JS, History, 1838–1856, vol. B-1, created 1 Oct. 1843–24 Feb. 1845; handwriting of and ; 297 pages, plus 10 pages of addenda; CHL. This is the second volume of a six-volume manuscript history of the church. This second volume covers the period from 1 Sept. 1834 to 2 Nov. 1838; the subsequent four volumes, labeled C-1 through F-1, continue through 8 Aug. 1844.
Historical Introduction
This document, volume B-1, is the second of the six volumes of the “Manuscript History of the Church.” The collection was compiled over the span of seventeen years, 1838 to 1856. The narrative in volume B-1 begins with the entry for 1 September 1834, just after the conclusion of the Camp of Israel (later called Zion’s Camp), and continues to 2 November 1838, when JS was interned as a prisoner of war at , Missouri. For a fuller discussion of the entire six-volume work, see the general introduction to the history.
, serving as JS’s “private secretary and historian,” completed the account of JS’s history contained in volume A-1 in August 1843. It covered the period from JS’s birth in 1805 through the aftermath of the Camp of Israel in August 1834. When work resumed on the history on 1 October 1843, Richards started a new volume, eventually designated B-1.
At the time of JS’s death in June 1844, the account had been advanced to 5 August 1838, on page 812 of volume B-1. ’s poor health led to the curtailment of work on B-1 for several months, until 11 December 1844. On that date, Richards and , assisted by , resumed gathering the records and reports needed to draft the history. Richards then composed and drafted roughed-out notes while Thomas Bullock compiled the text of the history and inscribed it in B-1. They completed their work on the volume on or about 24 February 1845. Richards, , and Jonathan Grimshaw later added ten pages of “Addenda,” which provided notes, extensive revisions, or additional text to be inserted in the original manuscript where indicated.
Though JS did not dictate or revise any of the text recorded in B-1, and chose to maintain the first-person, chronological narrative format established in A-1 as if JS were the author. They drew from a variety of primary and secondary sources including JS’s diaries and letters, minutes of meetings, the first edition of the Doctrine and Covenants, church and other periodicals, reports of JS’s discourses, and the reminiscences and recollections of church members. As was the case with A-1, after JS’s death, , , , and others modified and corrected the manuscript as they reviewed material before its eventual publication.
Beginning in March 1842 the church’s Nauvoo periodical, the Times and Seasons, began publishing the narrative as the “History of Joseph Smith.” It was also published in England in the church periodical the Millennial Star beginning in June 1842. Once a press was established in Utah and the Deseret News began publication, the “History of Joseph Smith” once more appeared in print in serialized form. Beginning with the November 1851 issue, the narrative picked up where the Times and Seasons had left off over five years earlier.
The narrative recorded in B-1 continued the story of JS’s life as the prophet and president of the church he labored to establish. The account encompasses significant developments in the church’s two centers at that time—, Ohio, and northwest —during a four-year-span. Critical events included the organization of the Quorums of the Twelve Apostles and the Seventy, the dedication of the House of the Lord in Kirtland, Ohio, the establishment of the Kirtland Safety Society, dissension and apostasy in Kirtland and Missouri, the first mission to England, JS’s flight from Kirtland to Missouri in the winter of 1838, the Saints’ exodus from Kirtland later that year, the disciplining of the Missouri presidency, and the outbreak of the Missouri War and arrest of JS. Thus, B-1 provides substantial detail regarding a significant period of church expansion and transition as well as travail.
hanging over our devoted , Solemn, dark, and terrible. <June 29 Report Continued.> This painful state of things has been produced mainly, by the rapid and increasing emigration of that people, commonly called mormons, during the last few months. It is known to all that in November 1833, these people were expelled from their homes in , without money without property, without the means of subsistence for themselves, their wives and their children, and like Noah’s Dove without a resting place for their feet. They came to our , thus friendless and pennyless, seeking (as they said) but a temporary asylum, from the storm of persecution by which they were then buffetted. Their destitute and miserable condition, at that inclement season of the year, excited the deep sympathies of the philanthropic and hospitable citizens of this ; and notwithstanding the thousand reports, that were borne on the wings of the wind, charging them with almost every crime known to the laws of our country; yet our feelings of kindness, and sympathy for human suffering prevailed over, every obstacle, and they were received with friendship, and treated with toleration, and after with marks of peculiar kindness. They always declared that they looked not upon this as their home, but as a temporary assylum, and that whenever a respectable portion of the citizens of this should request it, they would promptly leave us in peace as they found us. That period has now arrived. Duty to ourselves, to our families, and to the best interests of our , require at our hands, to demand the fulfilment of that pledge. They are charged by those who are opposed to them, with an unfriendly determination to to violate that pledge. Their rapid emigration, their large purchases and offers to purchase lands, the remarks of the ignorant and Imprudent portion of them, that this country is destined by heaven to be theirs, are received and [HC 2:449] looked upon, by a large portion of this community, as strong and convincing proofs that they intend to make this their permanent home, the centre and general rendezvous of this people. These are some of the reasons, why these people have become objects of the deepest hatred and detestation to many of our citizens. They are eastern men, whose manners, habits, customs, and even dialect, are essentially different from our own; they are non slave-holders, and opposed to slavery: which in this peculiar period, when abolitionism has reared its deformed and hagard visage in our land, is well calculated to excite deep and abiding prejudices in any community, where slavery is tolerated and practiced. In addition to all this, they are charged as they have [p. 736]