From my early childhood, almost from my infancy, I was afflicted with a lung disease, and supposed to be in consumption. Indeed, I was so bad a great deal of the time that my life was despaired of. When I was about nine years old my death seemed so imminent that my burial clothes were made. However, I rallied somewhat, but not to be able to do any work. I had a great desire to live, and also to know if the Lord had a church upon the earth, and I investigated the various doctrines professed by those with whom I came in contact, but could never feel satisfied to join any of the religious sects. When I attained my twentieth year, and while I was still very sickly, Elders David W. Patten and Warren Parrish visited the part where I resided, as missionaries, and I became convinced of the correctness of the doctrines which they taught and embraced the same, being baptized by Elder Parrish and confirmed by Elder Patten. Brother Patten, in confirming me, promised that I should be healed of my infirmity and become a strong and powerful man. This prediction was verified to the letter; I began to grow strong immediately. The following spring I was ordained a deacon and placed to preside over a small branch of the Church raised up by Elders Patten and Parrish, and on the 7th of the next April I was ordained an Elder under the hands of Brother Woodruff and started out with him preaching. I traveled with him in Kentucky and Tennessee until the early part of the following winter, when we left the South and went to Kirtland, Ohio, where I attended school with him and studied Greek and Latin. The change of climate and a little carelessness on my part brought on an attack of typhoid fever and pleurisy, from which I suffered severely, and it was thought that I could not recover. Brother Woodruff, however, who was waiting upon me, called in Elders Brigham Young, Heber C. Kimball, Willard Richards, and Hyrum Smith, and the five laid their hands upon me and rebuked the disease and blessed me. While their hands were upon my head I fell into an easy sleep, and when I awoke my disease was entirely gone. A few days after, I was advised by the Prophet Joseph to return to the Southern States and raise up a company of Saints and emigrate to Far West, Missouri. I accordingly went South, and in the month of May had succeeded in organizing a company of two hundred souls with about forty teams and started on our journey. The trip occupied about two months. We immediately set about making homes and soon began to get comfortable surroundings.