A revelation published in the 1835 edition of the Doctrine and Covenants indicated that the ancient prophets Peter, James, and John ordained and confirmed JS and Oliver Cowdery as “apostles and especial witnesses” and committed to them the “keys of my [the Lord’s] kingdom.” (Revelation, ca. Aug. 1835 [D&C 27:12–13].)

Lorenzo Snow, who was living with the Morgans at the time of Elizabeth’s death, indicated that she “continually expressed a wish that no doctor should administer her medicines; and particularly requested that no one should cast any reflections upon her dear husband and children because no doctor had been employed, for she wanted no physician but the Lord.” (Lorenzo Snow, London, England, to Parley P. Pratt, Manchester, England, 28 Oct. 1841, in Millennial Star, Nov. 1841, 2:109, italics in original.)

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

This refers to the Schwarzenau Brethren, which was a Christian denomination founded by religious refugees in Schwarzenau, in what is now Germany, in 1708. Members of the Brethren migrated to the United States in 1719 and organized a congregation near Germantown, Pennsylvania, in 1723. In America they were often referred to as “German Baptists,” “Dunkers,” or “Dunkards,” in reference to their belief in threefold baptism. (Durnbaugh, Fruit of the Vine, 25–29, 74–77, 118, 173–174.)

Durnbaugh, Donald F. Fruit of the Vine: A History of the Brethren, 1708–1995. Elgin, IL: Brethren Press, 1997.

A reference to the followers of Joanna Southcott, who were often referred to as “Southcottians.” While working as a domestic servant in Exeter, England, in the early 1790s, Southcott began to have visions of the end of the world and Christ’s second coming. She recorded her prophecies, hundreds of which were later published, and by the mid-1810s had gained at least twelve thousand followers in England. (Southcott, Strange Effects of Faith, 5; Hopkins, Woman to Deliver Her People, xvii–xviii, 76–79, 83–84; Lockley, Visionary Religion and Radicalism in Early Industrial England, 3–4.)

Southcott, Joanna. The Strange Effects of Faith; With Remarkable Prophecies (Made in 1792, &c.) of Things Which Are to Come: Also Some Account of My Life. Exeter, England: By the author; T. Brice, no date.

Hopkins, James K. A Woman to Deliver Her People: Joanna Southcott and English Millenar- ianism in an Era of Revolution. Austin: University of Texas Press, 1982.

Lockley, Philip. Visionary Religion and Radicalism in Early Industrial England: From Southcott to Socialism. Oxford Theological Monographs. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013.

A reference to the followers of Jemima Wilkinson, a preacher who established a religious society referred to as the Society of Universal Friends in the late 1700s. (See Moyer, Public Universal Friend, 2–3.)

Moyer, Paul B. The Public Universal Friend: Jemima Wilkinson and Religious Enthusiasm in Revolutionary America. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2015.