further. (See Helen Mar Kimball Whitney, “Scenes and Incidents in Nauvoo,” Woman’s Exponent, 1 Aug. 1882, 11:39.)  

   Woman’s Exponent. Salt Lake City. 1872–1914.

5. [5]

   Elizabeth Ann Smith Whitney, “A Leaf from an Autobiography,” Woman’s Exponent, 15 Dec. 1878, 7:105.  

   Woman’s Exponent. Salt Lake City. 1872–1914.

6. [6]

   Some men who solemnized early plural marriage sealings later recounted that JS had given them the words to use for the ceremony. Since no other revelations or instructions for conducting plural marriage sealings are extant for the Nauvoo period, it is impossible to know how unique or standardized these sealings were. (See Hales, Joseph Smith’s Polygamy, 1:233.)  

   Hales, Brian C. Joseph Smith’s Polygamy. 3 vols. SLC: Greg Kofford Books, 2013.

7. [7]

   For additional information on the creation of kinship ties through polygamous marriages, see Daynes, “Mormon Polygamy,” 130–146.  

   Daynes, Kathryn M. “Mormon Polygamy: Belief and Practice in Nauvoo.” In Kingdom on the Mississippi Revisited: Nauvoo in Mormon History, edited by Roger D. Launius and John E. Hallwas, 130–146. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1996.

8. [8]

   Some of the women who were sealed to JS indicated that conjugal relations were not part of their relationships with him, while the majority of JS’s plural wives never discussed this subject. A few of his plural wives stated decades later that their marriages did involve such relations with JS. Given nineteenth-century cultural mores and reticence about discussions of sexuality, these statements are often not explicit. Emily Dow Partridge, Lucy Walker, and Malissa Lott each implied in their respective statements that they had intimate relations with JS, with Lott affirming that she had been JS’s wife “in very deed.” (See Emily Dow Partridge Young, Testimony, Salt Lake City, Utah Territory, [19 Mar. 1892], pp. 371, 384, Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints v. Church of Christ of Independence, Missouri, et al. [C.C.W.D. Mo. 1894], typescript, United States Testimony, CHL; D. H. Morris, Statement, 12 June 1930, typescript, Vesta P. Crawford, Papers, J. Willard Marriott Library, University of Utah, Salt Lake City; Andrew Jenson, “Plural Marriage,” Historical Record, May 1887, 6:230; Malissa Lott Willes, Statement, Salt Lake City, Utah Territory, 4 Aug. 1893, CHL; and Hales, Joseph Smith’s Polygamy, 2:379–390.)  

   Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints v. Church of Christ of Independence, Missouri, et al. (C.C.W.D. Mo. 1894). Typescript. Testimonies and Depositions, 1892. Typescript. CHL.

   Crawford, Vesta P. Papers, 1844–1955. Special Collections, J. Willard Marriott Library, University of Utah, Salt Lake City.

   The Historical Record, a Monthly Periodical, Devoted Exclusively to Historical, Biographical, Chronological and Statistical Matters. Salt Lake City. 1882–1890.

   Willes, Malissa Lott. Affidavit, Salt Lake City, Utah Territory, 4 Aug. 1893. CHL. MS 29468.

   Hales, Brian C. Joseph Smith’s Polygamy. 3 vols. SLC: Greg Kofford Books, 2013.

9. [9]

   See Elizabeth Ann Smith Whitney, Affidavit, Salt Lake Co., Utah Territory, 30 Aug. 1869, in Joseph F. Smith, Affidavits about Celestial Marriage, 1:72.  

   Smith, Joseph F. Affidavits about Celestial Marriage, 1869–1915. CHL. MS 3423.

10. [10]

    Sarah Ann Whitney Kimball, Affidavit, Salt Lake Co., Utah Territory, 19 June 1869, in Joseph F. Smith, Affidavits about Celestial Marriage, 1:36; Elizabeth Ann Whitney and Sarah Ann Whitney Kimball, Affidavit, Salt Lake Co., Utah Territory, 13 Aug. 1869, in Joseph F. Smith, Affidavits about Celestial Marriage, 2:27–28; Letter to Newel K., Elizabeth Ann Smith, and Sarah Ann Whitney, 18 Aug. 1842.  

    Smith, Joseph F. Affidavits about Celestial Marriage, 1869–1915. CHL. MS 3423.

11. [11]

    Elizabeth Ann Smith Whitney, “A Leaf from an Autobiography,” Woman’s Exponent, 15 Dec. 1878, 7:105.  

    Woman’s Exponent. Salt Lake City. 1872–1914.

12. [12]

    Helen Mar Kimball Whitney, “Scenes in Nauvoo after the Martyrdom,” Woman’s Exponent, 1 Mar. 1883, 11:146.  

    Woman’s Exponent. Salt Lake City. 1872–1914.

13. [13]

    Orson F. Whitney, Salt Lake City, UT, to Joseph F. Smith, 1 Apr. 1912, Whitney Family Documents Collection, CHL. In addition to his letter, Whitney gave Smith a lock of hair Whitney’s parents claimed belonged to JS and a piece of wood taken from the well in Carthage where JS was killed. (See Whitney Family Documents Collection, CHL.)  

    Whitney Family Documents Collection, 1843–1912. CHL.

14. [14]

    See “Revelation to Newel K. Whitney through Joseph the Seer,” 27 July 1842, Revelations Collection, CHL.