TROUBLES OF THE SECT
"My President Joseph Smith," he explained, "is the oldest son of Joseph Smith, who, when a boy of fifteen, was directed to the mound wherein he found the golden plates from which he compiled the Book of Mormon.
"He organized his church in 1830, when 25 years old, and between 1830 and 1844 his following numbered 200,000. In 1844 he was shot and killed for his anti-slavery sympathies,[1] and with him died his brother Hyrum. John Taylor, a Toronto convert of 1838, was wounded, but recovered. Joseph Smith's city of Nauvoo, Illinois, was wrecked, and in 1847, at Kanesville, Iowa, Brigham Young was elected president, though he still professed to hold the office in trust for the dead president's eldest son, also, Joseph, whom the father had consecrated as his successor.[2] Brigham Young reorganized[3] the church, rebaptized every member, including himself, and in 1848 (1847) he reached Salt Lake City. With him went the widow and children of Hyrum Smith, whose son Joseph F., is now president of the Utah church. The widow of the first president had refused to follow Young, and her boy Joseph was brought up in his father's footsteps, hating polygamy and other impurities. 'Young Joseph,' as he was called, connected himself with the Saints, who had rejected Brigham Young, and was elected their president. He was then 28 years old. In 1872 he was called to Washington, a report having reached the Government that Mormonism had again sprung up in Illinois. He disproved the charge of polygamy and blood atonement, and demonstrated that Latter-day Saintism was in keeping with the law and supported by the Bible. Incorporation was granted, and we have prospered.