page_title: Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (Strangite)
section_title: Early successes and losses
hierarchical_section_title: Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (Strangite) / History / Early successes and losses
caption_attribution_description: English: Martin Harris, underwriter of the first printing of The Book of Mormon and also served as one of Three Witnesses who testified that they had seen the Golden Plates from which Joseph Smith, Jr. said the Book of Mormon had been translated.
context_page_description: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints—usually distinguished with a parenthetical (Strangite)—is one of the several organizations that claim to be the legitimate continuation of the Latter Day Saint movement. It is a separate organization from the considerably larger and better known The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Both churches claim to be the original organization established by Joseph Smith, on April 6, 1830. The Strangite church is headquartered in Voree, Wisconsin, just outside Burlington, and accepts the claims of James Strang as successor to Smith. It had approximately 300 members in 1998. Currently, there are around 130 active members throughout the United States.
  After Smith was murdered in 1844 with no clear successor, several claimants sought to take leadership of the church which Smith founded. Among them was Strang, who competed with other prominent members, notably Brigham Young and Sidney Rigdon.
  At its peak the Strangite Church had about 12,000 members, making them noteworthy rivals to the larger faction led by Young.
context_section_description: Many prominent Latter Day Saints believed in Strang's "letter of appointment" and accepted him as Mormonism's second "Prophet, Seer, Revelator and Translator"—at least in the short term. These included the church's Presiding Patriarch and apostle William Smith (Smith's only surviving brother); Book of Mormon witness Martin Harris (who left and later rejoined the LDS Church in Utah); Nauvoo Stake President William Marks; second Bishop of the Church and church trustee-in-trust George Miller; apostle John E. Page; former apostle William E. McLellin; Smith's mother Lucy Mack Smith; and other members of the Smith family.
  Another adherent was John C. Bennett, former mayor of Nauvoo and a former member of the First Presidency. Bennett had been in Smith's innermost circle but had broken with the founding prophet and had written an anti-Mormon exposé. Bennett founded a secretive Strangite fraternal society known as the "Order of Illuminati", but his presence disrupted Strang's church and ultimately led to his excommunication. Bennett's "order" fell by the wayside and no longer exists among the Strangites.
  All of these persons—with the exception of Miller, who would remain loyal to Strang until death—left the Strangite church by 1850. Many of these defections were due to Strang's seemingly abrupt "about-face" on the turbulent subject of polygamy. Vehemently opposed to the practice at first, Strang reversed course in 1849 to become one of plural marriage's strongest advocates. Since many of his early disciples had looked to him as a monogamous counterweight to Young's polygamous version of Mormonism, Strang's decision to embrace plural marriage proved costly to him and his church.
  Strang found his greatest support among the scattered outlying branches of Mormonism, which he frequently toured. His followers may have numbered as many as 12,000, at a time when Young's group had just over 50,000. After Strang won a debate at a conference in Norway, Illinois, he converted the entire branch. While in Voree, the Strangites published a periodical known as the Voree Herald. Strang's church also fielded a mission to England, one of the primary sources of converts to Mormonism. This mission was led by Martin Harris, the financier of the Book of Mormon and one of its Three Witnesses. Harris proved a poor spokesman, however, and the English missions sided with the LDS Church led by Young.
caption: Martin Harris circa 1870, age 87.
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