Footnotes
Although the copy of the letter bears Richards’s signature as “Secy.,” JS’s journal indicates that he instructed his clerk, which in this context could refer to either Phelps or Richards, to write the letter. It is unknown which of the two men wrote the letter or if they collaborated on it. (Council of Fifty, “Record,” 13 May 1844; JS, Journal, 13 May 1844.)
Pratt was assigned to take a memorial to Washington DC on behalf of the Nauvoo City Council requesting that Congress grant Nauvoo the powers and rights of a federal territory. He departed sometime in March after the Council of Fifty was founded. Pratt also carried a memorial from the city council and other Latter-day Saints regarding redress for losses in Missouri in the 1830s. Pratt had given the memorials to Senator Semple, who had already presented them to the United States Senate. (Nauvoo City Council Rough Minute Book, 12 Feb. 1844, 2; Memorial to the United States Senate and House of Representatives, ca. 16 Dec. 1843–12 Feb. 1844; Authorization for Orson Pratt, 12 Mar. 1844; JS et al., Memorial to U.S. Senate and House of Representatives, 28 Nov. 1843, Record Group 46, Records of the U.S. Senate, National Archives, Washington DC; Congressional Globe, 28th Cong., 1st Sess., p. 482 [1844].)
The Congressional Globe, Containing Sketches of the Debates and Proceedings of the Twenty-Sixth Congress. Vol. 8. Washington DC: Blair and Rives, 1840.
Orson Hyde, Washington DC, to “Dear Brethren,” Nauvoo, IL, 9 June 1844, JS Collection, CHL.
TEXT: The phrase “member of the United States Army”, which occupies a full line in the minute book in which this letter was copied, is enclosed within quotation marks. In the minute book, however, nearly every line of this letter begins with an opening quotation mark (not reproduced here) to indicate that the entire letter was being copied (or quoted) in the record book. Therefore, it is possible that the opening quotation mark before “member” was only continuing the pattern and that the closing quotation mark after “Army” was marking the end of a quoted paragraph. This is the only line in the letter that ends with a quotation mark.