Soon after this Joseph with his father's family came to Kirtland, and said the Lord had sent him there, and he or the devil would have to leave.
This was the first time I had beheld Joseph. After he arrived the false spirits which had been operating through the members of the Church ceased for awhile.
I held myself in readiness to assist the Smith family with my means or my personal services as they might require, as they were financially poor. They were living on a farm owned by F. G. Williams, in Kirtland, upon which there was a debt of four hundred dollars due, which had to be paid within a stated time or the farm would revert to its former owner.
Joseph Coe, who was required to raise this amount to save the farm, said he could not do so, for his wife held the money and she did not belong to the Church. Being present with Joseph when the subject came up, I said to him, "I can raise the money!" and he replied that if I would, I should be blessed.
I explained to him how I would have to raise the money. I owned twelve hundred acres of land lying twenty miles south of Elyria, which was worth three dollars per acre. In order to raise the money then I would have to sell a portion of it for one dollar and twenty-five cents per acre, and I accordingly did so and paid Joseph the four hundred dollars.
When Joseph came to Kirtland his fame spread far and wide. There was a woman living in the town of Hiram, forty miles from Kirtland, who had a crooked arm, which she had not been able to use for a long period. She persuaded her husband, whose name was Johnson, to take her to Kirtland to get her arm healed.
I saw them as they passed my house on their way. She went to Joseph and requested him to heal her. Joseph asked her if she believed the Lord was able to make him an instrument in healing her arm. She said she believed the Lord was able to heal her arm.
Joseph put her off till the next morning, when he met her at Brother Whitney's house. There were eight persons present, one a Methodist preacher, and one a doctor. Joseph took her by the hand, prayed in silence a moment, pronounced her arm whole, in the name of Jesus Christ, and turned and left the room.
The preacher asked her if her arm was whole, and she straightened it out and replied: "It is as good as the other." The question was then asked if it would remain whole. Joseph hearing this, answered and said: "It is as good as the other, and as liable to accident as the other."
The doctor who witnessed this miracle came to my house the next morning and related the circumstance to me. He attempted to account for it by his false philosophy, saying that Joseph took her by the hand, and seemed to be in prayer, and pronounced her arm whole in the name of Jesus Christ, which excited her and started perspiration, and that relaxed the cords of her arm.