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Letter from David Orr, 14 June 1843

Source Note

, Letter, Reed’s Creek Township, Lawrence Co., AR, to JS, [, Hancock Co., IL], 14 June 1843; handwriting and signature presumably of ; three pages; JS Collection, CHL. Includes address, postal notations, endorsement, and dockets.
Bifolium measuring 12½ × 7⅝ inches (32 × 19 cm). Each page of the bifolium is ruled with approximately thirty-three gray lines that are now faded. The letter was trifolded in letter style, addressed, and sealed with a red adhesive wafer. A remnant of the adhesive wafer remains on the last page of the bifolium. The letter was later refolded for filing.
The document was endorsed by , who served as JS’s scribe from December 1841 until JS’s death in June 1844 and served as church historian from December 1842 until his own death in March 1854. It was also docketed by , who served as a clerk in the Church Historian’s Office (later Church Historical Department) from 1853 to 1859. The document was listed in an inventory that was produced by the Church Historian’s Office circa 1904. By 1973 the letter had been included in the JS Collection at the Church Historical Department (now CHL). The document’s early dockets, its listing in a 1904 inventory, and its later inclusion in the JS Collection indicate continuous institutional custody.

Footnotes

  1. [1]

    JS, Journal, 13 Dec. 1841 and 21 Dec. 1842; Orson Spencer, “Death of Our Beloved Brother Willard Richards,” Deseret News (Salt Lake City), 16 Mar. 1854, [2].

    Deseret News. Salt Lake City. 1850–.

  2. [2]

    “Obituary of Leo Hawkins,” Millennial Star, 30 July 1859, 21:496–497.

    Latter-day Saints’ Millennial Star. Manchester, England, 1840–1842; Liverpool, 1842–1932; London, 1932–1970.

  3. [3]

    “Index to Papers in the Historians Office,” ca. 1904, draft, [3], Historian’s Office, Catalogs and Inventories, 1846–1904, CHL.

    Historian’s Office. Catalogs and Inventories, 1846–1904. CHL. CR 100 130.

  4. [4]

    See the full bibliographic entry for JS Collection, 1827–1844, in the CHL catalog.

Historical Introduction

On 14 June 1843, wrote a letter from Reed’s Creek Township, Arkansas, to JS in , Illinois, seeking additional information regarding a set of metal plates inscribed with characters resembling an ancient language. The plates were purportedly discovered downriver from Nauvoo near Kinderhook, Illinois. Orr, a Baptist preacher who had friendly relations with some Latter-day Saints, had read about the plates in a local newspaper, which reported the plates were being sent to Nauvoo for JS’s inspection.
In April 1843, Kinderhook residents Robert Wiley and Wilbur Fugate engaged a local blacksmith to help them make six bell-shaped plates of brass, which they then etched with miscellaneous characters of their own creation. After planting the plates in an Indian mound near town, Wiley reported that he had dreamed of treasure in a nearby mound and gathered others to help him with the excavation.
The purported discovery of the plates generated public interest. A newspaper from , Illinois, about twenty miles upriver from Kinderhook, opined that if JS could “decipher the hieroglyphics on the plates, he will do more towards throwing light on the early history of this continent, than any man now living.” By 1 May the plates were brought to JS with the apparent purpose of having him translate them and reveal the “true meaning of the plates.”
Several sources indicate that JS made a brief attempt to translate the brass plates. ’s account states, “Prest J. has translated a portion and says they contain the history of the person with whom they were found & he was a descendant of Ham through the loins of Pharaoh king of Egypt, and that he received his kingdom from the ruler of heaven & earth.” In a 7 May 1843 letter, wrote that the plates “are small and filled with engravings in Egyptian language and contain the genealogy of one of the ancient Jaredites back to Ham the son of Noah.” Pratt further explained that the “gentlemen who found” the plates “have brought them to Joseph Smith for examination & translation a large number of Citizens here have seen them and compared the characters with those on the Egyptian papyrus which is now in this city.”
In an entry for the same day that Pratt wrote his letter, JS's journal states that the men with the plates visited JS and that JS sent for the “Hebrew Bible & Lexicon,” likely to help him try to translate the plates. Another account further indicates that JS attempted a traditional linguistic translation by comparing the plates with an “Egyptian alphabet.” Though most of the sources suggest that JS’s efforts exhibited an attempt at linguistic translation, one letter suggests that JS may have initially considered a revelatory translation of the brass plates. A visitor to named Charlotte Haven wrote that according to Joshua Moore, who was present when JS was shown the plates, “the figures or writing on them was similar to that in which the Book of Mormon was written,” and “he [JS] thought that by the help of revelation he would be able to translate them.” However, there are no sources indicating JS actually attempted to translate the brass plates by means of revelation. Indeed, whatever JS’s initial interest in the plates, no known evidence indicates that he pursued a translation, via either a traditional method or revelation, beyond 7 May 1843. In the 1870s, Fugate confessed that the plates were forgeries.
In spring 1843, however, there was great interest in the Kinderhook plates, and sought more information about them. Addressing JS as a , Orr requested any further information regarding the plates and specifically requested that anything the church had published regarding them be mailed to him. He also reported briefly on the state of the church in his area and requested that an elder be sent to preach there.
Orr indicated that he had tried unsuccessfully to send letters to JS in the past and therefore mailed this 14 June 1843 letter to and , in , Illinois, asking them to convey it to JS. The Arkansas preacher mailed his letter from Lawrence County on 21 June. It had reached by 18 July, when a reply was sent to Orr. An endorsement written by suggests that Orr’s request was answered by sending him a “facsimilie of Plates,” likely a reference to a broadside printed by and that included details about and representations of the six brass plates.

Footnotes

  1. [1]

    Each bell-shaped plate was approximately 3 inches long and flared from 1¾ inches wide at the top to 2¾ inches at the bottom. Each was inscribed with characters or symbols on both sides, while a metal ring passing through a hole near the top of each plate bound them together. (“Singular Discovery—Material for Another Mormon Book,” Quincy [IL] Whig, 3 May 1843, [2]; Young, Journal, 1840–1844, 3 May 1843, 44; Kimball, “Kinderhook Plates,” 68–70.)

    Quincy Whig. Quincy, IL. 1838–1856.

    Young, Brigham. Journals, 1832–1877. Brigham Young Office Files, 1832–1878. CHL. CR 1234 1, boxes 71–73.

    Kimball, Stanley B. “Kinderhook Plates Brought to Joseph Smith Appear to Be a Nineteenth-Century Hoax.” Ensign, Aug. 1981, 66–74.

  2. [2]

    See Allen, Triennial Baptist Register, 217–218; Blevins, Hill Folks, 54; and Edward Harthorn, “David Orr,” in Encyclopedia of Arkansas.

    Allen, I. M. The Triennial Baptist Register. No. 2.–1836. Philadelphia: Baptist General Tract Society, 1836.

    Blevins, Brooks. Hill Folks: A History of Arkansas Ozarkers and Their Image. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2002.

    Encyclopedia of Arkansas. Central Arkansas Library System, Little Rock. Accessed 28 May 2020. https://encyclopediaofarkansas.net.

  3. [3]

    Wilbur Fugate, Mound Station, IL, to James Cobb, 30 June 1879, in Von Wymetal, Joseph Smith the Prophet, 207–208.

    Von Wymetal, Wilhelm [W. Wyl, pseud.]. Joseph Smith the Prophet: His Family and His Friends; A Study Based on Facts and Documents. Salt Lake City: Tribune Printing and Publishing, 1886.

  4. [4]

    “Singular Discovery—Material for Another Mormon Book,” Quincy (IL) Whig, 3 May 1843, [2].

    Quincy Whig. Quincy, IL. 1838–1856.

  5. [5]

    “Singular Discovery—Material for Another Mormon Book,” Quincy (IL) Whig, 3 May 1843, [2]; see also “Singular Discovery—Material for Another Mormon Book,” Times and Seasons, 1 May 1843, 4:186–187; and “Great Curiosities—Relics of Antiquity,” Mississippi Free Trader and Natchez Daily Gazette, 8 June 1843, [2].

    Quincy Whig. Quincy, IL. 1838–1856.

    Times and Seasons. Commerce/Nauvoo, IL. Nov. 1839–Feb. 1846.

    Mississippi Free Trader and Natchez Gazette. Natchez, MS. 1843–1851.

  6. [6]

    W. P. Harris, Letter to the Editor, Times and Seasons, 1 May 1843, 4:186; Clayton, Journal, 1 May 1843.

    Times and Seasons. Commerce/Nauvoo, IL. Nov. 1839–Feb. 1846.

    Clayton, William. Journals, 1842–1845. CHL.

  7. [7]

    Clayton, Journal, 1 May 1843.

    Clayton, William. Journals, 1842–1845. CHL.

  8. [8]

    Parley P. Pratt, Nauvoo, IL, to John Van Cott, Canaan Four Corners, NY, 7 May 1843, CHL.

    Pratt, Parley P. Letter, Nauvoo, IL, to John Van Cott, Canaan Four Corners, NY, 7 May 1843. CHL. MS 5238.

  9. [9]

    JS, Journal, 7 May 1843.

  10. [10]

    “A Gentile,” Nauvoo, IL, to James Gordon Bennett, 7 May 1843, in “Late and Interesting from the Mormon Empire on the Upper Mississippi,” New York Herald (New York City), 30 May 1843, [2].

    New York Herald. New York City. 1835–1924.

  11. [11]

    Charlotte Haven, Nauvoo, IL, to “My Dear Home Friends,” 2 May 1843, in “A Girl’s Letters from Nauvoo,” 630.

    Haven, Charlotte. “A Girl’s Letters from Nauvoo.” Overland Monthly 16, no. 96 (Dec. 1890): 616–638.

  12. [12]

    For more information on the Kinderhook plates and JS's translation efforts, see Bradley and Ashurst-McGee, “Joseph Smith and the Mistranslation of the Kinderhook Plates,” 452–523.

    Bradley, Don, and Mark Ashurst-McGee. “Joseph Smith and the Kinderhook Plates.” In A Reason for Faith: Navigating LDS Doctrine and Church History, edited by Laura Harris Hales, 93–115. Provo, UT: Religious Studies Center, Brigham Young University; Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 2016.

  13. [13]

    Wilbur Fugate, Mound Station, IL, to James Cobb, 30 June 1879, in Von Wymetal, Joseph Smith the Prophet, 207–208. The nineteenth-century manufacture of the plates was conclusively confirmed by forensic testing in 1980. (Kimball, “Kinderhook Plates,” 68–70.)

    Von Wymetal, Wilhelm [W. Wyl, pseud.]. Joseph Smith the Prophet: His Family and His Friends; A Study Based on Facts and Documents. Salt Lake City: Tribune Printing and Publishing, 1886.

    Kimball, Stanley B. “Kinderhook Plates Brought to Joseph Smith Appear to Be a Nineteenth-Century Hoax.” Ensign, Aug. 1981, 66–74.

  14. [14]

    The reply to Orr is apparently no longer extant, but copies of the broadside exist. (Brief Account of the Discovery of the Brass Plates [Nauvoo, IL, 24 June 1843], copy at CHL.)

    A Brief Account of the Discovery of the Brass Plates Recently Taken from a Mound in the Vicinity of Kinderhook, Pike County, Illinois. Nauvoo, IL: Tailor and Woodruff, 1843. Copy at CHL.

Page [2]

with lively Intrest in any Information which you may be pleased to transmit. That you may the more readly appreciate the purity of my motives and my Character as a man, I refer you to the 2 Elder Snow’s & Elder Farr with whom I contracted an acquaintance in in your Some 3 years Since— They Spoke in daytime and I Spoke at night— Also to Elder Stewhart who was Intimate with me while in this Country. Can you not Send an through this country the present Summer or fall? One of respectable talants, I think, could affect Considerable. The Mormons here are entirely destitute of Preaching from their Own denomination— Many of the Secterian Clergy are so proscriptive, and Dogmatical, that they cannot Enjoy themselves whare these hightoned Souls of Distinction, Lumber! As political DamagogueIsm, has well nigh destroid Our land and nation, bidding difyence [defiance] to constitutional liberty and the inalienable rights of man, so religious DemagogueIsm in many places, has bid defience to the mild precepts of Jesus Christ and his Enspired Apostles, and by the practice of Religious Fraud has duped and gutted their; Morally blind adherence, and arogated to themselves the Commanding atitude of a Cardinal Or Pope. Consequently Every Soul that does not Implicitly yield to Clerical Dictation, must, without mercy, be sacraficed upon the Alter of Secterion bigotry!! That I be no farther tedious, “My address is Lawrence County State of Ark, Reeds, Creek, P. O.— may grace, mercy, and truth through God the father and [p. [2]]
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Document Information

Related Case Documents
Editorial Title
Letter from David Orr, 14 June 1843
ID #
1096
Total Pages
4
Print Volume Location
JSP, D12:390–396
Handwriting on This Page
  • David Orr

Footnotes

  1. [6]

    The “2 Elder Snow’s” are likely Gardner Snow and James C. Snow, who were members of the church in Lima, Illinois. Gardner Snow was appointed bishop of the Lima, Illinois, branch. “Elder Farr” is possibly Winslow Farr or one of his older sons, Aaron or Lorin. Winslow Farr moved his family to Hancock County by 1840 and received a high priest license in February 1843. (“Church Record of the Lima Branch,” 1; Gardner Snow to William Canter, Notice, 23 Dec. 1840, Ella M. Bennett, Collection, CHL; 1840 U.S. Census, Hancock Co., IL, 183; General Church Recorder, License Record Book, 107.)

    Lima, IL, Branch, Record Book / “Church Record of the Lima Branch Who Belong to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints Organized Oct. 23, A.D. 1840, Their Church Business, etc.” In James C. Snow, Record Book, 1840-1851. CHL. MS 8928.

    Bennett, Ella M. Collection, 1834–1910. CHL.

    Census (U.S.) / U.S. Bureau of the Census. Population Schedules. Microfilm. FHL.

  2. [7]

    TEXT: Double underlined. According to Webster’s dictionary, lumber as a noun could refer to “any thing useless and cumbersome, or things bulky and thrown aside as of no use,” or it could refer to “harm; mischief.” As a verb it could mean “to heap together in disorder.” (“Lumber,” in American Dictionary [1828].)

    An American Dictionary of the English Language: Intended to Exhibit, I. the Origin, Affinities and Primary Signification of English Words, as far as They Have Been Ascertained. . . . Edited by Noah Webster. New York: S. Converse, 1828.

  3. [8]

    TEXT: Double underlined.

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