Sioux City Academy of Science and Letters. 87 
incidents here as throwing some light on the growth of 
ideas in Smith’s mind leading up to the declared revela- 
tion of the location of the golden plates on which the 
Book of Mormon was said to have been recorded. 
Shortly after their origin, the Mormons moved to 
Kirtland, Ohio, which was to be the seat of the New Jeru- 
salem, where they were soon joined by Brigham Young. 
They started a bank, erected a temple, and sent out 
twelve apostles. In 1838 the bank failed and Smith went 
to Caldwell County, Mo., where numerous others fol- 
lowed, and there they again flourished. The native Mis- 
sourians were hostile. Smith fortified his town and 
armed his people and defied the civil authorities. The 
militia was called out, and Smith arrested, and the col- 
ony was broken up. They had become numerous by this 
time, and it is said about 15,000 crossed the Missouri 
river back to Ilinois. 
A new colony at Nauvoo, Illinois, was organized. 
Smith escaped from prison in Missouri, and joined the 
Nauvoo colony, and became its leader. A charter was 
obtained from the Illinois Legislature on such terms as 
to make the colony almost independent of the State, and 
Smith a dictator. A new temple was started there in ° 
1841; a military company, called the Nauvoo Legion, was 
organized. 
In 1843 the revelation approving polygamy was pro- 
mulgated. This provoked bitter dissension within, and 
great indignation without the colony. Smith destroyed 
a newspaper office which had published too severe criti- 
cisms, and the editor swore out a warrant for the arrest 
of Smith and others, who resisted the officers. The mili- 
tia was called out, and the Mormons armed themselves, 
and civil war seemed imminent, when the Governor per- 
suaded Joseph Smith and his brother Hyrum to surren- 
der, and stand a civil trial, and they were placed in the 
Carthage jail, but at night a mob broke in the prison, 
and shot them both; this was in 1844. This made a 
martyr of Smith. Brigham Young was elected president 
of the twelve apostles, but there were grave dissensions 
in the ranks over polygamy, and there were temporal and 
religious differences. 
