# Wife No. 19/Chapter 1
### CHAPTER I.
#### THE DAYS OF MY CHILDHOOD. — WHY I EVER WAS A MORMON.

* An Important Question.
* Born in Mormonism.
* Telling my own Story.
* Joseph Smith's Mission.
* He Preaches a New Dispensation.
* My Parents Introduced to the Reader.
* The Days before Polygamy.
* My Mother's Childhood.
* Learning under Difficulties.
* First Thoughts of Mormonism.
* Received into the Church.
* Persecution for the Faith.
* Forsaking All for the New Religion.
* First Acquaintance with the Apostle Brigham.
* His Ambitious Intrigues.
* His Poverty.
* His Mission-work.
* Deceptive Appearances.
* My Mother's Marriage.
* A Brief Dream of Happiness.
* That sweet word "Home."
* The Prophet Smith turns Banker.
* The "Kirtland Safety Society Bank."
* The Prophet and Sidney Rigdon Flee.
* A Moment of Hesitation.
* Another "Zion" Appointed.
* Losing All for the Church.
* Privation and Distress.
* Sidney Rigdon and his "Declaration of Independence."
* He Excites an Immense Sensation.
* Mobs Assemble, and Fights Ensue.
* Lively Times among the Saints.
* The Outrages of the Danites.
URING the somewhat public career which I have led since my apostasy from the Mormon Church, I have often been asked why I ever became a Mormon. Indeed, I have scarcely entered a town where this question has not been put by some one, almost on the instant of my arrival. It is the first query of the newspaper reporter, and the anxious inquiry of the clergymen, who with one accord, without regard to creed or sect, have bid​Page:Wife No 19.djvu/36 ​Page:Wife No 19.djvu/37 ​Page:Wife No 19.djvu/38 ​Page:Wife No 19.djvu/39 ​Page:Wife No 19.djvu/40 ​flush of her religious experience that the Mormon missionaries came to Avon, the town in which she lived, preaching their new doctrines. My mother had very naturally a great deal of curiosity concerning this new religion, which was railed at as a delusion, and its prophet and founder, Joseph Smith, who was called a hypocrite, a false teacher, a blasphemer, and every other opprobrious name that could be heaped upon him, in the bitterness of religious persecution. But she was forbidden to attend their meetings, and it was many months before she was able to listen to one of the sermons. During this time she had grown somewhat into sympathy with these people, and had come to feel an interest in them greater than she would have felt had she not met with such persistent, and, what seemed to her, unreasonable opposition to her often expressed wish to hear them and judge of their sincerity and truth for herself.
After a time, however, she found an opportunity of attending a two days' meeting, without the knowledge of her friends; and she listened eagerly to Joseph Young as he expounded the new doctrine and dwelt upon the glories of the "kingdom" which was to be speedily set up upon. the earth. Predisposed as she already was in its favor, it ​Page:Wife No 19.djvu/42 ​Page:Wife No 19.djvu/43 ​started in business for himself. He was eminently successful in his undertaking, and made money sufficiently fast to suit his own ideas and ambitions. He built a cosy little house, and carried my mother to it; and there, for the first time since she was a little child, she knew what it was to have a home — a genuine home! not a mere resting-place, where she felt herself an intruder, but a place in which she was mistress, over which love and she held absolute and undisputed sway.
It was during that happy period, the only happy time in her whole life, that she fitted herself to teach. She was an indefatigable student, and she made the most and the best of her time. At that time she studied to satisfy her intense craving for knowledge, and as a pleasant recreation, with no thought that she might some day have to turn her studies to practical account. She had not then been introduced to the doctrine of "plural wives," and its attendant "glories," which, being defined, meant miseries and torture. And the definition has never been altered, and never will be, until women's natures are most radically changed.
As I said before, my father was prospering in worldly affairs, and when it was "revealed" to Joseph Smith that in addition to the profession of "Prophet," he should add that of banker, he assisted Smith in founding the "Kirtland Safety Society Bank," by promising to deposit all his money therein; in short, giving Smith all that he possessed outside of his house and shop towards completing the amount necessary for a capital on which to start the new enterprise. When the ​bank failed, which it did very shortly after its establishment, my father, of course, lost every cent which he had invested. He was intensely disgusted with the whole proceeding, which, if it had happened in the Gentile world, would have been termed swindling, and Smith would not have been easily let off by the mere calling of names. Many Gentiles, who had suffered by the failure, were not so lenient as Smith's followers, and demanded that the Prophet should answer to the complaint of swindling before the United States court. But, as usual, he eluded the officers of justice, and all attempts to arrest him were unavailing.
The poor Saints, although losing, many of them, all their hard-earned savings, were still loyal to their leader, and excused him on the ground that "he had lost the Spirit" for the time, and the revelation was not of divine origin; although he was unconscious of that fact, and received it in good faith. My father, however, not so ready to excuse what seemed to him an act of premeditated dishonesty, and having very little faith in "revelation" at any time, was very bitter in his denunciations; and it was only by my mother's influence, who still clung fondly to her faith, that he did not then renounce Mormonism. Although she has never openly acknowledged it, I think that my mother has since often regretted her steadfast adherence to the church at that time. Her loyalty and persistence brought upon her the unhappiness of her life, and finally plunged her into such utter misery as only polygamous wives can experience. Her religion, that was to be so much to her, brought her not one ray of comfort, but in after years blighted her domestic life, and laid upon her a cross almost too heavy to be borne. But I must do her the justice to say, that through it all she has never complained, but has endured her sufferings in silence, and met her woes with patience.
This unfortunate revelation of the Prophet's, together with other somewhat questionable business transactions, and the ​consequent growing prejudice of the people of Ohio against him and his followers, made it necessary for the Saints to seek some other place, where they might build their "Zion." It was certain that the Lord did not favor Ohio; and about that time he "revealed" to Joseph that the place he had selected in which to establish His temporal kingdom was Missouri. This was to be the Mormon Canaan, the land which they — the chosen people of the Lord — should enter and possess. To be sure, He had revealed the very same thing concerning Kirtland; it was there that he declared "He had established His name for the salvation of the nations." But according to the Prophet's later explanation, Satan was striving to break up the kingdom, and the spirit of "apostate mobocracy" raged and grew hotter, until Smith and his confederate, Sidney Rigdon, were obliged "to flee from its deadly influence, as did the apostles and prophets of old;" and "as Jesus had commanded his followers, when persecuted in one city, to flee to another," so these two worthies left the "chosen city of the Lord" most unceremoniously, under cover of darkness, pursued by officers of the law, and never returned to it again. But from Missouri Smith sent messages and exhortations to those of the Saints who still remained faithful, "to gather quickly to Zion."
Very many members of the church apostatized at that time, and the numbers of the faithful "chosen" were decidedly lessened. Among those who remained unshaken was my mother, who in her almost fanatical blindness, accepted the Prophet's explanations, and was still willing to be led by his revelations. My father was held by his affection for her rather than by any conviction of the "divine leading" of Smith, whom, indeed, he distrusted almost entirely; and it was in compliance with my mother's ardent wish to follow. her prophet, and to establish herself and family in Zion. amidst the Saints, that my father finally decided to emigrate with the remnant of the church to Missouri.
​He settled in Daviess County, about thirty miles from Far-West, where the body of the Saints were located, and was again tasting the sweets of prosperity and domestic comfort, when the Missouri war broke out, and he was obliged to remove his family, in the greatest haste, to Far-West for their safety, leaving house and property to be confiscated by an angry mob.
This was the second time, since casting his lot with the Saints, that all my father's possessions had been suddenly swept away, and this last would have discourged him sadly had it not made him so indignant to see the injustice which was shown by Gentiles to the Mormons; and he assisted in guarding the lives of the Mormon people, and the remant of property which was left to them, until such time as they could find another home.
During this time my mother's sufferings were intense. Many of the houses had been burned by mobs, and she, and many other women in as severe straits as herself, were compelled to live as best they could, exposed to the wind and rain, and without any proper shelter, during almost the entire winter, with two little children, one a baby only a few months old, the other about two years old. In addition to all the discomforts of the situation, she was always in constant terror of an attack by the infuriated mobs, who were waging a genuine war of extermination with the suffering Saints. As is always the case with a religious war, the feeling was intensely bitter. The Gentiles had no charity for the Mormons, and would neither tolerate their faith nor them. The Mormons returned the hatred of the Gentiles with interest, and considering themselves the chosen of the Lord, selected by Him to the exclusion of all the rest of the world, of course argued that whatever they did could by no possibility be wrong, and they returned their ill-treatment with interest.
Although there had been, always, a strong prejudice against the Mormons in Missouri, as in other states where ​they had lived, it was not until after Sidney Rigdon made his famous incendiary speech, at the commencement of the foundation of the new Temple at Far-West, on the 4th of July, 1838, that the feeling broke into anything like aggressive hostilities.
Rigdon had embraced Mormonism in 1830, and had been ever since that time an ardent Saint. He was a Campbellite preacher in Ohio at the time of his conversion, which was accomplished under the teachings of Parley P. Pratt, a man who played quite an important part in the early Mormon history. Rigdon was a very fluent speaker, much revered by the Saints on account of his eloquence, which, it must be confessed, was decidedly of the "buncombe" order. For a long time he was the intimate friend and chief counsellor of Joseph Smith, was connected with him in the Kirtland Bank swindle, and escaped with him to Missouri.
It had been revealed to the Prophet Smith that another temple must be built to the Lord in the new Zion, since the one at Kirtland had been desecrated by falling into Gentile hands, and Rigdon was chosen to make the speech on the occasion of laying the first foundation-stone of this sacred edifice.
The "Champion of Liberty," as Rigdon was called by his admirers, was more bombastic and more denunciatory than usual. He surpassed himself in invective, and maddened the already prejudiced Missourians, who were only waiting for some excuse to quarrel with their unwelcome neighbors. Among other absurd things, he said:
"We take God and all the holy angels to witness, that we warn all men to come on us no more for ever. The man or set of men that attempts it, does so at the expense of their lives. The mob that comes to disturb us we will follow until the last drop of their blood is spilled, or else they will have to exterminate us. We will carry the war into their own homes and families. No man shall come into ​our streets to threaten us with mobs; if he does, he shall atone for it before he leaves the place. We this day proclaim ourselves free, with a purpose and determination that can never be broken. No, never! No, never!! No, never!!!"
This speech fired the excitable nature of the Saints, and they were aroused to a high pitch of warlike enthusiasm. Already, in imagination, they saw Missouri conquered, and the church in possession of the entire state. There could be no doubt of the final result, for this was the Promised. Land into which they had been led by the hand of the Lord.
With the superstition which characterizes this people, they turned every accident or occurrence into some sign from Heaven, and it was always interpreted to promise success to them and confusion to their enemies. On this day of celebration the Mormons had erected a liberty-pole in honor of the occasion; in the afternoon it was struck by lightning, shivered to atoms, and fell, its flag trailing in the dust. There was rejoicing among the Mormons; that was certainly an omen of the speedy downfall of their enemies. It seems now as though — if it must be considered an omen of anything — that it was prophetic of the uprooting and scattering of this people, so soon was it followed by their expulsion from the state.
The feeling of bitterness between the two contending factions grew more intense daily, and each party was eagerly watching for some acts of violence from the other. The next month, at the election, the war commenced in earnest. A man named William Peniston was candidate for the legislature. The Mormons objected to him on the ground that he had headed a mob against them in Clay County. The Missourians, aware of this objection, endeavored to prevent the Mormons from voting, and a fight ensued, in which the latter proclaimed themselves victorious. Gallatin, the court town of Daviess County, was soon ​after burned by the Mormons. Then commenced robbing, plundering, and outrages of every kind by both parties. It was a season of the wildest confusion, and both sides were blinded with passion, and lost sight of reason, toleration, and, above all, Christian forbearance. It was a positive reign of terror. Houses, barns, and haystacks were burned, men shot, and all manner of depredations committed.
It is impossible for me to say which party was the principal aggressor; probably there was equal blame on both sides; but I have been informed that Joseph taught his followers that it was right, and "commanded of the Lord," for them to take anything they could find which belonged to their enemies, in retaliation for the wrongs which they had suffered at their hands. I can the more easily believe this to be true, because the spirit of the Mormon Church has always been that of retaliation. The stern old Mosaic law, "An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth," is in full force among them, and is not only advised by the leaders, but insisted upon by them. Indeed, they have added to its severity, until now it stands, "A life for an offence, real or ​suspected, of any kind." In support of this they refer to the Israelites "borrowing" jewelry from the Egyptians before they took their flight from Egypt; and they quote, "The earth is the Lord's, and the fulness thereof;" and as they claim to be the Lord's particularly favored children, — in fact, his only acknowledged ones, — they seem to consider this text peculiarly applicable to the situation, and all the excuse they need to give for any irregularities in the way of appropriating other people's property. They are merely coming into their inheritance.
At all events, the people were not slow to obey the command of the Lord and the counsel of Joseph, and they displayed their spirit of obedience by laying hold of every kind of property which came within their reach. In the midst of these troubles, Joseph came out to Daviess County to a town called "Adam-ondi-Ahman," named, of course, by revelation, and meaning, when translated, "The valley of God in which Adam blessed his children;" said to be the identical spot where Adam and Eve first sought refuge after their expulsion from Eden. Upon his arrival, he called the people together, and harangued them after this mild and conciliatory fashion: "Go ahead! Do all you can to harass the enemy. I never felt more of the spirit of God at any time than since we commenced this stealing and houseburning." My parents were living at Adam-ondi-Ahman at that time, and were present when Joseph delivered this peculiarly saint-like address.
About this time the Danite bands were first organized, for the purpose of plundering and harassing the people of the surrounding country. I have been told this by a person who heard the oaths administered at a meeting of the band in Daviess County. They were instructed to go out on the borders of the Settlements, and take the spoils from the "ungodly Gentiles;" for was it not written, "The riches of the Gentiles shall be consecrated to the people of the house of Israel?"
​Joseph Smith always denied that he had in any way authorized the formation of the Danite bands; and, in fact, in public he repeatedly repudiated both them and their deeds of violence. At the time of which I speak, however, Thomas B. Marsh, who was then the president of the "twelve apostles," together with Orson Hyde, who now occupies that post, apostatized. Both subsequently returned to the bosom of the church, making the most abject submission. Poor Marsh died, crushed and broken-hearted. Hyde's heart was of tougher composition, and he still lives; but Brigham will never forget or forgive his apostasy.
While both Marsh and Hyde were separated from the church, they made solemn affidavits against Joseph and the Mormons in general, accusing them of the grossest crimes and outrages, as well as of abetting the Danites and their deeds. The cowardly Apostles afterwards declared that these affidavits were made under the influence of fear. That is very probable, but at the same time there can be no real doubt that there was a larger amount of truth in what they affirmed than jealous Mormons would be disposed to admit.
The outrages committed by these Danites, and others like them, caused the expulsion of the Saints from Missouri. Joseph and about fifty of his followers were taken prisoners, and between his arrest and imprisonment, and the final exodus from the state, there was great suffering among the Mormon people.