E24: New, New Nauvoo

**Lindsay Hansen Park** (0:00)
Hey, welcome back, Sunstone Nerds. I bet you missed our long hiatus. We're trying to break these episodes into seasons, and today is your lucky day. We're starting off Season 2, the Nauvoo Period.
It's my second favorite period of Mormon history, maybe my third. But we got through the first, which was my least favorite period of Mormon history, and I think we did okay. What do you think, Bryan?

**Bryan Buchanan** (0:24)
It's so funny. For a lot of Mormons, those early years are everything.
Nauvoo, sure, but all of that early stuff. And I don't know, maybe we're just the iconoclasts. We got to push back and be like, no, I don't want to like that like everyone else. Look at me, I'm a hipster. I like other stuff.

**Lindsay Hansen Park** (0:42)
Well, I hope you've enjoyed Season 1 We're really excited to bring to you Season 2 Nauvoo, where we're going to be doing a lot of episodes on the Nauvoo Period.
Hi, this is Lindsay Hansen Park.

**Bryan Buchanan** (0:54)
And this is Bryan Buchanan.

**Lindsay Hansen Park** (0:56)
Bringing you the story of Mormonism from the shadow of the Everlasting Hills straight out of Zion, this isn't your grandpa's Mormon history.

**Bryan Buchanan** (1:23)
This is the tale of Mormon saints and sinners from our roots until present day.

**Lindsay Hansen Park** (1:29)
Gird your loins, lock your hearts and pay your tithing, because we're bringing you the story of Mormonism in all its paradisiacal glory.

**Bryan Buchanan** (1:36)
It's the Sunstone History Podcast.

**Lindsay Hansen Park** (2:12)
Mormons are a little infamous for some wonky names. I'm looking at your parents, Kinsley. That's spelled K-Y-N-Z-L-E-I-G-H, for the record.
Before that, we had crazy city names too. Tewila, Cushurum, all the Book of Mormon ones, Moroni, Manti, Nephi. But the granddaddy of them all is the city set on the Mississippi River, Nauvoo.
The name goes all the way back to 1836, when Mormons and Kirtland were studying Hebrew. That's what Bryan read at the beginning of this. He actually read it from Hebrew. He's a bigger nerd than most of you. If you look on page 28 of the Hebrew Grammar Book that they were using, there it is right there in the middle page. It gets its unique spelling because their teacher, Joshua Stacius, used a particular system of pronunciation. But why were Mormons even there? What happened to Missouri?

**Christopher Smith** (3:22)
I'm historian Christopher Smith, back to talk with you about the Mormon Redress Petition. During his imprisonment in Missouri's Liberty Jail in 1838 to 1839, Joseph Smith instructed the Latter-day Saint refugees by letter to assemble affidavits summarizing all their grievances against Missouri, and to appoint a committee to take the affidavits to Washington DC to petition the federal government for an investigation of the atrocities in Missouri and for reparations to the Mormon people.
Historian Richard Bushman has written that when the Mormons thought of Missouri, they did not remember looting houses or burning stores. They believed that they had acted solely in their own defense. They were the victims. As evidence of their sincerity, they asked for a full investigation. Joseph Smith was sure that an investigation would vindicate the Saints. By the fall of 1839, he was ready to lay the case before the President of the United States.
Over the next few years, the Saints petitioned the federal government three times, and they prepared about 800 affidavits written by nearly 700 petitioners. Some petitioners submitted more than one affidavit. About 500 of these affidavits were prepared for the first initial appeal to the US government in 1839, and the other 300 were prepared over the next few years for subsequent attempts to appeal to the US government. Historian Clark Johnson has assembled all of these Mormon petitions into a two-volume set, which spans nearly 900 printed pages in total, just to give you some idea of the volume of this material. The petitions describe some pretty horrible atrocities committed against the saints by the Missourians. Clark Johnson, that historian I just mentioned, says at least 73 petitions note that the mobs whipped, beat, or abused members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Charles Hewlett describes the beating of his son. Perry Keys relates that 30 men beat his father with their guns and ramrods. He also describes how a mob attacked him while he was on the prairie hunting horses, and a man named John Young gave him 23 lashes with a cowhide whip until he was barely able to stand. John Young also whipped another man named Truman Brace, who describes in his affidavit how a mob of 50 men caught him on the prairie hauling a load of wood and asked him if he believed in the Book of Mormon. Brace said that he did. John Young then seized an axe handle from Brace's hand and began to beat him with it. Brace says, I suppose I received about 50 strokes.