The authorities of Dr. Winter's statement are Rev. A. G. Kirk, to whom Dr. Winter communicated it in a conversation had at New Brighton, Pa., in 1870-1. The second authority is the Rev. A. J. Bonsall, a stepson of Dr. Winter, and for twenty-three years pastor of the Baptist Church at Rochester, Pa. To him the same story was often repeated by Dr. Winter. The third authority is Mrs. W. Irvine, a daughter of Dr. Winter, in 1881 resident at Sharon, Pa. Her statement has one or two details not already given, so I quote:
"I have frequently heard my father speak of Rigdon having Spaulding's manuscript, and that he had gotten it from the printers to read it as a curiosity; as such he showed it to father; and that at the time Rigdon had no intention of making the use of it that he afterwards did."[76]
[Footnote 76: "Who Wrote the Book of Mormon?" 11-12. "Braden-Kelly Debate," 42.]
Thus authenticated, Dr. Winter's statement may be given as much weight as though reduced to writing by himself.
RIGDON FOREKNOWS THE COMING AND CONTENTS OF THE BOOK OF MORMON.
The Rev. Adamson Bentley (whose wife was sister to Mrs. Sidney Rigdon) wrote the following to Walter Scott under date of January 22, 1841:
"I know that Sidney Rigdon told me that there was a book coming out, the manuscript of which had been found engraved on gold plates, as much as two years before the Mormon book made its appearance or had been heard of by me."
This statement was published in the Millennial Harbinger for 1844, with the following editorial note from Rev. Alexander Campbell:
"The conversation alluded to in Brother Bentley's letter of 1841 was in my presence as well as his, and my recollection of it led me, some two or three years ago, to interrogate Brother Bentley touching his recollection of it, which accorded with mine in every particular, except the year in which it occurred, he placing it in the summer of 1827, I in the summer of 1826, Rigdon at the same time observing that in the plates dug up in New York there was an account, not only of the aborigines of this country, but also it was stated that the Christian religion had been preached in this country during the first century, just as we were preaching it in the Western Reserve."[77]
[Footnote 77: Besides Millennial Harbinger 1844, p. 39, see "Who Wrote the Book of Mormon?" 12 and 13. "Braden-Kelly Debate," 45.]