Joseph Morris and the Saga of the Morrisites (revisited)

By C. LeRoy Anderson

Utah State University Press

Copyright © 2010 Utah State University Press
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-0-87421-787-2

Contents

Preface……………………………………………………………….ixIntroduction In Prospect……………………………………………….11. Letters from Obscurity……………………………………………….112. Prophets of Pentecost………………………………………………..163. The Seventh Angel Speaks……………………………………………..274. Threats in Desperation……………………………………………….435. The Millennial Hope………………………………………………….546. The Gathering Storm………………………………………………….797. The Storm Descends…………………………………………………..968. The Last Revelation………………………………………………….1279. Aftermath…………………………………………………………..14210. Exodus…………………………………………………………….15511. The Soda Springs Settlement………………………………………….15912. The Prophet Cainan………………………………………………….16513. The Left Wing of the Great Eagle: Nevada and California…………………17714. The Walla Walla Jesus……………………………………………….18715. Deer Lodge: The Heavenly City………………………………………..19316. The Deer Lodge Jesus………………………………………………..214Conclusion In Retrospect……………………………………………….219Bibliography…………………………………………………………..237Index…………………………………………………………………242About the Author……………………………………………………….250

Chapter One

Letters from Obscurity

In 1857, the tenth anniversary of the arrival of the Latter-day Saints (Mormons) in the Rocky Mountains, a series of events was about to unfold that would ultimately change the destiny of the church, the territory, and the Mormon people.

The great Mormon “reformation” begun the year before had continued into the summer. And every Saint was expected to repent of his sins, be rebaptized, and renew his covenants to uphold and sustain the church and its leaders—to consecrate himself to the work and glory of the Kingdom of God.

The Saints in the territory now numbered upwards of 40,000, and, despite the specter of polygamy, the possibility of statehood was being actively explored. Yet strong and bitter feelings existed toward non-Mormons and certain federal officials. Open conflict had occurred from time to time, the most serious of which was a shocking tragedy in September that left over 120 members of a wagon train dead at Mountain Meadows in west-central Utah.

Much of the tension and hostility that produced the Mountain Meadows affair was fostered by the presence on the Wyoming plains of a large military force authorized by the United States government to enforce “obedience” from the Mormon people. In order to resist this military force, the Mormons called home their foreign missionaries, abandoned many of their outlying colonies, and greatly restricted immigration to “Zion.” During the late summer and autumn of 1857, the Mormons prepared their defenses.

To further complicate matters, Alfred Cumming, recently of St. Louis and a former mayor of Augusta, Georgia, had been appointed governor on July 30 to succeed Brigham Young. However, Young, president of the Mormon church, refused to acknowledge him, and by late November the Utah Territory found itself with two governors—an unofficial one in Salt Lake City recognized by the territorial citizenry and an official one at Camp Scott with no local constituency.

Amidst these critical circumstances it is hardly surprising that a curious letter dated December 7, 1857, addressed “to si exelency Governor young” and signed by an obscure territorial citizen named Joseph Morris, received scant attention from the church leader. There is no evidence that Brigham Young answered this letter, but neither did he entirely ignore it. For penciled boldly on the letter’s margin are three cryptic words: “He’s weak minded.”

Although Joseph Morris received no reply from Governor Young, he was undeterred. Over the following three years he addressed more than a dozen letters to Young, yet apparently not one received an answer. Young did not take the letters seriously, for he frequently made disparaging remarks on their margins. Nonetheless, the letters were remarkable. They were couched in a grandiose style, yet were so ungrammatical and poorly spelled as to make them almost unintelligible. At first glance they could be quite justifiably dismissed as the incoherent mutterings of someone with even less mental than literary ability. Yet when taken together, the letters display a certain coherence, unity, and creativity that belies their unceremonious dismissal by Brigham Young. Although Young did not take Morris seriously in 1857, within a few short years Morris produced hundreds of pages of revelations, founded a church in the very center of Mormondom, and attracted hundreds of followers who accepted him (at Young’s expense) as prophet, seer, and revelator of the Mormon church.

Joseph Morris was deeply troubled by his own domestic and religious problems in 1857, but his near illiteracy made it difficult for him to communicate these problems to Brigham Young. The letter of December 7 fervently begged Young to consider Morris’s complaints against certain church authorities, most specifically James C. Snow, president of the Provo Stake of the L.D.S. church, who Morris believed had wronged him. Although not entirely clear, the letter also alluded to Morris’s appointment as a prophet. He wrote: “Dear sir, according to my impressions the time of my deliverance has come and as I have born the sins of those men for almost eleven months, I think that it is only right that I should appear before the public as I am, and that they should appear as they are.”

Accompanying Morris’s letter to Brigham Young was a copy of a lengthy letter addressed to James C. Snow also dated December 7, 1857. Although the ending of that letter is missing, the extant part details the wrongs Morris believed he had suffered at the hands of the church authorities, wrongs that left him discredited and impoverished. The letter to Snow also sought to establish Morris’s own steadfastness and propriety. Taken out of historical context, it appears very much like the ramblings of someone psychologically disturbed. However, given the temper of the times and especially the spirit of the Mormon “reformation,” which had been at its height only months before, the letter to Snow might be viewed as a desperate attempt on Morris’s part to clear his name of the many allegations raised against him. Clearly Morris was a religious man, and he wanted to do what he felt was right. He was especially resentful that he had been cut off from the Mormon church without the benefit of a trial and that his several attempts at matrimony had failed—primarily as a result of intervention from church authorities. To bolster his claims to righteousness, he went through the long list of questions asked of those in the reformation, all of which he answered properly, at least to his own satisfaction.

Morris’s detailed account of two of his attempts at matrimony are of considerable interest and explain in part his growing resentment toward the Mormon hierarchy.

I moved from American Fork to Provo with Thomas Smart. Soon after I came to that place I fell in company with Bishop Duke, [and] after having a little conversation with him he advised me to get married.

I felt resolved to take his counsel [and] shortly afterward I fell in company with a young lady named Fanney Nash who came one evening along with her father and mother to Mr. Fisher’s. Having taken a fancy to her I went out the next morning and spoke to her father concerning the matter. [I] told him that I had been making some preparations for getting married and that I had taken a fancy to his daughter and that I should like to become fully acquainted with her. He then spoke to me and said that he was going to move to a house a little ways off and … that I was at liberty to come and see them.

Accordingly I did so. I then gave him a short history of my proceedings in domestic life. He appeared quite satisfied with my course [of action] and gave me a good recommendation to his daughter, saying that I had never varied in my statements when they were made several times over. He then felt desirous for me to speak to his daughter on the subject….

Accordingly I did so and she was satisfied and [became] engaged with me. I then told her that I was ready to be married forthwith, but she desired for us to wait for a few days longer—until they had moved into another house…. she said that I need not fear for she would never give her word to another man.

I then … purchased bedding and wheat and other articles suitable for the circumstance and brought them to her father’s house expecting every day to get married…. [But] Deminicus Carter came into the house and lead her away and tried to destroy my character to her or lessen me in her estimation.

I went to him with a written [contract of] engagement that was between her and myself and read it to him and asked him to leave her alone. But I suppose it mattered not to him whether she was engaged or not or who she belonged to. David-like he saw her and he must be with her.

After that I was counseled again by Bishop Duke and very much urged … to get married…. being a Block Teacher, on my travels I visited … [the] house [of a man named] Thomas. He told me that there was a fresh family that had come into his house which consisted of an old lady, two sons and one daughter. He also told me that there was trouble in the family in consequence of the daughter being determined to go to the city.

Being apprised of this trouble, I considered that I had a right to find out the reason [for] it, and settle it if possible…. I went in and saw the old lady and she appeared down spirited in consequence of her husband [having died] on the plains and her daughter wishing to leave her…. [I asked] her to send for her [daughter] in [order] that I might know the reason why she was determined to leave her mother.

I asked her the reason why she wished to go to the city. She said that she [was] engaged to go and assist John Hokeley to teach school. I then asked her if that … [was the only reason]. She said, partly. I then asked her if she had made a covenant for courtship or marriage; and she said that she had not.

… Both of them … [gave] me the impression that she … [had become] engaged to assist this person to teach school without the consent of her mother. . I considered that according to the order of this Church … no young lady, with living parents, has a right to enter into any [agreement] with any man … without first getting their consent. I counseled her under these considerations to remain with her mother.

I, myself being so [much] urged upon to get married, and being satisfied, according to her … words, that she had no engagement, I considered that I had a right to form an acquaintance with her …I did so, and … [later] I found out her feelings toward me, I asked her mother for her. She said, “yes, she could please herself.”

I then considered that I had full liberty to court and marry her, having [gained] proper consent from all quarters. Accordingly I did so.

About three days after our marriage hell broke out…. James Snow and his associates made her believe that I had married her against her will. Allick Williams and another man [named] Windsor went to her and gave her counsel against me, which caused her to leave me.

Nothing would satisfy her after that but a bill [of divorcement]. She then went and filed an affidavit against me, stating that I had unlawfully obtained her to be my wife by using an influence from the devil. This affidavit was brought to me by Allick Williams…. and a number of others.

Shortly afterward I spoke to Deminicus Carter and asked him to step out of doors with me for I wanted to speak to him…. He did so. I then said to him that the girl [had no reason] to leave me, for you have never tried me nor proved anything against me. I then pleaded with him to give me a trial before a Bishop’s Court, but he would not. He then counseled me to give her a bill, threatening … that if I would not, it would be the worse for me.

I saw that they were determined to take her away from me, so I had to let her go.

Obviously Morris felt persecuted by his immediate church leaders; that smoldering resentment was directed in part against Young as the ultimate temporal ecclesiastical authority. Morris’s sense of persecution and his lengthy personal defense did not convince Young and indeed were probably unpalatable to the church leader. Not surprisingly, given the tone and contents of that first letter, Brigham Young thought that Morris was “weak minded.” To take him and his charges seriously would mean recognizing weaknesses in the hierarchy and in the church itself.

Chapter Two

Prophets of Pentecost

The spring of 1857 was one of great spiritual excitement in Zion. Although rumors of warlike preparations against Mormons in Utah had been heard as early as February, the threat was not imminent enough to cool the fire of the great reformation begun the previous year. In fact, the knowledge of growing anti-Mormon sentiment in the States and local difficulties with certain Gentile officials may well have served to fan the revivalistic flame, increasing the resolve of the Mormon people to separate the righteous from the unrighteous in preparation for the expected conflict. Earlier experiences in Ohio, Missouri, and Illinois had taught them that anti-Mormon sentiment could quickly grow beyond inflammatory rhetoric to open hostility and conflict. At such times loyalty to the church and its leaders could not be taken for granted—it needed to be openly demonstrated.

The first decade in the mountains had required that great attention be directed toward settlement, foreign missionary work, and development of industries to take care of the material needs of the people. Although spiritual matters were not neglected, they could not be given the priority that Mormon leaders believed they deserved. Now, however, they believed the time was ripe for a thorough revival and reformation—for rededication to the church, to its principles, and to its leaders. Some church members were considered to be too friendly to outsiders, were dissatisfied with hard living conditions, or were engaged in sexual immorality, gambling, and drunkenness. Furthermore, some were openly questioning the practice of polygamy.

On September 13, 1856, Jedediah Grant, second counselor to Brigham Young, delivered a fiery speech concerning the state of virtue of the Mormon people. This date has been generally considered the beginning of the reformation, but more appropriately it might be regarded as the date when the general church authorities gave public approval to it. Grant was simply giving official sanction to a revival movement that had been underway at least since early spring. Brigham Young had called on the people as early as 1854 to begin consecrating their property to the church, and historian Juanita Brooks reports that in April 1856 members of the church in southern Utah were confessing their sins and being rebaptized. That they were already in a revivalistic fervor is clearly illustrated in the account taken from the minutes of a meeting on April 26 recorded by Rachel Lee, a plural wife of John D. Lee.

Rachel Lee recorded that several men reported slothfulness and neglect of duty. Then Isaac C. Haight, stake president, baptized (that is, rebaptized) several men, including Rachel’s husband, John D. Lee.

All those that were [re]Baptized spoke their feelings and resolution to be better men henceforth—when Bro. Roundy spoke he felt truly pentinent before the Lord and floods of tears gushed from every eye. I do here bear witness that never since Harmony has been settled has their been such feelings of penitence and contrition and joy and thankfulness to God for his mercies and loving kindness toward us through all our wickedness, and hardness of heart that have existed in this place one toward another. Yea every one melted down in a flood of tears with thankful to their God and Savior for giving us a chance before it was gone too late for us to repent, of our ways, etc.

Many of the brethren spoke and all rejoiced together. Priest Haight and council rejoiced exceedingly and spoke their satisfaction to see the true penitence of the Brethren in the course of the reformation [emphasis added] and said that this was not a revival like had been sometimes of short duration but it would continue until the dividing line should be drawn between the righteous and wicked and the great struggle would commence between the two Kingdoms.

In addition to rebaptism, all Saints over the age of sixteen were encouraged to go to Salt Lake City to receive their endowments. Before being rebaptized or receiving endowments, all were privately questioned, or catechized, by church authorities. Each member was expected to satisfactorily answer all of the following questions:

Have you committed murder by shedding innocent blood—or consenting thereto?

Have you betrayed your brethren or sisters in anything?

Have you ever committed adultery by having connection with a woman that was not your wife or a man that was not your husband?

Do you pay your tithing promptly?

Have you spoken against any principle contained in the Bible, Book of Mormon, Doctrine and Covenants, or any principle revealed through Joseph the Prophet or the authorities of the Church?

Do you wash your bodies and have your family do so as often as cleanliness requires or circumstances permit?

Do you teach your families the Gospel of Salvation?

Do you preside over your family as a servant of God and is your family subject to you?

Do you fulfill your promises, do you pay your debts, or do you run into debt without prospect of paying?

Have you taken anything that did not belong to you without the owner’s knowing it, or giving consent?

Have you found lost property and not returned it to the owner or used all diligence to do so?

Have you lied about or maliciously misrepresented any person or thing?

Have you branded any animal that you did not know to be your own?

Have you taken up strays and converted to your own use without accounting to the proper authorities?

Do you work 6 days and go to the house of worship on the 7th?

Have you taken the name of the Deity in Vain? Have you been intoxicated by strong drink?

(Continues…)

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