170 years ago today - Jun 28, 1844

In the morning Orrin Porter Rockwell rides through Nauvoo crying, "Joseph is killed! Goddamn them! They have killed him!"

The bodies of Joseph and Hyrum Smith arrive in Nauvoo at 3:00 PM. William Clayton goes to see them and remarks: "Joseph looks very natural except being pale through loss of blood. Hyrum does not look so natural. Their aged mother is distracted with grief and it will be almost more than she can bear."

Allen Stout, former Danite, writes in his journal after viewing the bodies: "I stood there and then resolved in my mind that I would never let an opportunity slip unimproved of avenging their blood.... I knew not how to contain myself, and when I see one of the men who persuaded them to give up to be tried, I feel like cutting their throats yet"

[Source: On This Day in Mormon History, http://onthisdayinmormonhistory.blogspot.com, based on Michael Quinn's Mormon Hierarchy vols 1 & 2]

3 comments:

  1. AnonymousJune 28, 2014

    Alexander Wilkins, recorded in his journal about this day: We moved south of Nauvoo to Green Plains, just two miles from Carthage. On the afternoon of the 27th of June, 1844, I was standing on a knoll about half a mile from our home, when all of a sudden I heard the discharge of guns in the direction of Carthage. Almost instantly a peculiar feeling came over me. I hastened home and found my mother leaning against the well curb. She was very pale. I said, "Mother, what's the matter?" She replied that she had heard the guns and was afraid my father was in danger. Just then a usually gentle neighbor flew past on horseback yelling, "G... D... you, you've got no more prophet." My mother at once remarked, "That accounts for all of it." As soon as Joseph and Hyrum were martyred, the mob seemed to be seized with a sudden dread, fearing the Mormons would gather at Carthage and exterminate them, fled from the City and hid themselves. A bright light from heaven shone on the prophet's face as he lay against the well curb at Carthage jail ...

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  2. AnonymousJune 28, 2014

    Note the striking parallel: [both] "against the well curb"

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  3. AnonymousJune 28, 2014

    Note: "the bright light from heaven that shone on [Joseph's] face" was a warning from God to those who would even think about mutilating or desecrating the body.

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