One year in Scandinavia

by Erastus Fairbanks Snow

I feel that I have done the best I could under the circumstances, and that the Lord has accepted it and will add his blessing. As the Saints began to peruse its sacred pages, the Holy Ghost descended upon them, and bore record of it in a marvellous manner, speaking to some in dreams, visions, and divers manifestations, which caused our hearts to magnify the Lord.

In September, I published a small work, entitled "The Voice of Truth to the honest in heart," containing a sketch of the rise of the Church and its doctrines; and in March I published one containing the articles of the Church, and several extracts of revelations, for the instruction and government of the Saints, and also a small collection of some of our best hymns, put into Danish, and adapted to the tunes used in Zion. These little publications were a great help to us, and a source of much joy to the Saints.

Those who have laboured as you have for many years in a cold world to preach the word of life, can easier imagine than I can describe the sensations of our bosoms on hearing the Songs of Zion in a foreign tongue, and the Saints relate their dreams and visions, and pray for Zion and the Presidency, and the travelling Elders and Saints throughout the earth.

On the 15th September, 1850, we duly organized "Jesu Christi Kirke af sidste dages Helege" in Denmark, consisting of fifty members. We had been baptizing and confirming from the 12th of August, but had operated privately in small family gatherings, for I felt constrained to refrain from any attempt at public meetings.

We now presented our organization and sketch of our faith, before the "Cultus-minister" and board of magistrates, and obtained permission to procure a place of worship and hold meetings, but he informed us that we might meet obstruction from the police.

Elder John E. Forssgren being banished from Sweden, arrived in Copenhagen on the 18th September. Soon after this elder Dykes was appointed to commence labour in Aalborg, in the province of Jutland, where he soon established a branch of the Church. I thought to send brother Forssgren to the island of Bornholm, which formerly belonged to Sweden, and has a dialect nearly allied to the Swedish; but he was positively refused a pass to that or any other province. The reason assigned by the president of the police department was, that he had taken upon himself, at the request of the Swedish government, to see to it, that Forssgren did not make his escape into Sweden. He has consequently remained in and about Copenhagen ever since, and has been a great help to me, for he was soon able to make himself understood by the Danes, as well or better than myself; besides, there were many native Swedes in Copenhagen, many of whom are now numbered among our best members.

During the winter a bill relating to dissenting religious parties, with very liberal provisions, was introduced into the legislature, but met with such powerful opposition from the bishops and their clergy in all parts of the state, that it was finally ruled out.

While this was pending many of the papers were teeming with misrepresentations about "Mormoniterne," and the chief bishop published a pamphlet against the bill, in which he detailed the usual catalogue of transatlantic lies about the Saints, and thought it the duty of governments to "protect the people against this dangerous sect." Several marvelous cases of healing, and other manifestations of the power of God, together with the weekly distribution of 200 copies of a sheet of the Book of Mormon, contributed also greatly to exasperate them, and arouse the demon of persecution, which came upon us almost simultaneously, in every place where we were sowing seed.

In Aalborg, where the Saints had secured a popular hall, the chief officer of police suppressed their meetings; and elder Dykes was mobbed in a neighbouring town, where he had begun to baptize, and narrowly escaped with his life. In Roskilde, where brothers Forssgren and Aagren had secured a hall and commenced preaching, they were mobbed, beaten, arrested, and banished from the town by the chief officers of police, while those that were known to have received them, paid the penalty with the loss of windows and the like.

In Hersholm, where they next commenced, they fared but little better. In Copenhagen, our hall and the streets about it were thronged by a great crowd of journeymen, apprentices, sailors, &c., led on by the theological students, who turned our meetings into a "pow wow," dealing out all manner of threats and abuses, until we were finally obliged to cease our public meetings, while the police refused interference in our behalf.