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Sidney Rigdon, Appeal to the American People, 1840, Second Edition

Page 53

Source Note

[], An Appeal to the American People: Being an Account of the Persecutions of the Church of Latter Day Saints; and of the Barbarities Inflicted on Them by the Inhabitants of the State of Missouri, second edition; i-vi, 7–60 pp.; Cincinnati, OH: Shepard and Stearns, 1840. The copy used herein is held at CHL.

Historical Introduction

While incarcerated at , Missouri, in March 1839, JS addressed a letter to the church “at Illinois and scattered abroad and to in particular,” instructing the Saints to gather up “a knowledge of all the facts and sufferings and abuses put upon them by the people of this ”. Among the earliest responses to JS’s call was ’s pamphlet, An Appeal to the American People: Being an Account of the Persecutions of the Church of Latter Day Saints; and of the Barbarities Inflicted on Them by the Inhabitants of the State of Missouri (Cincinnati: Glezen and Shepard, 1840).
A manuscript draft of this pamphlet, simply titled “To the Publick” was presented to a conference of church members at , Illinois, on 1 November 1839. The conference voted to approve the manuscript and authorized its publication on behalf of the church. The pamphlet, when published, carried the endorsement of JS, , and as “Presidents of said Church.”
and collaborated on the publication of the text, which was available in print by May 1840. Though no author is named on the title page, was acknowledged as author in an 1840 Times and Seasons newspaper article, and when the pamphlet was advertised in that church periodical in 1841. JS and held some expectation that funds from the sale of An Appeal would eventually help defray costs of their late-1839 trip to .
By July 1840, and had been authorized to produce a second, revised edition to be published by Shepard & Stearns in . Page related some of the circumstances surrounding its publication and circulation in a letter sent to JS, “. . . at [Ohio] we parted for a few days . . . Elder Hyde went to Cincinnati where in my absince he published a second Edition of the ‘Apeal to the American people’ (2000 copies)[.] when I arrived the work was about completed[.] after disposing of as many of them as posible and suplying the market about cincinnati and the adjacient country he left me with some fourteen or fifteen hundred on hand, to dispose of” (John E. Page, Philadelphia, PA, to JS et al., Nauvoo, IL, 1 Sept. 1841, JS Collection, CHL). Funds from this printing were to be for the express purpose of subsidizing Hyde and Page’s imminent mission to in Palestine.
The second edition was essentially a lightly edited reprint of the first, with a four-page “Publisher’s Preface” added. In the preface, and noted the purpose of the publication, explained the severe hardships imposed by the persecutions upon Page’s own family, provided a detailed account of a vision experienced by Hyde, and expressed enthusiasm about the prospects of the mission. The preface also contained a copy of an official letter of appointment and commendation for Hyde and Page from an April 1840 church conference at , Illinois, signed by JS, and a letter of reference from , governor of .
Although many of the events reported in both editions of ’s pamphlet can be corroborated from other sources, his chronology of events is often inaccurate. However, Rigdon’s account does contain the texts of several significant documents. Among these are JS’s September 1838 affidavit concerning the 7 August 1838 visit to and those of and regarding the massacre. Consequently, though in many respects Rigdon’s document from a historical perspective is more advocacy than history, it offers access to some important material not readily found elsewhere.

Footnotes

  1. [1]

    Letter to the Church and Edward Partridge, 20 March 1839 [D&C 123:1, 6].

  2. [2]

    Sidney Rigdon, JS, et al., Petition Draft (“To the Publick”), circa 1838–1839.

  3. [3]

    “A History, of the Persecution,” Times and Seasons, May 1840, 1:99; Advertisement, Times and Seasons, 1 Jan. 1841, 1:272.

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

  4. [4]

    Crawley, Descriptive Bibliography, 1:103–104.

    Crawley, Peter. A Descriptive Bibliography of the Mormon Church. 3 vols. Provo, UT: Religious Studies Center, Brigham Young University, 1997–2012.

Asterisk (*) denotes a "featured" version, which includes an introduction and annotation. *Statement, circa 1 November 1839–B *Affidavit, 5 September 1838 [ State of Missouri v. JS et al. for Riot ]

Page 25

lives of the owners have been threatened if they offered to take them, or even to go where they were. People passing civilly along the road were stopped, insulted and abused out of all bearing; and not only insulted and abused, but plundered. Families that were moving were prevented from going to their places. Bodies of armed men were passing and repassing, not only through , but the adjoining counties in open violation of the laws; committing depredations and abusing civil citizens, and that in the face of the authorities of the ; the having full knowledge of it, yet the transgressors went unpunished. And when the militia, under the before mentioned generals, went to quell them, all that was done was to make militia out of them and disband them, and send them home to enjoy the plunder which they had taken; and to gratify themselves with rehearsing to their associates acts of violence and plunder, and boasting of it, and that publicly. There was not the the first effort made to restore the property they had stolen, nor pay for the cattle they had killed, though the civil authorities were called upon time and again to do so; and at all times when called on to do so, replied, that it was in vain to undertake it, for there could not be a jury found that would do the Saints justice, and it was in vain to sue, for they would obtain nothing. Thus being put off, from time to time, the Saints had to sit down and submit to their fate.
Here probably would be as suitable a place as any to notice one circumstance, which goes far to prove the apathy which reigned in the civil authorities, and their unwillingness to do the Saints justice. The truth is, the civil officers were as much to blame for the outrages of the mob as the mob was, because they gave them lenity to do so.
There was in a quantity of arms, from forty to fifty stand. They were in the care of a man by the name of Pollard, known by the title of Capt. Pollard. While this mob was collecting in , being scarce of arms, they went to the place where those arms were deposited and took them, whether with or without the consent of Pollard we know not, and were carrying them off to . In going through from to , they had to pass through a corner of . The civil authorities of hearing of the circumstance sent the sheriff of the to intercept them in passing through the . This the sheriff effected—arrested the persons carrying the guns, and brought them to for trial. The trial came on—the facts were all proven, that the guns were taken by one of the men who was then in custody, and they were taking them to to arm the mob that was then collecting in —and it was also proven that the mob was collecting for the purpose of driving the Saints from their homes.
After the arrest and trial a letter was sent to , the circuit judge, informing him of the facts, and asking his advice, how to dispose of both the prisoners and the guns. Accordingly, when ’s army was on their march to they passed through . demanded the prisoners—they were accordingly given up. He said he had the authority of to do so. They were marched off with the troops and set at liberty, after they had been convicted at a court of inquiry, and holden to bail for their [p. 25]
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Editorial Title
Sidney Rigdon, Appeal to the American People, 1840, Second Edition
ID #
7509
Total Pages
62
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