I thought this story would be of particular interest to El Sid, Seamaster, Rab and others who have serious reservations concerning the character of Joseph Smith. Rather than simply rely on Joseph's enemies or others that are generations removed, this is a first hand account of a convert and close friend who betrayed Joseph and was then excommunicated. His lies were the primary cause for Joseph spending 8 months in the Liberty jail with some of his close friend where they underwent tremendous suffering. In addition, his false testimony helped persuade Governor Boggs to give his infamous "Extermination Order". What then later transpired is amazing. It is truly well worth reading to anyone who is truly interested in the "truth"! I will say this, I don't think I could have forgiven anyone who was responsible for such suffering and death.
Praise To the man
by
Dean Black
Two days after Joseph Smith was murdered by a mob at Carthage Jail, his funeral sermon was preached by W. W. Phelps. A report of the sermon calls the choice of Phelps as speaker "strange". He wasn't a General Authority, after all, nor was he more prominent locally than a hundred other men. Yet here he was, eulogizing the Prophet as his body was laid to rest. Why?
Perhaps he was chosen because he wrote such lovely hymns. Twenty-nine of his hymns appeared in the first hymnbook that Emma Smith compiled. Fifteen appear in the hymnbook we use today. Among them are "Now Let Us Rejoice," "Redeemer of Israel," "Gently Raise the Sacred Strain," "The Spirit of God," and "Praise to the Man."
As a poet, W. W. Phelps understood the inspiring power of words, which the occasion surely required.
But it also required a speaker with something to say, and speaking-style mattered as little in those days as it does in the Church today. So we can assume W. W. Phelps wasn't chosen primarily for how eloquently he might speak, but for what he had to say-for the testimony he could bear on the matter at hand, which was the character and calling of the Prophet Joseph Smith. And in this respect he truly was a worthy choice, for the Prophet's dealings with W. W. Phelps reveal the healing power of the restored gospel at its exalting best.
William Wines Phelps first learned of Joseph Smith three days after the Church was organized and barely two weeks after the Book of Mormon first came off the press. He was living in Ontario County, New York, where he edited a newspaper called the Ontario Phoenix. On April 9, 1830, he bought a copy of the Book of Mormon from Parley P. Pratt, who was passing through. A single, all-night reading session convinced him it was true.
In December of that year, William traveled to Fayette, New York, where he met Joseph Smith. "My faith increased," he later wrote, "like the grass after a refreshing shower, when I for the first time held a conversation with our beloved brother Joseph who I was willing to acknowledge as a prophet of the Lord.
In May 1831, William resigned as the editor of the Ontario Phoenix and moved to Kirtland, Ohio, where the Church had since settled. When he announced himself ready "to do the will of the Lord," Joseph inquired of the Lord and received a revelation directing William to move to Missouri, where he would "assist my servant Oliver Cowdery to do the work of printing, and of selecting a writing books for schools in this church."
Three days after his baptism, William set out with Joseph and others for Jackson County, Missouri. He took pride in being among the first settlers in Zion: When the first Elders went along with brother Joseph to the western boundaries of Missouri, to seek the land of Zion, for the gathering of the saints in the last days, I was in the little band; when that goodly land was consecrated, we kneeled together; when the first house was raised I helped carry the first log.
His sabbath discourse was the first one preached to the saints after their arrival in Jackson County. He also offered the opening prayer when the Jackson County temple site was dedicated. He began publishing the Evening and Morning Star, which so pleased the Prophet that it virtually became "the official organ of the Church." And he was charged with printing both the Book of Commandments and the hymnbook edited by Emma Smith. The Prophet also called William to the presidency of the Church in Missouri and wrote that he had most implicit confidence in (him] as a man of God, having obtained this confidence by a vision of heaven.
As the Church grew in Jackson County, so did local opposition, most of which was directed at W. W. Phelps and the Evening and Morning Star. On July 20, 1833, as William attended to his duties in the printing shop, a mob attacked, destroying both the press and the Phelps home and scattering galleys of the Book of Commandments into the street.
Brother and Sister Phelps escaped separately, neither knowing for a time where the other was. All of the children escaped but two, who were left buried (but uninjured) in the rubble of the family's home.
When the mob demanded that all Mormons leave Jackson County, William Phelps was among those offering themselves as a ransom, which the mob refused, and the Saints fled to Clay County in July 1833.
After fleeing with the Saints to Clay County, William was called back to Kirtland to help "carry on the printing establishment" there. In Kirtland, he worked on the committee that compiled the Doctrine and Covenants. He served with Oliver Cowdery as scribe for the Prophet's translation of the Book of Abraham. One of his hymns - "The Spirit of God Like"- so impressed Joseph Smith that it was printed on white satin for the dedication of the Kirtland Temple. After the congregation sang the hymn at the dedication, the Spirit of God did burn like a fire.
In April 1836, less than a month after the Kirtland Temple was dedicated, William was called to return to Clay County, where he resumed his duties as a member of the Church presidency there. In July 1836, the Missourians asked the Mormons to leave Clay County, so William and the others moved to unsettled territory in what would become Caldwell County and the city of Far West.
This is where the troubles began.
William Phelps and John Whitmer had chosen the site of Far West, so the two of them assumed responsibility for distributing the! property. The north half of Far West was entered in the name of William W. Phelps and the south half in John Whitener's name. But they "so presumed to act independently of the high council of the church in Missouri," B. H. Roberts explains, "that they seemed to be conducting matters with a high hand, also in their own interests - for personal gain.
They laid out the public square; they appointed and ordained a committee to supervise the building of a house unto the Lord - a temple; and appropriated to themselves the profits arising from the sale of town lots." Thomas B. Marsh, for example, had gathered $1,450 from Saints in Tennessee for buying land. "But these men," Thomas B. Marsh later wrote, "instead of laying out the money for the benefit of poor bleeding Zion, purchased land for their own emolument." They were also accused of selling their lands in Jackson County, contrary to the revelations of the Lord.
On April 5, 1837, a Church council was held to investigate their behavior, and the properties they had been responsible for were turned over to Bishop Edward Partridge.
On September 4, 1837, the Lord chastised them in a revelation:
Verily thus saith the Lord unto you my servant Joseph—my servants John Whitmer and William W. Phelps have done those things which are not pleasing in my sight, therefore if they repent not they shall be removed out of their places. Amen.
On November 7, 1837, Joseph Smith held conference in Far West and offered the Missouri Saints an opportunity to sustain William Phelps and John Whitmer as their leaders. Some objected to John Whitmer, whose name was proposed first, and "a list of charges" against John Whitmer and William Phelps was read. John Whitmer then "spoke a few words by way of confession and the vote to sustain him "carried unanimously." After the conference adjourned for an hour, William Phelps "rose and made certain remarks on the subject of the charges referred to above by way of confession," and he too was sustained unanimously.
On February 5, 1838, another council was held in which W. W. Phelps and John Whitmer were stripped of their callings in the presidency of the Church in Missouri.
And on march 10, 1838, during a council they refused to attend, W. W. Phelps and John Whitmer were tried "for persisting in unchristian—like conduct," with the judgment that they be no longer members of the Church of Christ of Latter-day Saints, and be given over to the buffetings of Satan, until they learn to blaspheme no more against the authorities of God, nor fleece the flock of Christ.
Once excommunicated, they began stirring up trouble for the Saints. They urged vexatious lawsuits, spread false rumors, and published slanderous reports, fueling the anger of the mobs.
On July 8, 1838, the Lord, in a revelation, offered William a chance to repent. He refused.
On October 27, 1838, the anger William was helping stir up led Governor Boggs to issue his extermination order, demanding that all Mormons leave the state or be killed.
On October 30, 1838, a mob attacked Haun's Mill, killing eighteen or nineteen Saints, including a nine-year-old boy.
On October 31, 1838, the mob (allegedly the state militia) surrounded Far West and demanded that the Prophet and other Mormon leaders surrender. The militia outnumbered the Mormons five to one. At 8:00 a.m., the enemy sent out a white flag of truce.
Joseph Smith asked Colonel Hinkle of the Far West militia to meet them, inviting W. W. Phelps and John Corrill, another apostate, to accompany him. Rather than negotiating for the Saints, however, these men secretly agreed with the mob that the leaders of the Church would be given up for trial, that the property of Mormons who had taken up arms would be appropriated to pay for debts and damages incurred in the mob actions, that the remaining Saints "should leave the state and be protected while doing so by the militia," and that the Saints would give up their arms of every description in exchange for receipts.
Toward evening, Colonel Hinkle returned to the Prophet and told him the leaders of the state militia wished to interview him. "I immediately complied with the request," Joseph wrote of the occasion, "and in company with Elders Sidney Rigdon and Parley P. Pratt, Colonel Wight and George W. Robinson, went into the camp of the militia. But judge of my surprise, when, instead of being treated with that respect which is due from one citizen to another, we were taken as prisoners of war, and treated with the utmost contempt.
Colonel Hinkle was charged with betraying Joseph Smith to the mob, but he later wrote to W. W. Phelps hinting that Phelps may have been responsible: "Now Sir, as you are the man who was engaged in the whole affair with me, I request that you write a letter for publication, and either put it in the Times and Seasons or send it to me; and in it exempt me from those charges, and correct the minds of that people and the public on this subject – for you know that they are as base as the blackness of darkness, and as false as Satan himself.
When the Prophet was tried before Judge Austin King, W. W. Phelps (under "horrid duress" to save his own life, he later admitted) signed an affidavit saying he swore under oath that "secret and private meetings were held; I endeavored to find out what they were; and I learned from John Corrill and others, that they were forming a secret society called Danites," whose members covenanted "that if any man attempted to move out of the county...[they] should kill him, and haul him aside into the brush, and that all the burial he should have be in a turkey buzzard's guts," and that "if any person from the surrounding county came into their town, walking about -- no odds who he might be -- any one of that meeting should kill him, and throw him aside into the brush."
He also issued (with others) a statement to the Missouri State Legislature commending the behavior of the Missouri force:
We have no hesitation in saying that the course taken by Gen. Clark with the Mormons was necessary for the public peace, and that the 'Mormons' are generally satisfied with his course, and feel in duty bound to say that the conduct of the General, his staff officers and troops, was highly honorable as soldiers and citizens, so far as our knowledge extends.
On November 30, 1838, based largely upon the actions and testimony of W. W. Phelps, Joseph Smith was imprisoned in Liberty Jail, where he remained until March 1839, as the Saints fled to Illinois, leaving trails of blood in the snow.
What followed for W. W. Phelps was a time of utter misery. He "suffered from ‘several disorders,' accompanied with the 'chills and fever.' His wife had the 'Billons' fever; his son Waterman had the 'fever', Ague, and inflammatory dysentery'; and Sarah had 'two or three diseases, plus the chills and fever."
In the early part of 1840, William moved, destitute, to Dayton, Ohio. Apparently unable to support his family there, he wrote John Whitmer that he hoped to find success by moving farther east. In June, however, before he could carry out the move east, Elders Orson Hyde and John E. Page passed through Dayton on their way to dedicate the land of Palestine. As they met with William, a spirit of deep repentance touched his heart, and he told them in great sorrow that "he wants to live." They encouraged him to write to the Prophet, which he did on June 29, 1840:
Brother Joseph:-
I am alive, and with the help of God I mean to live still. I am as the prodigal son...I have seen the folly of my way, and I tremble at the gulf I have passed. So it is, and why I know not. I prayed and God answered, but what could I do. Says I, "I will repent and live, and ask my old brethren to forgive me, and though they chasten me to death, yet I will die with them; for their God is my God. The least place with them is enough for me, yea, it is bigger and better than all Babylon.”...I know my situation, you know it, and God knows it, and I want to be saved if my friends will help me.... I have done wrong and I am sorry. The beam is in my own eye. I have not walked along with my friends according to my holy anointing. I ask forgiveness in the name of Jesus Christ of all the Saints, for I will do right, God helping me. I want your fellowship, for we are brethren, and our communion used to be sweet, and whenever the Lord brings us together again, I will make all the satisfaction on every point that Saints or God can require. Amen.
W. W. Phelps
Nearly a month passed before Joseph received William's letter in Nauvoo and could compose a reply, and still more time passed before the Prophet's reply could be delivered to Dayton and placed William's hands.; We can only imagine William's anxiety and anticipation, then, as he opened the Prophet's letter and read:
Dear Brother Phelps:
Is true, that we have suffered much in consequence of your behavior--the cup of gall, already full enough for mortals to drink, was indeed filled to overflowing when you turned against us...However, the cup has been drunk, the will of our Father has been done...and having been delivered from the hands of wicked men by the mercy of our God, we say it is your privilege to be delivered from the powers of the adversary...and again take your stand among the Saints of the Most High...Believing your confession to be real, and your repentance genuine, I shall be happy once again to give you the right hand of fellowship, and rejoice over the returning prodigal. Your letter was read to the Saints last Sunday, and an expression of their felling, when it was unanimously
Resolved, That W. W. Phelps should be received into fellowship."
Come on, dear brother, since the war is past, For friends at first, are friends at last.'
Yours as ever, Joseph Smith, Jun.
And so it was that Brother Phelps came to be in Nauvoo, where he again became Joseph's companion, where he was able to visit him in Carthage in the hours before the murder took place, and where two days later, called upon to preach the funeral sermon, he bore witness to the character and calling of the prophet he had known:
...Was Joseph Smith the friend of gamblers, drunkards, robbers, fornicators, adulterers, liars and hypocrites? No; read his life from Vermont to Carthage Jail, and every line and every act, shines with virtuous principles, and words of wisdom, that warms this heart with a god like sensation....
What [Joseph] knew came natural;...he quoted the finer sentiments of morals, divinity, legislation, and laws... as if he had learned them in his mother's lap; and though they were original with him, they were always correct. He was a man of God...
He came, not in a tempest of wrath, but in the still small voice of Jehovah with full power to restore the holy priesthood; he came, not in "the whirl-wind of public opinion" but in the simple name of Jesus Christ with a love that surpasses understanding...
He is dead, but he lives; he is absent from us, but at home in heaven....
And yet the spirit whispers, what shall I say of Joseph the seer, cut off from his useful life in the midst of his years? Why, I will say that he has done more in fifteen years, to make the truth plain--open the way of life; and carry glad tidings to the meek...than all Christendom has done in fifteen hundred years with money, press, and a hired clergy...
Tell the world, and let eternity bare record, that the great name of Joseph Smith will go down to unborn worlds and up to sanctified heavens, and gods, with all his shining honors and endless fame as stars in his crown, while the infamy of his persecutors can only be written in their ashes.
Well may it be echoed, congratulate the dead that die in the Lord, ...for they can rest from their labors, and their works shall follow them...
It is finished! it is finished! The saints are free; Jehovah's won the victory, and not a righteous man is lost!
A short time later, his grieving not yet done, William W. Phelps sat down, pen in hand, and wrote this final eulogy to his everlasting friend.
Praise to the man who communed with Jehovah!
Jesus anointed that Prophet and Seer.
Blessed to open the last dispensation,
Kings shall extol him, and nations revere.
Praise to his mem'ry, he died as a martyr;
Honored and blest by his ever great name!
Long shall his blood, which was shed by assassins,
Plead unto heav'n while the earth lauds his fame.
Great is his glory and endless his priesthood.
Ever and ever the keys he will hold.
Faithful and true, he will enter his kingdom,
Crowned in the midst of the prophets of old.
Sacrifice brings forth the blessings of heaven;
Earth must atone for the blood of the man.
Wake up the world for the conflict of justice.
Millions shall know "Brother Joseph " again.
Hail to the Prophet, ascended to heaven!
Traitors and tyrants now fight him in vain.
Mingling with Gods, he can plan for his brethren;
Death cannot conquer the hero again.
[This message has been edited by Genesisag (edited 5/14/2007 11:09a).]
Praise To the man
by
Dean Black
Two days after Joseph Smith was murdered by a mob at Carthage Jail, his funeral sermon was preached by W. W. Phelps. A report of the sermon calls the choice of Phelps as speaker "strange". He wasn't a General Authority, after all, nor was he more prominent locally than a hundred other men. Yet here he was, eulogizing the Prophet as his body was laid to rest. Why?
Perhaps he was chosen because he wrote such lovely hymns. Twenty-nine of his hymns appeared in the first hymnbook that Emma Smith compiled. Fifteen appear in the hymnbook we use today. Among them are "Now Let Us Rejoice," "Redeemer of Israel," "Gently Raise the Sacred Strain," "The Spirit of God," and "Praise to the Man."
As a poet, W. W. Phelps understood the inspiring power of words, which the occasion surely required.
But it also required a speaker with something to say, and speaking-style mattered as little in those days as it does in the Church today. So we can assume W. W. Phelps wasn't chosen primarily for how eloquently he might speak, but for what he had to say-for the testimony he could bear on the matter at hand, which was the character and calling of the Prophet Joseph Smith. And in this respect he truly was a worthy choice, for the Prophet's dealings with W. W. Phelps reveal the healing power of the restored gospel at its exalting best.
William Wines Phelps first learned of Joseph Smith three days after the Church was organized and barely two weeks after the Book of Mormon first came off the press. He was living in Ontario County, New York, where he edited a newspaper called the Ontario Phoenix. On April 9, 1830, he bought a copy of the Book of Mormon from Parley P. Pratt, who was passing through. A single, all-night reading session convinced him it was true.
In December of that year, William traveled to Fayette, New York, where he met Joseph Smith. "My faith increased," he later wrote, "like the grass after a refreshing shower, when I for the first time held a conversation with our beloved brother Joseph who I was willing to acknowledge as a prophet of the Lord.
In May 1831, William resigned as the editor of the Ontario Phoenix and moved to Kirtland, Ohio, where the Church had since settled. When he announced himself ready "to do the will of the Lord," Joseph inquired of the Lord and received a revelation directing William to move to Missouri, where he would "assist my servant Oliver Cowdery to do the work of printing, and of selecting a writing books for schools in this church."
Three days after his baptism, William set out with Joseph and others for Jackson County, Missouri. He took pride in being among the first settlers in Zion: When the first Elders went along with brother Joseph to the western boundaries of Missouri, to seek the land of Zion, for the gathering of the saints in the last days, I was in the little band; when that goodly land was consecrated, we kneeled together; when the first house was raised I helped carry the first log.
His sabbath discourse was the first one preached to the saints after their arrival in Jackson County. He also offered the opening prayer when the Jackson County temple site was dedicated. He began publishing the Evening and Morning Star, which so pleased the Prophet that it virtually became "the official organ of the Church." And he was charged with printing both the Book of Commandments and the hymnbook edited by Emma Smith. The Prophet also called William to the presidency of the Church in Missouri and wrote that he had most implicit confidence in (him] as a man of God, having obtained this confidence by a vision of heaven.
As the Church grew in Jackson County, so did local opposition, most of which was directed at W. W. Phelps and the Evening and Morning Star. On July 20, 1833, as William attended to his duties in the printing shop, a mob attacked, destroying both the press and the Phelps home and scattering galleys of the Book of Commandments into the street.
Brother and Sister Phelps escaped separately, neither knowing for a time where the other was. All of the children escaped but two, who were left buried (but uninjured) in the rubble of the family's home.
When the mob demanded that all Mormons leave Jackson County, William Phelps was among those offering themselves as a ransom, which the mob refused, and the Saints fled to Clay County in July 1833.
After fleeing with the Saints to Clay County, William was called back to Kirtland to help "carry on the printing establishment" there. In Kirtland, he worked on the committee that compiled the Doctrine and Covenants. He served with Oliver Cowdery as scribe for the Prophet's translation of the Book of Abraham. One of his hymns - "The Spirit of God Like"- so impressed Joseph Smith that it was printed on white satin for the dedication of the Kirtland Temple. After the congregation sang the hymn at the dedication, the Spirit of God did burn like a fire.
In April 1836, less than a month after the Kirtland Temple was dedicated, William was called to return to Clay County, where he resumed his duties as a member of the Church presidency there. In July 1836, the Missourians asked the Mormons to leave Clay County, so William and the others moved to unsettled territory in what would become Caldwell County and the city of Far West.
This is where the troubles began.
William Phelps and John Whitmer had chosen the site of Far West, so the two of them assumed responsibility for distributing the! property. The north half of Far West was entered in the name of William W. Phelps and the south half in John Whitener's name. But they "so presumed to act independently of the high council of the church in Missouri," B. H. Roberts explains, "that they seemed to be conducting matters with a high hand, also in their own interests - for personal gain.
They laid out the public square; they appointed and ordained a committee to supervise the building of a house unto the Lord - a temple; and appropriated to themselves the profits arising from the sale of town lots." Thomas B. Marsh, for example, had gathered $1,450 from Saints in Tennessee for buying land. "But these men," Thomas B. Marsh later wrote, "instead of laying out the money for the benefit of poor bleeding Zion, purchased land for their own emolument." They were also accused of selling their lands in Jackson County, contrary to the revelations of the Lord.
On April 5, 1837, a Church council was held to investigate their behavior, and the properties they had been responsible for were turned over to Bishop Edward Partridge.
On September 4, 1837, the Lord chastised them in a revelation:
Verily thus saith the Lord unto you my servant Joseph—my servants John Whitmer and William W. Phelps have done those things which are not pleasing in my sight, therefore if they repent not they shall be removed out of their places. Amen.
On November 7, 1837, Joseph Smith held conference in Far West and offered the Missouri Saints an opportunity to sustain William Phelps and John Whitmer as their leaders. Some objected to John Whitmer, whose name was proposed first, and "a list of charges" against John Whitmer and William Phelps was read. John Whitmer then "spoke a few words by way of confession and the vote to sustain him "carried unanimously." After the conference adjourned for an hour, William Phelps "rose and made certain remarks on the subject of the charges referred to above by way of confession," and he too was sustained unanimously.
On February 5, 1838, another council was held in which W. W. Phelps and John Whitmer were stripped of their callings in the presidency of the Church in Missouri.
And on march 10, 1838, during a council they refused to attend, W. W. Phelps and John Whitmer were tried "for persisting in unchristian—like conduct," with the judgment that they be no longer members of the Church of Christ of Latter-day Saints, and be given over to the buffetings of Satan, until they learn to blaspheme no more against the authorities of God, nor fleece the flock of Christ.
Once excommunicated, they began stirring up trouble for the Saints. They urged vexatious lawsuits, spread false rumors, and published slanderous reports, fueling the anger of the mobs.
On July 8, 1838, the Lord, in a revelation, offered William a chance to repent. He refused.
On October 27, 1838, the anger William was helping stir up led Governor Boggs to issue his extermination order, demanding that all Mormons leave the state or be killed.
On October 30, 1838, a mob attacked Haun's Mill, killing eighteen or nineteen Saints, including a nine-year-old boy.
On October 31, 1838, the mob (allegedly the state militia) surrounded Far West and demanded that the Prophet and other Mormon leaders surrender. The militia outnumbered the Mormons five to one. At 8:00 a.m., the enemy sent out a white flag of truce.
Joseph Smith asked Colonel Hinkle of the Far West militia to meet them, inviting W. W. Phelps and John Corrill, another apostate, to accompany him. Rather than negotiating for the Saints, however, these men secretly agreed with the mob that the leaders of the Church would be given up for trial, that the property of Mormons who had taken up arms would be appropriated to pay for debts and damages incurred in the mob actions, that the remaining Saints "should leave the state and be protected while doing so by the militia," and that the Saints would give up their arms of every description in exchange for receipts.
Toward evening, Colonel Hinkle returned to the Prophet and told him the leaders of the state militia wished to interview him. "I immediately complied with the request," Joseph wrote of the occasion, "and in company with Elders Sidney Rigdon and Parley P. Pratt, Colonel Wight and George W. Robinson, went into the camp of the militia. But judge of my surprise, when, instead of being treated with that respect which is due from one citizen to another, we were taken as prisoners of war, and treated with the utmost contempt.
Colonel Hinkle was charged with betraying Joseph Smith to the mob, but he later wrote to W. W. Phelps hinting that Phelps may have been responsible: "Now Sir, as you are the man who was engaged in the whole affair with me, I request that you write a letter for publication, and either put it in the Times and Seasons or send it to me; and in it exempt me from those charges, and correct the minds of that people and the public on this subject – for you know that they are as base as the blackness of darkness, and as false as Satan himself.
When the Prophet was tried before Judge Austin King, W. W. Phelps (under "horrid duress" to save his own life, he later admitted) signed an affidavit saying he swore under oath that "secret and private meetings were held; I endeavored to find out what they were; and I learned from John Corrill and others, that they were forming a secret society called Danites," whose members covenanted "that if any man attempted to move out of the county...[they] should kill him, and haul him aside into the brush, and that all the burial he should have be in a turkey buzzard's guts," and that "if any person from the surrounding county came into their town, walking about -- no odds who he might be -- any one of that meeting should kill him, and throw him aside into the brush."
He also issued (with others) a statement to the Missouri State Legislature commending the behavior of the Missouri force:
We have no hesitation in saying that the course taken by Gen. Clark with the Mormons was necessary for the public peace, and that the 'Mormons' are generally satisfied with his course, and feel in duty bound to say that the conduct of the General, his staff officers and troops, was highly honorable as soldiers and citizens, so far as our knowledge extends.
On November 30, 1838, based largely upon the actions and testimony of W. W. Phelps, Joseph Smith was imprisoned in Liberty Jail, where he remained until March 1839, as the Saints fled to Illinois, leaving trails of blood in the snow.
What followed for W. W. Phelps was a time of utter misery. He "suffered from ‘several disorders,' accompanied with the 'chills and fever.' His wife had the 'Billons' fever; his son Waterman had the 'fever', Ague, and inflammatory dysentery'; and Sarah had 'two or three diseases, plus the chills and fever."
In the early part of 1840, William moved, destitute, to Dayton, Ohio. Apparently unable to support his family there, he wrote John Whitmer that he hoped to find success by moving farther east. In June, however, before he could carry out the move east, Elders Orson Hyde and John E. Page passed through Dayton on their way to dedicate the land of Palestine. As they met with William, a spirit of deep repentance touched his heart, and he told them in great sorrow that "he wants to live." They encouraged him to write to the Prophet, which he did on June 29, 1840:
Brother Joseph:-
I am alive, and with the help of God I mean to live still. I am as the prodigal son...I have seen the folly of my way, and I tremble at the gulf I have passed. So it is, and why I know not. I prayed and God answered, but what could I do. Says I, "I will repent and live, and ask my old brethren to forgive me, and though they chasten me to death, yet I will die with them; for their God is my God. The least place with them is enough for me, yea, it is bigger and better than all Babylon.”...I know my situation, you know it, and God knows it, and I want to be saved if my friends will help me.... I have done wrong and I am sorry. The beam is in my own eye. I have not walked along with my friends according to my holy anointing. I ask forgiveness in the name of Jesus Christ of all the Saints, for I will do right, God helping me. I want your fellowship, for we are brethren, and our communion used to be sweet, and whenever the Lord brings us together again, I will make all the satisfaction on every point that Saints or God can require. Amen.
W. W. Phelps
Nearly a month passed before Joseph received William's letter in Nauvoo and could compose a reply, and still more time passed before the Prophet's reply could be delivered to Dayton and placed William's hands.; We can only imagine William's anxiety and anticipation, then, as he opened the Prophet's letter and read:
Dear Brother Phelps:
Is true, that we have suffered much in consequence of your behavior--the cup of gall, already full enough for mortals to drink, was indeed filled to overflowing when you turned against us...However, the cup has been drunk, the will of our Father has been done...and having been delivered from the hands of wicked men by the mercy of our God, we say it is your privilege to be delivered from the powers of the adversary...and again take your stand among the Saints of the Most High...Believing your confession to be real, and your repentance genuine, I shall be happy once again to give you the right hand of fellowship, and rejoice over the returning prodigal. Your letter was read to the Saints last Sunday, and an expression of their felling, when it was unanimously
Resolved, That W. W. Phelps should be received into fellowship."
Come on, dear brother, since the war is past, For friends at first, are friends at last.'
Yours as ever, Joseph Smith, Jun.
And so it was that Brother Phelps came to be in Nauvoo, where he again became Joseph's companion, where he was able to visit him in Carthage in the hours before the murder took place, and where two days later, called upon to preach the funeral sermon, he bore witness to the character and calling of the prophet he had known:
...Was Joseph Smith the friend of gamblers, drunkards, robbers, fornicators, adulterers, liars and hypocrites? No; read his life from Vermont to Carthage Jail, and every line and every act, shines with virtuous principles, and words of wisdom, that warms this heart with a god like sensation....
What [Joseph] knew came natural;...he quoted the finer sentiments of morals, divinity, legislation, and laws... as if he had learned them in his mother's lap; and though they were original with him, they were always correct. He was a man of God...
He came, not in a tempest of wrath, but in the still small voice of Jehovah with full power to restore the holy priesthood; he came, not in "the whirl-wind of public opinion" but in the simple name of Jesus Christ with a love that surpasses understanding...
He is dead, but he lives; he is absent from us, but at home in heaven....
And yet the spirit whispers, what shall I say of Joseph the seer, cut off from his useful life in the midst of his years? Why, I will say that he has done more in fifteen years, to make the truth plain--open the way of life; and carry glad tidings to the meek...than all Christendom has done in fifteen hundred years with money, press, and a hired clergy...
Tell the world, and let eternity bare record, that the great name of Joseph Smith will go down to unborn worlds and up to sanctified heavens, and gods, with all his shining honors and endless fame as stars in his crown, while the infamy of his persecutors can only be written in their ashes.
Well may it be echoed, congratulate the dead that die in the Lord, ...for they can rest from their labors, and their works shall follow them...
It is finished! it is finished! The saints are free; Jehovah's won the victory, and not a righteous man is lost!
A short time later, his grieving not yet done, William W. Phelps sat down, pen in hand, and wrote this final eulogy to his everlasting friend.
Praise to the man who communed with Jehovah!
Jesus anointed that Prophet and Seer.
Blessed to open the last dispensation,
Kings shall extol him, and nations revere.
Praise to his mem'ry, he died as a martyr;
Honored and blest by his ever great name!
Long shall his blood, which was shed by assassins,
Plead unto heav'n while the earth lauds his fame.
Great is his glory and endless his priesthood.
Ever and ever the keys he will hold.
Faithful and true, he will enter his kingdom,
Crowned in the midst of the prophets of old.
Sacrifice brings forth the blessings of heaven;
Earth must atone for the blood of the man.
Wake up the world for the conflict of justice.
Millions shall know "Brother Joseph " again.
Hail to the Prophet, ascended to heaven!
Traitors and tyrants now fight him in vain.
Mingling with Gods, he can plan for his brethren;
Death cannot conquer the hero again.
[This message has been edited by Genesisag (edited 5/14/2007 11:09a).]
