General Hardin announced the coming of his force, which numbered about four hundred men, in a proclamation addressed "To the Citizens of Hancock County," dated September 27. He called attention to the lawless acts of the last two years by both parties, characterizing the recent burning of houses as "acts which disgrace your county, and are a stigma to the state, the nation, and the age." His force would simply see that the laws were obeyed, without taking part with either side. He forbade the assembling of any armed force of more than four men while his troops remained in the county, urged the citizens to attend to their ordinary business, and directed officers having warrants for arrests in connection with the recent disturbances to let the attorney-general decide whether they needed the assistance of troops. But the citizens were in no mood for anything like a restoration of the recent order of things, or for any compromise. The Warsaw Signal of September 17 had appealed to the non-Mormons of the neighboring counties to come to the rescue of Hancock, and the citizens of these counties now began to hold meetings which adopted resolutions declaring that the Mormons "must go," and that they would not permit them to settle in any of the counties interested. The most important of these meetings, held at Quincy, resulted in the appointment of a committee of seven to visit Nauvoo, and see what arrangements could be made with the Mormons regarding their removal from the state. Notwithstanding their defiant utterances, the Mormon leaders had for some time realized that their position in Illinois was untenable. That Smith himself understood this before his death is shown by the following entry in his diary:-- "Feb. 20, 1844. I instructed the Twelve Apostles to send out a delegation, and investigate the locations of California and Oregon, and hunt out a good location where we can remove to after the Temple is completed, and where we can build a city in a day, and have a government of our own, get up into the mountains, where the devil cannot dig us out, and live in a healthy climate where we can live as old as we have a mind to."* * Millennial Star, Vol. XX, p. 819.