The times., 1898-09-12
MORMON PROPHET DEAD
Brigham Young's Chair Is
Vacant Once More.
CHOOSING A NEW LEADER
Ia tne Death of WiIford Woodruff
Strange and Romantic Career
Is Terminated-He Led His People
tc ProsRerity-story OF His Life
and Work.

(
| Wiiford Woodruff. president and 'phoph-
ct. seer and revelator'' of the Church of
Latter Day Saints, has died after passing
/ the mark of -four score and ten. His
! career with the peculiar sect of the Rocky
! Mountains is romance. 1t contains
| many mysteries bound up in the blood
and bone of mysterious Mormonism Now
that the tones which they thought divine
! have been stilIed, new prophet must
! arise to lead the Mormon people.
! Wilford Woodruff was the fourth proph-
! ct, successor of Joseph Smith, Brigham
! Young and John Taylor, and died in San
Francisco after service of sixty-five
years in his church and life of ninety
one years and after realizing the two
great ambitions of his life-one that he
should dedicate the great Temple in Salt
| Lake City. the other that he should place
! his favorite son in position to become
I his successor.
The life of this man was bound up in
! the struggles of Mormonism. When Jo-
seph Smith had placed himself in Kirt-
I land, o., after having been driven from
i New York, he gathered about him a stur-
| dy band of rugged New England men.
Converted in an Hour.
To this band came Brigham Young and
/ MILFORD Woodruff The latter was a
: chance acquisition, converted in an hour.
faithful until his death. He was travel
! ing through Oswego, n. Y, in 1888.
! Two itinerant Mormon elders were MAX
ing their way in the State at the time,
speaking In the humblest of halls and de-
pending on the charity of those with
whom they came in contact for food and
| lodging.
Polygamy was not a part of the Nor
mon creed at that time. The missionaries
only told of a great preparation for the
millennium Woodruff and his brother
heard them one night in a lowly place,
and Immediately after the sermons asked
TO be baptized.
Scant reward came TO him a s a result of
his change of faith. When he went TO the
Kirkland headquarters of the Mormons he
found them lacking in everything. and he
was sent into the Southern missionary
field. without purse or scrip the
Mormons phrase it, TO tell the people that
he was a messenger to prepare the way
for the millennium.
Mobs threa tened him there after polyg
amy was taught, and he was compelled
to move quickly from place to place.
Thence he went TO England, where he
organized an aggressive missionary cam
paign. The most bitter opposition met
him as he sent shipload after shipload
of converts to swell Joseph Smiths band,
and his enemies finally appealed to par
lament to expeI the whole Mormon force
from the British dominions because they
taught polygamy.
But he drank the dregs of the bitter
cup prepared for the Mormons only after
he returned from his canvass of England.
He came in time to find his people driven
from Illinois to the wilderness, their
prophet murdered and the whole country
desirous of effacing them from it's civili-
zation. With them he tramped across
the great plains, fought Indians and faced
frost and starvation in the new Zion they
created near the Dead Sea of the West.
Led His People Westward.
One of the chief sufferers in this time.
when there seemed no hope for his people
it is curious that he should have been the
leader who piloted the Mormons out of
their troubles. restored to them the prop
erty that had been confscated, saw his
former enemies honoring those who had
been his leaders, and gained the state
hood for Utah, which had long been rec
| ognized as the one measure of safety for
| the religion.
The romance of Mormonism, the forti-
tude of the people who fought the desert
| and conquered. will not be appreciated for
many generationS-not until the stain of
polygamy has been wiped from their rec
ord. Then the Mormons will thank Will
ford Woodruff, who took the important
step to bring about this result, when he
told his people that he had been moved
by the will of God to command them to
abandon that which had caused almost
all their disasters.
He did this in 1880. He had become the
prophet of the church only a short time
| before. and had found himself unable to
appear before his people to be invested
! with the honors Of the office He and all
the other important leaders of the
| church, in fact. We're in hiding to escape
the deputy United States marshais who
We're endeavoring to have them punished
for their plurality of wives.
Only woe had been brought by this
disfranchised in Idaho, and those in Utah
were threatened with the same debase-
ment. All the property of the sect had
been taken by the Federal authorities,
and they found themselves hunted like
animals.
They had been compelled to teach their
wives and children to answer, II don't
know to any question a stranger might
ask and to go into hiding whenever one
might appear. More than all, the great
temple in Salt Lake on which they had
expended fortunes, and in which their
hopes were bound up, was approaching
completion. but it was feared that none
of the priestly leaders would be able to
dedicate it, for fear that the authorities
would find an opportunity thus to trap
their game
Ordered PoIysnmy Abandoned.
! 1t was then that the prophet told his
| people they were no longer to oppose the
will of the American people 1t was the
end of long fight. Mormons had stub
bornly endured every hardship and hu-
initiation, and had even fought a United
| States army rather than disobey what
they had considered a divine command.
| And 1t was only when this command was
revoked in the name of divinity that they
bowed to the will of the nation
| Prosperity has shown the wisdom of
their change. With polygamy gone, their
enemies have been disarmed and their
friends have increased many fold They
! control State and are a power in the
nation, while 2.Go0 missionaries going
without purse or scrip are gathering
converts to swell their numbers and their