page_title: Death of Joseph Smith
section_title: Incidents leading to the event
hierarchical_section_title: Death of Joseph Smith / Incidents leading to the event
caption_attribution_description: English: Joseph and Hiram Smith (Last Ride) monument in front of the Nauvoo Temple (LDS), Nauvoo, Illinois
context_page_description: Joseph Smith, the founder and leader of the Latter Day Saint movement, and his brother, Hyrum Smith, were killed by a mob in Carthage, Illinois, United States, on June 27, 1844. The brothers had been in jail awaiting trial when an armed mob of about 200 men stormed the facility, their faces painted black with wet gunpowder. Hyrum was killed first, having been shot in the face. As he fell, Hyrum shouted, "I'm a dead man, Joseph!" After emptying the pistol with which he tried to defend himself, Smith was then shot several times while trying to leap from a second-story window and fell from that window as he died.
  Smith, as mayor of the town of Nauvoo, Illinois, had ordered the destruction of the facilities producing the Nauvoo Expositor, a newly established newspaper set up by a group of non-Mormons and people who had seceded from the church. The newspaper's first issue was highly critical of Smith and other church leaders—reporting that Smith was practicing polygamy and claiming he intended to set himself up as a theocratic king.
context_section_description: Followers of the Latter Day Saint movement, or Mormons, began to move into Hancock County, Illinois, in 1839; at the time, most supported the Democratic Party. After the Mormons' expulsion from Missouri, Joseph Smith went to Washington, D.C., and met with President Martin Van Buren, seeking intervention and compensation for lost property. Van Buren said he could do nothing to help. After returning to Illinois, Smith vowed to join the Whig Party. Most of his supporters switched with him, adding political tensions to the social suspicions in which the Mormons were held by the local populace.
caption: Joseph and Hyrum Smith monument, entitled Last Ride, is in front of the Nauvoo Illinois Temple
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