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| Joseph Smith The Making of a Prophet |
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Joseph Smith, founding prophet of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormon), is among the most enigmatic, controversial figures of the nineteenth century. He has been variously described as a pretender after worldly power, religious fanatic, or God's mouthpiece on earth. Such strong reaction doubtless stems from Smith's own claims, specifically his declaration that all churches are false and that those who reject the gospel he restored will be damned. For Smith, there was no middle ground—and thus seemingly no middle ground for assessing him or his claims. However, Boston's mayor Josiah Quincy, who interviewed Smith in 1844, was less dogmatic:
Quincy notwithstanding, I believe we must address what Jan Shipps, non-Mormon historian of the LDS experience, once termed the "prophet puzzle" if we ever hope to understand Smith and the church he founded. In her 1974 essay, "The Prophet Puzzle: Suggestions Leading toward a More Comprehensive Interpretation of Joseph Smith,"2 Shipps wrote of the Mormon prophet: "What we have in Mormon historiography is two Josephs: the one who started out digging for money and, when he was unsuccessful, turned to propheteering and the one who had visions and dreamed dreams, restored the church, and revealed the will of the Lord to a sinful world."3 To resolve this "schizophrenic state of Mormon history, with its double interpretive strand of Joseph Smith as a man of God and Joseph Smith as a kind of fraud who exploited his followers for his own purposes," Shipps called for a more fully integrated view of Smith, one allowing for, even encouraging, the complex spectrum of human personality.4 Unraveling Smith's character and motives is difficult, but before the puzzle can be assembled, we must try to gather and interpret as many of the pieces as possible. Some of these, I believe, have been overlooked, ignored, or mishandled—pieces which reveal important, telling features of Smith's multifarious personality. Since I am convinced that it is impossible to write a meaningful biography of Smith without addressing his claims, I begin with a discussion of some of the major pieces of the puzzle together with my own assumptions and biases. To my mind, the most obvious solution to Shipps's conundrum is to suggest that Smith was a well intentioned "pious deceiver" or, perhaps otherwise worded, a "sincere fraud," someone who prevaricated for "good" reasons. Admittedly, the terms are not entirely satisfying. Nevertheless, "pious" connotes genuine religious conviction, while I apply "fraud" or "deceiver" only to describe some of Smith's activities. I believe that Smith believed he was called of God, yet occasionally engaged in fraudulent activities in order to preach God's word as effectively as possible. Robert N. Hullinger, a Lutheran minister, argued similarly in his 1980 book, Mormon Answer to Scepticism: Why Joseph Smith Wrote the Book of Mormon.5 Responding in part to Shipps, Hullinger plumbed Smith's motives for writing the Book of Mormon by examining its rhetoric and concluded: "Joseph Smith ... regarded himself as [a] defender of God."6 "Even if one believes that Joseph Smith was at best a scoundrel," he observed, "one still must account for the Book of Mormon."7 Indeed, the book's religious appeal—its defense of God, Jesus, spiritual gifts, call to repentance—argues against presuming that Smith's motives were wholly self-serving.8 Marvin S. Hill, at the time a professor of history at Mormon-owned Brigham Young University, cautioned against approaching Smith solely in either/or terms.9 In his 1972 review of Fawn Brodie's biography, No Man Knows My History: The Life of Joseph Smith the Mormon Prophet (1945), Hill suggested that she had ignored the religious side of Smith's personality, portraying him as essentially irreligious. "[Brodie] says little about the rationalizations Joseph would have had to go through where his religious role was imposed upon him," he wrote. "Brodie was never able to take us inside the mind of the prophet, to understand how he thought and why. A reason for that may be that the sources she would have had to use were Joseph's religious writings, and her Smith was supposed to be irreligious."10 While Hullinger's thesis harmonizes many disparities in the historical record concerning Smith, I do not believe it goes far enough, for—like Brodie's discussion—it does not explore the inner moral conflicts of an individual who deceives in God's name while holding sincere religious beliefs. Among the first words Smith recorded in the diary he began keeping in late 1832 were: "Oh my God grant that I may be directed in all my thoughts. Oh bless thy servant. Amen." A few days later, he added: "Oh Lord deliver thy servant out of temptations and fill his heart with wisdom and understanding."11 Such passages reveal his inner world, and those who disregard them, who do not recognize a spiritual dimension to Smith's character or who count his profession of belief as contrived, discard a major piece of the puzzle. At the same time, one cannot ignore Smith's capacity to deceive. One of the clearest evidences of this is his repeated public denial during the early 1840s of his own and others' plural marriages.12 Perhaps more relevant to his early life is his activity as a treasure seer, one of the pieces of the puzzle that, I believe, has not been fully exploited by most writers. For example, some dismiss this as irrelevant to his later prophetic career or view it as a kind of supernatural training-ground for a developing prophet.13 Such perspectives, while not entirely inaccurate, are nonetheless incomplete. Despite attempts to minimize his involvement in treasure searching, Smith was in fact a leader among the treasure seers of Manchester, New York. It was Smith's reputation as a seer that drew Josiah Stowell to travel more than a hundred miles to hire the twenty-year-old, not to dig, but to lead in the hunt.14 From November 1825 until his arrest and court hearing in South Bainbridge in March 1826, Smith was employed by Stowell and others to locate buried treasure not only in Harmony, Pennsylvania, but throughout the southern part of New York state in Broome and Chenango counties.15 During the 1826 proceeding, Smith admitted that he had been actively engaged as a treasure seer for the past three years but said that he had decided to abandon the practice because it strained his eyes.16 It was not without reason that Smith tried to conceal these facts in his official history: if he did not consider them at odds with his role as prophet, he at least found them easier to omit than to explain. When we examine specific examples of Smith's treasure seeing, most attempts to minimize his involvement fail to persuade. For example, Jonathan Thompson, testifying in Smith's defense at the 1826 court hearing, reported that Smith once located a treasure chest with a seer stone. After digging several feet, the men struck something like a board or plank. They asked Smith to look into his stone again, but Smith refused, stating that the treasure was protected by the spirit of a murdered native American. Thompson remained a firm believer in Smith's "professed skill," adding that "on account of an enchantment, the trunk kept settling away from under them while digging."17 Any interpretation of Smith that is to be taken seriously must account for Thompson's friendly testimony. As I see it, there are three possible explanations: (1) Smith saw an imaginary treasure in his stone, (2) Smith pretended to see a treasure in his stone, or (3) Smith saw a real treasure which disappeared before being unearthed. Thus, we either accept the treasure-seeking lore of Smith's day as reality and reject rationalist categories of traditional historical investigation or come face-to-face with a man who consciously or unconsciously deceived. Personally, as both a rationalist and skeptic, I find it easier to assume that the treasure never existed and that Smith deceived Thompson or was himself deluded rather than believe that a buried treasure supernaturally vanished or relocated itself to another hiding spot. Those who believe that Smith literally translated the Book of Mormon from anciently engraved gold plates or who dismiss his treasure-seeing activities as irrelevant have difficulty with Thompson's testimony. Central to this is the knowledge that Smith used the same stone to translate the Book of Mormon. The implications are clear: if Smith translated and received revelations with his stone, did he also locate real buried treasure by the same means? Specifically, in the instance that Thompson reported, was there an actual trunk and did Smith really see two Indians who had fought over it? In the Book of Mormon, Smith integrates the treasure-seer's world view into his religious beliefs, describing cursed and slippery treasures (Hel. 12:18-19; 13:17-22, 31; Morm. 1:18-19) while confining the use of the seer stone to translating (Mosiah 8:13-18). The fact that Smith's interviews with a heavenly messenger (1823-27) occurred while he was also seeking treasure and that he used the same stone to translate the Book of Mormon seem to exclude any explanation that separates the two roles.18 Determining the nature of Smith's treasure seeking activities is thus essential in assessing his subsequent prophetic career. The pious fraud theory suggests a conscious decision to deceive. But what if Smith's deceit was unconscious? This theory posits that Smith may have been a victim of his own delusions, that he truly believed that he was receiving revelations when, in fact, they originated in his subconscious. A version of this theory was advanced at the turn of the twentieth century by I. Woodbridge Riley, who suggested that Smith's visions were the result of epileptic seizures, the Book of Mormon the product of unconscious forces.19 Riley associated Smith's rapid dictation of the Book of Mormon with a phenomenon known as "automatic writing," examples of which may be found in literary history.20 While elements of Riley's theory have persisted,21 his appeal to epilepsy has not. Smith did not inherit epilepsy from a grandfather whose seizures were the result of a head injury, and Smith's description of a loss of consciousness accompanying some of his early visions is comparable to the fainting spells of revivalists. Moreover, there is no evidence that Smith's early faintings were symptomatic of a life-long trait. Likewise, Utah-born literary critic Bernard DeVoto's theory that Smith's visions and revelations were entirely the result of paranoid delusions has not fared well.22 Brodie effectively countered such theories, arguing that the Book of Mormon's "very coherence belies their claims. ... Its structure shows elaborate design, its narrative is spun coherently, and it demonstrates throughout a unity of purpose."23 Dale Morgan observed that one would expect the continuance, even proliferation, of hallucinations and the like if DeVoto's thesis had merit, whereas with Smith, the reverse was true.24 In 1976, non-Mormon psychologist T. L. Brink argued that Smith's fears of persecution were based on reality and did not exhibit pathological or delusional qualities.25 The same fate may hold for those who suggest that Smith suffered from manic-depressive illness, also known as bipolar affective disorder. Prolonged depression can cause delusions and other dysfunctional behavior, but it does not adequately explain the Book of Mormon. As noted by Robert D. Anderson, a psychiatrist who points to the apparent lack of "periodicity" (i.e., episodic occurrences of mania) as a major weakness of such theories: "How does any form of Bipolar Affective Disorder explain the Book of Mormon, Smith's revelations, or the Book of Abraham? At best, it only provides Smith with thoughtful introspection when depressed and energy when hypomanic. It contributes little to the explanation for these 'miracles.'"26 Anderson's suggestion that Smith suffered from narcissistic personality disorder, which includes symptoms of grandiosity and mania, may offer a more persuasive approach to explaining Smith.27 Despite the apparent appeal of the unconscious fraud thesis, which seemingly relieves Smith of responsibility for his behavior, the specifics of his actions, both as treasure seer and inspired translator, demonstrate to my mind, at least, a major failing.28 There is an important piece of evidence that Smith's treasure seeing was not an unconscious delusion. It comes from Josiah Stowell, who testified at Smith's 1826 trial. Stowell said that Smith once told him he looked in his stone and saw a treasure buried with a "tail feather" near a certain tree stump. Stowell said he and Smith dug for the treasure and eventually found the feather, but the treasure had disappeared.29 The discovery of an object not normally found underground is proof either of a gift or of fraud, for the deluded would not accomplish such feats. For me, the most compelling evidence against unconscious fraud is the existence of the Book of Mormon plates themselves as an objective artifact which Joseph allowed his family and friends and even critics to handle while it was covered with a cloth or concealed in a box. The plates were either ancient or modern.30 Despite what I see as compelling evidence of conscious misdirection, I caution against viewing Smith's activities as treasure seer in either/or terms for it is possible that Smith was both convinced of his ability and also deceptive. In other words, he may have been sincere in his claims about seeing treasures and guardian spirits but at times provided additional proof through nefarious means to either satisfy followers or to silence enemies. Although the evidence for deceit is more easily demonstrated, Smith's complaint about being persecuted for his gift may nevertheless have been sincere. Likewise, as prophet, Smith may have believed himself to be inspired and may have at times heard voices or experienced visions but still used some deception to convince others. No biographer is completely free of bias. As is no doubt apparent, my inclination is to interpret any claim of the paranormal—precognition, clairvoyance, telekinesis, telepathy—as delusion or fraud. I do not claim that the supernatural does not exist, for it is impossible to prove a negative. I maintain only that the evidence upon which such claims rest is unconvincing to me. As a teenager I dabbled in stage magic and sleight-of-hand tricks, but my attention soon turned to charlatans and confidence men who use similar methods. The more I learned of the art of deception and its history, the more skeptical I became of any kind of real magic. While I later enjoyed D. Michael Quinn's Early Mormonism and the Magic World View (1987), I thought his treatment of magicians was too generous. Indeed, the book says virtually nothing of charlatans or of those who use magic as a backdrop for trickery and seems to accept uncritically the possibility that magicians—aside from stage magicians—actually possess to some degree the supernatural powers they claim. In fact, there is a variety of possibilities for categorizing magicians, as follows:
While most magicians make no religious or supernatural claims about their sleight-of-hand tricks and illusions, the roots of "manipulative magic" extend back to the origins of shamanism. If ancient shamans were anything like their counterparts in the world today, they were by definition magicians. Today, tribal shamans use rudimentary sleight-of-hand, fire handling, and other techniques to reinforce their spiritual messages.31 Despite their use of trickery, they sincerely believe they possess special gifts of healing and divination. Similar commingling of deception and sincere belief is practiced in the West by some faith healers. In ancient Egypt and Greece, shamans were temple priests who used their knowledge of science to control people. In the Apocrypha, the book "Bel and the Dragon" (ca. 130 B.C.) includes the story of Daniel exposing the trickery of Babylonian priests who entered the temple at night through a secret passage to consume food left for the god Bel. With the adoption of Christianity as the official religion of Rome in the fourth century, the magician's role diminished. The church guarded its authority and did not treat competitors kindly. During the latter Middle Ages, the Inquisition turned its attention from heretics to witches and sorcerers. In 1584, Reginald Scott, horrified by the slaughter of witches, published the Discovery of Witchcraft in which he not only described magic as a belief system but revealed the secret tricks of street magicians. By doing so, he hoped to put an end to superstition, fear, and bloodshed. In the nineteenth century, modern Spiritualism began with a simple hoax, conceived and perpetrated by teenage sisters Margaret and Kate Fox. Their home in Hydesville, New York, was purportedly invaded in 1848 by the ghost of a murdered man. As the sisters later confessed, the thumping sounds the ghosts made were achieved by the sisters cracking their toe joints. This prank turned into a small industry as the sisters and hundreds of others became "mediums" through whom the dead contacted the living during seances. While some mediums believed they possessed this gift, others used a variety of tricks to convince skeptics and to attract clients. Spiritualism thrived, especially after the Civil War and World War I, because mediums gave the grieving what they most wanted, which was hope. The history of mentalism (clairvoyance, precognition, second-sight) is equally relevant to Joseph Smith. The earliest famous practitioner was Conte Alessandro di Cagliostro (1743-95), a fraudulent seer who, like Smith, began his career locating buried treasure, then became an advisor to Marie Antoinette. During the French Revolution, he was exposed, arrested, and nearly executed. Washington Irving Bishop was an American mentalist who, in the late 1800s, perfected the blindfolded driving trick, claiming that "Almighty God" had given him special powers. He was exposed by the leading English stage magician, John Nevil Maskeylne, and left that country in disgrace. During the early twentieth century, a talented and charismatic mentalist named Joseph Dunninger claimed psychic powers and, through radio broadcasts, reached a prominence that was unparalleled by his predecessors. More recently, psychics Edgar Cayce and Jeane Dixon attracted followers, even posthumously, despite poor showings in scientifically controlled tests. Today the curious may reach psychics by telephone at any time of day or night for a fee. While Quinn describes magic in the context of treasure seeking and Smith's participation in a widespread phenomenon, he does not address the issue of charlatans and their methods. A typical confidence scheme in Smith's time involved a transient who entered an area that was known for its tales of lost treasures and the charlatan's magical powers could be put to good advantage. Using a "peep" stone or mineral rod, he would lead the credulous to a remote spot where he had previously deposited a few coins and was able to impress them by "finding" the coins. In the ensuing excitement, he would ask to be paid for his services or, more boldly, suggest that a company be established and that shares be sold. Thereupon, he would disappear with the money. On the other hand, he might string the people along by leading them to subsequent spots, then offer magical explanations for the failure to locate or secure the treasure. For instance, he might tell them that the treasure was protected by an evil spirit or that they had not precisely followed the magical formula he had given them. Eventually he would suggest that the undertaking be abandoned, whereupon he would slip out of town with the money. Aversion of the above scheme was perpetrated upon some of the inhabitants of Morristown, New Jersey, by Ransford (or Rainsford) Rogers in 1788-89. Rogers, who had duped a number of citizens in Exeter, New Hampshire, prior to his arrival in Morristown, bilked the Morristown treasure seekers of large sums of money before being exposed and arrested. However, he managed to escape and flee the state.32 The charlatan cannot exist without those who are vulnerable to his approach. The confidence scheme works because the charlatan takes advantage of his victim's greed, vanity, and trust. Similarly, the pious fraud works because of our own vulnerabilities. Otherwise rational people can be deceived because of their desire to control their environment or to avoid life's dangers. They want to believe that the future can be known, that the dead can be contacted, or that evil can be averted. It gives us a sense of control over the uncontrollable or a sense of comfort about the unknowable. Magic is an escape from the real world to a simpler time of fantasy when our parents were all-powerful and we were immortal. When the magician takes on the role of a surrogate parent, the attraction is irresistible to some. Indeed, the bond may be so strong that some charlatans continue to attract followers even after their fraud is exposed. Those who persist in trusting someone despite the evidence are said to suffer from the "true believer's syndrome."33 The magician requires the cooperation of his audience—the abandonment of skepticism and the suspension of disbelief. To penetrate the illusion, to expose the fraud, one must first stop collaborating. Since all magicians use the same vocabulary and exploit the same world view, we may ask what kind of magician/shaman Joseph Smith may have been. I believe that during his early career as a treasure seer, he was a charlatan but came to believe that he was, in fact, called of God and thereafter occasionally used deceit to bolster his religious message. I do not believe in real magicians, slippery treasures, bleeding ghosts, and so I regard Smith's discovery of the tail feather as an example of fraud. Nevertheless, there is a high degree of sincerity in Smith's career as a prophet, his defense of God against deism and skepticism. His touching emotional outburst at the 1830 baptism of his father appears to have been genuine.34 Taking a cue from Robert F. Berkhofer's 1969 book, A Behavioral Approach to Historical Analysis,35 some writers have suggested that historians should not attempt to evaluate Smith's supernatural experiences but instead "try to understand [such] experiences in the way in which the actors themselves understood them."36 Reflecting this approach in his 1984 biography of Smith, Richard L. Bushman wrote: "My method has been to relate events as the participants themselves experienced them. ... Insofar as the revelations were a reality to them, I have treated them as real in this narrative."37 While there is value to such a method, I am reluctant to dispense with critical tools and become a storyteller or narrator of the supernatural. I, too, want to understand Smith on his own terms, but I would like to be able to explain him. The suggestion that historians simply "relate events as the participants themselves experienced them" oversimplifies Berkhofer's thesis and results in a methodological reductionism that assumes the historical record is both factual and accurate. Berkhofer knew well that the record of an event cannot be taken at face value because accounts are so often tainted by a recorder's subjective beliefs. The historian's task is to determine, as best he or she can, what really happened. Berkhofer was not dealing with reports of supernatural events but with more mundane human behavior. Even so, when Smith fails to mention foundational visions until years after the event and gives conflicting and anachronistic accounts of them, how certain can one be that he relates events as he experienced them at the time? Even if we were to accept the idea that testimony regarding supernatural phenomena is reliable, we would still be under no obligation to uncritically embrace the witnesses' interpretations of those experiences. What Berkhofer did in 1969 was to open the door to psychology and sociology, not to close the door on the humanistic sciences. Historians do well to narrate the Salem witch trials of 1692 "as the participants themselves experienced them"—complete with accounts of paranormal phenomena, demonic possession, etc.—but they are also right to make a case for mass hysteria, for example.38 Simply put, a researcher is not limited in his or her analysis by the subjective view of the participant or even the work of past generations. Often, succeeding generations find additional sources and better tools with which to assess an event beyond what the participants themselves assumed. Arguing that skeptics like me are victims of their own "naturalistic assumptions" diverts attention from the fact that there is simply no reliable proof for the existence of the supernatural. Naturalism is part of our everyday experience; supernaturalism is not.39 The burden of proof rests with those making supernatural claims, and until such claims are proven "beyond a reasonable doubt," one is justified in approaching such claims skeptically. In his book The Age of Reason, eighteenth-century deist Thomas Paine argued: "Is it more probable that nature should go out other course, or that a man should tell a lie? We have never seen, in our time, nature go out of her course; but we have good reason to believe that millions of lies have been told in the same time; it is, therefore, at least millions to one, that the reporter of a miracle tells a lie."40 In my experience, those who champion the supernatural invariably do so arbitrarily, picking and choosing with little explanation which events qualify as genuine, which do not, and why one experience is superior to another. In my view, the defenders of a certain spiritual experience are vulnerable to the chaos of contradictory claims and lack the means, or methodology, to enable them to distinguish between theoretically "real" events and those clearly explained by naturalistic assumptions. None of Smith's defenders, as far as I know, have attempted to school themselves in the methods of the charlatan or in the psychology of the psychic. Yet, I believe such an education is essential to understanding phenomena that one sometimes encounters in the historical record. Consider, for example, Smith's use of stones and rods to locate buried treasure and lost objects. If the historian believes that divination is possible or that magic is real, he or she may make false assumptions about the nature of Smith's activities as a treasure seeker that will lead to misinterpretations of Smith's work as translator. In 1987, Quinn worried that some writers too willingly accepted "rationalist categories of superstition and fraud rather than Smith's and his supporters' affirmations of supernatural powers from the perspective of folk magic."41 In 1999, Bushman suggested that "treasure-seeking stones ... helped Joseph move step-by-step into his calling" and that Smith "must have understood that the stones had prepared him to step into the improbable roles of seer and unlearned translator."42 More recently, another scholar proposed that Smith moved "incrementally" from mineral rod to seer stone, to "a better seer stone," to the biblical urim and thummim, and was finally able, with the aid of this last instrument, to "train himself for unaided revelation."43 As I read these assertions, they not only imply that Smith saw objectively real treasures in his stone but embrace as fact a magical world view, including the bleeding ghosts and enchanted treasures that moved through the earth. In my mind, the failure of present-day adepts to prove the efficacy of divination under scientific conditions weighs heavily on the interpreter trying to make sense of Smith's early involvement in treasure searching and subsequent use of the same method as a translator.44 Since the same psychological forces producing this phenomenon today were undoubtedly at work in previous centuries, in what way could Smith possibly train himself to be a prophet using such delusive methods? Is it reasonable to assume that the same instruments that deluded so many of Smith's contemporaries suddenly became real in Smith's hands? Apologists for the supernatural argue that since true objectivity is impossible, faith-based history is as legitimate as secular-based history. Using the vocabulary of certain epistemologists, these writers confuse reasonable certainty with unreasonable doubt. Like all human endeavors, history has limitations, but I am comfortable in letting the best reconstruction—the one having the fewest assumptions and inconsistencies, and requiring the least elaboration—prevail. In writing this biography, I did not want to provide a simple chronological narrative of Smith's early life. Rather, I intended to consider the psychological implications of Smith's actions and beliefs and get as close to the man as possible. Thus, I have written an interpretive biography of an emotional and intellectual life. I will occasionally use qualifying verbs and adverbs to indicate where my analysis is speculative or conjectural, but my overall discussion and conclusions are firmly grounded in the primary source documents. The reason the pious fraud concept has not been fully considered in the past is because it is difficult to imagine why someone would deceive in God's name while simultaneously holding sincere religious beliefs. Yet, history is replete with examples of this. In 1748, skeptic David Hume asserted that "a religionist may be an enthusiast and imagine he sees what has no reality; he may know his narrative to be false and yet persevere in it with the best of intentions in the world, for the sake of promoting so holy a cause."45 Concerning religious fraud generally, seventeenth-century moral philosopher William Paley declared:
While Paley referred to medieval and post-medieval religious forgeries, one should not forget the many pseudepigraphic (or pseudonymous) and apocryphal writings—the Assumption of Moses, the Book of Enoch, the Ascension of Isaiah—generally dating from 200 B.C. to A.D. 200. These writers appended names of ancient prophets and other Jewish figures to their books not only to conceal their own identities but to lend authority and prestige to their works.47 While the pseudonymous author believed his writing was inspired, he knew its ancient setting was fictional, leading one interpreter to compare Smith's Book of Mormon to the work of the pseudepigraphists.48 Britain boasted two talented forgers in the eighteenth century, Thomas Chatter-ton, who at age twelve began "discovering" poems said to have been written in the fifteenth century, and James MacPherson, who pretended to translate a series of poems purportedly dating from the third century.49 A religious forgery surfaced in England in the mid-1790s bearing the tide, A Remarkable Prophecy, and claimed to be a translation of a 600-year-old Hebrew text written in gold letters on a stone buried in France. Republished throughout America, Remarkable Prophecy foretold the French Revolution and the eventual establishment of God's millennial kingdom in 1800.50 A forged letter of Jesus "found" sixty-five years after the crucifixion under a large stone that only a young boy could lift was also widely published in America between 1761 and 1815.51 Like Paley, Paine declared in The Age of Reason:
We need not confuse Smith's inner, spiritual world with the image he projected to followers. Many of those close to Smith eventually discovered the disparity between the mantle of the prophet and the man himself. Historians must similarly distinguish between the public and private Smith and carefully unravel the many layers of his image, created in large measure to satisfy the demands of followers. We should seek to discover the emotional, spiritual, and intellectual "reality" from which he operated. It is not enough to know that Smith was religious or that he had a spiritual dimension; one must try to know what those particular beliefs and actions were. Sometimes one's private beliefs are unconsciously or unintentionally revealed in the implied or connotative meanings of a text. In my analysis, I will consider the Book of Mormon and the texts of Smith's revelations as primary sources containing possible clues to his inner conflicts and state of mind. The Book of Mormon, in particular, is important in any consideration of possible environmental and cultural sources. This is not to say that I am trying to determine its modernity or antiquity but rather to achieve a deeper understanding of its contents and what it reveals about Smith. As one writer explained:
In other words, I am in fact interested in the cultural and environmental influences on the Book of Mormon, and I will bring them to the reader's attention wherever applicable, but I am mostly interested in Smith's state of mind. "Like any first novel," Brodie noted, the Book of Mormon "can be read to a limited degree as autobiography."54 This is especially true since Smith's method of dictation did not allow for rewriting. It was a more-or-less stream-of-consciousness composition. Indeed, woven into the Book of Mormon's narrative are certain beliefs, hopes, fears, struggles, transformations, thoughts, dreams, and future plans that are illuminating when read in the context of autobiography. However, to suggest that the Book of Mormon is partly autobiographical is not to say that it would exactly reproduce Smith's life. Rather, it contains possible fragments of Smith's life and views, rearranged and altered in a way that produce a distinct narrative force and continuity.55 Of particular interest are instances where Smith articulates the ideas and philosophies of an apparent religious pretender, including the principles upon which a pious deception could be founded. One of the most important textual evidences of Smith's early state of mind is a revelation he dictated in March 1830—the month the Book of Mormon came off the press (D&C 19). Directed to Martin Harris, the revelation not only reveals a secret belief in Universalism, seemingly reversing the Book of Mormon doctrine, but also provides a glimpse into pious rationalizations.56 The revelation explains that the terms "eternal punishment" and "endless punishment" are motivational scriptural embellishments intended to "work upon the hearts of the children of men" (v. 7) but that "it is not written that there shall be no end to this torment" (v. 6). In other words, God deceives men and women for their own good. This is precisely what one would expect of a religious pretender. The revelation invokes secrecy concerning its contents and expresses concern that the truth of the temporary hell would encourage sinners to remain unrepentant (BofC 16:22-23; cf D&C 19:21-22). Despite posing as a traditionalist in regard to heaven and hell, Smith privately aligned himself with the Universalists and did not himself fear an eternal, never-ending punishment. Like other pious manipulators, Smith undoubtedly took comfort in various biblical precedents such as the story of Abraham and Isaac lying about the marital status of their wives (Gen. 12:11-13, 20:13; Gen. 26:7); Abraham lying to Isaac about the true object of sacrifice (Gen. 22:7-8); Jacob deceiving Isaac to obtain his firstborn's blessing (Gen. 27); Moses lying to Pharaoh (Exod. 3:18); one prophet lying to another (1 Kings 13); Jehu pretending to worship Baal (2 Kings 10); and Paul becoming "all things to all people" (1 Cor.9:22) in circumcising Timothy (Acts 16:3). Smith knew that God told Adam he would die "in the day" he ate the forbidden fruit (Gen. 2:17), that God sent a lying spirit to Ahab (1 Kings 22:19-23; cf 2 Thess. 2:11), and that God deceived Israel (Jer. 4:10), as he did Jeremiah (Jer. 20:7) and other prophets (Ezek. 14:9).57 Combined with Universalism, the belief that God sometimes deceives to save his children explains how Smith could perpetrate religious deception while at the same time having the appearance of a deep and sincere faith. Those who overlook this aspect of Smith's private belief system cannot fully understand or appreciate his development as prophet. To counter the argument that the infusion of other disciplines diminishes history, I point to Berkhofer's observation that a historian brings to his subject a considered view of human behavior, so this view should draw from a disciplined and conscious theory.58 A disciplined understanding of human personality and psychology has a twofold benefit of being a safeguard against the unintentional imposition of one's own psychology onto the subject and an expanded spectrum from which a subject may be viewed. My approach to Joseph Smith is also informed by family-systems theory, which views the family as an organism-like system that seeks to maintain emotional equilibrium (homeostasis).59 In a dysfunctional family, where one or both of the parents are emotionally impaired, the family seeks balance in neurotic or pathological ways. An imbalance between parents greatly affects the family system, especially the children who usually seek to save the marriage. I argue that the marriage of Smith's parents—Lucy and Joseph Sr.—like many marriages, was essentially dysfunctional. It was marked by religious conflict and financial burden even before Joseph Jr''s birth.60 Other contributing factors were Lucy's periodic bouts with depression and suicidal fantasies and Joseph Sr.'s struggle with low self-esteem and alcoholism.61 I argue that the Smith children, first Alvin and then Joseph Jr., were drawn into their parents' dynamic in an attempt to save their marriage. In the years before his death in 1823, Alvin functioned almost as a surrogate husband and father.62 The significance of his death in his younger brother's development cannot be overemphasized. The sudden loss of Alvin created a vacuum in the family, plunging it into a period of instability and conflict. It would take years for the Smiths to achieve a measure of equilibrium, largely acquired through the founding of Smith's church. Smith's family environment cannot be ignored. I will argue that the "singular environmental pressure" motivating Smith's behavior came primarily from his family, that he began his religious career, in part, to resolve family conflict.63 To augment Hullinger's thesis, I suggest Smith believed he was called of God to preach repentance to a sinful world and felt justified in using whatever means were at his disposal to accomplish this mission. Initially, he thought he could frighten followers into repentance and thereby save them from the torments of even a temporary hell (D&C 19). Later, in 1832, he would use incentives of higher rewards by introducing the concept of three heavens (D&C 76). Meanwhile, if men and women were saved by erroneously believing in an eternal hell, this was justified by the fact that Smith's followers would be saved; all that mattered were that their repentance and faith in Christ were sincere. Like the faith healer who uses confederates and deception to create a faith-promoting atmosphere in which "true" healing miracles can occur, Smith assumed the role of prophet, produced the Book of Mormon, and issued revelations to create a setting in which conversion experiences could take place. In perpetuating this myth, what did Smith believe his own fate would be? There is a hint of this in his March 1830 revelation which declares: "I, God, have suffered these things for all, that they might not suffer if they would repent; But if they would not repent they must suffer even as I" (D&C 19:16-17). Of course, orthodox Christians view this as an infringement on Jesus' infinite atonement. Still, in Smith's day, this concept was held by other Universal-Restorationists in one form or another. Applied to Smith's piety, he may have thought that those who believed in the Book of Mormon and repented, regardless of the book's origins, would be saved or at least not destroyed at Jesus' second coming. For this act of deception. Smith—much like Jesus—would have to suffer in a temporary hell and become a savior to his followers.64 His March 1830 revelation—together with other passages from his writings—demonstrates that he believed God sometimes inspires deception, that some sins are committed in accordance with divine will, and that occasionally it is necessary to break one commandment to fulfill another. We may never fully know Smith's reasons, but we can confidently say that if he wrote the Book of Mormon, became a prophet, and founded his church as a pious invention, he possessed the psychological means to explain and justify such acts. In assembling the prophet puzzle, I have tried to understand Smith, but I have not wanted to judge him. I find myself sympathetic to Smith, although not uncritically. As Shipps noted, "The mystery of Mormonism cannot be solved until we solve the mystery of Joseph Smith."651 hope this biography not only brings Shipps's two Josephs together but elucidates his motives, conflicts, and rationalizations, as Hill also suggested. Indeed, only by pushing an analysis of Smith beyond the prophet/fraud dichotomy and plumbing the complexities of his life will a truly three-dimensional person emerge. He may have been a prophet, however one might define that term; but to instill faith, he pretended to be more. He became the kind of man his followers wanted him to be—one more convincing, powerful, and righteous than he knew himself to be. I need to express thanks and appreciation to those who encouraged me in this project: H. Michael Marquardt for his support; Lavina Fielding Anderson, Robert D. Anderson, Newell G. Bringhurst, and Richard Van Wagoner for their advice; and my wife, Margie Dresser-Vogel, for her love and encouragement. While I am certain that none of these individuals agrees entirely with my analysis and conclusions, I have benefitted immensely from each of them. Whatever errors may exist within the book are my own. In quoting original manuscripts, I have sometimes silently edited spelling, capitalization, and punctuation to enhance readability. References to my five-volume Early Mormon Documents (Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 1996-2003) appear in the chapter endnotes as EMD followed by volume and page number(s). _______________ NOTES: * * * * * As a probable result of Solomon Mack's financial difficulties, the Smiths moved from their modest cabin in the Sharon hills and returned to be with Joseph Sr.'s family in Tunbridge, arriving shortly before Samuel Harrison's birth on 13 March 1808.1 By this time, at least one of Asael Smith's sons, Silas, and possibly John and Asael Jr., had moved to St. Lawrence County, New York, which meant that there was temporary living space available in Tunbridge.2 Ultimately each of Asael's sons forsook their Vermont inheritances and settled in northeastern New York, while the stubborn Joseph Sr. would hang on another eight years, wandering from town to town until near-starvation forced him to abandon the unyielding soil of his homeland. The Smiths stayed in Tunbridge a short time and then moved to nearby Royalton, but the tranquility of their four years in Sharon and Tunbridge in the bosom of the Mack and Smith families would contrast sharply with the tumult of the next eight years. At Royalton, the Smiths settled into what was known as the "Metcalf neighborhood," and Joseph Sr. may have engaged in "merchandising" part of the time.3 In later years, Lucy expressed a sentiment that probably contributed to their lack of success as merchants. While taking tea with the wives of some wealthy Palmyrans, Lucy defended her family's humble circumstances, commenting that she was comfortably situated and quite happy to avoid the evils accompanying the mercantile profession. Her family's circumstances, she said, had "not been obtained at the expense of the comfort of any human being; we owe no man [and] we never distressed any man, which circumstance almost invariably attends the mercantile life. So I have no reason to envy those who are [so] engaged."4 Town records indicate that by the end of the Smiths three years in Royalton, Joseph Sr. had returned to cultivating a thirteen-acre farm.5 Royalton residents would later claim that Joseph Jr. attended school on Dewey Hill where Deacon Jonathan Kinney taught letters.6 If true, this would be the youngster's first exposure to education outside the home. The Smith children would only sporadically participate in formal education. During their residence in Royalton, Lucy gave birth to two sons: Ephraim, named after Joseph's son in the Old Testament and born, according to Lucy's memory, on 13 March 1810; and William, perhaps named after the young orphan who had accompanied Jason Mack and for whom the Smiths had much affection, born the following year, also on 13 March. Ephraim died eleven days after birth, which meant that there had been two deaths in the household, but this being the first to directly affect four-year-old Joseph. In the month after William's birth, Lucy reports that Joseph Sr.'s "mind became much excited upon the subject of religion" but that "he would not subscribe to any particular system of faith." Rather, she remembered, her husband--like her brother Jason--"contended for the ancient order" as established by Jesus and his apostles. Joseph Sr. received a remarkable dream that confirmed this disposition. As Lucy recalled the dream years later, her husband found himself walking through a wasteland completely barren except for some fallen trees. There was no sign of life; a "death-like silence prevailed." Besides the "attendant spirit" who accompanied him, Joseph felt alone in this "gloomy desert." The spirit told him the field represented the world "which now lieth inanimate and dumb, in regard to the true religion, or plan of salvation." The spirit instructed Joseph to walk until he came to a log with a box on top, to open it, and to eat its contents which, the spirit said, "will give unto you wisdom and understanding." As Joseph began to consume the contents of the box, he felt "perfectly happy" until he was interrupted by "all manner of beasts, horned cattle, and roaring animals, [which] rose up on every side in the most threatening manner possible, tearing the earth, tossing their horns, and bellowing most terrifically all around me, and they finally came so close upon me, that I was compelled to drop the box, and fly for my life." He then awoke "trembling with terror."7 The dream's depressed tone and the dreamer's yearning for spiritual nourishment have been commented upon by others.8 Joseph Sr. evidently possessed a melancholy disposition, which perhaps contributed to his reported excessive drinking. His dream visions were replete with motifs of death and destruction. His favorite hymn, according to his son William, was "Evening" by Baptist minister John Leland, the theme of which is the nearness of death.9 Yet, Palmyra residents describe Joseph Sr. as a happy drunkard, and he evidently had moments of frivolity for which he subsequently berated himself. On a deeper level, the dream reflects the same impotence Joseph experienced with regard to his father's and brother's disapproval of Lucy's attendance at Methodist meetings. Because Joseph lacked the courage to stand up to adversity, true happiness was fleeting. The dream may have been triggered in part by the revival of 1810-11 which was instrumental in Solomon Mack's conversion. Solomon's defection from Universalism left Joseph with a keener sense of being alone in a wasteland of religious orthodoxy. Lucy was encouraged by her mother's success with her father, and she renewed her efforts to convert her husband and claim the promise of her 1803 dream. In this context, Joseph's first dream vision not only expressed his religious and emotional conflict but more importantly asserted his independent spirit. As Lucy said of his behavior following his dream, Joseph "seemed more confirmed than ever, in the opinion that there was no order or class of religionists that knew any more concerning the kingdom of God than those of the world, or such as made no profession of religion whatever."10 The dream permitted him to resist all invitations to convert and placed him in opposition to his wife. Indeed, he would hold back until his son founded the Church of Christ in 1830. Probably during the summer or fall of 1812, the Smiths moved across the Connecticut River to Lebanon, New Hampshire. The years of hard work at Royalton had paid off, for Lucy remarked on their initial settlement in Lebanon: "We settled down and began to congratulate ourselves upon our prosperity. ... We looked around us anc said, what do we now lack. There is nothing which we have not a sufficiency of to make us and our children perfectly comfortable both for food and raiment as well a; that which is necessary to a respectable appearance in society both at home and abroad."11 Success did not cause them to slacken their efforts. "We doubled our diligence," Lucy reported, "in order to obtain more of this world's goods."12 Lucy prepared to work through the ensuing winter by storing up 100 pounds of candles and 200 yards of cloth. Hyrum was sent to Moore's Charity School in nearby Hanover while Alvin and Sophronia, perhaps Joseph too, went to common school. William and Samuel remained at home. Lucy reported that she and her husband "were industriously laboring late and early to do all in our power for their [children's] future welfare."13 For the first time in their marriage, Joseph and Lucy began to think about providing for their old age. "We met with success on every hand," Lucy later recalled.14 The Smiths were enjoying their prosperity and optimistically looking to the future when suddenly calamity struck. Typhoid fever began a deadly march through the Connecticut Valley in 1812 Sophronia was the first in the family to fall ill. When Hyrum returned from the winter session at Hanover four weeks later, he too was sick. Alvin followed, then another child until all except the parents lay sick in bed. After three months, the physician at tending Sophronia pronounced her case terminal. One night, as Sophronia lay wide-eyed and motionless and apparently dead, Lucy and Joseph fell to their knee and begged God to spare her life. Suddenly Lucy threw a blanket around Sophronia: and gathered her into her arms. Pressing the child to her breast, she paced the floor, refusing to be consoled and determined not to lose another child. After a few moments, the child suddenly began to cry. Joseph's and Lucy's prayer would be answered. Lucy placed the girl on the bed and then collapsed next to her. Death had called upon the Smiths for the third time, but Luc''s faith had barred it from entering. Young Joseph seemed to have recovered, but one day he suddenly screamed out from pain in his shoulder. The symptom was misdiagnosed by the attending physician, Dr. Parker, as a sprain and treated as such despite the youngster's objections. Two weeks later a boil underneath the shoulder blade was lanced and drained. The procedure appeared to be successful, but Joseph next felt a severe pain in his left shin bone. He was experiencing common complication of typhoid fever whereby bacteria in the blood seeds and then infects the bone. His leg swelled. After two weeks, the pain was unbearable. Lucy was pregnant and did all she could in her condition to alleviate her son's suffering until she herself became ill. Hyrum then took over, sitting by his brother's bed and pressing the infected leg between his hands, which helped to reduce the pain. After the third week, the Smiths called for a surgeon, Dr. Stone, who made an eight-inch incision on the front of Joseph's leg between the knee and the ankle. This provided temporary relief. The physician was called again; this time he cut to the bone. When the procedure proved ineffectual, he advised amputation of the leg. A small group of physicians from the Dartmouth Medical College soon appeared at the Smiths' door. The details of this third attempt to save Joseph's leg, as related by Lucy in 1845, are somewhat questionable. According to Lucy, the physicians came ready to perform the amputation, but she and her seven-year-old refused. She said she spoke privately with the doctors, imploring them to try once more to save the leg, going as far as to refuse them entrance to the room where Joseph lay until they promised not to amputate. Agreeing to her wishes, the doctors proposed to cut away only the infected part of the bone, an unconventional but sound procedure for which one of the doctors, Nathan Smith, was well-known. Lucy's account places her in the central role of saving her son's leg. Plastic surgeon William D. Morain refers to Lucy's story as "fabrication," noting that "Nathan Smith was probably alone in American medicine at this time in arguing vehemently against amputation and in favor of limited removal of the dead portion of bone. ... Thus, it was not Lucy Smith's flash of surgical insight and persuasive power that convinced the pessimistic surgeons to do as she 'had requested' in saving Joseph's leg. ... In her distorted narrative she was not the powerless, frustrated person she most certainly had been at the critical moment of Joseph's crisis."15 Lucy said she allowed the doctors to enter the room where, in the presence of the boy's father, who had attended to him throughout the ordeal, young Joseph heard the procedure explained. Upon hearing this plan, Joseph Sr. "burst into a flood of tears, and sobbed like a child," according to Lucy. 16 Here again, one notes the contrasting images: Lucy is strong and decisive while Joseph Sr. is weak and childlike. In preparation for the surgery. Dr. Smith suggested that the child be bound with cords, to which the youngster objected. The seven-year-old was then asked to drink some brandy. He again refused. The doctor offered wine, which Joseph declined. All he needed, he said, was for his father to hold him during the operation. Such a request may have been prompted partly by a desire to see his father be strong in these circumstances in addition to the comfort his father would provide. The young Joseph tearfully insisted that his mother leave the house so she would not hear his screams. Yet, said Lucy, at a hundred yards, she could still hear her son's cries and therefore flew to his side. When she entered the room, her son pleaded for her to go. When she ran into the room a second time, she saw the open wound and blood and her son "pale as a corpse": "Big drops of sweat were rolling down his face, every feature of which depicted agony that cannot be described."17 Lucy was forced out of the room and was prevented from reentering. The operation would prove successful. Dr. Smith bore holes into the tibia, then broke off three large pieces of bone. As the leg healed, fourteen additional fragments worked their way to the surface. During his recuperation, Joseph became so emaciated that Lucy carried him around the house with ease. He slowly began to thrive again but relied on crutches for about three years and, through the remainder of his life, would retain a reminder in the form of a slight limp. Emotionally, the experience no doubt left scars that would not be easily healed.18 As soon as he could travel, Joseph accompanied his uncle Jesse to Salem, Massachusetts, to convalesce in the ocean breeze. With Jesse as tour guide, Joseph was no doubt surprised by the opulence he encountered in a city that had so obviously strayed from its Puritan heritage. Ironically, he would return to Salem in 1836 hoping to find treasure said to be buried in the basement of a house there.19 Lucy remembered that her family was afflicted with typhoid fever for an entire year and that the medical expenses left them in "very low circumstances."20 Meanwhile, Katharine was born on 28 July 1813.21 Soon after her birth, Joseph Sr. had a second dream vision which reflected his desire for family unity in religion. In his dream, Joseph found himself walking on a wide road through a desert-like field. He hesitated to travel such a barren path, but his spirit guide encouraged him to continue. Finally, he reached a narrower trail, which he followed to "a beautiful stream of water, which ran from east to west." Along the bank was a rope "about as high as a man could reach." In the distance was a pleasant valley with a single tree bearing some kind of fruit, similar in shape to a chestnut but white. The husks began to open and drop their contents onto the ground. Drawn to the tree, Joseph began feasting on its fruit, which he found to be "delicious beyond description." He felt a desire to share the experience with his family, which at that time consisted of Lucy and seven children: Alvin, Hyrum, Sophronia, Joseph Jr., Samuel, William, and Katharine. After they commenced eating and praising God for this blessing, Joseph noticed, opposite the valley, a tall "spacious building" full of doors and windows wherein finely dressed people ridiculed the family and pointed a "finger of scorn" at them. The guide instructed Joseph to bring the rest of his family to the tree, but he responded that his entire family was present. The guide showed him two children standing to one side, perhaps representing Ephraim and the Smiths' first, unnamed, stillborn child. Joseph brought the two children to the tree and the entire family knelt and began eating the fruit. Shortly, Joseph turned to the guide and asked the meaning of the building full of people. "It is Babylon," the guide said, "and it must fall. The people in the doors and windows are the inhabitants thereof, who scorn and despise the saints of God, because of their humility." Joseph awoke clasping his hands together for joy.22 The dream certainly represents Joseph Sr.'s wish for his entire family to be religiously united despite outside pressures to the contrary. It also expressed his desire to share with his family the rewards of personal faith. Yet, it reveals the pain and embarrassment he felt over his family's poverty as well as his increasing sense of alienation resulting from his unorthodox religious views. The dream reassured him that his family would be saved and that his enemies would be destroyed. In bringing his two dead children to the tree, he rejected the orthodox idea that children who die without baptism are damned. This eased his mind about his children's deaths, which he confessed in 1834 had caused him emotional pain.23 Probably in the late spring or early summer of 1814, the Smiths returned across the Connecticut River to Norwich, Vermont. Mounting debt may have necessitated the move across a state line. In Norwich, according to Lucy, the Smiths rented a farm from a "Squire Moredock," apparently Constant Murdock, one of the town's leading citizens. Here Joseph Sr. held on for three successive crop failures before permanently forsaking the unforgiving soil. Lucy remembered that despite their first crop failure, her family was able to survive on the proceeds of the farm's orchard as well as by their own in-home industry. When their crops failed the second year, Joseph Sr. determined to give Vermont one last chance, vowing to leave the state if he met with a third failure. He could not have known that a volcanic explosion on the island of Sumbawa in the Indian Ocean in 1815 would result in mid-summer snowstorms in 1816 for New England's farmers. On 15 March 1816, perhaps anticipating a difficult harvest, town officials issued the Smiths a "Warning Out," releasing the community from the responsibility of supporting the poor.24 The birth of Don Carlos on 25 March 1816 further encumbered an already burdened family. About this time, Joseph Sr. had another of his remarkable dreams. This time he dreamed he was traveling on foot and was so sick and lame that he could barely walk Finally his knee gave out and he fell to the ground. His spirit guide commanded hin to keep walking until he reached a certain garden, promising him that he would be healed. Upon asking how he would recognize the place, the guide said that he should walk until he came to a large gate, open it, and that he would therein see the mos beautiful flowers he had ever encountered. Joseph Sr. took hold of a staff and hobbled along with the "firmest resolution" to reach his destination "in order to be healed." Upon entering the garden, he saw a walkway bordered by two long benches. Seats on these benches were twelve wooden images, six on each side, about the size of large man. As he walked past them, each pair rose up and bowed to him. He turned to his guide to ask the meaning of the vision, but suddenly awoke.25 While the published version dates the dream to 1822, which would be during the Smiths' residence in Manchester, New York, the preliminary manuscript of Lucy history indicates that it occurred in "the month that Carlos was born."26 In this context, the dream foreshadowed the Smiths' move to New York. If Lucy is right, the dream occurred when the Smiths had just experienced two crop failures and we about to encounter a third. Even before the seeds were planted, Joseph Sr. may ha been turning his thoughts toward New York. Perhaps it would be his land of promise and healing where he would escape the indignities of poverty and find honor. But reaching his destination, he would have to fight his own feelings of inadequate self-doubt, and depression. The dream's conclusion was reminiscent of the Old Testament dream of Jose wherein the ancient patriarch saw twelve sheaves in a field representing the two sons of Jacob. The eleven sheaves bowed to his sheave (Gen. 37:5-8). Although Joseph Sr. was not told the meaning of the twelve figures, his son would eventually appoint him presiding patriarch of a church that would include twelve apostles. Recalling the conditions that caused her family's third successive failed harvest Lucy said that the crops were "blighted by [an] untimely frost ... which well nigh produced a famine."27 She does not say whether her family experienced hunger or even starvation, but the situation was desperate enough to justify drastic measures. One day Joseph Sr. came into the house and hesitantly told Lucy about an opportunity to depart for Palmyra, New York, with a Mr. Howard. Both he and Lucy knew the separation would be necessary. Joseph was concerned about abandoning his family, nor could he leave town without first paying his debts. Following Lucy's suggestion, he arranged with his debtors to pay his creditors. All parties were satisfied--or so the Smiths thought--and so Joseph left Norwich. Alvin and Hyrum followed their father for a distance before returning home. They knew it would be some time before they would see him again. With winter fast approaching, Lucy prepared for her own difficult 300-mile trip by making "a great quantity of woolen clothing."28 Snow had begun to fall by the time she received a letter from her husband asking her to join him. The letter informed her that he had made arrangements for her and the children to travel with Luther Howard, a cousin of his former traveling companion. Lucy began at once to load the wagon with furniture and other belongings but was interrupted when some of her husband's creditors demanded immediate repayment. Lucy was forced to pay $150 from her traveling funds or risk being sued and detained in Norwich. This left her with approximately $70 for the trip. Nevertheless, after a determined Lucy placed her elderly mother in the wagon and bundled up her eight children, who ranged in age from ten months to eighteen years, with Howard at the reins, she set out for New York. They began their trip perhaps as late as January 1817.29 Joseph Jr. remembered that "the snow was generally deep through the country during this journey."30 On the second day of the trip, the sleigh overturned and injured Lucy's mother. Upon reaching Lydia's home in Royalton, mother and daughter bid one another an emotional farewell, not knowing when, if ever, they might see each other again. Lydia admonished her daughter to "continue faithful in the exercise of every religious duty to the end of your days that I may have the pleasure of embracing you in another fairer world above."31 In her history, Lucy remarked that the separation was a "severe trial to my feelings, one to which I shall ever look back with peculiar sensations that can never be obliterated."32 Lucy does not express similar sentiments about her father, who may have been away from home at this time.33 Lucy found that Howard was unprincipled and cruel--fond of drinking, gambling, and women. At one point during the journey, a family named Gates joined them and Howard, so he could keep company with two of Gates's daughters, forced young Joseph out of the wagon. Joseph had only recently discarded his crutches and "suffered the most excruciating weariness and pain."34 When Alvin and Hyrum protested, Howard struck them with the handle of his whip. An already difficult trip quickly turned abusive and humiliating for the Smiths. When the company reached a small town twenty miles west of Utica, New York, Lucy ran out of money and patience. In the morning, as she prepared for the day's journey, a distraught Alvin came to her with news that Howard had thrown their things from the wagon and was preparing to leave with their wagon and team. Joseph remembered otherwise that his mother seized the horses by the reins and refused to let Howard leave.35 Lucy said she found Howard in the tavern and shouted to ever one that he was trying to steal her wagon and horses, then turned to him and said "As for you sir I have no use for you and you can ride or walk the rest of the way; you please but I shall take charge of my own affairs."36 It is not known if Howard stayed with the company for the remaining hundred miles or went his own way. Out of funds, Lucy paid for her family's lodging with bits of cloth, clothing, an finally at the last inn, Sophronia's earrings. For the last leg of the trip, she arrange for Joseph to ride with the Gateses, but when he attempted to get into their sleigh the driver, one of Gates's sons, knocked him down and Joseph was "left to wallow in my blood until a stranger came along, picked me up, and carried me to the town of Palmyra."37 This was undoubtedly a terrifying event for an eleven-year-old boy. After the difficult journey of about two weeks, Lucy and the children arrived in Palmyra with few possessions and two cents in cash. Lucy said the joy of "throwing myself and my children upon the care and affection of a tender husband and father" was reward enough for what she had suffered. She described her family's joyous reunion: "The children surrounded their father clinging to his neck covering his face with tears and kisses that were heartily reciprocated by him."38 Adversity has strengthened the family against a hostile world for the time being. _______________ 1. Solomon evidently took out a second mortgage on his Sharon land on 21 March 1807 (see Richard L. Anderson, Joseph Smith's New England Heritage: Influences of Grandfathers
Solomon Mack and Asael Smith, 2nd rev. ed. [Salt Lake City: Deseret Book; Provo, UT: BYU
Press, 2003], 221, n. 65). |