Essentials in Church History: A History of the Church from the Birth of Joseph Smith to the Present Time (1922), with Introductory Chapters on the Antiquity of the Gospel and the "Falling Away"Smith, Joseph Fielding
History
Essentials in Church History: A History of the Church from the Birth of Joseph Smith to the Present Time (1922), with Introductory Chapters on the Antiquity of the Gospel and the "Falling Away"
Smith, Joseph Fielding
Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints -- History
On April 15, 1839, the brethren obtained from Judge Birch a change of
venue from Daviess to Boone County, and a mittimus was made out by
him without date, name or place. The prisoners were fitted out with a
two-horse wagon, necessary horses, and four men besides the sheriff, to
guard them to Boone County. The prisoners numbered five, as follows:
Joseph Smith, Hyrum Smith, Lyman Wight, Caleb Baldwin, and Alexander
McRae. They started from Gallatin in the afternoon and went as far as
Diahman, where they camped for the night at Judge Morin's. The next day
they went about twenty miles where a jug of whiskey was procured, and
all of the guards, save one, got drank and went to bed. The sheriff
showed the prisoners the mittimus and said to them that Judge Birch
told him never to carry them to Boone County, and never to show the
mittimus, and, the sheriff said: "I shall take a good drink of whiskey
and go to bed, and you may do as you are a mind to."
The Escape
The prisoners bought from the guards two of the horses, paying for
one with clothing, and giving their note for the other. After four of
the guards had retired and were asleep in drunken slumber, the fifth
helped them to saddle the horses and started them on their way. Two of
the brethren mounted and three went on foot, changing places from time
to time. Said Hyrum Smith, "we took our change of venue for the state
of Illinois, and in the course of nine or ten days arrived at Quincy,
Adams County." They found their families in good health, but in a state
of poverty due to their persecutions and expulsion from Missouri's soil.
A "Concocted Plan"
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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