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     It was many days after the assassination of the Smiths before the circumstances of the murder fully became known. It then appeared that, agreeably to previous orders, the posse at Warsaw had marched on the morning of the 27th of June in the direction of Golden's Point, with a view to join the force from Carthage, the whole body then to be marched into Nauvoo. But by the time they had gone eight miles, they were met by the order to disband; and learning at the same time that the governor was absent at Nauvoo, about two hundred of these men, many of them being disguised by blacking their faces with powder and mud, hastened immediately to Carthage. There they encamped, at some distance from the village, and soon learned that one of the companies left as a guard had disbanded and returned to their homes; the other company, the Carthage Greys, was stationed by the captain in the public square, a hundred and fifty yards from the jail. Whilst eight men were detailed by him, under the command of Sergeant Franklin A. Worrell, to guard the prisoners. A communication was soon established between the conspirators and the company; and it was arranged that the guard should have their guns charged with blank cartridges, and fire at the assailants when they attempted to enter the jail. Gen. Deming, who was left in command, being deserted by some of his troops, and perceiving the arrangement with the others, and having no force upon which he could rely, for fear of his life retired from the village. The conspirators came up, jumped the slight fence around the jail, were fired upon by the guard, which, according to arrangement, was overpowered immediately, and the assailants entered the prison, to the door of the room where the two prisoners were confined, with two of their friends, who voluntarily bore them company. An attempt was made to break open the door; but Joe Smith being armed with a six-barrelled pistol, furnished by his friends, fired several times as the door was bursted open, and wounded three of the assailants. At the same time several shots were fired into the room, by some of which John Taylor received four wounds, and Hyrum Smith was instantly killed. Joe Smith now attempted to escape by jumping out of the second-story window, but the fall so stunned him that he was unable to rise; and being placed in a sitting posture by the conspirators below, they dispatched him with four balls shot through his body.

    Thus fell Joe Smith, the most successful impostor in modern times.; a man who, though ignorant and coarse, had some great natural parts, which fitted him for temporary success, but which were so obscured and counteracted by the inherent corruption and vices of his nature, that he never could succeed in establishing a system of policy which looked to permanent success in the future. His lusts, his love of money and power, always set him to studying present gratification and convenience, rather than the remote consequences of his plans. It seems that no power of intellect can save a corrupt man from this error. The strong cravings of the animal nature will never give fair play to a fine understanding, the judgment is never allowed to choose that good which is far away, in preference to enticing evil near at hand. And this may be considered a wise ordinance of Providence, by which the counsels of talented but corrupt men, are defeated in the very act which promised success.

     It must not be supposed that the pretended Prophet practiced the tricks of a common impostor; that he was a dark and gloomy person, with a long beard, a grave and severe aspect, and a reserved and saintly carriage of his person; on the contrary, he was full of levity, even to boyish romping; dressed like a dandy, and at times drank like a sailor and swore like a pirate. He could, as occasion required, be exceedingly meek in his deportment; and then again rough and boisterous as a highway robber; being always able to satisfy his followers of the propriety of his conduct. He always quailed before power, and was arrogant to weakness. At times he could put on the air of a penitent, as if feeling the deepest humiliation for his sins, and suffering unutterable anguish, and indulging in the most gloomy forebodings of eternal woe. At such times he would call for the prayers of the brethren in his behalf, with a wild and fearful energy and earnestness. He was full six feet high, strongly built , and uncommonly well muscled. No doubt he was as much indebted for his influence over an ignorant people, to the superiority of his physical vigor, as to his greater cunning and intellect.

     His followers were divided into the leaders and the led; the first division embraced a numerous class of broken down, unprincipled men of talents, to be found in every country, who, bankrupt in character and fortune, had nothing to lose by deserting the known religions, and carving out a new one of their own. They were mostly infidels, who holding all religions in derision, believed that they had as good a right as Christ or Mahomet, or any of the founders of former systems, to create one for themselves; and if they could impose it upon mankind, to live upon the labor of their dupes. Those of the second division, were the credulous wondering part of men, whose easy belief and admiring natures, are always the victims of novelty, in whatever shape it may come, who have a capacity to believe any strange and wonderful matter, if it only be new, whilst the wonders of former ages command neither faith nor reverence; they were men of feeble purposes, readily subjected to the will of the strong, giving themselves up entirely to the direction of their leaders; and this accounts for the very great influence of those leaders in controlling them. In other respects some of the Mormons were abandoned rogues, who had taken shelter in Nauvoo, as a convenient place for the head-quarters of their villainy; and others were good, honest, industrious people, who were the sincere victims of an artful delusion. Such as these were more the proper objects of pity than persecution. With them, their religious belief was a kind of insanity; and certainly no greater calamity can befall a human being, than to have a mind so constituted as to be made the sincere dupe of a religious impostor.

     The more polished portion of the Mormons were a merry set of fellows, fond of music and dancing, dress and gay assemblies. They had their regular dancing parties of gentlemen and ladies, and were by no means exclusive in admitting any one to them on the score of character. It is a notorious fact, that a desperado by the name of Rockwell, having attracted the affections of a pretty woman, the wife of a Mormon merchant, took her from her husband by force of arms, to live with him in adultery. But whilst she was so living notoriously in adultery with a Mormon bully, in the same city with her husband, she was freely admitted to the best society in the place, to all the gay assemblies, where she and her husband frequently met in the same dance.

    The world now indulged in various conjectures as to the further progress of the Mormon religion. By some persons it was believed that it would perish and die away with its founder. But upon the principle that "the blood of the martyrs is the seed of the church," there was now really more cause than ever to predict its success. The murder of the Smiths, instead of putting an end to the delusion of the Mormons and dispersing them, as many believed it would, only bound them together closer than ever, gave them new confidence in their faith and an increased fanaticism. The Mormon Church had been organized with a first presidency, composed of Joe and Hiram Smith and Sidney Rigdon, and twelve apostles of the prophet, representing the apostles of Jesus Christ. The Twelve apostles were now absent, and until they could be called together the minds of the "saints" were unsettled, as to the future government of the church. Revelations were published that the prophet, in imitation of the Saviour, was to rise again from the dead. Many were looking in gaping wonderment for the fulfillment of this revelation, and some reported that they had already seen him, attended by a celestial army coursing the air on a great white horse. Rigdon, as the only remaining member of the first presidency, claimed the government of the church, as being successor to the prophet. When the twelve apostles returned from foreign parts, a fierce struggle for power ensued between them and Rigdon. Rigdon fortified his pretensions by alleging the will of the prophet in his favor, and pretending to have several new revelations from heaven, amongst which was one of a very impolitic nature. This was to the effect, that all the wealthy Mormons were to break up their residence at Nauvoo, and follow him to Pittsburgh. This revelation put both the rich and the poor against him, The rich, because they did not want to leave their property; and the poor, because they would not be deserted by the wealthy. This was fatal to the ambition of Rigdon; and the Mormons tired of the despotism of a one-man government, were now willing to decide in favor of the apostles. Rigdon was expelled from the church as being a false prophet, and left the field with a few followers, to establish a little delusion of his own, near Pittsburgh; leaving the government of the main church in the hands of the apostles, with Brigham Young, a cunning but vulgar man, at their head, occupying the place of Peter in the Christian hierarchy.

     Missionaries were dispatched to all parts to preach in the name of the "martyred Joseph;" and the Mormon religion thrived more than ever. For awhile it was doubtful whether the reign of the military saints in Nauvoo would not in course of time supplant the meek and lowly system of Christ. There were many things to favor their success. The different Christian sects had lost much of the fiery energy by which at first they were animated. They had attained to a more subdued, sober, learned, and intellectual religion. But there is at all times a large class of mankind who will never be satisfied with anything in devotion, short of a heated and wild fanaticism. The Mormons were the greatest zealots, the most confident in their faith, and filled with a wilder. fiercer, and more enterprising enthusiasm, than any sect on the continent of America: their religion gave promise of more temporal and spiritual advantages for less labor, and with less personal sacrifice of passion, lust, prejudice, malice, hatred, and ill will, than any other perhaps in the whole world. Their missionaries abroad, to the number of two or three thousand, were most earnest and indefatigable in their efforts to make converts; compassing sea and land to make one proselyte. When abroad, they first preached doctrines somewhat like those of the Campbellites; Sidney Rigdon, the inventor of the system, having once been a Campbellite preacher; and when they had made a favorable impression, they began in far-off allusions to open up their mysteries, and to reveal to their disciples that a perfect "fulness of the gospel" must be expected. This "fulness of the gospel" was looked for by the dreamy and wondering disciple, as an indefinite something not yet to be comprehended, but which was essential to complete happiness and salvation. He was then told that God required him to remove to the place of gathering, where alone this sublime "fulness of the gospel" could be fully revealed, and completely enjoyed. When he arrived at the place of gathering. he was fortified in the new faith by being withdrawn from all other influences; and by seeing and hearing nothing but Mormons and Mormonism; and by association with those only who never doubted any of the Mormon dogmas. Now the "fulness of the gospel" could be safely made known. If it required him to submit to the most intolerable despotism; if it tolerated and encouraged the lusts of the flesh and a plurality of wives; if it claimed all the world for the saints; universal dominion for the Mormon leaders; if it sanctioned murder, robbery, perjury, and larceny, at the command of their priests, no one could now doubt but that this was the "fulness of the gospel," the liberty of the saints, with which Christ had made them free.

    The Christian world, which has hitherto regarded Mormonism with silent contempt, unhappily may yet have cause to fear its rapid increase. Modern society is full of material for such a religion. At the death of the Prophet, fourteen years after the first Mormon Church was organized, the Mormons in all the world numbered about two hundred thousand souls (one-half million according to their statistics); a number equal, perhaps, to the number of Christians, when the Christian Church was of the same age. It is to be feared that in course of a century, some gifted man like Paul, some splendid orator, who will be able by his eloquence to attract crowds of the thousands who are ever ready to hear, and be carried away by the sounding brass and tinkling cymbal of sparkling oratory, may command a hearing, may succeed in breathing a new life into this modern Mahometanism, and make the name of the martyred Joseph ring as loud, and stir the souls of men as much, as the mighty name of Christ itself. Sharon, Palmyra, Manchester, Kirtland, Far West, Adamon Diahmon, Ramus. Nauvoo, and the Carthage jail, may become holy and venerable names, places of classic interest, in another age; like Jerusalem. the Garden of Gethsemane, the Mount of Olives, and Mount Calvary to the Christian, and Mecca and Medina to the Turk. And in that event, the author of this History feels degraded by the reflection, that the humble governor of an obscure State, who would otherwise be forgotten in a few years, stands a fair chance, like Pilate and Herod, by their official connection with the true religion, of being dragged down to posterity with an immortal name, hitched on to the memory of a miserable impostor. There may be those whose ambition would lead them to desire an immortal name in history, even in those humbling terms. I am not one of that number.

    About one year after the apostles were installed into power, they abandoned for the present the project of converting the world to the new religion. All the missionaries and members abroad were ordered home; it was announced that the world had rejected the gospel by the murder of the prophet and patriarch, and was to be left to perish in its sins. In the meantime, both before and after this, the elders at Nauvoo quit preaching about religion. The Mormons came from every part, pouring into the city; the congregations were regularly called together for worship, but instead of expounding the new gospel, the zealous and infuriated preachers now indulged only in curses and strains of abuse of the Gentiles, and it seemed to be their design to fill their followers with the greatest amount of hatred to all mankind excepting the "saints." A sermon was no more than an inflammatory stump speech, relating to their quarrels with their enemies, and ornamented with an abundance of profanity. From my own personal knowledge of this people, I can say with truth, that I have never known much of any of their leaders who was not addicted to profane swearing. No other kind of discourses than these were heard in the city. Curses upon their enemies, upon the country, upon government, upon all public officers, were now the lessons taught by the elders, to inflame their people with the highest degree of spite and malice against all who were not of the Mormon church, or its obsequious tools. The reader can readily imagine how a city of fifteen thousand inhabitants could be wrought up and kept in a continual rage by the inflammatory harangues of its leaders.

    In the meantime, the anti-Mormons were not idle; they were more than ever determined to expel the Mormons; and being passionately inflamed against them, they made many applications for executive assistance. On the other hand, the Mormons invoked the assistance of government to take vengeance upon the murderers of the Smiths. The anti-Mormons asked the governor to violate the constitution, which he was sworn to support, by erecting himself into a military despot and exiling the Mormons. The Mormons, on their part. in their newspapers, invited the governor to assume absolute power, by taking a summary vengeance upon their enemies, by shooting fifty or a hundred of them, without judge or jury. Both parties were thoroughly disgusted with constitutional provisions restraining them from the summary attainment of their wishes for vengeance; each was ready to submit to arbitrary power, to the fiat of a dictator, to make me a king for the time being, or at least that I might exercise the power of a king, to abolish both the forms and spirit of free government, if the despotism to be erected upon its ruins could only be wielded for its benefit, and to take vengeance on its enemies. It seems that, notwithstanding all our strong professions of attachment to liberty, there is all the time an unconquerable leaning to the principles of monarch and despotism, whenever the forms, the delays, and the restraints of republican government fail to correct great evils. When the forms of government in the United States were first invented, the public liberty was thought to be the great object of governmental protection. Our ancestors studied to prevent government from doing harm, by depriving it of power. They would not trust the power of exiling a citizen upon any terms; or of taking his life, without a fair and impartial trial in the courts, even to the people themselves, much less to their government. But so infatuated were these parties, so deep did they feel their grievances, that both of them were enraged in their turn, because the governor firmly adhered to his oath of office; refusing to be a party to their revolutionary proceedings; to set aside the government of the country, and execute summary vengeance upon one or the other of them.

    Another election was to come off in August, 1844, for members of Congress, and for the legislature; and an election was pending throughout the nation for a President of the United States. The war of party was never more fierce and terrible than during the pendency of these elections. The parties in many places met separately almost every night; not to argue the questions in dispute, but to denounce, ridicule abuse, and belittle each other, with sarcasm, clamor, noise, and songs, during which nothing could be heard but hallooing, hurrahing, and yelling, and then to disperse through town, with insulting taunts and yells of defiance on either side.

    In all this they were but little less fanatical and frantic on the subject of politics, than were the Mormons about religion. Such a state of excitement could not fail to operate unfavorably upon the Mormon question, involved as it was in the questions of party politics, by the former votes of the Mormons. As a means of allaying excitement, and making the question more manageable, I was most anxious that the Mormons should not vote at this election, and strongly advised them against doing so. But Colonel E. D. Taylor went to their city a few days before the election, and the Mormons, being ever disposed to follow the worst advice they could get, were induced by him and others to vote for all the democratic candidates. Col. Taylor found them very hostile to the governor, and on that account much disposed not to vote at this election. The leading whig anti-Mormons, believing that I had an influence over the Mormons, for the purpose of destroying it had assured them that the governor had planned and been favorable to the murder of their prophet and patriarch. The Mormons pretended to suspect that the governor had given some countenance to the murder, or at least had neglected to take the proper precautions to prevent it. And yet it is strange that at this same election, they elected Gen. Deming to be the sheriff of the county, when they knew that he had first called out the militia against them, had concurred with me in all the measures subsequently adopted, had been left in command at Carthage during my absence at Nauvoo, and had left his post when he saw that he had no power to prevent the murders. As to myself, I shared the fate of all men in high places, who favor moderation, who see that both parties in the frenzy of their excitement are wrong -- espousing the cause of neither; which fate always is to be hated by both parties. But Col. Taylor, like a skillful politician, denied nothing, but gave countenance to everything the Mormons said of the governor; and by admitting to them that the governor was a great rascal; by promising them the support of the democratic party, an assurance he was not authorized to make, but which they were foolish enough to believe, and by insisting that the governor was not the democratic party, he overcame their reluctance to vote. Nevertheless, for mere political effect, without a shadow of justice, the whig leaders and newspapers everywhere, and some enemies in the democratic ranks, immediately charged this vote of the Mormons to the governor's influence; and this charge being believed by many, made the anti-Mormon party more famous than ever in favor of the expulsion of the Mormons. In the course of the fall of 1844, the anti-Mormon leaders sent printed invitations to all the militia captains in Hancock, and to the captains of militia in all the neighboring counties in Illinois, Iowa, and Missouri, to be present with their companies at a great wolf hunt in Hancock; and it was privately announced that the wolves to be hunted were the Mormons and Jack Mormons. Preparations were made for assembling several thousand men, with provisions for six days; and the anti-Mormon newspapers, in aid of the movement, commenced anew the most awful accounts of thefts and robberies, and meditated outrages by the Mormons. The whig press in every part of the United States, came to their assistance. The democratic newspapers and leading democrats, who had received the benefit of the Mormon votes to their party, quailed under the tempest, leaving no organ for the correction of public opinion, either at home or abroad, except the discredited Mormon newspaper at Nauvoo. But very few of my prominent democratic friends would dare to come up to the assistance of their governor, and but few of them dared openly to vindicate his motives in endeavoring to keep the peace. They were willing and anxious for Mormon votes at elections, but they were unwilling to risk their popularity with the people, by taking a part in their favor, even when law and justice, and the Constitution, were all on their side. Such being the odious character of the Mormons, the hatred of the common people against them, and such being the pusillanimity of leading men in fearing to encounter it.

    In this state of the case I applied to Brigadier General J. J. Hardin, of the State militia, and to Colonels Baker and Merriman, all whigs, but all of them men of military ambition, and they, together with Colonel William Weatherford, a democrat,* with my own exertions, succeeded in raising about five hundred volunteers; and thus did these whigs, that which my own political friends, with two or three exceptions, were slow to do, from a sense of duty and gratitude.

    * Of the officers who were out with me in this expedition. Genera; Hardin. Colonels Baker and Weatherford, and Major Warren, afterwards greatly distinguished themselves in the Mexican war. Major Warren is noticed by General Taylor in his dispatches to the war department, as a prudent and gallant officer,. Lieutenant-Colonel Waetherford was left a whole day with a few companies to guard the main pass at Buena Vista, where he and his men stood, during all that time, the fire of the Mexican artillery, without being allowed to advance near enough to return it. Colonel Baker, after the fall of General Shields, commanded a brigade of two Illinois regiments and one New York regiment, in storming the last stronghold of the Mexicans at the battle of Cerro Gordo, in which he and his men behaved most gallantly, carrying everything before them, which completed the entire route of the Mexican army. General Hardin at the Battle of Buena Vista, in command of two Illinois regiments in conjunction with a regiment of Kentucky volunteers, made a most gallant charge upon a large body of Mexican infantry and lancers, five times the number of the Americans, which decided the victory on our side; but in which Hardin and many other gallant officers and men lost their lives. But they will live in the affectionate remembrance of their countrymen, to the latest time.

    With this little force under the command of General Hardin, I arrived in Hancock county on the 25th of October. The malcontents abandoned their design, and all the leaders of it fled to Missouri. The Carthage Greys fled almost in a body carrying their arms along with them. During our stay in the county the anti-Mormons thronged into the camp, and conversed freely with the men, who were fast infected with their prejudices, and it was impossible to get any of the officers to aid in expelling them. Colonels Baker, Merriman and Weatherford, volunteered their services if I would go with them, to cross with a force into Missouri, to capture three of the anti-Mormon leaders, for whose arrest writs had been issued for the murder of the Smiths. To this I assented, and procured a boat, which was sent down in the night, and secretly landed a mile above Warsaw. Our little force arrived at that place about noon; that night were to cross to Missouri at Churchville, and seize the accused there encamped with a number of their friends; but that afternoon Colonel Baker visited the hostile encampment, and on his return refused to participate in the expedition, and advised all his friends against joining it. There was no authority for compelling the men to invade a neighboring State, and for this cause, much to the vexation of myself and several others, the matter fell through.

     It seems that Colonel Baker had already partly arranged the terms for the accused to surrender. They were to be taken to Quincy for examination under a military guard; the attorney for the people was to be advised to admit them to bail, and they were to be entitled to a continuance of their trial at the next court at Carthage; upon this, two of the accused came over and surrendered themselves prisoners.

    But at that time I was held responsible for this compromise with the murderers. The truth is, that I had but little of the moral power to command in this expedition. Officers, men, and all under me, were so infected with the anti-Mormon prejudices that I was made to feel severely the want of moral power to control them. It would be thought very strange in any other government that the administration should have the power to direct, but no power to control. By the Constitution the governor can neither appoint nor remove a militia officer. He may arrest and order a court martial. But a court martial composed of military officers, elected in times of peace, in many cases upon the same principles upon which Colonel Pluck was elected in New York City, is not likely to pay much attention to executive wishes in opposition to popular excitement. So, too, in Illinois, the governor has no power to appoint, remove, or in anywise control sheriffs, justices of the peace, nor even a constable; and yet the active co-operation of such officers with the executive, is indispensable to the success of any effort the governor may take to suppress civil war. If anyone supposes that the greatest amount of talents will enable anyone to govern under such circumstances, he is mistaken. It may be thought that the governor ought to create a public sentiment in favor of his measures, to sway the minds of those under him to his own course, but if any one supposes that even the greatest abilities could succeed in such an effort against popular feeling, and against the inherent love of numerous demagogues for popularity, he is again mistaken.

    I had determined from the first that some of the ring-leaders in the foul murder of the Smiths should be brought to trial. If these men had been the incarnation of Satan himself, as was believed by many, their murder was a foul and treacherous action, alike disgraceful to those who perpetrated the crime, to the State, and to the governor, whose word had been pledged for the protection of the prisoners in jail, and which had been so shamefully violated; and required that the most vigorous means should be used to bring the assassins to punishment. As much as anything else the expedition under General Hardin had been ordered with a view to arrest the murderers.

    Accordingly, I employed able lawyers to hunt up the testimony, procure indictments, and prosecute the offenders. A trial was had before Judge Young in the summer of 1845. The sheriff and panel of jurors, selected by the Mormon court, were set aside for prejudice, and elisors were appointed to select a new jury. One friend of the Mormons and one anti-Mormon were appointed for this purpose; but as more than a thousand men had assembled under arms at the court, to keep away the Mormons and their friends, the jury was made up of these military followers of the court, who all swore that they had never formed or expressed any opinion as to the guilt or innocence of the accused. The Mormons had one principal witness, who was with the troops at Warsaw, had marched with them until they were disbanded, heard their consultations, went before them to Carthage, and saw them murder the Smiths. But before the trial came on, they had induced him to become a Mormon; and being much more anxious for the glorification of the prophet than to avenge his death, the leading Mormons made him publish a pamphlet giving an account of the murder; in which he professed to have seen a bright and shining light descend upon the head of Joe Smith, to strike some of the conspirators with blindness, and that he heard supernatural voices in the air confirming his mission as a prophet! Having published this in a book, he was compelled to swear to it in court, which of course destroyed the credit of his evidence. This witness was afterwards expelled from the Mormons, but no doubt they will cling to his evidence in favor of the divine mission of the prophet. Many other witnesses were examined, who knew the facts, but under the influence of the demoralization of faction, denied all knowledge of them. It has been said, that faction may find men honest, but it scarcely ever leaves them so. This was verified to the letter in the history of the Mormon quarrel. The accused were all acquitted.

    During the progress of these trials, the judge was compelled to permit the court-house to be filled and surrounded by armed bands, who attended court to browbeat and overawe the administration of justice. The judge himself was in a duress, and informed me that he did not consider his life secure any part of the time. The consequence was, that the crowd had everything their own way; the lawyers for the defense defended their clients by a long and elaborate attack on the governor; the armed mob stamped with their feet and yelled their approbation at every sarcastic and smart thing that was said; and the judge was not only forced to hear it, but to lend it a kind of approval. Josiah Lamborn was attorney for the prosecution: and O. H. Browning, O. C. Skinner, Calvin A. Warren, and William A. Richardson, were for the defense.

    At the next term, the leading Mormons were tried and acquitted for the destruction of the heretical press. It appears that, not being interested in objecting to the sheriff or the jury selected by a court elected by themselves, they in their turn got a favorable jury determine upon acquittal, and yet the Mormon jurors all swore that they had formed no opinion as to the guilt or innocence of their accused friends. It appeared that the laws furnished the means of suiting each party with a jury. The Mormons could have a Mormon jury to be tried by, selected by themselves; and the anti-Mormons, by objecting to the sheriff and regular panel, could have one from the anti-Mormons. From henceforth no leading man on either side could be arrested without the aid of an army, as the men of one party could not safely surrender to the other for fear of being murdered; when arrested by a military force the constitution prohibited a trial in any other county without the consent of the accused. No one would be convicted of any crime in Hancock; and this put an end to the administration of the criminal law in that distracted county. Government was at an end there, and the whole community were delivered up to the dominion of a frightful anarchy. If the whole State had been in the same condition, then indeed would have been verified to the letter what was said by a wit, when he expressed an opinion that the people were neither capable of governing themselves nor of being governed by others. And truly there can be no government in a free country where the people do not voluntarily obey the laws.