Mormons in Clay County

Joseph Smith, the Mormon Prophet, visited Jackson County just prior to 1832, when large numbers of acres of land were purchased for settlement by his followers, and during 1832 there was a great influx of Mormons to Independence and the western part of Jackson County. The Mormons soon established a printing press and issued therefrom a newspaper in which criticisms of the Gentiles of the county were published. The Mormons were charged with numerous petty larcenies and crimes; whether true or not, a bitter hatred arose between the Mormons and Gentiles and so intense did this hatred become, that the Gentiles determined to drive all Mormons from the county. The Mormon printing press was destroyed and the Mormons compelled to leave the county, many taking refuge in Clay County, others in Caldwell, Davies and Ray Counties.

The people of Clay County did not receive the refugees with open arms, but with suspicion and no little dread. The conduct of the so-called saints in Jackson County was not unheard of or unknown to Clay County. After this exodus from Jackson County and settlement of the saints in Clay, Ray, Davies and Caldwell Counties, the conduct of the Mormons were such as to exasperate the Gentiles to such an extent that open hostiles resulted and so alarming did the situation become, especially when the Mormons began to concentrate their entire numbers at Far West, in Caldwell County, armed with every available weapon of warfare, that the governor of the state was compelled to call out the militia. Two companies of militia were ordered from Clay County,' commanded by Captain Pryor and O. P. Moss. These companies were from Gen. A. W. Doniphan's brigade, Maj. Gen. D. R. Atchison's division. The companies from Clay County and other companies of General Doniphan's brigade confronted the breastworks of the Mormons at Far West when surrounding the place. General Doniphan demanded the sun-ender of the Mormon forces, which were under the command of one G. W. Hinkle. The Mormon commander seeing resistance in vain, surrendered his forces. Not a fire from a hostile gun was heard after a near approach of the militia. The conditions of the surrender were that the Mormons should deliver up their guns, surrender their prominent leaders for trial, and the remainder of them with their families leave the state. Joe Smith, Sidney Rigdon, Lyman Wight, G. W. Hinkle and other prominent Mormons were held for the faithful performance of the conditions of the surrender and to await indictments which might be preferred against them. These prominent leaders were taken to Richmond, Ray County, before the presiding judge of the Circuit Court, Austin A. King, and remanded them to Daviess County, there to await the action of the grand jury on a charge of treason against the state and murder. After being taken to Daviess County, it was then determined that the jail of that county was not sufficiently safe, when the prisoners were taken to the Liberty jail.

Indictments by the grand jury of Daviess County were found for various offenses, treason, murder, resisting legal process, etc., against Joe Smith, Hiram Smith, brother of Joe, Sidney Rigdon, G. W. Hinkle, Caleb Baldwin, Parley P. Pratt, Luman Gibbs, Maurice Phelps, King Follett, William Osburn, Arthur Morrison, Elias Higbee and others. Sidney Rigdon was released on a writ of habeas corpus. The others obtained a change of venue to Boone County, where some of them were tried and acquitted and the indictments against the others dismissed. The difficulty in getting the evidence against them, sufficient to convict, there being so many interested witnesses to combat the evidence for the state was insurmountable. Parley P. Pratt escaped from the jail in Columbia. Gen. A. W. Doniphan and Hon. James S. Rollins were of counsel for the defendants who were tried.

Col. Lewis Wood, of this county, who was present, stated to the compiler that a council of the leading militia officers held the night following the surrender, it was voted by nearly three to one to put these leaders to death and their lives were only saved by the intervention of General Doniphan, who not only urged his authority as a brigadier, but declared he would defend the prisoners with his own life. This statement goes to show the indignation of the Gentiles toward the Prophet and his followers. These officers knew the difficulty of conviction in court of these men by the state, where any number of men stood ready to give evidence to establish an alibi, or give other testimony directly in conflict that that adduced by the state to establish the innocence of the defendants. Governor Lilburn W. Boggs, who had taken an active part against the Mormons several years after the Mormons were driven from the state, while seated in a chair at his home in Independence was shot. Porter Rockwell, a notorious follower of the Prophet was arrested and charged with having committed the deed, and although there was evidence against him, enough in ordinary cases of the kind to convict, yet the array of witnesses for the defense was overwhelming; his brethren had come to hits relief in force. There can be no question that m the early organization of the Mormon Church there were men who from fanatical zeal or other motives, brought the early church into disrepute, but it can be said that in these latter years, a more law abiding, and in many respects, better class of citizens cannot be found.

For more than fifty years after the Mormons the greater part of them had left the state, very few of them, if any, made Jackson County their home, but within the last thirty-five years great numbers of Mormons have settled in and about Independence. One branch of this religious denomination is the owner of what is known as "Temple Lot", a place where Joe Smith prophesied a great temple dedicated to the Lord would be erected. This lot was the property of the writer's father for at least a quarter of a century and was sold by him to a preacher of the Hedrick faction, a branch of the Mormon Church. The Latter Day Saints of Utah and this Hedrick branch of the church were in litigation for years, each claiming that the property was purchased for the use of the Mormon Church and that each was the true church. The Supreme Court of Missouri affirmed a decision of a lower court in which the decision was in favor of the Hendrickites. The Mormons in Jackson County belong to that branch of the church known as monogamists, while the Utah branch were believers in a plurality of wives and for many years practiced and preached plural wives as a doctrine of the church. 

Clay County| AHGP Missouri

Source: History of Clay County, Missouri, by W. H. Woodson, Historical Publishing Company, Topeka, 1920.