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.
<May 17> to my nation the least attack of reproach, yet, as publicity was given of a western convention to take up the subject of a national merit— by delegating and instructing delegates, by the expression of a will to submit to the nomination of the Baltimore Convention and covenant to support the nominee— and with all the utterance of our disapprobation of ’s ever standing before the lovers of the “’76” cause in any character that might respect or recognize him as a portion of material in the erection or construction of this American microcosm I on this occasion stay the ceremony of exposition— I tremble for our once happy country, at the threat of ’s election again by the Americans to the Presidency and thank God that the age of gray hairs will to every American in these days say “look e’er you leap”; since 1819 I have risked an American’s part for the sustenance of democracy, and I do assert, Jeffersonianism; ever shaded by the promise of better times, while the Locker was opened and the Americans hope till spill’d. On this occasion, delegates hasten to the Baltimore convention— and like Americans, we trust, will represent the cares of a nation and claim the western peoples choice— open again as in the “Declaration of Independence” the assertion “that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. That to secure these rights governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed; that whenever any form of government becomes destructive of the ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute a new government laying its foundation on such principles, and organizing its powers in such form as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness.”
“Light and transient causes” may be by party opposition to be the movers for this proposition of Reform. But with one voice we will respond No! No!! No!!! For very many years agitating ceremonies have roused from their slumber, and caused the offsprings of “1776” to look back and rehearse the tales, remembering the savage shriek and calling up to horrible vivification the bloody banners of Britain, when the unholy proffer was made for “slavery or death”. When the cradle was only a forest of uncertainty and our Mothers as in the hands of Heaven’s King sustained to impart the voice of patriotic perfective and excellence. This day associates with our recollection much of the history of Americans, and but for the want of time ’twould be rehearsed. This day sweetens recollection with the privilege of a convention to tell over the national grievances— the omissions of official duty and the usurpation of aristocratical power. This day only whispers the silly lilliputian efforts of , sanctioned by , , and . This day published for days passed, has told the world that to be free was our privilege, that to renounce Van Burenism would be healthy to Americans— that to dissanction the deaf eared costumes of a White Housed scorpion was prudent, and to tell the old veterans of 1776 that those rights occupy our wills— and the spirits of our fathers yet mingle in our blood and stimulate our actions, to nobly die defending the covenant made by the signers of the “Declaration of Independence” on the 4th. day of July, 1776.
‘Nail to the topmast the Flag with letters of gold legible to all “Free trade and sailors rights, protection of person and property.”
‘Americans now begin to examine their privileges; and like the skilled physician examining a diseased heart, will thump in proper character on its environs for a flat cone— if flat, they’ll say “beware”— if cone “all’s right”— the diseased heart has been detected, and in its furious race, is hastening the exit of that aspirant, who, while in its premonitory stage said, “Your cause is a good one, but I cannot afford you any assistance in your present distressed condition”; and that man who refused the hearing of the Mormon grievances, when by a , a Steward, and a , they were offered for Congressional action [p. 45]