THREATS OF THE MOB--APPEAL OF THE SAINTS.
The third day after the events related in the preceding chapter, the
mob, to the number of some five hundred, again came dashing into
Independence bearing a red flag, and armed with rifles, pistols, dirks,
whips and clubs. They rode in every direction in search of the leading
elders, making the day hideous with their inhuman yells and wicked
oaths. They declared it to be their intention to whip those whom they
captured with from fifty to five hundred lashes each, allow their
negroes to destroy their crops, and demolish their dwellings. Said they:
"We will rid Jackson County of the 'Mormons,' peaceably if we can,
forcibly if we must. If they will not go without, we will whip and kill
the men; we will destroy their children, _and ravish their women!_"
"WE WILL RAVISH THEIR WOMEN!"
A threat most horrible. Worse than murder; for murder has in it yet
some mercy as compared with ravishment, that worst exercise of brute
force against helpless innocence. Murder when it has completed its work
leaves its victim senseless and peaceful in death; "after life's fitful
dream is over," he may sleep well. But what damning torments must that
breast suffer which is robbed of its peace by brutal force! How deep
the woe that bears the burden of an outraged modesty! How agonizing to
be an object of pity! How much more cruel the living tortures of a life
so humiliated than the calmness and the peace of death! When devils
would with their direst terrors shake a people they say,
_We will ravish your women!_
The leading elders, seeing their own lives, and the property and
lives of those over whom they presided in jeopardy, resolved to offer
themselves as a ransom for The Church--willing to be scourged, or even
put to death if that would satisfy their tormentors, and stop their
inhuman cruelties practiced toward the flock of which the Holy Ghost
had made them overseers. The men who thus offered their own lives for
the lives of their friends were:
JOHN CORRILL,
JOHN WHITMER,
W. W. PHELPS,
A. S. GILBERT,
EDWARD PARTRIDGE,
ISAAC MORLEY.
Forever let their names be known throughout all Israel as men who have
given the greatest evidence within the power of man to give, that they
loved the brethren. "Greater love hath no man than this, that a man
lay down his life for his friends;" and that faith which will inspire
in man a love for his fellows; that will lead him to offer his life as
a ransom for his brethren, is so nearly akin to that faith and love
which glowed within the breast of the Divine Master, that its source
cannot be mistaken. But the inhuman wretches who had combined to drive
the saints from their homes in Jackson County, were insensible to the
sublime manifestations of love they witnessed. It appealed not to
their adamantine hearts. With brutal imprecations they told these men
that not only they, but every man, woman and child would be whipped or
scourged until they consented to leave the county, as they had decreed
that the "Mormons" should leave the county, or they "or the 'Mormons'
must _die_."
The presiding brethren, finding that there was no alternative but
for them to leave speedily or witness innocent blood shed by fiends
incarnate, concluded to leave Jackson County. A new committee was
selected by the mob to confer with the brethren, and the following
agreement was entered into:
The leading elders with their families were to move from the county by
the first of January following; and to use their influence to induce
all their brethren to leave as soon as possible, one half by the first
of January, 1834, and the remainder by April, 1834. They were also to
use all the means in their power to stop any more of their brethren
moving into the county; and also to use their influence to prevent
the saints then enroute for Missouri settling permanently in Jackson
County, but for those then on the way they were to be permitted to make
temporary arrangements for shelter until a new location was agreed upon
by the society. John Corrill and A. S. Gilbert were to be allowed to
remain as general agents to settle up the business of The Church, so
long as necessity required. Gilbert, Whitney & Co. were to be permitted
to sell out their merchandise then on hand, but no more was to be
imported. The _Evening and Morning Star_ was not again to be published,
nor a press established by any member of The Church in the county.
Edward Partridge and W. W. Phelps were to be allowed to pass to and
from the county to wind up their business affairs, provided they moved
their families from the county by the first of January following. On
the part of the mob, the committee pledged themselves to use all their
influence to prevent any violence being used against the saints, so
long as the foregoing stipulations were complied with on the part of
The Church.[A]
[Footnote A: Evening and Morning Star, p. 229.]
A day or two after this treaty was entered into, The Church in Zion
dispatched Oliver Cowdery to Ohio to confer with the general Church
authorities on the situation of the saints in Missouri. This conference
resulted in the general authorities sending as special messengers
Elders Orson Hyde and John Gould to Jackson County, with instructions
to the saints not to dispose of their lands or other property, nor
remove from the county, except those who had signed the agreement to do
so.
Meantime the saints attempted to settle in Van Buren, the county
joining Jackson on the south (the name has since been changed to Cass),
but the people of that county, after the saints commenced a settlement,
drew up an agreement to drive them from there, and destroy the fruits
of their labors; so they were obliged to return to their former homes.
While the saints were making efforts to carry out the first part of the
stipulation entered into with the mob of Jackson County, the mob on
their part failed to refrain from acts of violence. Daily the saints
were insulted. Houses were broken into, and the inmate threatened with
being mobbed if they stirred in their defense. But Truth began to make
herself heard. As the fiendish acts of the mob became known, they
called forth execrations from various quarters. A number of articles
published in the _Western Monitor,_ printed at Fayette, Howard County,
Missouri, censured the conduct of the mob, and suggested that the
saints seek redress of the State authorities for the wrongs they had
suffered. Whereupon the leaders of the mob began to threaten life,
and declared that if any "Mormon" attempted to seek redress by law or
otherwise, for defamation of character, or loss of property, he should
die.
These threats, however, did not deter the saints from appealing to the
chief executive of the State for a redress of grievances. A petition
setting forth their suffering, and denying the allegations of the mob,
was presented by Orson Hyde and W. W. Phelps to Daniel Dunklin, who,
at the time, was governor of the State. In addition to relating the
story of their wrongs, and denying the charges made by the mob, upon
which the old settlers of Jackson County depended to excuse or defend
their acts of cruelty toward the saints, the petition set forth that
whenever that fatal hour arrived that the poorest citizen's person,
property, or rights and privileges shall be trampled upon by lawless
mobs with impunity, "that moment a dagger is plunged into the heart
of the Constitution of the country, and the Union must tremble * *
* We solicit," said they, "assistance to obtain our rights; holding
ourselves amenable to the laws of our country, whenever we transgress
them." They asked the governor by express proclamation or otherwise
to raise a sufficient number of troops, who, with themselves, might
be empowered to defend their rights; that they might sue for damages
for the loss of property, for abuse, for defamation of character,
and, if advisable, try for treason those who had trampled upon law
and government, that the law of the land might not be defied, nor
nullified, but peace restored to the country.
To this very reasonable request Governor Dunklin made a patriotic
reply. He stated he would think himself unworthy the confidence with
which he had been honored by his fellow citizens, did he not promptly
employ all the means which the Constitution and laws had placed at his
disposal to avert the calamities with which the saints were threatened,
and added:
Ours is a government of laws, to them we all owe obedience, and their
faithful administration is the best guarantee for the enjoyment of our
rights. No citizen, nor number of citizens, have a right to take the
redress of their grievances, whether real or imaginary, into their
own hands. Such conduct strikes at the very existence of society, and
subverts the very foundation on which it is based. I am not willing
to persuade myself that any portion of the citizens of the State of
Missouri are so lost to a sense of these truths as to require the
exercise of _force,_ in order to insure respect for them.
He advised the threatened saints, therefore, to make a trial of the
efficacy of the laws; that wherein their lives had been threatened,
they make affidavit to that effect before the circuit judge, or the
justices of the peace in their respective districts, whose duty it
then became to bind the threatening parties to keep the peace. By this
experiment it would be proven whether the laws could be executed or
not; and in the event that they could not be peacefully executed, the
governor pledged himself, on being officially notified of that fact, to
take such steps as would insure a favorable execution of them.
As to the injuries the saints had sustained in the loss of property,
the governor advised them to seek redress by civil process--expressing
the opinion that the courts would grant them relief.[B]
[Footnote B: Evening and Morning Star, p. 351.]
I do not doubt the sincerity of Governor Dunklin in giving this counsel
to the saints, and under ordinary circumstances to seek redress at the
hands of the civil authorities would be the proper thing to do. But in
this case the officers of the law had been the head and front of this
high-handed and infamous proceeding. In proof of this statement I give
the names and offices held by those who were most active in the lawless
proceeding related:
S. D. LUCAS, _colonel, and judge of the county court;_
SAMUEL C. OWENS, _county clerk;_
RUSSEL HICKS, _deputy clerk;_
JOHN SMITH, _justice of the peace;_
SAMUEL WESTON, _justice of the peace;_
WILLIAM BROWN, _constable;_
THOMAS PITCHER, _deputy constable._
Besides these there were Indian agents, postmasters, doctors, lawyers
and merchants.
These were the men who had despoiled the saints--these the ones, in
connection with the secret assistance of the lieutenant governor of
the State, LILBURN W. BOGGS, who inflamed the minds of the ignorant
frontier settlers against an innocent people, and encouraged the
vicious to maltreat the virtuous. These were the men who on the 23rd of
July of the same year had said:
_"We will rid Jackson County of the 'Mormons' peaceably if we can,
forcibly if we must. If they will not go without, we will whip and kill
the men; we will destroy the lives of their children, and ravish their
women!"_ And these were the men--the officers of _justice,_ to whom
the "Mormons" were to appeal for a redress of grievances! To say the
least, does it not smack of "going to law with the devil, when court
is to convene in hell?" Surely it was only a forlorn hope the saints
could entertain of being redressed for their wrongs by appealing to
the very parties who inflicted those wrongs upon them; and yet it was
about the only course open to the governor to suggest at that time.
Being willing to magnify the law, the saints acted upon the governor's
advice. For this purpose they engaged the services of four lawyers from
Clay County, then attending court at Independence, viz.: Messrs. Wood,
Reese, Doniphan and Atchison. These gentlemen engaged to plant all the
suits the saints might wish to present before the courts, and agreed
to attend to them jointly throughout for one thousand dollars. W. W.
Phelps and Bishop Partridge gave their notes for that sum, endorsed by
Gilbert & Whitney.
No sooner did the mob witness these movements than they began to
prepare for further hostilities. The red right hand of persecution was
again armed to plague the saints.