JS, History, 1838–1856, vol. F-1, created 9 Apr.–7 June 1856 and 20 Aug. 1856–6 Nov. 1856; handwriting of and Jonathan Grimshaw; 304 pages, plus 10 pages of addenda; CHL. This is the final volume of a six-volume manuscript history of the church. This sixth volume covers the period from 1 May to 8 Aug. 1844; the remaining five volumes, labeled A-1 through E-1, go through 30 Apr. 1844.
Historical Introduction
History, 1838-1856, volume F-1, constitutes the last of six volumes documenting the life of Joseph Smith and the early years of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The series is also known as the Manuscript History of the Church and was originally published serially from 1842 to 1846 and 1851 to 1858 as the “History of Joseph Smith” in the Times and Seasons and Deseret News. This volume contains JS’s history from 1 May 1844 to the events following his 27 June 1844 death, and it was compiled in Utah Territory in 1856.
The material recorded in volume F-1 was initially compiled under the direction of church historian , who was JS’s cousin, and also assistant church historian . Smith collaborated with in collecting material for the volume and creating a set of draft notes, which Smith dictated to Bullock and other clerks. Woodruff gathered additional material concerning the death of Joseph Smith as a supplement to George A. Smith’s work recording that event. Jonathan Grimshaw and , members of the Historian’s Office staff, transcribed the draft notes into the volume along with the text of designated documents.
According to the Historian’s Office journal, Jonathan Grimshaw initiated work on the text of volume F-1 on 9 April 1856, soon after Robert L. Campbell had completed work on volume E-1. (Historian’s Office, Journal, 5 and 9 Apr. 1856.) Grimshaw’s scribal work begins with an entry for 1 May 1844. Unlike previous volumes in which the numbering had run consecutively to page 2028, Grimshaw began anew with page 1. He transcribed 150 pages by June 1856, and his last entry was for 23 June 1844. Though more of his writing does not appear in the volume, he continued to work in the office until 2 August, before leaving for the East that same month. (Historian’s Office, Journal, 2 and 10 Aug. 1856.)
assumed the role of scribe on 20 August 1856. (Historian’s Office, Journal, 20 Aug. 1856.) He incorporated ’s draft notes for the period 24–29 June 1844 on pages 151–189, providing an account of JS’s death and its immediate aftermath. He next transcribed a related extract from ’s 1854 History of Illinois on pages 190–204. Pages 205–227 were left blank.
provided the notes for the final portion of the text. This account begins with an entry for 22 June 1844 and continues the record through 8 August 1844, ending on page 304. (The volume also included ten pages of addenda.) The last specific entry in the Historian’s Office journal that captures at work on the history is for 6 November 1856. A 2 February 1857 Wilford Woodruff letter to indicates that on 30 January 1857, the “presidency sat and heard the history read up to the organization of the church in , 8th. day of August 1844.” (Historian’s Office, Journal, 6 Nov. 1856; Wilford Woodruff, Great Salt Lake City, Utah Territory, to George A. Smith, 2 Feb. 1857, Historian’s Office, Letterpress Copybooks, vol. 1, p. 410; see also Wilford Woodruff, Great Salt Lake City, Utah Territory, to Amasa Lyman and Charles C. Rich, 28 Feb. 1857, Historian’s Office, Letterpress Copybooks, vol. 1, pp. 430–431.)
The pages of volume F-1 contain a record of the final weeks of JS’s life and the events of the ensuing days. The narrative commences with and arriving at , Illinois, on 1 May 1844 from their lumber-harvesting mission in the “” of Wisconsin Territory. As the late spring and summer of 1844 unfold, events intensify, especially those surrounding the suppression of the Nauvoo Expositor in mid-June. Legal action over the Expositor leads to a charge of riot, and subsequently JS is charged with treason and is incarcerated at the jail in , Illinois. The narrative of volume F-1 concludes with an account of the special church conference convened on 8 August 1844 to consider who should assume the leadership of the church.
<June> to produce a general famine all over the country. The wheat harvest was also approaching; and if we got into a war, there was no foreseeing when it would end, or when the militia could safely be discharged. In addition to these considerations, all the grist mills in all that section of the country had been swept away, or disabled, by the high waters, leaving the in[HC 7:7]habitants almost without meal or flour, and making it impossible then to procure provisions by impressment— or otherwise, for the sustenance of any considerable force.
“This was the time of the high waters; of astonishing floods in all the rivers and creeks in the western country. The at , was several feet higher than it was ever known before; it was up into the second stories of the warehouses on Water street; the steamboats ran up to these warehouses, and could scarcely receive their passengers from the second stories; the whole American bottom was overflowed from eight to twenty feet deep, and steamboats freely crossed the bottom along the road from to the opposite bluffs in ; houses and fences and stock of all kinds, were swept away, the fields near the , after the water subsided, being covered with sand form a foot to three feet deep; which was generally thrown into ridges and washed into gullies, so as to spoil the land for cultivation. Families had great difficulty in making their escape. Through the active exertions of Mr Pratt, the mayor of , steamboats were sent in every direction to their relief. The boats found many of the familiies on the tops of their houses just ready to be floated away. The inhabitants of the bottom lost nearly all their personal property. A large number of them were taken to in a state of entire destitution, and their necessities were supplied by the contributions of the charitable of that . A larger number were forced out on to the bluffs, where they encamped, and were supplied with provisions by the neighboring inhabitants. This freshet nearly ruined the ancient village of Kaskaskia. The inhabitants were driven away and scattered, many of them never to return. For many years before this flood, there had been a [HC 7:8] flourishing institution at Kaskaskia, under the direction of an order of nuns of the Catholic Church. They had erected an extensive building, which was surrounded and filled by the waters to the second story. But they were all safely taken away, pupils and all, by a steamboat which was sent to their relief, and which ran directly up to the building and received its inmates from the second story. This school was now transferred to , where it yet remains. All the rivers and streams in were as high, and did as much damage in proportion to their length and the extent of their bottoms, as the .
“This great flood destroyed the last hope of getting provisions at home; and I was totally without funds belonging to the , with which to purchase at more distant markets, and there was a certanty— that such purchases could not have been made on credit abroad. For these reasons I was desirous of avoiding a war, if it could be avoided.
“In the meantime, I made a requisition upon the officers of the Nauvoo Legion for the State arms in their possession. It appears that there was [p. 193]