A true and descriptive account of the assassination of Joseph & Hiram Smith,: The Mormon prophet and patriarch
Lyne, Thomas A. 1844. A true and descriptive account of the assassination of Joseph & Hiram Smith,: The Mormon prophet and patriarch. At Carthage, Illinois, June 27th, 1844, Printed by C.A. Calhoun.
Rating:
2
Summary:
more a pamphlet than a book, but I had it so I read it
The pamphlet begins with a diatribe by, I believe, Thomas Lyne who was a believing Mormon. His diatribe vilifies the Nauvoo Expositor, the Governor of Illinois, and the members of the militia groups that took Joseph Smith into custody, were guarding him in Carthage Jail, and that took his life by storming the jail. This diatribe makes up the bulk of the pamphlet. The vitriolic diatribe eventually gives way to a more objective accounting plus a brief synopsis of the beliefs of the early Mormon Church.
Review:
The early diatribe is pretty much worthless as it is so heavily laced with derogatory comments aimed at everyone involved except Joseph Smith and the Nauvoo militia, which destroyed the Nauvoo Expositor’s press, that it makes it hard to tell what the author is actually trying to say. The more objective version following the vitriol is fairly informative and probably has been used as a primary source for the events that took place surrounding Joseph and Hiram Smith’s deaths (I’m not a historian; I don’t really know).
This is a relatively quick read, though somewhat labored considering the grammar of the authors is horrendous (though they certainly deserve some leeway on this point considering the overall level of education of their day). One point the authors do make is that ‘freedom of the press’ should not be considered an adequate defense for the Nauvoo Expositor, which is downright silly. What Joseph Smith did was illegal, the Nauvoo charter notwithstanding, and he should have been punished for it (though death was certainly not the appropriate punishment for the crime). Of course, in making this claim the authors fail to mention that claiming a newspaper is a ‘public nuisance’ also should not be an adequate defense for Joseph Smith’s actions. They also don’t mention that what the Expositor was publishing was the fact that Joseph Smith was engaging in polygamy, which is what lead the owners of the Expositor to apostatize from the religion and turn against it. Many believing Mormons today seem to think that polygamy began with Brigham Young, probably near when the official pronouncement of the practice was made in 1853. Of course, they are wrong – it began with Joseph Smith, who not only married multiple women, but also married other men’s wives and engaged in sexual intercourse with them. None of this is mentioned in this pamphlet, but then, I didn’t expect it to be considering the authors were faithful Mormons and most faithful Mormons choose to deny the existence of or ignore completely history that is not ‘faith-affirming,’ thanks to the efforts of Mormon leaders like Boyd K. Packer.
Overall, this pamphlet is likely best-suited for historians, though it could also be useful for checking facts for the interested amateur historian. If you don’t fall into either of these categories, you probably wouldn’t find this particularly interesting.