Skip to main content

Mayor’s Order to Nauvoo City Marshal, 10 June 1844

  1. Home > 
  2. The Papers > 

Mayor’s Order to Nauvoo City Marshal, 10 June 1844

Source Note

JS, Mayor’s Order, to city marshal [], , Hancock Co., IL, 10 June 1844; included endorsement. Featured version copied [ca. 25 June 1844]; handwriting of and ; two pages; JS Collection, CHL. Includes redactions and notation.
Single leaf measuring 9⅝ × 7¾ inches (24 × 20 cm). Both the recto and verso are ruled with twenty-seven printed horizontal lines (now faded). The left side of the recto was irregularly cut, which suggests that the leaf was removed from a book or larger sheet. The top half of the recto contains a copy of the City Council’s resolution declaring the Nauvoo Expositor a public nuisance. The bottom half of the recto contains this featured document. The verso is blank except for a copy of ’s endorsement of the order. The document was trifolded for filing. The upper left corner has holes made from staples or pins.
, who served as JS’s scribe from 1843 to 1844 and as clerk to the church historian and recorder from 1845 to 1865, made insertions to ’s endorsement. The order was possibly listed in an inventory that was produced by the Church Historian’s Office (later Church Historical Department) circa 1904. By 1973 this document had been included in the JS Collection at the Church Historical Department (now CHL). Bullock’s insertions, the document’s possible listing in the circa 1904 inventory, and its later inclusion in the JS Collection suggest continuous institutional custody.

Footnotes

  1. Resolution, 10 June 1844.

  2. See Jessee, “Writing of Joseph Smith’s History,” 456, 458; and Woodruff, Journal, 22 Jan. 1865.

    Jessee, Dean C. “The Writing of Joseph Smith’s History.” BYU Studies 11 (Summer 1971): 439–473.

    Woodruff, Wilford. Journals, 1833–1898. Wilford Woodruff, Journals and Papers, 1828–1898. CHL. MS 1352.

  3. “Letters to and from the Prophet,” ca. 1904, [4], Historian’s Office, Catalogs and Inventories, 1846–1904, CHL. This inventory lists two undated letters to the city marshal under the year 1844. One of these could be referring to the order featured here. However, JS wrote to Greene on more than two occasions in 1844, so it is unclear which two letters are referenced in the inventory.

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

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

Historical Introduction

As mayor of , Illinois, JS issued an order on 10 June 1844 to city marshal instructing him to destroy the printing equipment and papers in the Nauvoo Expositor’s office. The first issue of the Expositor was published on 7 June 1844. During a 10 June meeting, the city council passed a resolution declaring the Expositor a nuisance and directing JS, as mayor of Nauvoo, to remove the printing establishment as well as all copies of the newspaper it contained.
With this authority, JS issued an order directing , as city marshal, to destroy the Expositor’s press, jumble or scatter its type, and burn any copies of the paper and other libelous materials found in its printing office. JS further instructed Greene to demolish the Expositor’s office if the owners or others resisted and to arrest anyone who threatened Greene, JS, or other officers of the city. The order was apparently transmitted to Greene soon after it was written. In conjunction with this order, JS directed , the acting major general of the , to have the legion ready to assist Greene if requested to do so. The newspaper’s proprietors were reportedly warned that if they did not remove the press within three hours, it would be destroyed.
Around sundown on 10 June, formed a posse to carry out the mayor’s order. At the Expositor office, Greene asked the newspaper’s proprietors to surrender the keys to the building, but they refused to comply and forbade the posse from entering their establishment. A group of men from the posse forced the door and began clearing the office of printing equipment, while demolishing the press and scattering its type. They ultimately piled much of the office’s contents in the street and set fire to them. After his men destroyed the press, Greene endorsed the order.
JS was later charged with riot for his role in the destruction of the Nauvoo Expositor’s press. On 24 June, JS’s attorneys, and , wrote to JS as they prepared to defend him against this charge, requesting that he send them the original order for the press’s destruction. The next day, , JS’s private clerk, complied with this request. It may have been at this point that Clayton, with the help of , made a retained copy of the order, including Greene’s endorsement. The Nauvoo Neighbor published a slightly altered form of the order in its 17 June 1844 extra and 19 June 1844 issue.
JS’s original order to is apparently not extant. The handwritten copy made by and is featured here, with significant differences between that version and the published version noted.

Footnotes

  1. JS, Journal, 7 June 1844; Nauvoo Expositor, 7 June 1844.

  2. Minutes, 10 June 1844; Resolution, 10 June 1844; see also Nauvoo City Council Minute Book, 10 June 1844, 210–211.

  3. Military Order to Jonathan Dunham, 10 June 1844.

  4. Richards, Reminiscences and Journal, 10 June 1844; Clayton, Journal, 10 June 1844; “Outrage at Nauvoo,” Lee County Democrat (Fort Madison, Iowa Territory), 15 June 1844, [2].

    Richards, Samuel W. Reminiscences and Journal, ca. 1843–1845. Samuel W. Richards, Papers, 1839–1909. CHL. MS 1841.

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

    Lee County Democrat. Fort Madison, Iowa Territory. 1841–1847.

  5. Clayton, Journal, 10 June 1844; John R. Wakefield, Affidavit, Henry Co., Iowa Territory, 24 June 1844, JS Office Papers, CHL; JS, Journal, 10 June 1844.

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

  6. Trial Report, Nauvoo, IL, between ca. 12 and 20 June 1844, State of Illinois v. JS for Riot on Habeas Corpus (Nauvoo Mun. Ct. 1844), draft; John R. Wakefield, Affidavit, Henry Co., Iowa Territory, 24 June 1844, JS Office Papers, CHL; Clayton, Journal, 10 June 1844; Minutes, Nauvoo, IL, 12 June 1844, State of Illinois v. JS for Riot on Habeas Corpus (Nauvoo Mun. Ct. 1844), Nauvoo, IL, Records, CHL; “For the Neighbor,” Nauvoo Neighbor, Extra, 21 June 1844, [1]; “For the Neighbor,” Nauvoo Neighbor, 16 [26] June 1844, [2]; Law, Diary, 10 June 1844, in Cook, William Law, 55–56; “Unparalleled Outrage at Nauvoo,” Warsaw (IL) Signal, 12 June 1844, [2]; Charles A. Foster, “Tremendous Excitement—Unparalleled Outrage. On Board Steamer ‘Osprey,’” St. Louis Evening Gazette, 12 June 1844, [2], in Hallwas and Launius, Cultures in Conflict, 157–159; JS, Journal, 10 June 1844.

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

    Nauvoo Neighbor. Nauvoo, IL. 1843–1845.

    Cook, Lyndon W. William Law: Biographical Essay, Nauvoo Diary, Correspondence, Interview. Orem, UT: Grandin Book, 1994.

    Warsaw Signal. Warsaw, IL. 1841–1853.

    Hallwas, John E., and Roger D. Launius. Cultures in Conflict: A Documentary History of the Mormon War in Illinois. Logan, UT: Utah State University Press, 1995.

  7. Letters from Hugh T. Reid and James W. Woods, 24 June 1844; Clayton, History of the Nauvoo Temple, 31; Clayton, Journal, 25 June 1844.

    Clayton, William. History of the Nauvoo Temple, ca. 1845. CHL. MS 3365.

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

  8. “For the Neighbor,” Nauvoo Neighbor, Extra, 17 June 1844, [1]; “For the Neighbor,” Nauvoo Neighbor, 19 June 1844, [3].

Asterisk (*) denotes a "featured" version, which includes an introduction and annotation. Revised Minutes, 17 June 1844 Revised Minutes, 17 June 1844, as Published in Nauvoo Neighbor *Mayor’s Order to Nauvoo City Marshal, 10 June 1844
Go to previous page 1

Page [2]

The within press & type is destroyed and pied according to order this tenth day of June 1844 at about 8 o clock P. M—
C. M. [city marshal] [p. [2]]
View entire transcript

|

Cite this page

Source Note

Document Transcript

Go to previous page 1

Page [2]

Document Information

Related Case Documents
Editorial Title
Mayor’s Order to Nauvoo City Marshal, 10 June 1844
ID #
1388
Total Pages
2
Print Volume Location
Handwriting on This Page
  • John McEwan
Go to page