Iron County register. [volume] (Ironton, Iron County, Mo.) 1867-1965, 1891-09-17
MORMON PROSECUTING.


Renewed Activity of Mormon Mission.
aries in England and Scandinavia At.
tracing Attention-Women SeeminpI,
the Principal Object of the PROSECUTING
Observation-Disclosures Interviews, Rather
than Public Meetings, Now Resorted To-
LONDON, Sept. 1.-The renewed ac.
tivity of Mormon missionaries in En-.
gland and Scandinavia is attracting
marked attention. As previously
stated, fully 200 elders from Utah are
now engaged in the work of prosely-
ting In the countries mentioned They
are sent from Salt Lake City with com.
missions to stay one or two years,
when they return and their places are
taken by fresh recruits. In Yorkshire
there are known to be eight at work,
and more than this number are labor
ing in Lancashire. Two of the mis-
slonaries have been working in a
small Lancashire village for nearly a
year. They do not hold public meet
lngs, but endeavor to secure converts
by private interviews. Their method
is to visit the people in their homes,
and in conversation with them to point
out the beauty of the system of belief
of the Latter Day Saints. They have
supply of tracts setting forth the Nor
mon faith, which they freely distrib-
ute. These proselyters are young men.
A reporter happened to be visiting
a cottage when one of these mission
aries called. The cottage was occupied
by three women, weavers, and all sim
gle. The elder said, after a pleasant
greeting: Il will leave you this tract
and will call again to answer you any
questions you may desire to ask me
about it
The tract contained an outline Of
their doctrines and was entitled:
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter
Day Saints; it's Faith and Teaching"
By Elder John Morgan.
A man whom one of these elders Wis
tied says: Il asked them a single
question and that was enough. / said:
DO you believe in a plurality of
wives ~ He replied in the affirmative.
| then told him that that finished the
job, so far as | was concerned
To another man one of the elders
showed a card containing the ''Articles
OF Faith" of the Latter Day Saints
which asserted belief in the gift of
prophesy, in visions. in the power of
healing by prayer, etc. The man sug-
gested to the elder that he go with him
and cure Il girl who had withered
hand. To this request the elder re-
piled that he had seen sight restored to
the blind by prayer, but that he would
not visit the girl referred to, as faith
was necessary on her part in order to
enable him to, bring about a cure.
This elder, in the course of an inter-
view, said polygamists were of as pure
life as others They lived in accord
ance with the laws of Abraham. They
were not prompted by vice, but were
simply fulfilling Gods will. There
are no Mormons now living in polyg-
amy" said he, ''but they are obeying
the decision of the supreme court
of the United States. In Utah it
is believed that the decision
is unjust. and we fought it
until the church decided to abide by
the decision. The decree, however,
caused great amount of suffering in
consequence of the forced separation
of wives and children from their hus-
bands and fathers. 1t is not true that
the MOrmons opposed education What
Brigham Young opposed was the pub
lie schools in the United States We
believe that education includes reli-
gious instruction. We believe that
Christ will return to his own people,
who will be gathered in the United
States. Our converts are still mostly
drawn from England. Wales and Sean
dinavia."
During the interview the words
martyr and martyrdom" were fire.
quently used.