From the first the Prophet Joseph Smith had a clear apprehension of the importance of keeping a faithful record of the events connected with the great work which God was bringing forth through his instrumentality; and it is to his appreciation of the importance of that fact, and his never tiring energy respecting it, that we are indebted for the minute completeness of our Church annals. While the very rapidity with which events happened, together with the quickly changing circumstances through which the purposes of God were unfolded in the great Dispensation of the Fulness of Times, necessarily occupied the time of the Prophet, and well nigh made it impossible for him to give all the attention to the making of annals that is necessary to such work, still he quite thoroughly supervised the writing of his history, with the result that more complete historical data have been written and preserved {V} respecting the coming forth of the work of God in these last days than any other great movement whatsoever. One difficulty the Prophet experienced in writing the annals of the Church, which he usually called his history, was the unfaithfulness of some whom he employed in this service, and the frequent change of historians, owing to the ever shifting conditions surrounding the Church in the early years of its existence. It would be marvelous indeed if under all these circumstances there had been no mistakes made in our annals, no conflict of dates, no errors in the relation of events. But whether these conditions are taken into account or not, the manuscript annals of the Church are astonishingly free from errors of dates, relation of facts, and anachronisms of every description. When the Church historians George A. Smith and Wilford Woodruff completed their publication of the _History of Joseph Smith_, down to the 8th of August, 1844, which history was published in installments in the _Deseret News_, Utah, and in the _Millennial Star_, England, they expressed themselves upon the correctness of what they had published in the following manner: "_The History of Joseph Smith_ is now before the world, and we are satisfied that a history more correct in its details than this was never published. To have it strictly correct, the greatest possible pains have been taken by the historians and clerks engaged in the work. They were eye and ear witnesses of nearly all the transactions recorded in this history, most of which were reported as they transpired, and, where they were not personally present, they have had access to those who were. Moreover, since the death of the Prophet Joseph, the history has been carefully revised under the strict inspection of {VI} President Brigham Young, and approved by him. We, therefore, hereby bear our testimony to all the world, unto whom these words shall come, that the _History of Joseph Smith_ is true, and is one of the most authentic histories ever written."