The death of the prophet did not bring peace with their outside neighbors to the Mormon church. Indeed, the causes of enmity were too varied and radical to be removed by any changes in the leadership, so long as the brethren remained where they were.
In the winter of 1844-1845 charges of stealing made against the Mormons by their neighbors became more frequent. Governor Ford, in his message to the legislature, pronounced such reports exaggerated, but it probably does the governor no injustice to say that he now had his eye on the Mormon vote. The non-Mormons in Hancock and the surrounding counties held meetings and appointed committees to obtain accurate information about the thefts, and the old complaints of the uselessness of tracing stolen goods to Nauvoo were revived. The Mormons vigorously denied these charges through formal action taken by the Nauvoo City Council and a citizens' meeting, alleging that in many cases "outlandish men" had visited the city at night to scatter counterfeit money and deposit stolen goods, the responsibility for which was laid on Mormon shoulders.
It is not at all improbable that many a theft in western Illinois in those days that was charged to Mormons had other authors; but testimony regarding the dishonesty of many members of the church, such as we have seen presented in Smith's day, was still available. Thus, Young, in one of his addresses to the conference assembled at Nauvoo about two months after Smith's death, made this statement: "Elders who go to borrowing horses or money, and running away with it, will be cut off from the church without any ceremony. THEY WILL NOT HAVE SO MUCH LENITY AS HERETOFORE."*
* Times and Seasons, Vol. V, p. 696.
A lady who published a sketch of her travels in 1845 through Illinois and Iowa wrote:—
"We now entered a part of the country laid waste by the desperadoes among the Mormons. Whole farms were deserted, fields were still covered with wheat unreaped, and cornfields stood ungathered, the inhabitants having fled to a distant part of the country.... Friends gave us a good deal of information about the doings of these Saints at Nauvoo—said that often, when their orchards were full of fruit, some sixteen of these monsters would come with bowie knives and drive the owners into their houses while they stripped their trees of the fruit. If these rogues wanted cattle they would drive off the cattle of the Gentiles."*
* "Book for the Married and Single," by Ann Archbold.
A trial concerning the title to some land in Adams County in that year brought out the fact that there existed in the Mormon church what was called a "Oneness." Five persons would associate and select one of their members as a guardian; then, if any of the property they jointly owned was levied on, they would show that one or more of the other five was the real owner.
While the Mormons continued to send abroad glowing pictures of the prosperity of Nauvoo, less prejudiced accounts gave a very different view. The latter pointed out that the immigrants, who supplied the only source of prosperity, had expended most of their capital on houses and lots, that building operations had declined, because houses could be bought cheaper than they could be built, and that mechanics had been forced to seek employment in St. Louis. Published reports that large numbers of the poor in the city were dependent on charity received confirmation in a letter published in the Millennial Star of October 1, 1845, which said that on a fast-day proclaimed by Young, when the poor were to be remembered, "people were seen trotting in all directions to the Bishops of the different wards" with their contributions.
We have seen that the gathering of the Saints at Nauvoo was an idea of Joseph Smith, and was undertaken against the judgment of some of the wiser members of the church. The plan, so far as its business features were concerned, was on a par with the other business enterprises that the prophet had fathered. There was nothing to sustain a population of 15,000 persons, artificially collected, in this frontier settlement, and that disaster must have resulted from the experiment, even without the hostile opposition of their neighbors, is evident from the fact that Nauvoo to day, when fifty years have settled up the surrounding district and brought it in better communication with the world, is a village of only 1321 inhabitants (census of 1900).